Making Sense of the Week 8 Waiver Wire: Adds and Avoids

We’re getting deep into the NFL season now, and star players are dropping like flies. Just this week, Mike Evans, Bryce Young, Darren Waller, Kendre Miller, and Michael Penix went down with injuries, adding to the ever-growing list of fantasy-relevant players now out of the picture. Luckily, I’ve got you covered with the top waiver wire pickups of the week to fill those roster spots and help you make a midseason playoff push. I’ve also included some “fool's gold” players who look like great pickups, but are duds under the surface.

Diamonds in the Rough:

Joe Flacco

As many have said online: “Unc still got it.” Flacco has done the impossible yet again, turning back the clock to produce vintage numbers and make a foreign offense hum. It’s not just his great week seven that should excite you: It’s his rest-of-season schedule. Joe Burrow will be out until December, and in the stretch before then, Flacco will play the Bears, Steelers, and Ravens twice, who give up the 7th, 4th, and 2nd most points to quarterbacks, respectively. If your starter or backup went down this week, grab the 41-year-old before it’s too late.

Kyle Monongai

Younger, shifter, and on the rise, Kyle Monongai is poised to eat into more and more of D’Andre Swift’s workload each week. This week was his best performance by far, taking 13 carries for 81 yards and adding a score. He is also seeing more usage in the receiving game than in past weeks. I’ve never been sold on Swift, and Monangai is an exciting candidate to make a late-season run at the starting job.

Tez Johnson

Another player I wasn’t sold on was Tez Johnson after last week’s game, where he caught that great touchdown, but nothing else. However, after another improvement and the injury to Mike Evans, Johnson has a real shot at fantasy relevance for the rest of the season. He finally got more than four targets, commanding nine, and was dynamic with the ball in his hands. He’s going to be a hot commodity, so grab him if you can.

Oronde Gadsden II

Gadsden is owned in only 10% of leagues, and after this week, I’d bet that becomes close to 100%. This one is obvious: Despite Quintin Johnston returning to the lineup, Gadsden set the rookie tight end record for reception yards and tacked on a touchdown. It was an incredible game and a sure signal that he has control of the Chargers’ #1 tight end role. Pick up and start Gadsden going forward.

Fools Gold:

Brashard Smith

Everyone wants to be excited about the next Chiefs running back to come out of nowhere and become fantasy relevant. Brashard Smith reached double-digit fantasy points for the first time this season and had nearly as many carries as Pacheco. However, most of that is due to the way the game played out, with the Chiefs pulling starters once the game got out of reach for Vegas. Pacheco is still the starter, Hunt is the goal-line back, and Smith is not fantasy-relevant yet.

Xavier Legette

Legette’s game this week is an obvious one-game flash for many reasons. Firstly, his competition for targets was the lowest it’ll be for the rest of this season. Tet was shadowed by Sauce all game long, Coker was in his first game back from injury, and Renfrow was out. Going forward, there’s no guarantee that Legette is even a starter. While I love his story and his accent, I wouldn’t save a roster spot for him.

Alec Pierce

It seems that every year Alec Pierce will have a great week and subsequently be rostered in many leagues. Similar to Legette, though, this is a flash-in-the-pan scenario. In this game, Downs was out with an injury, and AD Mitchell still hasn’t been forgiven for his goal-line gaffe from a few weeks ago. Pierce is the #4 receiver on this offense and doesn’t have a path to consistent production. 

Pat Freiermuth

There is nothing more confusing and frustrating for fantasy owners than Arthur Smith’s usage of tight ends. He terrorized Kyle Pitts' owners for years in Atlanta, and now he is doing the same with Jonnu Smith believers. His latest trick was scheming up big plays for none other than Pat Freiermuth, who scored a whopping 28 points this week. This tight end room and entire offense are inconsistent and confusing, but Pat’s performance is most likely not an indicator of things to come.