Welcome to the Monday edition of the Daily Dose newsletter, our “Fantasy Fallout” day. In this article, you will get a quick rundown of the relevant things we learned from the week’s games from Thursday through Sunday. 

We won’t talk about every single player and we usually won’t spend time on studs who go nuts (no one needs to be told to start CeeDee Lamb right now!), but rather, the idea is to update you on usage trends, injuries, and other relevant things to help your decisions with your teams.

Broncos at Saints

• Rookie WR Mason Tipton led the Saints with nine targets, turning the opportunity into 45 yards on six catches. With Rashid Shaheed (knee) out for the season and Chris Olave recently suffering his fourth career concussion, Tipton is an intriguing waiver pickup for those needing WR depth.
• Alvin Kamara struggled as the Saints were unable to generate offense without Derek Carr or either of their top two WRs, but he still saw seven targets. Despite the poor outing, Kamara remains a weekly starter but may face an uphill battle until Carr and Olave return.
• Javonte Williams scored his first two TDs of the season and saw 17 or more touches for the third time in his last four games. He gets the league’s worst rush defense in the Carolina Panthers next week.
• Courtland Sutton wasn’t targeted in the game, which was the first time all season he drew fewer than four targets. Sutton’s upside is going to continue to be capped by rookie Bo Nix, but he gets a friendly matchup next week and can continue to be started as a WR3 in deeper leagues.  

Patriots at Jaguars

These are the top players to consider adding from waivers this week. Unless otherwise noted, all players below are available in greater than 50% of Yahoo leagues (as of Sunday evening).

Week 8 teams on bye: None

QB Streaming Special

Tua Tagovailoa, MIA, Week 8 vs AZ

• Mike wrote this spot up well in Sunday’s “Early Waiver Adds”. Remember that in some leagues you might have been able to stash Tua on your IR spot already and could’ve saved your waiver priority or FAAB this week if you need a streamer.
• Low-priority add. Tua returns to a Miami lineup full of playmakers and in a great matchup home against the Cardinals. He’s a great streaming option in single-QB formats.
• 5% or less of FAAB.

RB Pickups

These are the guys who public perception may be low on but have brighter days ahead…..as well as the guys who may be coming off a big game but have a tough schedule or potential role change in their future.

BUY LOW

C.J. Stroud, QB, HOU

• Stroud had a down game against the Packers, passing for only 86 yards in a close loss. However, the Texans’ offense still scored 22 points and their upcoming schedule against the Colts, Jets, and Lions should provide opportunities for Stroud to get back on track. Stroud will also be getting Nico Collins back around Week 10 or 11 and should have a nice stretch late in the season with his pass catchers back at full strength.

Alvin Kamara, RB, NO

This article is intended to highlight some players who may have a positive or negative weekly outlook relative to their baseline value. 

“Starts” are players who might generally be on fantasy benches but might have a terrific perceived matchup or game script/environment, or the potential for an expanded role due to past performance or injuries to teammates or opponents. 

“Fades” are players who were likely drafted as fantasy starters or have performed as automatic starters lately but face a particularly tough week due to a poor matchup or a lack of short-term role clarity due to an injury, etc.

Here are a few of my notable starts and fades for Week 8 of the 2024 NFL season, with some notes on my thought process included:

QB

Start: Caleb Williams, CHI (at WAS)

• The Bears are well rested coming off of their bye. Williams had two great games heading into the bye week, completing 43/58 passes for 530 yards and six TDs with a single interception. He added 90 yards rushing.
• This week, Williams and the Bears head to Washington in a game with a middling implied point total (43.0). This was supposed to be a battle between the top two picks from April’s draft, Williams and Jayden Daniels, but Daniels is questionable to play after leaving last week’s game with a rib injury. The Commanders’ defense is among the most generous in the league in passer rating allowed (107.4, third worst), completion percentage allowed (70.2, sixth worst), and yards per attempt allowed (7.8, seventh worst).
• Pure narrative/speculation here, but I’m guessing the entire Bears organization has been hearing how awesome Daniels is/has been (rightfully so!) and would like nothing more than to run up the score this week with their own ascending rookie QB against an exploitable Washington defense. I like Williams as a back-end QB1 option.

