NFL Week 8 Start, Sit and More!

It might feel slightly early, but welcome to the Halloween edition of the Ballfield Banter newsletter! 👻 🎃 🍬 

I wanted to have some fun with this newsletter, so I did something dangerous: I told my wife to pick a title/theme and I would have to write about or incorporate it into the newsletter in some fashion. In this case, the theme is SCARY!

So, if you see a bunch of lame puns, please go easy on me. I’m just trying to have some little Halloween fun and every now and then it’s just nice to stick in a little cheesy, or maybe (candy)corny, bits here and there.

Let’s kick this thing off!

Things to look out for in Week 8

Quarterbacks

🧀 Jordan Love gets a great matchup this week against Jacksonville. The Jags have allowed the second-most passing yards and the most passing touchdowns to QBs this year. They have only one interception on the season.

🐬 After missing more than a month due to a concussion, Tua Tagovailoa is back. He gets the Cardinals, who have given up the fourth most points to the position. It doesn’t hurt that the Cardinals also have one of the worst pressure rates in the NFL, so Tua should have no problem finding time to throw and avoiding injury. Don’t let the injury scare you off of Tua this week.

🐎 Let’s live a little and throw out Bo Nix as a streaming candidate this week against Carolina. Their defense can’t stop anyone and Nix has been the QB13 or better in three of the last five weeks. Let’s live even more and throw out Jameis Winston as a streamer. Baltimore is a great matchup for quarterbacks this year and Winston is known for his gunslinger play style. Maybe we get a Cedric Tillman takeover too.

🇺🇸 Despite his recent success, I’m a little hesitant to start Drake Maye against the Jets this week. Their defense has shown some cracks, especially against the Steelers, but against a rookie, I think they can handle themselves. I think the Patriots might pumpkin this week. 🎃 

Running Backs

🐎 It pains me to say it, but start Javonte Williams this week. He had a bit of a revival last week against New Orleans, and now he faces Carolina. It’s not that I don’t want him to succeed, it just pains me to say it because my trust hasn’t been built yet. Carolina has given up big games to D’Andre Swift, Zack Moss, Chase Brown, Bijan Robinson, J.K. Dobbins, and Alvin Kamara, so basically everyone they’ve faced. The only back who wasn’t able to put up a decent game against them was Zamir White (Alexander Mattison was respectable). They’ve allowed 13 rushing touchdowns on the season and it just feels like things are lining up for Williams to have yet another big game.

🔷 Kenneth Walker is…walking…into a great matchup this week against Buffalo. They are very much a run funnel team so expect Seattle to lean on their talented back. Bonus points if they let Walker have some run in the receiving game, where the matchup is stellar.

🏹 Another back who is in a spooktacular game this week? Kareem Hunt. He’s been the clear bellcow in Kansas City this year and has a combined 52 touches in his last two games, and he got 16 the week before that when he joined the team off the street. Look at pretty much any stat category you want, and Vegas is a top-half matchup for running backs.

Wide Receivers

⚡️ Ladd McConkey gets an above-average slot matchup this week against the New Orleans Saints. Now, he is dealing with an injury, so that will need to be monitored. If he can’t go, Joshua Palmer looks like the next man up for slot snaps in the Chargers offense.

🔥 Calvin Ridley is now the clear-cut top target in the Titans offense, for whatever that’s worth. He’s getting a massive team air yards share, as in 48% of the team’s total air yards. Detroit is a pass-funnel defense, so maybe they finally get him the ball and Ridley has a massive game. But, that’s a big ask with the quarterbacks struggling like they are. He’s worth stashing with Hopkins gone now, but don’t start him just yet. It’s just too scary. 👻 

🔴 by It’s been a couple of weeks since he had a good game, but I’m willing to start Darnell Mooney against Tampa Bay. He was back up to a 22.8% target share after being at just 16% against Carolina. Tampa is allowing the sixth most half-PPR points to receivers this year and even without Mike Evans and Chris Godwin, I think Tampa keeps the pace with Atlanta.

🐈‍⬛ This might be painfully obvious but don’t start any Panther this week outside of Chuba Hubbard. They face the No-Fly Zone Denver defense and Bryce Young is back at QB.

🟠 This might be surprising coming from a Browns fan, but I am not on the Cedric Tillman hype train. To an extent, anyway. I am starting him in a league over Jerry Jeudy to “feel alive” (and because the target share was so good in Week 7). But let me just utter a word of caution: I wouldn’t start him over most options. This is very much a “do as I say not as I do” situation. I cannot advise starting him just yet, despite me doing so in one league. His 23% target share was amazing in Week 7, but he had just three total receptions leading up to that game. In 2023, he had only three games with three or more receptions. I need to see more from him before I join the hype train, but I am hopeful.

Tight Ends

🏴‍☠️ How you don’t start Cade Otton this week I don’t know. Maybe you have George Kittle! But there’s a legitimate chance Otton leads the Bucs in targets this week. They haven’t allowed a touchdown to the tight end position so far this season, but that might change this week. Otton is tied for third among tight ends in Red Zone targets and second in receptions. With their current personnel and that usage, I think there’s a good chance he scores.

💀 Do you want to know someone I’d be scared to face this week? 😱 Brock Bowers. The Chiefs have allowed the most points per game to tight ends this season and you know where the ball is going when Gardner Minshew steps back to pass.

🐄 Despite what looks like a great matchup, I’m finding it hard to be confident in Dalton Schultz. Indianapolis is one of the best matchups for tight ends in the league, but Schultz’s best performance this year is 4 receptions for 34 yards. I’m more interested in starting Joe Mixon and the receivers than Shultz.

🟠 Start David Njoku. I don’t know if I needed to tell you that, but with Jameis Winston at the helm and what figures to be a negative game script for Cleveland (and a great matchup for tight ends), I think Njoku is going to be good this week.

And Finally:

Tank Dell - Dell has not been that good so far this year. He has a 17-game pace of 96 targets, 56 receptions, 550 receiving yards, and three touchdowns. That’s well off his nearly 1,100-yard pace last year. A big part of the reason his numbers are down is his YPR is down from 15.1 in 2023 to 9.7 in 2024. His ADOT reflects that. He’s not being targeted down the field like last year, and he’s also just simply losing targets to Stefon Diggs. He and Stroud will connect at some point and it very well could be this week against Indy. I think he treats you on Sunday and is a good dynasty buy, but the rest of the year? 🍬 

Jaxson Smith-Njigba - DK Metcalf is a long shot to play this week, which makes JSN an intriguing play. Here’s the thing: Buffalo is one of the worst matchups for receivers this season. That’s the scary part. But, there is reason for optimism. Buffalo is an above-average matchup for slot receivers, and JSN, so far, has run 79% of his routes out of the slot according to PlayerProfiler. 🍭 

Caleb Williams - Don’t look now, but the Washington Commanders are merely an average matchup for quarterbacks this year. That could be due to the Andy Dalton disappearance game, but they’ve held up well against opposing QBs recently. Over the last four games, they have held opposing passers to 115 yards or less in three of them. Lamar Jackson was the only one with more (and what a game that was!). That doesn’t exactly bode well for Williams this week. DJ Moore may have a fine week for fantasy, but that doesn’t mean Williams will as well. I think the early-season Washington defense is still stuck in people's minds, and I’d take care not to let that trick you into Williams this week. 🪦 

That’s all for this week!

Join the Ballfield Banter Discord now!