What You Need to Know:

-- Cook set career highs last year in yards per catch, yards per target and TDs.

-- He ranked just 21st among TEs in targets per game.

-- Cook’s playing time dipped late in the year, and then the team drafted TE Adam Trautman.

-- The Saints have added Emmanuel Sanders to the WR corps.

Inflating the Bubble

Cook enjoyed a nice 1st season with the Saints, finishing 7th among TEs in PPR scoring and 6th in non-PPR. He set career highs in yards per catch, yards per target and TDs and put up his 2nd-best catch rate. Cook did so despite ranking just 16th at the position in targets; 21st among TEs in targets per game.

Look no further than the TDs. Cook scored on 20.9% of his receptions. Among the top 50 fantasy TEs, only Ricky Seals-Jones and Foster Moreau posted higher TD rates -- and neither caught more than 21 passes. The nearest TE to Cook in TD rate with 40+ catches was Mark Andrews, at 15.6%.

They were the only 2 TEs with 40+ catches who cracked 10% in TD rate last season.

Over 10 years with 4 other teams before last season, Cook scored on 5.9% of his receptions. Jimmy Graham scored TDs on 13.2% of his catches across 5 years with the Saints (and Drew Brees). Graham’s best TD season -- when he led the NFL with 16 in 2013 -- produced an 18.6% TD rate.

The message here: Cook is headed for a downturn in TD rate, and it could be a big one.

Altered Situation

Saints WRs drew the 5th-smallest share of targets among WR corps league wide last season (47.7%). Only Minnesota, Philly, Baltimore and Oakland threw fewer passes to wideouts.

That also marked the smallest share for Saints WRs since 2014. New Orleans’ WR corps that season was led by a 31-year-old Marques Colston -- who would play just 1 more year -- and rookie Brandin Cooks, who missed 6 games.

The Saints addressed their 2019 WR deficiency by signing Emmanuel Sanders in free agency. He’ll be the team’s best #2 wid…