New Orleans Saints - Fantasy News

Who to Start: Drew Brees or Jameis Winston?

by Mike Rose

12/28/17

NFL

New Orleans Saints

Drew Brees

The New Orleans Saints have something to play for in their Week 17 trip to Tampa Bay where they’ll square off against Jameis Winston and the Buccaneers.

A win paired with losses from teams ahead of them in the playoff race would assure Drew Brees and company a home game and possibly a higher seed.

Expect No. 9 to be a popular selection on Dober Play Cards this week with Dirk Koetter’s squad marching the worst pass defense onto the field heading into the final week of the regular season.

Fantasy Matchup: Drew Brees (17.0 PFP) vs. Jameis Winston (16.0 PFP)

It hasn’t been one of those quintessential Brees-type seasons. He has averaged just 16.94 Dober Fantasy Points per game, a mark that finds him ranked No. 10 at the quarterback position. That’s not to say the New Orleans offense hasn’t been potent—that’s actually far from the truth. The Saints are just doing it in a different way in 2017.

The unit is averaging better than 395.0 yards and 28.3 points per game. Both outputs find the offense ranked within the top-five of the league. While Brees overlooks the No. 5 ranked passing attack, he also has arguably the best running back tandem in the league in back of him. Both Mark Ingram and rookie Alvin Kamara have sucked some of the fantasy goodness out of Brees.

Both facets of the New Orleans attack proved they can perform at a high level in the first meeting with the Bucs in Week 9. The ground game accounted for 151 total yards while Brees went for 263 yards with two touchdowns and no interceptions. New Orleans won the game with ease 30-10, and the Saints’ field general went for 18.72 DFP, which beat his Dober fantasy projection (17.5). Tampa’s defense has only gotten worse since.

Meanwhile, Winston had some pretty big expectations heading into the 2017 campaign. Forecasted as a major sleeper at the quarterback position, Winston kicked off his campaign with three solid performances through four tries. Then the injury to his throwing shoulder ruined the season in Week 6 at Arizona. While he continued playing, it wasn’t until Week 10 that he was finally shut down to let it heal.

Since returning under center to lead Tampa Bay’s offense, the Florida State product has been locked in, throwing for 270 yards or more in four straight games while racking up an impressive eight-to-two touchdown-to-interception ratio. Fresh off a 367-yard passing effort at Carolina, Winston will go up against the same Saints defense that put him on IR for three weeks.

It won’t be easy, however, with New Orleans ranked No. 11 versus opposing fantasy quarterbacks in allowing just 16.5 points per game. The unit has allowed just one passing touchdown in each of the last three games, and it held Matt Ryan below his PFP of 15.5 last week. Even though the Saints bottled up Atlanta pretty good, Julio Jones still had a big game. That should have both Winston and Mike Evans smiling after the duo re-introduced themselves to one another last week six times for 107 yards.

Though New Orleans is the only team playing for something in this matchup, the Bucs aren’t just going to roll over and die. Tampa Bay has been feisty of late, and that has everything to do with Winston re-energizing the offense.

Brees has an excellent ground game to back him up. Winston doesn’t, and game script could end up forcing the home team to the air early. That puts Winston in a more favorable position to accrue fantasy points, so I’d add him to your Dober Play Card in this matchup.

Week 17 Fantasy Projection: Jameis Winston (+1) vs. Drew Brees