Week 7 Thursday Night Football Single-Game NFL DFS: Top FanDuel & DraftKings Plays

Oct 19, 2023

Thursday Night Football Single-Game DFS: Jaguars vs. Saints

Charles LeClaire-USA TODAY Sports

Welcome to the showdown breakdown for Week 7 Thursday Night Football, where the Jacksonville Jaguars and the New Orleans Saints are set to clash in a game with tons of moving parts even with the game just hours away. The Jaguars, sitting atop the AFC South with a 4-2 record, are looking to solidify their division lead. Quarterback Trevor Lawrence’s knee is a bit banged up but it’s looking like he will still see action tonight. On the other side, the Saints, tied for second in a hotly contested NFC South, have a 3-3 record and are favored by a point in tonight's matchup, which may speak to the amount of uncertainty under-center for Jacksonville. Saints’ quarterback Derek Carr has been underwhelming, but they've still managed to piece together enough wins to stay competitive in a wide-open division, and it looks like they have a chance to do the same in this one. Let's dive into this intriguing game and review some strategies for single-game slate DFS players.

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Game Environment

^{This chart represents the general offensive strategies for each team when the game outcome is still in question (win probability between 20% and 80%). The final two minutes of each half are also excluded. We’ll include last year’s statistics through Week 4 of the regular season. Teams in the upper-right quadrant pass more often and play faster than the average NFL team in neutral game scripts, and conversely, teams in the lower-left quadrant play slower and run more often than the average NFL team.}

Jaguars (+1, 19.5) @ Saints (-1, 20.5); Over/Under 40

The Jaguars come into this matchup with an implied total of 19.5 points as one-point underdogs. Both teams have shown a faster-than-average pace in neutral game scripts, but neither has been overly pass-heavy. Jacksonville ranks 12th in pass plays per game and 14th in pace of play, resulting in an average of 2.3 offensive touchdowns per game. With Trevor Lawrence's knee not at 100%, the game script might lean slightly more towards the run but don't discount Lawrence's ability to air it out when needed.

The Saints, despite their faster pace and seventh overall ranking in pass plays per game, haven't been able to convert that into scoring. Favored by just a point, we’re likely in for a low-scoring affair with a horrible 40-point over/under. New Orleans’ offensive struggles make them a perplexing (read: annoying) team for DFS purposes, as they rank eighth overall in pace of play—meaning they're generally pass-oriented and fast—but score just 1.6 touchdowns per game, severely limiting the team's fantasy upside in most weeks. Considering the generally inefficient quarterback play, they usually need help from their defense and/or their opponents to keep games close, and lo and behold that might be the case again in week 7. Exploiting Lawrence's compromised mobility (or his absence) may result in a surprise positive game script throughout for New Orleans.

Quarterback Analysis

^{While there may be 22 people on the field for every play, each play and game is heavily dictated by the performance of each team’s quarterback. While efficiency isn’t everything for quarterbacks, it is the best indicator of future performance, so we use a trio of metrics to suss out top performers at the position compared to lackluster ones. xDrive Success %, or True Drive Success Rate, is a measurement of a QB’s ability to turn drives into scores weighted by sample size. EPA or Expected Points Added, is a measurement of the QB’s contribution, both running and throwing, to the team’s scoring and production vs. the average NFL team. Completion % over Expected (CPOE)represents the accuracy and efficiency of a QB’s passes compared to league expectations.}

Trevor Lawrence has been a mixed bag from a production and efficiency standpoint this season. While he's league average in per-drive and per-game efficiency, he's shown some decent accuracy, ranking slightly above average in completion percentage versus expectation. However, the third-year QB has struggled in high-leverage situations. He's 10th best in completion percentage from a clean pocket but falls to 18th in the red zone. Moreover, Lawrence has been abysmal under pressure—his 47% completion rate under such circumstances ranks him 29th among quarterbacks.

His unexpected rushing volume would be intriguing, as 5.5 rushes per game are the seventh-most among quarterbacks, but given his knee issue and lack of red-zone usage, expecting significant rushing upside at all is a stretch in this one. Lawrence's volatile style is most evident when looking at play grade data, as he ranks second-best in "money throws" but sixth-worst in danger plays as charted by PlayerProfiler.

For the Saints, Derek Carr has been less than stellar, as previously mentioned. Though he ranks just inside the top 10 in completion percentage vs. expectation, the positives pretty much end there. His efficiency metrics, gauged by true Drive Success Rate and EPA per game, are well below league averages, and in the bottom third among starters. Carr ranks 20th in adjusted yards per attempt, 20th in true completion percentage, and a dismal 29th in fantasy points per game. He’s no threat on the ground, averaging a mere 1.2 rushing yards per game, which further diminishes his fantasy appeal. Carr's willingness to go deep helps him a bit, as he leads the NFL in passes of 20-plus air yards. There's no way to spin it, Carr is a middling game manager of a QB at this point in his career.