As the New Orleans Saints use their bye week to rest up from their week in France — and in preparation for the 10-game finishing stretch to come — it’s fair to wonder whether the 2026 season is already lost.

The Saints’ 16-10 loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday in Paris came in dreary fashion and dropped them to 2-5 on the season, in last place in the NFC South and two full games behind a wild-card spot.

So is it over already?

Veteran defensive end Cam Jordan, for one, doesn’t think so. When asked on ESPN’s “Get Up” show Wednesday how the Saints could get back in the division race, he responded energetically, praising the team’s offense and head coach Kellen Moore.

“We’re sitting at 2-5, and I’m like, how did we get here?” Jordan said. “Because we have such a high, potent offense. You talk about Chris Olave, Devaughn Vele, you know, not even inserting Jordyn Tyson, who’s coming back soon. You talk about Tyler Shough, how he’s grown.

“… Kellen comes in and says, ‘Hey, this is gonna be our identity.’ He comes in a cool, calm manner at all times. He’s fired up and energetic in talking to his guys, just, ‘Hey, this is what we need to do.’”

But the fact remains the Saints will have to dig themselves out of a huge hole. Consider recent NFL history: Since the league moved to four-team divisions in 2002, there have been 122 teams that started 2-5. Only nine (7.4%) have made the playoffs.

The good news is that since the NFL expanded to the playoffs to seven teams per conference in 2020, that number increases, although it’s still a long shot: Four of 33 teams to start 2-5 in the previous six seasons made the playoffs (12.1%).

Had the Saints won just one more game — insert hand-wringing here about a bizarre officiating decision in an overtime loss Sept. 13 at Detroit, or a four-turnover fourth quarter Sept. 27 against Las Vegas — their chances would have nearly doubled. Teams that start 3-4 have made the playoffs at a 14.5% clip since 2002 (18 of 124), and that rate has increased to 24.4% (10 of 41) since playoff expansion.

Of course, expanded playoffs may not help the Saints, who are closer to the NFC South-leading Carolina Panthers (3-3) than they are to any team currently in a wild-card position. Of the nine teams who battled back from 2-5 to make the playoffs in the last 24 seasons, five of them won their division with a record of 9-7 or worse.

It’s also true that not all 2-5 teams are created equally. The Saints have a minus-32 point differential through seven games, worse than any of the teams to dig out of a 2-5 hole to make the playoffs since 2020. In fact, since 2002, only three of 76 teams with a 2-5 record and a minus-30 differential or worse have made the playoffs: The 2002 New York Jets (minus-77, rebounded to finish 9-7 and win the AFC East), the 2011 Denver Broncos (minus-67, went on to win the AFC West at 8-8) and the 2015 Houston Texans (minus-45, won the AFC South at 9-7).

But even those teams don’t offer a good template for the Saints to follow. The 2002 Jets and 2011 Broncos both made early quarterback switches to spark their turnarounds, with New York turning to Chad Pennington and Denver to Tim Tebow. And the 2015 Texans lost starting quarterback Brian Hoyer to injury early, and it took them most of the season to figure out a successful QB rotation.

The Saints aren’t replacing Shough any time soon, so to make the playoffs after this start, they’d have to do something almost unprecedented.

There is, however, one team in recent history that perhaps offers some hope: The 2021 Philadelphia Eagles, who also had a young head coach and a second-year quarterback who was drafted in the second round and had started a few games the previous season. After starting 2-5 with a minus-26 point differential, Nick Sirianni and Jalen Hurts led the team to a strong finish and an NFC wild card at 9-8.

But that’s just one success story among dozens of 2-5 teams that continued to fizzle. Time will tell if the Saints have what it takes to become the next.

“We’ve just gotta really dig in and solve this thing,” Moore said after the loss in Paris. “Any time you go into a bye week, you go into evaluation mode as far as identifying the things you need to work on and solving those.”