Fade:  Geno Smith, SEA (vs BUF)

Some things in fantasy football are easy. We know we should start Ja’Marr Chase and Saquon Barkley. We know we should bench the backup running back who is only on our roster in case of injury. A lot of the decisions are made for us. However, there are a lot of things that are not so simple. All of the “in between” situations are what can make the difference between a few wins and losses, and therefore it can be the difference between a successful season or a failed season. Every Friday, we are here to help!!

I’ll take questions each week in our #fantasy-football channel in our Discord from people looking for Start/Sit advice and give my thoughts. This article on Fridays will feature a few of those questions and responses, so join our Discord to be a part of the conversation or ask questions of your own!!

Question 1:: Full PPR. Need 3 out of these 5: Malik Nabers, Brian Thomas Jr., Jayden Reed, Cedric Tillman, or DeAndre Hopkins? (mpr3eagle2)

Answer:: This feels like a situation where you are overthinking things and we need to be able to separate the different types of fantasy football, while also being able to use thoughts from one format to help make decisions in another. For me, the answer to this is clearly Nabers, Thomas, and Reed as your three starters. Tillman is coming off a nice game and is cheap in DFS this week while facing a team that may force the Browns to throw a lot (while also getting a QB upgrade). Hopkins is getting a massive QB upgrade from the Titans to Mahomes. It’s easy to want to play those guys. But in regular fantasy football, there is no salary cap savings to benefit you or ownership angles to consider. In a vacuum, the expectations and projections for the first three in this question are significantly better than Tillman and Hopkins for this week. Trust the talent.

Question 2:: Pick one if Zay Flowers is in, two if he’s out: DeAndre Hopkins, Chase Brown, Trey Palmer, Xavier Worthy, or DeMario Douglas? (0.5 PPR) (skilledwg)

The weekend is here and it’s time to get our lineups set before Sunday’s full slate of games. Each week, the Saturday edition of the Daily Dose will feature my rankings for all players who have yet to play a game this week. Obviously this will not include the Thursday games, but feel free to hit me up in Discord if you have some tough decisions around guys who play on Thursday. 

Most of the leagues I play in are full-PPR, 12-team leagues and these rankings are designed for those settings – you may need to make some slight adjustments based on your own league settings.

QB:: 

1. Lamar Jackson
2. Josh Allen
3. Jalen Hurts
4. Joe Burrow
5. Jordan Love
6. C.J. Stroud
7. Jayden Daniels
8. Kyler Murray
9. Caleb Williams
10. Patrick Mahomes
11. Kirk Cousins
12. Tua Tagovailoa
13. Jared Goff
14. Brock Purdy
15. Trevor Lawrence
16. Bo Nix
17. Drake Maye
18. Aaron Rodgers
19. Baker Mayfield
20. Anthony Richardson
21. Dak Prescott
22. Jameis Winston
23. Geno Smith
24. Russell Wilson
25. Daniel Jones

RB:: 

The theme of this article is, “Work smarter, not harder.” Every week we will give you the top Waiver Adds in our Tuesday article. However, you can make things a lot easier and less stressful by getting ahead of things with some players and situations. Doing so in a smart way can help you save FAAB or preserve high waiver priority in your league. 

Every Sunday I will give you a few players who stand out to me as great potential additions that can give you a leg up on your league mates. Look to add these players if you have players you are willing to drop, who get late-week injuries, or who are ruled out of their games and allow you to move them to an IR spot once they are officially inactive on Sunday morning.

Derek Carr, QB, NO

• Why would you pick up a QB who is about to miss his third straight game? Because he plays the Panthers next week and his coach expects him to return. Carr may not be the highest-ceiling QB around, but among the QBs that are rostered in under 50% of leagues currently, he has by far the best matchup. If for some reason he isn’t able to play in Week 9, you can just pick up a different QB that you would have been stuck with anyways. This is an especially good pickup if your league has an IR spot, as you can add Carr now, put him on IR, and still pick another player up to fill that roster spot. Carr is available in about 90% of leagues.

Braelon Allen, RB, NYJ