2025 New Orleans Saints Fantasy Preview: Can Kellen Moore optimize Alvin Kamara and Chris Olave?

Few teams have had as much turnover in the offseason as the New Orleans Saints. In the coaching staff alone, the team will feature a new head coach in Kellen Moore, a new offensive coordinator in Doug Nussmeier, and a new defensive coordinator in Brandon Staley. That means there will be new visions all over the organization, which include new playbooks, terminology, and schemes for every player on the roster to learn.

Getting everybody on the same page quickly will be a big task for Moore, who is the youngest head coach in the NFL, but how quickly those changes begin to click will be crucial for determining how good this team can be in 2025.

2024 New Orleans Saints Stats (Rank)

Points per game: 19.9 (24th)

Total yards per game: 320.1 (21st)

Plays per game: 60.7 (22nd)

Dropbacks per game: 39.1 (18th)

Dropback EPA per play: -0.07 (30th)

Rush attempts per game: 26.1 (21st)

Rush EPA per play: -0.04 (10th)

Can a new coaching staff get the Saints to go marching?

The identity of the Saints’ offense will be the biggest mystery heading into preseason. The Saints have brought in Kellen Moore as their head coach, and given that he previously served as the offensive coordinator for the Eagles, Chargers, and Cowboys, it should go without saying that he will be the primary voice in the team’s offensive vision. However, he also brought in Doug Nussmeier, who was the quarterbacks coach on the same staff as Moore with the Eagles, Chargers, and Cowboys, and had previously served as the offensive coordinator at Alabama, Michigan, and Florida in the collegiate ranks. He’s bound to have a few ideas of his own from his wealth of experience. All of that offensive acumen could lead to fun things in New Orleans, but we also need to see that the vision for the offense is cohesive and achievable.

What we know about Moore from his stints as an offensive coordinator is that he loves to run a fast-paced offense that features plenty of plays. That’s generally great news for fantasy points. He uses motion consistently as a big part of his offenses as he aims to make his offense “look as confusing as possible” while keeping it simple underneath, using “a lot of the same concepts as ways of doing the same things,” as he said before his Chargers tenure. However, even in that piece, Moore mentions that “the beauty of the system is that you want to build it around the players,” so we should expect a system that caters to the skillset of guys like Alvin Kamara and Chris Olave. What that looks like is anybody’s guess right now.

Passing Game

QB: Tyler Shough, Spencer Rattler, Jake Haener

WR: Chris Olave, Bub Means, Dante Pettis

WR: Rashid Shaheed, Kevin Austin Jr.

WR: Brandin Cooks, Donovan Peoples-Jones, Cedrick Wilson Jr.

TE: Juwan Johnson, Taysom Hill, Foster Moreau

The biggest change for the Saints, other than the coaching overhaul, was the retirement of Derek Carr. After battling multiple injuries, including a few major ones to his shoulder, the 34-year-old abruptly called it a career in May, which means that the Saints will turn to either rookie Tyler Shough or second-year pro Spencer Rattler to lead their offense. In six games started last year, Rattler completed 120 of 228 passes (57% completion percentage) for 1,317 yards with four touchdowns and five interceptions. He never won a game for the Saints and had an inflated 9% sack rate, so the Saints will certainly hope that Shough can beat him out in the preseason.

Shough himself comes with many question marks. The 25-year-old was a surprise second-round pick this season after throwing for 3,195 yards with 23 touchdowns and six interceptions for Louisville last year. As a seven-year college football veteran, Shough has far more experience than most rookies and has played in many different systems. He has smooth mechanics with a quick delivery and more than enough arm strength to make throws at all levels. He doesn’t have tons of mobility to be an asset with his legs at the NFL level, but he can make good decisions when things go awry and should be able to push the ball down the field enough to rejuvenate an offense that averaged 205.2 passing yards per game last season, which was good for 23rd in the NFL. Without Carr, their yards per play dropped from 5.7 to 4.6, so the bar for Shough to clear to be better isn’t super high.

