Saints Stunned: No Primetime Games on 2025 NFL Schedule for First Time in 25 Years

The NFL released their regular season schedule for 2025, which brought excitement for many franchises, stress for others, and sadness for some. This year, the New Orleans Saints could actually be filed under "sadness", because something massive is missing from their regular season schedule.

Over the last couple of months, the Saints have dealt with one mild controversy after another.

A Turbulent Offseason for the Saints

First, it was "will the Saints trade their first round draft pick". Then came the news that quarterback Derek Carr could be hurt, and it might be bad enough to force him out of the 2025 season. Which then changed the draft controversy to "what quarterback will the Saints take a #9 in the first round of the NFL draft"? That evolved into "the Saints won't draft Shedeur Sanders no matter what".

We're not even done with the cold war of controversies the Saints have dealt with. The Saints ended up taking quarterback Tyler Shough in the second round, which ignited quarterback debates over Shough and everyone else on the roster (or who could be traded for). But after Shough was picked, rumors started to flow from reporters that some insiders thought Derek Carr might be "faking" his injury. All of that came to a crashing conclusion as Carr announced his shock retirement.

So now, here we are, schedule release time. What could possibly go wrong for the Saints when the schedules are released? Well, something was missing from their regular season schedule. Honestly, it took some people two or three reads to try and see where they made a mistake. But it turns out, there wasn't a mistake...

The Streak is Over: No Primetime Games for New Orleans

For the first time in a quarter century, the New Orleans Saints will not play a primetime game.

Which is pretty wild, considering the primetime expansions from Thursdays to Saturdays and Sundays that have taken place since the last time the Saints didn't have a primetime slot. Even with all of the available slots in 2025, the Saints couldn't catch one.

For the first time since 2000, the Saints won't have a Monday Night Football, Thursday Night Football, Sunday Night Football, random Saturday night game, or even a primetime holiday game.

A Glimmer of Hope: NFL Flex Scheduling and Week 18

However, there is still a slight shred of hope out there.

There's still a couple of things the Saints could have happen which could swing this back in their favor. This book isn't completely written. Because the NFL could change things during the season, and award a primetime game to the Saints, but they will have to work for it.

The NFL can flex primetime games during the season. So if a Thursday or Monday night game looks bad in week 13, and the Saints are playing incredible football, the NFL could flex them into a primetime slot. But that's not the only option left for the Saints.

New Orleans has one last chance at the end of the season. Week 18 the Saints will play the Atlanta Falcons in a divisional game. That game has a TBD for date, and kickoff time. Because if these two teams are locked in a winner-take-all NFC South matchup to end the season, the NFL will move that game into a highlight position. If that game is set to decide the last playoff spot, it will likely be the last Sunday Night Football game of the year...which means the Saints could extend their streak at the last minute.