The New Orleans Saints were shorthanded in the 2012 NFL Draft, so they picked an intriguing prospect in Akiem Hicks. The one-time LSU commit had played at the University of Regina in Canada, where he’d used his immense physical gifts to get on the Saints’ radar. Towering at 6-foot-5, 332 pounds with 35-plus inch arms, he was a natural fit as a big interior pass rusher. And to hear him tell it, he loved his initial fit in New Orleans.

“I thought I was going to be a Saint for life,” Hicks told Dan Pompei of the Athletic. “I’m going to play here for 10 years and they are going to put my name on a banner in the stadium.”

It was a welcome career shift for Hicks, who had previously worked in call centers and grocery stores.

But things took an ugly turn for Hicks in New Orleans. He was traded away early in the 2015 season, a difficult experience which he describes as “the absolute lowest point of my life.” From his perspective, he’d done everything possible to be a good teammate and an asset to the team.

Hicks sought out the leaders in the Saints locker room to show him how to be a professional. Linebacker Jonathan Vilma looks back on their time together fondly, admitting that they still talk frequently. He’s still puzzled by a position switch the Saints forced on Hicks ahead of his final season.

“In our defense at the time, they were trying to put him on an edge and be more of a speed rusher as opposed to using leverage and hands and power,” Vilma said. “That wasn’t really his thing. It was frustrating. I’m like, this is silly. I loved when he would bull rush. I would say, ‘Just do what you do best. We’ll figure it out with the coaches.'”

Hicks simply didn’t fit the job description; he outweighed the other players the Saints tried out there by a mile. Bobby Richardson, who they benched him for, weighed 44 pounds less than Hicks. Tavaris Barnes was 41 pounds lighter. The team’s real speed rushers, Kasim Edebali (79 pounds lighter) and Obum Gwacham (86 pounds lighter) were dwarfed by him. They were asking a mountain to tip over.

“I was asked for things I couldn’t deliver,” Hicks said. “When I stepped on the field, the weaknesses in my game showed, and they showed brightly. It wasn’t where I needed to be. By game three, it was clear I wasn’t supposed to be in that position.”

Frustrations grew and eventually boiled over, with Hicks and head coach Sean Payton arguing on the sidelines.

Hicks says that doesn’t have much ire for his Saints teammates, but he’s quick to take aim at his ex-position coach, Bill Johnson: “I had a certain amount of resentment towards him because I felt like if anybody should know my strengths and weaknesses, he should have known. So I was very hurt by the fact that I felt there was nobody in my corner who had my back.”

There’s some logic in the Saints wanting to get their best players on the field together. But lining Hicks up so badly out of position neutralized him. It was one of a number of missteps the Saints defense made that year, which tried to juggle two co-coordinators in Rob Ryan and Dennis Allen. They ended the season with a league-record 45 touchdown passes allowed, and Ryan was shown to the door. A year later, the staff the Saints shackled him to — Johnson, linebackers coach Joe Vitt, and various assistants — were all jettisoned.

There’s no taking back the mistakes the Saints made with Hicks. But it was a valuable (if painful) lesson on the importance of lining players up in the best position to succeed. It’s just not the sort of thing you’d expect a staff that had been together for so long to have to learn.

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