A punt option is usually a player so inexpensive that you aren’t looking for big points, but just enough to keep from sinking your lineup while you pay up for bigger — home run plays like Christian McCaffrey or Michael Thomas or Lamar Jackson. We’ve started your research for you with some of the better bottom-priced players going for this Saturday.
Today we’ll look at tight ends and defense/special teams,
Tight Ends
Cameron Brate ($3,500), O.J. Howard ($4,000), Buccaneers
Both Brate and Howard saw an uptick in work against the Colts with Mike Evans out and Chris Godwin out for a quarter. Howard led the team with eight targets and Brate tied with Godwin at seven. Neither put up strong fantasy points though, as Breshad Perriman used his six targets to go off for 113 yards and three touchdowns. Perriman won’t likely take up such a huge chunk of the scoring this week and Brate and Howard both have a good matchup against a team that allows the eighth-most fantasy points to tight ends.
As an anecdotal aside, Winston reportedly told his tight ends when they came in on Tuesday, “Hey, y’all are going to get the rock.”
Jordan Akins ($2,900), Texans
This small slate is filled with cheaper tight ends in committees and on teams that don’t use them much. The return of Will Fuller knocked Akins and Darren Fells down to two targets each last week and with Kenny Stills and Fuller healthy for this week, there likely won’t be enough work to give either Texans tight end enough to be fantasy relevant. But, the Buccaneers have been bad against tight ends this season while Aikins has been the slightly preferred tight end target of late. I’d probably lean his way more in Showdown rather than full day slate, though.
Defense/Special Teams
Buccaneers ($2,300) vs. Texans
This game has the highest over/under of the day by a wide margin, so there will likely be plenty of points, which isn’t great for a D/ST but it also means a lot of passing and DeShaun Watson is coming off back-to-back games where he threw two interceptions in each and was sacked 10 times total. Shaq Barrett is at 16.5 sacks on the season and the Bucs stop the run, having allowed just 56.4 rushing yards per game and the fewest fantasy points to running backs. Watson will be forced to drop back early and often, giving the Bucs chances for sacks and interceptions.