Eli's TNF Player Prop Picks: Jaguars @ Saints

In his editorial FlashPicks debut Eli walks us through his favorite plays for Thursday Night Football and he's focusing on one key player in particluar...

There haven’t been many reasons to watch the Saints play football this season unless you’re a Saints fan. Or, I guess, if your team is facing the Saints. So, you may not have heard much about Rashid Shaheed. He may not be a household name yet behind guys like Chris Olave and Michael Thomas, but he's quickly becoming a guy that Derek Carr is looking to get the football.

First, we have to talk about his love for the deep ball. Among receivers with more than 150 yards this season, Shaheed ranks third in the entire NFL with an average depth of target (ADOT) of 18.22 yards, trailing only Justin Watson and Marvin Mims Jr. He’s not a check down receiver, this man only runs go-routes. With this Saints offense looking extremely vanilla most of this season, Shaheed could really be the guy that takes them to the next level.

With that absurd ADOT number, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that Shaheed has the same number of explosive plays (6) as Chris Olave. He’s done that, mind you, with only 27 targets this season, compared to Olave’s 53.

Next, let's address the target situation. In the first three weeks, Shaheed only saw the ball 12 times. But in the last three weeks, this jumped to 15 targets. Plus, that’s including a 2-target game against the Patriots. This was a game that saw the Saints run the ball 38 times, and a season low 28 passing plays. In fact, it’s the only week this season where the Saints ran the ball more than they passed. Thursday, they’ll take a Jags defense that just held Jonathan Taylor and Zach Moss to 40 total rushing yards on 15 attempts, while also allowing Gardner Minshew to throw for 329, I expect Derek Carr to be throwing it around quite a bit.

What should we do with all of this information? That’s a good question. Here’s what I’m doing.