Before diving into Fantasy analysis for each team, I'll present a brief overview containing their offensive ranks in my base line team projections as well as any notable coaching or offensive line changes.

Projected Offensive Plays – (17th)

Projected Passing TDs – 25.5 (19th)

Projected Rushing TDs – 15.3 (29th)

Notable coaching changes:

• Klint Kubiak hired as offensive coordinator

Kubiak served as the passing game specialist for the 49ers in 2023. He as also the offensive coordinator for the Minnesota Vikings in 2021. It's tough to predict in what ways Kyle Shanahan and Kevin O'Connell will have rubbed off on him, but those are two terrific influences for Kubiak to have worked with. Both are among the absolute best play-callers, and both utilize pre-snap motion and play action at a high rate. Things will likely look much different for this Saints offense in 2024.

Notable offensive line changes

• Drafted tackle Taliese Fuaga 14th overall
• Lost Andrus Peat in free agency

This Saints offensive line has three former first round picks -- Fuaga in 2024, Trevor Penning in 2022, and Cesar Ruiz in 2020 -- along with a 2019 Round 2 pick and 2023 Round 4 pick as projected starters. There's talent on this line. And yet, this may be the worst offensive line in the NFL in 2024. Ruiz has yet to post his first season with a PFF grade above 60, and he's entering his fifth season. Penning has managed to only stay on the field for 541 total snaps through two pro seasons and allowed pressure at the highest rate of any Saints lineman in 2023. Other than reliable center play from Erik McCoy, the only lineman who the Saints could trust in 2023 was Ryan Rramczyk, and he's set to miss all of 2024 and potentially beyond as he rehabs knee surgery.

There's enough talent on this line that I'm not assuming it will be a disaster. But it requires a leap of faith to assume that these underachieving former early-round draft picks will improve in a significant way in 2024. And, really, New Orleans needs multiple guys to step up here. Really strong center play doesn't do much for an offense if the offensive line pieces surrounding that spot are liabilities.

Olave finished as the WR25 in Fantasy (full PPR scoring) as a rookie and ranked as the WR16 in 2023. That's pretty impressive given what the Saints offense has asked him to do. During Olave's initial two professional seasons, he's played in one of the league's most static and predictable offenses. I'm so excited to see the ways in which Kubiak might empower him to take a step forward in Year 3.

What is wild about Olave is that even with a boring route tree, he's won in a pretty unprecedented way for a WR at this stage in an NFL career.

I have Olave projected for a 24.5% target share in Year 3. His career target share is 24% and rises to 25.5% in healthy games. The Saints didn't add any significant target competition. This offense will again center around Olave, and it's possible that we see his target share reach levels that we've never seen if he isn't stuck running so many go routes.

I project Olave for 150 targets, which still isn't enough to get him near the range of receivers like Puka Nacua, Garrett Wilson, and Nico Collins in my projections. Olave actually comes in notably lower than Jaylen Waddle, Drake London, and Brandon Aiyuk too. There's a significant difference in their touchdown projections. Olave hasn't accounted for more than 20% of his offense's passing touchdowns in either of his first two seasons, a relatively easy mark for an alpha WR to eclipse. His red zone target shares through two seasons sit at just 18.5% and 17.7%. He's accounted for 23.4% of the New Orleans end zone targets in healthy games, again, a relatively low rate for a player of his caliber.

With Michael Thomas off the roster, it appears the Saints are ready to move forward with undrafted gem Rashid Shaheed as a full-time player. The Fantasy degenerates rejoice!

Without Thomas on the field, Shaheed has drawn a target on one-fifth of his routes run and produced a super strong 2.16 yards per route run.

When given opportunities, Shaheed has looked like a baller.

If Kubiak does indeed implement a significant increase in play action usage, Shaheed will likely be the recipient of a lot of those targets.

For what it's worth, we saw Shaheed's efficiency drop in a meaningful way over a larger sample size in his second season, but he still was plenty productive. We sometimes see part-time players struggle to produce the same type of magic when elevated into a full-time role, but I don't necessarily suspect that will be the case with Shaheed. I'm cautiously optimistic that he's going to be a productive player who does matter for Fantasy. Both Shaheed and Olave have been better when not facing press coverage, so here's to hoping that Kubiak does indeed find creative pre-snap motion answers for these two and keeps opposing defender's hands off of these receivers at the line of scrimmage!

Alvin Kamara reported to camp amid a contract dispute, and my expectation is that he will suit up and handle the bulk of the backfield work for this offense in Week 1. The reports out of New Orleans on second-year RB Kendre Miller have not been positive this summer, and the most recent quote is really discouraging.

I feel pretty confident in projecting Kamara for a large workload. I feel less convicted about the type of efficacy that we can expect from him in his age-29 season.

Kamara' efficiency has been on a steady decline, and I do not feel good about his fit with the new coaching regime as a zone rusher.

Even with this considered, Kamara's PPR projection is just silly. His median PPR per-game projection is higher than all of the following players: Travis Etienne, De'Von Achane, James Cook, Kenneth Walker, Joe Mixon. He was the RB3 in PPR on a per-game basis in 2023, only Christian McCaffrey and Kyren Williams averaged more PPR points. In half-PPR, Kamara still projects for more points than Cook and Walker and isn't far off of Etienne, Achane, or Mixon. In any sort of PPR format, Kamara looks like a massive value. I don't expect him to be an efficient rusher, but I do expect this offense to rank in the top-10 in both pass rate and pace of play and produce a ton of target opportunities for Kamara. On paper, he's a clear steal at his price in drafts.

Last thing -- shoutout Juwan Johnson. If he gets healthy, he brings upside to become an upside late-round tight end if this offense performs well under Kubiak.

I'll be back in your inbox every weekday with a new team preview during the month of July and into the first week of August! Friday, we will be covering the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. If you have any feedback on the team-by-team previews or any questions about the upcoming teams, feel free to send them my way.