Of course, part of that struggle last season was injuries to the team’s top two wide receivers, Chris Olave and Rashid Shaheed. Olave appeared in just eight games due to multiple concussions, while Shaheed tore his meniscus and had season-ending surgery after playing in just six games. Olave figures to be the primary target on the outside. He had 1,123 receiving yards and five touchdowns in 2023 and has shown flashes of being a true gamebreaker when healthy. The two biggest questions will be his ongoing concussion issues, which got scary in 2024, and whether Kellen Moore can scheme ways to get him the ball. Shough was not particularly accurate when under pressure during college, so the Saints can’t let him hang in the pocket and wait for Olave and Shaheed to get open downfield. Moore loves to use motion, so it would seem likely that he’ll move Olave around the formation and try to find ways to get the ball in his hands with room to make a play. That gives the 25-year-old plenty of upside as a fantasy WR2, but the concussion issues will always keep his risk high.

How Shaheed fits into this offense will be a bigger question. The 26-year-old had emerged as one of the better deep threats in the league, but the Saints had trouble connecting on those deep balls without Carr, and Shaheed had just a 49% catch rate last year. Shough has the arm to push the ball down the field, but will he have the time and patience to stay in the pocket to let Shaheed get open? If not, can Moore and Nussmeier create ways for Shaheed to be impactful without those home run catches? All the questions around the Saints’ offense make it hard to draft Shaheed outside of deeper formats or as a later-round pick in best ball leagues.

The Saints round out their receiving corps with second-year receiver Bub Means and two new additions, Brandin Cooks and Donovan Peoples-Jones. Cooks is not the player he once was and hasn’t topped 700 receiving yards since 2021. However, he is a veteran receiver who will bring a wealth of experience to a Saints organization that drafted him in the first round in the 2014 NFL Draft. Peoples-Jones seemed to be on the verge of a breakout after a strong 2022 season that saw him put up 839 receiving yards and three touchdowns with the Browns. He was a victim of the Browns’ chaos in 2023, failed to produce in eight games with the Lions that season as well, and then didn’t get into an NFL game last season. He’s just 26 years old and is one of the bigger receivers on the team at 6’2″ 205 pounds, so perhaps he or the 6’2″ 215-pound Means can emerge as a red zone threat or chain-mover in this offense. Until we see how the playing time is going to shake out, it’s hard to draft any of those three in fantasy leagues.

Lastly, starting tight end Juwan Johnson benefited from the injuries to the other pass-catchers and emerged as a primary receiving option last year, posting 548 receiving yards on 50 catches with three touchdowns. He took off for the Saints after Taysom Hill tore his ACL in Week 13 and was then re-signed to a three-year contract in the off-season, so it would be safe to assume that, with Hill likely to miss most of the season, the Saints would like to keep Johnson as a key contributor in the offense. Over the final five weeks of the season, after Hill’s injury, Johnson ran a route on 80% of the team’s dropbacks and averaged 5.4 targets per game, which was a nearly 16% target share. He posted 7.9 fantasy points per game in half-PPR leagues over that stretch, which was good for TE12; however, we also have to acknowledge that Olave and Shaheed were not healthy during that stretch. Moore’s offenses tend to have a high play volume, so there is a good chance that Johnson is a solid TE2, but with a fully healthy receiving corps, getting consistent TE1 production from him might be hard.

Running Game

RB: Alvin Kamara, Kendre Miller, Devin Neal, Cam Akers

OL (L-R): Kelvin Banks Jr., Trevor Penning, Erik McCoy, Cesar Ruiz, Taliese Fuaga

People like to think of Kellen Moore as a pass-first coach because he was a quarterback himself and the Cowboys offenses that he ran threw the ball a ton. However, last season with the Eagles, his 44.3% pass rate was one of the lowest marks in the league, and he has talked about gearing his offense to his personnel. With an inexperienced quarterback under center, regardless of who wins the job, it would not be surprising to see Moore try to lean into Alvin Kamara and a rushing attack that finished 14th in the NFL last year with 114.9 rush yards per game.

