Buccaneers vs Saints Fantasy Football Worksheet, Week 1

The Worksheet, a fantasy football overview by Rich Hribar, breaking down everything you need to know for the Week 1 Tampa Bay Buccaneers vs New Orleans Saints Sunday afternoon game on September 13, 2019 at 4:25 pm ET.

Tampa Bay	Rank	@	New Orleans	Rank
3.5		Spread	-3.5
23		Implied Total	26.5
28.6	4	Points/Gm	28.1	5
28.1	29	Points All./Gm	21.6	14
67.9	5	Plays/Gm	62.6	20
67.1	29	Opp. Plays/Gm	63.1	14
37.70%	26	Rush%	39.60%	20
62.30%	7	Pass%	60.40%	13
33.70%	1	Opp. Rush %	35.90%	2
66.30%	32	Opp. Pass %	64.10%	31

The Saints are just 1-8 against the spread (2-7 straight up) in their past nine season openers, including six consecutive failed covers.
Those games have gone over the game total eight times with an average combined score of 63.6 points.
In 2019, the Saints had the fewest turnovers (eight) in league history. Turning the ball over on 4.4% of their possessions.
Tampa Bay turned the ball over a league-high 21.9% of their drives last season (league average outside of them was 12%). It was the highest turnover rate per drive since the 2006 Raiders (25.1%).
Over his past 10 seasons, Tom Brady and the Patriots have had the lowest turnover rate per drive (7.8%) while ranking third or better in seven of those 10 seasons (with a low mark of seventh).

Quarterback

Tom Brady: Brady dropped back and attempted 613 passes last season, but unfortunately posted a low in yards per pass attempt (6.6 Y/A) in a season since 2002 while his touchdown rate (3.9%) was an all-time low. Brady has been a top-12 scorer in nine of his past 25 games dating back to the 2018 season, but gets new life for a final chapter in Tampa Bay, surrounded by a much improved skill group of playmakers than what he had a year ago with New England.

Brady averaged a league-low 4.1 yards per pass attempt under pressure in 2019 while the Saints were fifth in the league in pressure rate defensively (26.4%). Despite being able to get to the quarterback, New Orleans still ranked just 21st in passing points allowed (15.4) to quarterbacks in 2019. The Saints defense has regularly started the season slowly as well, allowing 28 or more points in six consecutive season openers. There is potential for fireworks here if continuity is not an early-season issue for Brady and his new set of teammates.

Drew Brees: Missing five full games with a thumb injury hid the fact that Brees was still as good as ever at age-40, finishing seventh in points per game (20.4) while finishing as a QB1 scorer in eight of his 10 full games played. He posted a career-high 7.1% touchdown rate.

Tampa Bay was a prime pass-funnel target for us in fantasy a year ago. 78.5% of the yardage gained versus Tampa Bay in 2019 came via passing, the highest rate in the league. They ranked 29th in passing points allowed (18.2) while allowing a QB4 scoring week to Teddy Bridgewater (27.3 points) and a QB10 week to Brees (21.3 points) in their two matchups with the Saints.

Running back

Alvin Kamara: Kamara has averaged over 18.0 touches per game in each of the past two years and has exactly 81 receptions in each of his first three seasons. Kamara suffered a midseason ankle injury that impacted his season a year ago while he came out and said he was also playing through a knee injury.

Through six weeks, Kamara had forced a missed tackle on a league-leading 31.9% of his touches and he averaged 5.5 yards per touch. Once he returned to the lineup in Week 10, Kamara forced a missed tackle on just 13.5% of his touches for the remainder of the season and averaged 5.1 yards per touch.

Kamara was a clear workhorse still. He out-carried Latavius Murray 7-to-3 inside of the 5-yard line a year ago while Murray averaged just 8.2 touches per game when the two played together.

The Buccaneers were lights out against the run last season. They were third in the league in EPA rush defense while allowing a league-low 3.02 yards per carry to opposing running backs. To go along with shutting teams down on the ground, they also ranked fifth in the league in receiving points allowed to backfields per game (8.6). But Kamara still found his way to solid fantasy lines in both matchups against the Bucs a year ago, having 22 touches for 104 yards in Week 5 and then 23 touches for 122 yards in Week 11.

Buccaneers RBs: With the late offseason addition of Leonard Fournette, there is some ambiguity surrounding the Tampa Bay backfield touches between Fournette, Ronald Jones, and LeSean McCoy. Bruce Arians has claimed that Jones is their lead back, but there is certainly some fragility there while we do not have clarity on which back will get the goal line opportunities or work in passing situations.

The Saints are also a team that has consistently limited opponents from big games on the ground. New Orleans has not allowed a 100-yard rusher since Week 11 of the 2017 season while they ranked third in the league in rushing points allowed per game (9.1) to backfields in 2019. They were vulnerable in the passing game, however, ranking 23rd in receiving points allowed per game (11.4) to backfields.

In two games versus Tampa Bay a year ago, Buccaneers backs totaled 24 carries for 76 yards with one touchdown while catching 13 passes for 80 yards and a touchdown. There is shootout potential in this game, which can lead to touchdown potential for these backs, but it is hard to dive in head first with any individual back with more than RB2 expectations.

