2022 Week 13: Buccaneers 17, Saints 16 (Dynasty/Fantasy Analysis Game Report)
It's been a few days since this game was completed, and I still cannot believe the Buccaneers won this game. Down 16-3 with 8 minutes remaining and getting dominated the entire game…the Bucs went into a hurry up mode and Tom Brady hit some clutch throws, the Bucs got a few lucky breaks, and the Saints wilted and…game winning TD with 0:03 remaining.
The Saints should’ve won this game by 3+ scores, but they dropped all kinds of key passes throughout the game and then choked/blinked in fear at the end and let an inferior Tampa Bay team effectively end their season.
Tampa Bay rises to (6-6), pushing to a game-and-a-half lead over Atlanta (5-8)…and really killing off New Orleans 2022, the now last place Saints at (4-9). Tampa should now win this division because Atlanta is coached by Arthur Smith. Tampa Bay has a terrible team, mostly due to their O-line destruction via injury, but as sad as they are…all the other teams in the division are worse -- which is what Tom Brady does…he curses the rest of the teams in his division for the past 20+ years. TB will win the division and then get shellacked in the playoffs and Brady can move on to San Francisco for 2023…or wherever he’ll play in 2023. It won’t be New England, that I can assure you…and likely won’t be back in Tampa either, but not totally ruled out.
The Saints will now pack it in. We might see Jameis Winston back at QB. We might see less of a very 2022 ineffective Alvin Kamara. We might see this Saints team lose every game the rest of the season, but they do have the Desmond Ridder-led Falcons Week 15, after a Week 14 bye, so maybe a win there.
*Note any fractional numbers in parentheses (4/2) or (2/3), etc., are a ‘split’ stat on our definition of a ‘quality start’ (or not) marker on a player -- using 14 PPR points in a game for RB-WR-TE and 21 for a QB…point levels that are good/productive/well above average starts for a Fantasy week. Trying to identify trends, consistency (or not) in players we might not normally realize.
A (3/2), for example, means: 3 times the player hit at/above the mark, and 2 times they did not.
Fantasy Player Notes…
-- One of the bigger reasons why I loved, and bet on, the Saints to win outright/cover the spread (+3.5) here was because I knew if Leonard Fournette (10-49-0, 6-32-0/7) was back from injury, this coaching staff would flock to him and thus be hurting their own cause because Fournette cannot hold a candle next to the next FF superstar RB Rachaad White (9-28-0, 6-41-1/8). It’s actually hurting the offense when Fournette is on the field versus White. The Bucs staff hurt the team over half the time in this game (35-25 Fournette snap count favor).
In this game, White started…as I expected…but then Fournette filtered in and stayed in too much…and late game it was Fournette for most of the hurry up comeback attempt, when even Tom Brady knows White is far superior in the passing game. It was White that made the catch, and the slick move to score the game winning TD.
You might think, “Surely, the Bucs can see this NOW…after the past few games of Rachaad superiority in all phases AND then White’s clutch game winning TD!” I would respond: Nope. You’re making the mistake of using logic and business sense, when you’re applying that to a totally illogical and no-business-sense staff of coaches -- you’re dealing with a bunch of ex-players (at whatever level) who think they know something because they played the game. Most ex-players who made it to high college ball, and then for sure if they were good enough to go from there to the NFL, have never had to work a real mental, managerial job in their lives, and they have zero business sense with their affairs usually handled by others.
I hate to paint an entire group like that, but let me ask you…what ex-NFL coach do you listen to any pregame or podcast or TV game analysis and feel like they are at another level of understanding of normal things…or football things? What NFL analysts, ex-NFL coaches, really impress you with their mind and expression thereof? I would bet that there isn’t even one ex-coach in NFL analysis you desire to listen to at all…not even close.
