Chris Olave

Olave has mostly been as advertised since the Saints drafted him 11th overall in 2022, putting up back-to-back 1,000-yard seasons while making a living with his 4.39 speed and nifty route-running rather than yards after the catch. His second season featured 15 more catches, 81 more yards and one more TD than his debut campaign, but it was a product of adding 207 snaps. Olave was actually targeted on a slightly larger share of his routes as a rookie (26.9 percent to 25.1) and produced more yards per route (2.35 to 2.05) and per target (8.8 to 8.1), even though the Saints got an ostensible QB upgrade during the 2023 offseason. In practice, 2023 Derek Carr was similar to 2022 Andy Dalton, playing through numerous injuries and struggling to get anything going on passes that weren't thrown to Olave (138 targets), Rashid Shaheed (75) or rookie A.T. Perry (18). Those three accounted for half of the team's receiving TDs and 49 percent of the yardage on 40 percent of the targets, while RB Alvin Kamara and WR Michael Thomas got volume when they were available but didn't do much with it. Thomas is gone now and hasn't been replaced by another veteran, with Shaheed and Perry both profiling as deep threats but probably not volume guys. That leaves a lot of the burden on Olave's shoulders, potentially setting up a third-year breakout if things go well for Carr and the passing game under new offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak. Read Past Outlooks