The top pick of the New Orleans Saints’ 2026 NFL Draft class appears to be ready to go for the top of training camp, general manager Mickey Loomis confirmed in his pre-camp press conference on Tuesday afternoon.
Rookie wideout Jordyn Tyson is “good to go,” Loomis said, after being limited throughout the offseason practices and minicamps at the direction of the team’s medical staff. A decision that Loomis believes is setting up the young rookie for success.
“We’re relying on the training staff,” he said. “We’re relying on (director of sports performance) Ted Rath and his staff to guide us in terms of you know what’s enough, what’s too much, what’s too little. One thing I discovered in the last season was Ted Rath knows his stuff.”
Indeed he does. He’s helped to lead some of the NFL’s healthiest rosters over the course of his pro tenure. His work dramatically improved the Saints’ health outlook last year, with a steep decline in soft tissue injuries until the closing weeks of the season.
As for what has led to New Orleans choosing to be cautious around Tyson’s recovery this offseason, it’s not as simple as the hamstring injury the wideout suffered, and played through, in February while with Texas Tech.
As Loomis highlighted, a potential aggravation of the injury during the draft process factored in. Along with the reference is key addition, however, that Tyson could have been more involved than the Saints felt comfortable risking over the offseason.
“I think he had a recurrence of it prior to us drafting him, and so we’ve just been cautious,” he said. “Really, there’s a lot of stuff he could have done, but we’ve been super cautious about it.”
That’s good news for the Saints and the fans that are hoping to see Tyson hit the field as training camp begins. However, no one should be surprised if New Orleans also tries to maximize the acclimation period early on in camp, allowing him to continue to ramp up before going full-go after the first week of camp.
“We have this acclimation period, right?” Loomis said. “So, we’ll talk about it at the end of each day; how the day went for each player. They are just guys, because of the offseason, because of where he was at, he’s one of several players. We’ve just got to keep our eye on him here, and we’ll rely on Ted and the training staff to do that for us.”
So while the rookie may not be full-go right away, it’s clear that the Saints’ decision to keep him under wraps a bit over the course of Organized Team Activities and minicamp has more to do with their own caution and process rather than any hold ups on Tyson’s side.