Steve Mariucci? Bill Cowher? Rex Ryan? And I just named ‘the good ones’ (supposedly) in broadcasting…the ones with prime gigs. Did you remember when Bruce Arians and Jeff Fisher, among other ex-coaches, worked TV games? Yikes. Ever watch Hard Knocks and see these coaches in their natural habitat? The old school coaches grew up in a football bubble, by-and-large…and it’s hard for them to think outside of the conditioned bubble.
So, I too hope White breaks free to RB1 in the games ahead…but he’ll have a Fournette anchor tied to his leg as long as Len is active…an anchor dragging him towards RB2, which he would have been headed to here had he not gone and won the game in the last few seconds. Things will be better for Rachaad in 2023…hopefully. Free of Fournette, hopefully, in 2023…but we also don’t know if Blaine Gabbert will be his QB or not. Bruce Arians is still lurking around the team like a helicopter parent.
-- Alvin Kamara (12-26-0, 2-11-0/3) has rushed for less than 50 yards in a game in five straight games, and in six of his last 7 games. He’s been another redraft 1st-round RB FF-bust. He’s likely toast for 2022…and he’s likely to start 2023 suspended. His value is fading fast.
In this game, the Saints started using Ingram more over Kamara…out of obvious frustration. So, I’m not sure where the Saints staff goes from here. There’s no sense running AK into the ground the rest of the season, and he doesn’t seem interested in doing so anyway…and with Mark Ingram (12-26-0, 5-22-0/5) hurt/done for 2022 after getting hurt in this game, I’m looking at who NO might want to take a look at to work with Kamara like Ingram has this season.
Dwayne Washington is the only 53-man roster RB, but he’s not someone they want/need to take a look at.
David Johnson is on the practice squad, but again…not a guy the Saints need to see for the future.
Which leaves Derrick Gore, right now…a decent little RB from Kansas City last season but grabbed by the Saints for their practice squad this season. If you see him get activated, he might get some decent work…but it may not happen for a few more weeks…or might not happen at all. I’m just trying to think ahead on what the Saints might consider if Kamara is crashing and burning in a lost season.
-- Taysom Hill (2-35-1/3, 3-10-0, 1-for-1 for 21 yards) caught a TD pass to get back to a TE1 output week. If not for that/getting lost in coverage for a wide-open 30-yard TD catch it would have been another TE3 week. But with the sad state of streaming TEs, Taysom is still as hopeful as any random TE.
I like holding Taysom as a #2 TE going into the FF-playoffs, if I have spots to work with, because you never know if the Saints will have to force him in at QB late week due to the flu or whatever, and you could stumble into a week where Taysom is your starting TE but is playing QB…and that would be FF-huge in a playoff week.
-- I know Chris Olave (4-65-0/8) is the Saints #1 WR, but…man…is Rashid Shaheed (4-75-0/4) making a case that he’s a ‘playa’ as well.
Shaheed’s snaps are increasing every week and the past two weeks Shaheed has averaged 3.0 rec. (3.5 targets), 64.0 yards, 0.0 TDs per game…he’s moving towards WR3, a WR3 with upside to make lightning strike big plays.
This season, Rasheed has a 53-yard TD catch, a 44-yard jet sweep rushing TD…and he had a sweet 40-yard catch in this game.
Shaheed is working as the #2 WR, and when Olave gets a ton of cover attention, Shaheed is making plays when given the chance. But he’s the kind of guy that could get 1 target next week as they throw to Olave 17 times.
-- Third week in-a-row for Tom Brady (36-54 for 281 yards, 2 TDs/1 INT) with 2 TD passes in a game. I’d bet that streak is broken, for the bad, against SF this week…unless he gets there via a 4th-quarter flurry versus a prevent defense -- but the 49ers defense will be the toughest he’s faced all season…and doing so with his O-Line at its worst/most injury ravaged.
Snap Counts of Interest:
48 = Fournette
33 = Rachaad W
69 = Godwin
67 = Evans
52 = Julio
41 = Olave
36 = Shaheed
32 = Landry
13 = Callaway
11 = Kirk Merritt (just signed to 53-man roster)
11 = TreQuan
35 = Kamara
25 = Ingram
