Thursday Night Football Preview: Week 16

Following last week’s blowout between two sub-.500 teams, Week 16 offers a pairing of NFC playoff contenders. The Rams and Saints enter this game at 7-7 and in the thick of the playoff picture. FullTime Fantasy’s Thursday Night Football Preview: Week 16 breaks down what is a must-win game for both teams.

The visiting Saints have won two straight and are tied for the NFC South lead. At +42, New Orleans has the fourth-best points differential in the conference. However, they must contend with traveling on a short week to face an LA squad that has won three consecutive games at home.

Additionally, Los Angeles has averaged 33 points per game in their last four. This Rams offense is now healthy and will pose problems for a New Orleans defense that has struggled when facing teams that are capable of moving the ball up and down the field.

The game opened with the Rams being favored by 4.5 points with a total of 44.5.

Matchup

TEAM	OFFENSE	PASS	RUSH	YDS/PLAY	POINTS
New Orleans Saints	14	14	19	18	12
Los Angeles Rams	8	11	11	7	9

On paper, these two teams are more evenly matched than it seems. However, the Saints have an edge defensively. At least they did until recently. The Saints pass rush has slowed and the team has dipped to 24th in run defense.

Meanwhile, the Rams have had issues defending the run. However, the return of Kryen Williams has had a significant impact on the team’s offensive resurgence. Also, in the last five games, Matthew Stafford is the overall fantasy QB5.

For this game, the Saints are looking at their own significant addition with ace No. 1 wideout Chris Olave returning after a 1-game absence.

This is the first away game for New Orleans since dropping a 24-15 game to the Falcons in Week 12. Meanwhile, the Rams have been thriving at home and have not lost to the Saints as hosts since 2009.

New Orleans Offense

Derek Carr is coming off his best fantasy performance of the year. However, 2023 has been a mostly mediocre season for the veteran signal-caller. Week 15 was the first time since Week 9 that Carr had topped 11 fantasy points. Carr ranks 16th in passing yards, 18th in fantasy points per game, and has been a non-factor as a runner.

However, the matchup for Carr is fine. LA has allowed the seventh-most fantasy points to quarterbacks. But the Rams tend to play better at home. They have only allowed seven touchdown passes in eight games at SoFi Stadium. Carr is averaging 227 passing yards with six TDs in seven road games.

Despite missing the first three games of the season, Alvin Kamara is RB7 in PPR scoring. He’s scored 11 or more fantasy points in every game with 5-plus targets in all but one. Even though the Rams allow the second-fewest fantasy points to running backs, Kamara’s volume and production make him an RB1 every week.

Jamaal Williams led the NFL with 17 rushing scores last season. He’s only 17 behind so far in 2023. Kamara is dominating snaps and volume, reducing Williams to 3.5 fantasy points per game. With less than one target per game, Williams can safely be left out of consideration in Week 15.

The return of Chris Olave will be a big boost for the Saints. Olave ranks 13th in the league with 116 targets. Meanwhile, the Rams are very average in defending the position. Nearly 80% of Olave’s routes come from the slot or right side. That means he’ll face advantageous coverage against Ahkello Witherspoon and Quentin Lake. Olave is a fringe WR1, but only because of the lack of touchdown upside.

Rashid Shaheed leads the Saints with a 48% slot rate. Shaheed will mostly be paired off with Lake but should benefit from the presence of Olave, who will command extra attention. View Shaheed as a volatile WR4/flex option. However, he has the speed to thrive on this surface, giving him some appeal in daily formats.

Lynn Bowden (275) has played the most snaps of New Orleans’ ancillary wideouts. However, Bowden owns a minuscule 3.1% target share. That’s higher than that of A.T. Perry. Regardless, the lack of opportunities makes both players poor fantasy options in Week 16.

The Saints are using four tight ends weekly. Juwan Johnson leads the way with a 43% snap share and 8.3% target share. The Rams are allowing the fifth-most fantasy points to tight ends, so view Johnson as a modest streamer. Jimmy Graham is worth of TD-or-BUST look in single-game slates.

Los Angeles Offense

Matthew Stafford has thrown 12 touchdowns in his last four games. And they haven’t all come against hollow opposition. He averaged 287 passing yards and five total scores against the Browns and Ravens during the streak.

New Orleans has been solid against quarterbacks, who score the sixth-fewest fantasy points when facing the Saints. New Orleans has allowed six rushing touchdowns to running backs and 18 total to quarterbacks. If the Rams score three touchdowns, at least two should come from Stafford. That gives him solid QB2 value on Thursday.

Only Christian McCaffrey plays a higher snap rate than Kyren Williams. Since returning from IR, Williams is averaging 26.5 touches per week. Meanwhile, the Saints’ once-staunch run defense has allowed seven double-digit fantasy outings to running backs in their last eight games. Williams is a top-5 back in every format.

Things will be a bit tougher for the receivers. New Orleans has only surrendered eight touchdowns to enemy wide receivers all season. Still, nobody is sitting LA’s dynamic duo, Cooper Kupp runs over 53% of his snaps from the slot. From there, he should have no issues getting open against slot corner Alontae Taylor.

Puka Nacua will also spend a fair number of snaps inside, but the majority of damage he does is from the right side of the formation. Nacua averages 18.9 fantasy points at SoFil Stadium, so he is a target worth spending up for in Showdown slates, with sneaky appeal as a captain.

Demarcus Robinson seems to have taken over the WR3 duties for the Rams. Robinson is quietly the WR15 over the last three games, with a touchdown game in each contest. However, the return of Tutu Atwell (concussion) complicates things. For the season, Atwell’s 65% snap share dwarfs Robinson’s sub-20% rate.

At tight end, Tyler Higbee will dominate snaps and targets. However, Higbee has not topped 50 yards since Week 4 and faces an uphill battle against a Saints defense that struggles against elite tight ends but generally shuts down modest ones.

Prediction & Best Bet

We need that Raiders cover last week and it was a no-doubter early on. However, this week’s ‘elimination’ game is tougher to handicap.

The last time the Saints defeated the Rams on their home turf was on November 15, 2009. And that was in St. Louis. Since then, the Rams have won five straight home games and covered all five when hosting New Orleans. Overall, LA is 4-1 straight up and against the spread in their last five home games this season.

Additionally, the under has hit in five of LA’s last six at SoFi.

Conversely, the Saints haven’t been as good at covering the spread. New Orleans is 4-9-1 ATS this season, which includes a subpar 2-4-1 mark as visitors. The under is also 10-4 in Saints’ games this season and 16-4 dating back to the second half 0f 2022.

Combined, the under is 18-10 for these two teams. However, the opening line of 44.5 has risen to 46, which gives me some hesitation on the total.

I think the Rams win this game but I’m not as confident that they will cover. Instead, let’s bypass all those trends of under and hope the return of Olave spikes the Saints’ offense.

Best Bet: OVER 46 WIN

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