Thursday Night Football Preview: Week 7

Only in a season as cruel as 2024 would we have to sit through…Bo Nix vs. Spencer Rattler. No, seriously. We have to pay for it and everything. Lamentably, duty calls and even bad football is still football. The FullTime Fantasy Thursday Night Football Preview: Week 7 breaks down all the fantasy-relevant players in this Denver Broncos at New Orleans Saints matchup.

Losers of four straight, the New Orleans Saints are reeling. The team that started 2-0 and outscored their opponents 91-29 is barely represented on the field in Week 7. The Saints are missing their quarterback, both wideouts and have other injury concerns.

Meanwhile, the Broncos seem fortunate to be 3-3 with their offensive struggles. Denver started 0-2 before rattling off three straight wins against the Buccaneers, Jets, and Raiders. However, things fell back to earth last week with a poor showing against the Chargers.

Unsurprisingly, the Saints opened as 4-point favorites. However, we’ve seen a massive shift as the Broncos are now 2.5-point favorites.

The opening line has also seen a precipitous dip, falling a full four points from his opening total of 41.5 points.

Matchup

TEAM	OFFENSE	PASS	RUSH	YDS/PLAY	POINTS
Denver Broncos	29	26	18	28	22
New Orleans Saints	18	17	12	18	4

Seeing the Saints rank competently in offense is a bit of a surprise. However, most of that production came in the season’s first two weeks when the Saints were rolling. Since then, injuries and fading quarterback play have tanked the Saints’ attack.

Additionally, the New Orleans defense has struggled. The Saints have lost four straight games to drop to 2-4. And the injury woes that decimated the Saints’ offense have also taken a toll on the defense. New Orleans ranks 30th against the pass and next to last in surrendering yards per play.

Conversely, the Denver offense has been one of the worst units in football all season. This was not expected starting a rookie quarterback who rarely pushed the ball downfield in college. Only four teams are averaging fewer yards per play than Sean Payton’s Broncos.

Things have been much better for Denver on the other side of the ball. The Broncos’ defense ranks sixth overall and versus the pass. This is a formidable unit that will make it hard for the Saints to mount much offense in Spencer Rattler’s second start in four days.

Denver Offense

After a brutal start, Bo Nix has shown improvements. He’s topped 200 passing yards in four of his last five starts and exceeded 20 fantasy points in back-to-back games. A big part of that production has come via the ground. Nix ranks sixth with 180 rushing yards and has chipped in an excellent three rushing TDs.

This is a tough matchup for Nix. New Orleans allows the seventh-fewest fantasy points to quarterbacks. The opportunistic Saints have picked off 10 passes while only surrendering five touchdowns through the air. Four of those TDs came last week, meaning the Saints only allowed one TD pass in their first five games.

Denver ranks 18th in rushing but a lot of that production is via Nix. Javonte Williams leads the backfield in playing time and touches but enters this game as the RB34. Williams has only exceeded 13 carries in one game and has yet to score a touchdown. While New Orleans is a bottom-10 unit in terms of allowing fantasy points to running backs, Williams is merely a weak RB3 due to lack of volume.

Jaleel McLaughlin hasn’t topped 10 carries since Week 1. While his role in the passing game has grown in the past two games, McLaughlin isn’t playing enough snaps to be considered fantasy-relevant except in the deepest leagues.

Courtland Sutton is tied for 13th in the league with 47 targets. However, Sutton ranks outside the top 50 with 10.1 PPR points per game. That volume keeps Sutton as a decent WR3/flex option, especially in a week where he’s matched up with a Saints’ secondary that surrenders the ninth-most fantasy points to enemy wideouts.

Last week, Troy Franklin played the second-most snaps and scored his first NFL touchdown. Franklin seems to have taken over for Josh Reynolds, who is on IR. Franklin and Devaughn Vele were the main options in three wide sets. Meanwhile, Lil’Jordan Humphrey saw his playing time plummet to just 19 snaps in Week 6.

The tight end position has been an afterthought in this offense. Greg Dulcich has been a healthy scratch in two consecutive games. Last week Lucas Krull played the most snaps (33) but caught only two balls for 11 yards. Payton will use a committee but none of Denver’s options are anything other than cheap DFS punt plays.

New Orleans Offense

The ailing New Orleans offensive line played a big part, but Spencer Rattler‘s first start was erratic. Rattler was sacked five times, threw a pair of interceptions, and his 27.9 QBR was the third-worst in Week 6.

However, it wasn’t all bad. Rattler threw for 243 yards and a score and also rushed for 27 yards. But the Saints’ injury-ravaged receiving corps and facing a Denver secondary surrendering the fifth-fewest fantasy points to opposing quarterbacks is a tough spot for a fifth-round rookie making his prime-time debut.

Expect a healthy dose of Alvin Kamara in this game as both a runner and receiver. Kamara enters this game as the No. 1 fantasy running back, averaging 22. 8 fantasy points per game on 22 touches. Denver allows 21.9 fantasy points per game to the position, so Kamara looks locked in for another top-5 week.

Chris Olave (concussion) and Rashid Shaheed (knee) are not expected to play in this game.

That leaves Bub Means to move into the WR1 role for the Saints. Means barely played before last week, seeing just 19 snaps in New Orleans’ first five games. However, he did snag five passes for 45 yards and a TD in the Saints’ frantic comeback attempt. Additionally, Means won’t have to face shutdown CB Patrick Surtain, who will miss this game with a concussion.

Mason Tipton and Cedrick Wilson will be the team’s other two wideouts. Yikes. Neither receiver has topped 30 yards in any game this season, making both merely dart-throw DFS options in a low-scoring game.

However, the good news comes at tight end where Taysom Hill (ribs) has a good chance to return. If Hill is active, he can factor in as both a runner and receiver while always posing the threat of passing. If he’s active, view Hill as a top-12 fantasy TE facing a Denver team that has allowed the tenth-most points to the position.

That also puts Juwan Johnson and even Foster Moreau in play as middling streaming options.

Prediction & Best Bet

The Saints are normally one of the top home teams to target, especially when they’re getting points. However, that all gets thrown out the window with the group that will take the field in Week 7.

Denver has outright won three games in a row at the Superdome versus the Saints. Granted, that goes back to the year 2000, but the Broncos have won five of their last six overall against the Saints. And the under has hit in five of the last five in the series.

This is also a big game for Sean Payton, who makes his return to New Orleans.

Tough spot for Rattler and the short-handed Saints, who will have a hard time putting up points in a big spot.

Best Bet: Broncos -2.5 ✅

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