Despite not topping 1,000 yards rushing again, Kamara rushed for his most yards ever in 2024, piling up 950 yards on 228 carries, which was good for 4.2 yards per carry. He was ninth among all running backs in carries per game and handled the second-most carries of his career; however, his efficiency metrics weren’t great. He was below average in broken tackle rate, yards after contact, and rush yards over expected. He has never been great at gaining yards after contact as a rusher, and, at this stage in his career, is going to rely heavily on his offensive line and his receiving work for fantasy value. He had 68 catches on 89 targets last year for 543 receiving yards and two touchdowns, despite posting a below-average 9% drop rate.

At the end of the day, Kamara is a volume play. He had 17.4% of the Saints’ targets and had a touch on 48.5% of snaps, but is that type of workload repeatable with Olave and Shaheed back in the mix? There is some upside for Kamara to gain red zone work with Hill hurt and Jamaal Williams gone, but Kamara has not been an efficient red zone running back in his career, and has converted just two of 10 rushes inside the 10-yard line over the last five seasons. He finished as RB6 in half-PPR points per game last year with 16.5, so his receiving work still keeps him in the RB1 mix, but he feels like more of a back-end RB1 this season who is more of an RB2 in standard leagues.

A lot of Kamara’s production will depend on the improvement of an offensive line that ranks 22nd in football, according to Pro Football Focus. There are plenty of high draft picks on the line, including new left tackle Kelvin Banks Jr. Starting center Erik McCoy graded out as easily their best player in just seven games last season, and Trevor Penning showed some promise at guard, so there are pieces here; they’re just young and inexperienced. If Banks Jr. can hit the ground running, this can be at least a league-average unit, but if the younger players don’t develop or struggle with consistency early on, that’s going to hurt both Kamara and the passing attack.

Elsewhere in the running back room, Jamaal Williams leaving town should also open up more work for Kendre Miller, who is freed from Dennis Allen’s doghouse. It’s been a tough NFL road for Miller, who suffered an MCL injury, a knee injury, and a hamstring injury in his rookie season, and then missed the first five weeks of 2024 with a hamstring injury and then four more weeks with a hamstring injury on his other leg. Soft tissue injuries are often recurring, so there is plenty of risk that Miller’s body can’t hold up at the NFL level. However, he has shown flashes as both a runner and receiver when he is on the field. At 6’0″ and 220 pounds, he has the size to fill the red zone role for the Saints and is still just 23 years old, so his career arc is not written in stone. With Kamara healthy, Miller’s best avenue to fantasy relevance is that red zone usage, so that will be a key to watch in preseason. Still, he’s not a preferred handcuff pick in drafts given his own extensive injury history.

The Saints also return Clyde Edwards-Helaire, brought in Cam Akers this offseason, and drafted Devin Neal out of Kansas in the sixth round. All three will battle Miller for backup reps behind Kamara, but none are exciting for 2025 purposes. Akers looked semi-rejuvenated in Minnesota after struggling with the Texans in the first five games of the season, but he lacks explosiveness, and Edwards-Helaire played behind Miller last year in New Orleans. Neal showed a three-down skillset at Kansas and can break a big play, but he fell in the draft and landed in a confusing running back room on a mediocre offense, so it’s probably best to stay away in fantasy.

2025 New Orleans Saints Win Total

DraftKings Over/Under: 5.5

Pick: Over (+100)

This pick is as much about the Saints as it is about their weak division, which also features the Panthers and Falcons, and a schedule that ranks as the second-easiest in the NFL thanks to games against the Patriots, Rams, Jets, and Titans. We also have to consider the defensive side of the ball when projecting wins. Brandon Staley may have flamed out as a head coach for the Chargers, but he was a great defensive coordinator before getting that job, and he’ll get to coach a squad with players like Cameron Jordan, Demario Davis, Tyrann Mathieu, Chase Young, Bryan Bresee, Kool-Aid McKinstry, and now also Justin Reid. That should be more than enough talent to put together a solid defense, so if the offensive playmakers can stay healthy and the Saints get just marginal quarterback play, they should go over this total.