Saquon Barkley & Evan Engram Injury Updates: Fantasy Outlook

Giants pick up Saquon Barkley's fifth-year option

Getty Saquon Barkley of the New York Giants.

The New York Giants have been extremely hampered by their inability to move the football down the field these past few weeks. Mainly due to their limited amount of skill players surrounding quarterback Daniel Jones.

The G-Men have mustered up an alarmingly low average of just 212 total yards over the past two weeks. However, if signs from the Giants practice field on Wednesday are an indication of what’s to come this coming week, New York will have their most complete offensive arsenal to date.

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Saquon Barkley Trending Towards a Return

Saquon Barkley has not played since injuring his ankle back in Week 3 vs. the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. His loss from the Giants offense has been extremely detrimental to not only the team as a whole but the growth of quarterback Daniel Jones. Jones has averaged below 190 passing yards and doubled his three touchdowns with six interceptions over that time span.

Barkley could have likely given it a go a week ago vs. the Patriots. However, due to a short week, and the vaunted matchup in front of them, New York decided to give their star running back one more week to get right. From all indications, It seems like it’s worked.

Wednesday marked the first day Barkley has been a full participant in practice since originally sustaining his injury.

All signs point towards Barkley returning the Giants lineup in time for a matchup with the Arizona Cardinals on Sunday. While Arizona has been surprisingly stout against the running back position this season, they were recently gashed by Devonta Freeman in Week 6 to the tune of 25.3 fantasy points.


Evan Engram Primed for Monster Performance in Return

Saquon Barkley was not the only injured star to make his return to the practice field on Wednesday. Tight end Evan Engram was also a full participant amidst a knee injury that kept him out of last week’s lineup.

Engram has emerged as one of the league’s top playmakers at the tight end position. Prior to his injury, only one player at his position had averaged more than Engram’s 16.6 fantasy points per game.

Engram is gifted with a mouth-watering matchup in Week 7 vs. an Arizona defense who has been abysmal at defending tight ends. In fact, no team has been worse at defending the position than the Cards in 2019. They allow a staggering 20.82 fantasy points per game to TEs. No other team in the league allows more than 14.70.  If that’s not enough to get you excited about Engram’s fantasy prospect this weekend, take into consideration that the Cardinals have allowed seven receiving touchdowns to tight ends over their first six games. That’s more receiving touchdowns than 10 NFL defensive units have allowed all season, regardless of position.

Engram and Barkley’s likely return to the Giants’ lineup for Week 7 will mark the first time that Daniel Jones has had the benefit of having both top playmakers alongside Golden Tate at his arsenal in the same game.

With New York just one game out of first place in the NFC East, the arrow is certainly pointing up on the Giants season.

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