The Week 14 matchup between the New Orleans Saints and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers features division rivals who know how to score points when everything is clicking. We’ve got the fantasy projections courtesy of numberFire.
Fantasy football projections, Week 14: Saints-Buccaneers featuring Drew Brees, Brandon Cooks and Doug Martin
We break down the Week 14 matchup between the New Orleans Saints and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
New Orleans Saints
It’s been a tough season in New Orleans. That means it’s also been a tough year for quarterback Drew Brees. Brees has only been held under a 60% completion rate twice this season, but both of those instances have occurred in the last two weeks. He also struggled in the team’s Week 2 game against the Buccaneers. While fantasy owners may hear those statistics and think that benching Brees as the playoffs began might be a good idea, it’s also worth noting he still threw for 262 yards and three touchdown passes against a tough Carolina Panthers defense last week.
Given wide receiver Willie Snead has been limited in practice throughout the week, teammate Brandin Cooks might be worth a look. He had a rough start to the season, but Cooks has scored all but one of his seven touchdowns on the year in the last five weeks. He torched Carolina for six catches, 104 yards and a score last week. That’s very hard to do against cornerback Josh Norman and company.
Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Only one team in the NFL has given up more fantasy points to running backs than the New Orleans Saints. Combine that with the fact running back Doug Martin has found his game over the last three weeks after going through a bit of a slump, and fantasy owners don’t need to think twice about starting him. He’ll be in the lineup no question. The main question mark with him will be whether or not he can actually find the end zone. Martin has scored just three rushing touchdowns this year. He’s on a bad team so it’s not his fault, but if his rushing yards are limited, his number of fantasy points may be as well.
Wide receiver Mike Evans will also be watched closely by fantasy owners this week. He’s been held under 64 receiving yards in each of the last three games, but nobody is more talented in the Buccaneers’ offense than Evans. Regardless of whether or not he posts a big yardage total against the Saints, what he will have going for him is that he gets a steady number of targets. Through 11 contests this year, which includes the game he left early thanks to injury, Evans has averaged 10 targets.
