The Worksheet, a fantasy football overview by Rich Hribar, breaking down everything you need to know for the Week 7 New Orleans Saints at Arizona Cardinals Thursday Night Football game.
| New Orleans | Rank | @ | Arizona | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1.5 | Spread | -1.5 | ||
| 21.75 | Implied Total | 23.25 | ||
| 23.5 | 11 | Points/Gm | 19 | 22 |
| 26.3 | 29 | Points All./Gm | 23.7 | 22 |
| 64.8 | 11 | Plays/Gm | 72 | 1 |
| 60.8 | 8 | Opp. Plays/Gm | 60.2 | 6 |
| 5.9 | 7 | Off. Yards/Play | 4.8 | 31 |
| 5.6 | 19 | Def. Yards/Play | 5.6 | 18 |
| 43.70% | 12 | Rush% | 37.50% | 23 |
| 56.30% | 21 | Pass% | 62.50% | 10 |
| 43.56% | 21 | Opp. Rush % | 39.89% | 11 |
| 56.44% | 12 | Opp. Pass % | 60.11% | 22 |
- Arizona has led for 3.0% of their offensive snaps, the lowest rate in the league.
- 49.1% of the points scored by Arizona this season have come in the fourth quarter the highest rate in the league.
- 14.2% of the first down plays for Arizona have resulted in a first down or touchdown, the lowest rate in the league.
- Arizona is averaging 5.0 yards per passing play, the fewest in the league.
- The Saints (31.1%) and the Cardinals (27.5%) rank 30th and 32nd in use of pre-snap motion.
- The Saints have allowed a league-high seven touchdowns from outside of the red zone.
Quarterback
Kyler Murray: It has been a miserable run here for Murray, fishing as a QB1 in just one of his past four games. Six weeks into the season, Murray resides among players he has no business surrounding in terms of production. Murray is averaging a league-worst 5.8 yards per pass attempt (career rate is 7.1 Y/A) and is 30th with a 2.4% touchdown rate (career rate is 4.1%). Through six games, he has not even averaged more than 6.5 yards per attempt in any game.
Murray is at or near the bottom of the league in accuracy and production inside of the 10-yard line, under pressure, and throws over 10 yards downfield.
Under pressure, Murray is averaging 2.7 yards (not a typo) per attempt, completing 22-of-58 passes (37.9%) for 159 yards with one touchdown and two interceptions under pressure.
On throws over 10 yards downfield, Murray is dead last in the league in completion rate (35.4%), yards per pass attempt (7.1 Y/A), and EPA per dropbacks (-0.11).
Murray has the league's lowest completion rate inside of the 10-yard line at 23.5% (4-of-17).
There are almost no positives to find here for Murray, but he is getting DeAndre Hopkins back this week. With Hopkins on the field in 2021, Murray completed 72.1% of his passes for 8.8 yards per pass attempt. With Hopkins off the field, Murray completed 65.1% of his passes for 6.6 Y/A.
The Saints have also struggled defensively. New Orleans is allowing 7.4 yards per pass attempt (23rd), 11.9 yards per completion (24th), with a 4.7% touchdown rate (24th). Over the past two weeks, New Orleans has allowed the QB4 and QB1 scorers on the week to Geno Smith and Joe Burrow. They are also dead last in the NFL in pressure rate (22.5%).
Now, we just lived through Murray tanking against a Seattle defense that had previously been hemorrhaging fantasy points to any and every passer before facing this Arizona offense. Take any matchup notes with grains of salt, but Murray still possesses enough mobility and potential regression to his career marks to be handled as a lower-end QB1.