Wide receiver

Michael Thomas: In 2019, Thomas set the all-time record for receptions in a season (149) for 1,725 yards. He led all players in share of the team’s targets (31.8%) and receiving yards per team passing attempt (2.97). He even totaled a ridiculous 66.3% share of the New Orleans wide receiver targets. Oft-targeted and hyper-efficient, Thomas has secured at least 76% of his targets in three of his first four NFL seasons while catching 85% and 80.5% of his targets the past two seasons. Thomas had 119, 97, and 51 more receptions than the next highest Saints wide receiver across the past three seasons. Those marks should come back to more reasonable ranges with the addition of Emmanuel Sanders, but he is still a set-and-forget top option.

Thomas also runs into a matchup that was giving a year ago. Tampa Bay was 31st in points allowed per game (19.1) to opposing WR1 options, including games of 11-182-2 and 8-114-1 to Thomas. Thomas has had at least six receptions in all seven of his career games against the Bucs with 94 or more receiving yards in six of those contests.

Mike Evans: With 1,157 yards in 13 games this past season, Mike Evans joined Randy Moss as the only wideouts in NFL history to clear 1K yards in each of their first six seasons. The past two significant downfield targets Brady has had have been better than the league rate despite Brady’s depth of passing target being far lower than that of Winston or Fitzpatrick. In 2018, Josh Gordon caught 11-of-21 targets (52.4%) over 15-yard downfield while Brandin Cooks caught 24-of-46 (52.2%) of those targets in 2017. League completion rate on those targets over the past five years is 43.4%.

Evans has ghosted us a few times in this rivalry he has developed with Marshon Lattimore. Last season, he was goose-egged on three targets versus New Orleans in Week 5 and then came back with 4-69-0 on eight targets in Week 11 with Lattimore inactive. In five career games with Lattimore on the field, Evans has reeled in 17-of-35 targets for 301 yards and one score while averaging 11.0 PPR points per game, but does have one 7-147-1 haymaker game mixed in around those low points to remind us that Evans is capable of still providing a spiked week at any moment regardless of the matchup.

**Evans missed practice Wednesday with a hamstring injury per Bruce Arians. Evans did practice on Friday, but even if Evans is good to play Sunday, anticipate him to potentially have some snaps shaved off of his usual allotment given this unique offseason. If he is unable to play Justin Watson would get extended run and would elevated Scott Miller into more target opportunity as well, but both Miller and Watson would be deeper plays and for daily formats over seasonal usage.

Chris Godwin: Godwin has improved across the board in every category in each of his first three seasons. Still only 24-years old entering 2020, Godwin is coming off an 86-1,333-9 campaign playing a role that has seen big slot men flourish in the past in Hines Ward, Reggie Wayne, and Larry Fitzgerald.

It remains to be seen with the addition of Rob Gronkowski and questionable wide receiver depth, how much 12 personnel the Bucs will run, which would push Godwin outside more often in 2020. Godwin scored 163.8 PPR points from the slot last season, which ranked fourth in the league. He averaged 2.22 yards per route run in the slot, but that number dipped to 1.29 yards per route versus man coverage.

New Orleans was 12th in the league in points allowed to boundary wideouts, but 30th in points allowed to wideouts from the slot. Godwin totaled 10-172-3 versus New Orleans a year ago with 8-132-2 coming from the slot. How much Scott Miller can get on the field will help Godwin hang onto his high slot usage.

Emmanuel Sanders: Sanders posted a 66-869-5 line on 97 targets in 2019 in 17 games played between the Broncos and 49ers. Sanders closed the season with just one week higher than WR49 over his final eight games, but is now playing with the best quarterback he has had since Peyton Manning. Wideouts averaged a league-high 15.0 receptions per game versus Tampa Bay a year ago.

Tight end

Jared Cook: At age-32, Cook led the entire NFL in rate of receptions that went for 20-plus yards (23.1%) and led all tight ends with 10.9 yards per target. He also tied Mark Andrews with 11 end zone targets among all tight ends. He set career-highs in touchdowns (nine), yards per catch (16.4), and caught a touchdown on 13.9% of his targets. His stellar rate stats masked his 4.6 targets per game, which ranked 19th at the position.

The addition of Sanders can prevent those targets from ballooning, but Cook runs into a matchup we chased frequently a year ago. The Buccaneers were 25th in points allowed to opposing tight ends a year ago and 27th in yardage per game (59.6) to the position. Cook found the end zone in both games against Tampa Bay in 2019 with games of 4-41-1 and 2-33-1.

Rob Gronkowski/O.J. Howard: The last time we saw Gronkowski on the field was 2018. In that season, Gronkowski dealt with a lingering ankle injury that forced him to miss three games. He had limited mobility and his play suffered from it, averaging just 3.6 receptions for 52.5 receiving yards per game. It was the fewest amount of yardage per game he had in a season in any other season outside of his rookie year. He also caught just three touchdowns on 47 receptions (4.2%) after catching a touchdown on 16.5% of his career receptions prior. Despite that down production to his own standards, Gronkowski still averaged 14.5 yards per reception, which ranked fifth among all tight ends with more than 25 receptions in 2018.

Entering 2020 at age-31, Gronk has not appeared in a full season since 2011 and is not the lead option in a passing game that has two prime wide receivers. We also do not know if Gronk will be a full-time player or a package player in the offense with O.J. Howard also involved. Last season, Tampa Bay was in 12 personnel 23% of the time, but just 17% of their passing plays.

More Week 1 Fantasy breakdowns from The Worksheet: