It’s Week 13 in the NFL and that means, for many of us, that the fantasy football regular season is rapidly coming to a close. Meanwhile, the actual regular season is just heating up with six weeks to go and both the (5-6) Saints and the (7-4) Cowboys have a lot at stake when they square off in New Orleans on Thursday.
(-220) Cowboys at (+180) Saints (+4.5, o/u 47.5)
Both teams are struggling right now. Dallas has lost three of their last four while New Orleans has dropped four straight and the only win, by either team, during that stretch came against their common opponent, the Falcons. The Boys whooped Atlanta 43-3 and the Saints should have probably beat them too but blew a coverage late in the game. Dallas is fortunate to still be comfortably sitting atop the pitiful NFC East, but the Saints’ skid saw them fall from 1st to 3rd in the NFC South and on the outside looking in at the playoff picture.
The Cowboys have had all sorts of personnel issues recently, including Trysten Hill being rightfully suspended for punching Raiders’ guard John Simpson after their Thanksgiving game. That suspension was reduced to one game on appeal, but Hill will still miss the Thursday nighter. in good news, Amari Cooper looks like he’ll finally be back for the Cowboys after being activated off the Covid list. His absence made it abundantly clear how valuable he is to their offense, but he was able to get in a limited practice on Wednesday so it’ll be tough to know if he’ll be 100% game-ready given the short week. Cooper’s wingman, CeeDee Lamb looked like he may not be back for this one either, still dealing with a concussion, but he was a full participant in practice all week and says he’ll be there. The news comes at a good time as WRs Cedric Wilson is out with an ankle injury and Malik Turner is questionable after not practicing this week due to illness. Cooper and Lamb are as good of tandem as there is in the league and we saw how the Saints struggled in pass coverage against Buffalo.
New Orleans gets a bit of good news, but it’s mostly not great. Alvin Kamara was upgraded to questionable as he deals with a lingering knee injury but was ruled out on Thursday morning. That’s a huge hit to the offense, but Mark Ingram II will for sure be back as his injury designation was wiped after a week of full practice. The most interesting piece of news just might be the rumors/news that Taysom Hill is going to take over as the starting QB. He was dressed for the Thanksgiving game but spent the entire game on the sidelines. He’s been limited by a foot injury and given his style of play, Sean Payton being conservative is understandable.
Payton is a crafty coach and, especially with Hill in the game, you know they’re going to attack the Boys’ 21st ranked rush defense that surrenders over 107-yards-per-game and 4.4-yards-per-carry. The problem is that their starting tackles Ryan Ramczyk and Terron Armstead are out of this one too. New Orleans won’t be able to stray too far from their identity so the burden is going to be on the defense to keep it close. The Saints give up the fewest rushing-YPC and rank 3rd in YPG, so their best bet is to control the clock, limit possessions, and hope they can disrupt the passing game enough to keep it close. That defense is also missing defensive end Marcus Davenport, DE Tanoh Kpassagnon, and LB Kaden Ellis. So, it’s going to be an uphill climb for that group.
I can’t help but feel a little bad for Trevor Siemian in all this because he’s mostly played well. He stepped up and beat the Bucs when Jameis Winston got injured and, in his five games, he’s thrown from 1,083-yards & 9-TDs with only 3-INTs. The bigger issue is that the Saints’ defense gave up more than 30-points-per-game over that four-game losing streak in November. That’s 8-PPG more than their season average, and that’s not Siemian’s fault. The Saints desperately need to correct that with Dallas getting some offensive firepower back. If they can dominate on the ground and get a break here and there, it’s a winnable game.
Looking back to each team’s respective Turkey Day games, the Cowboys showed signs of life and forced overtime after trailing the entire game but ultimately cost themselves with unforced errors. The Saints, on the other hand, got steamrolled by the Bills and had very little success until garbage time. With the injuries in the key positions for NO, I’ve gotta think Dallas is in a better position heading into this one.
Pick: Cowboys | ATS: Cowboys -4.5 | O/U: Over 47.5 | Final: DAL 27-17 NO