It’s been another trying season for anyone crafting Fantasy football rankings, with NFL injury news dominating the headlines and COVID-19 still threatening to disrupt life at a moment’s notice. If you have Patrick Mahomes in your Fantasy football lineups, you dodged a crushing blow after he took a knee to the head last week. It appears that Mahomes will be able to play this week, but the same can’t be said for Lamar Jackson and Derek Carr, who are on bye. Which Fantasy football picks should you make?
Running back depth has whittled away on a weekly basis, but Saquon Barkley and Nick Chubb owners are holding their breath that they might get their stalwarts back this week. No matter what the shape of your roster, you’ll want a reliable set of Week 8 Fantasy football RB, QB, WR, and TE rankings to help you make any difficult start-sit decisions. Before you lock in your lineups, be sure to check out the Week 8 Fantasy football rankings from the proven computer model at SportsLine.
When it comes to ranking players, SportsLine’s model beat human experts in Fantasy football for the past several seasons especially when there were big differences in ranking. Over the course of a season, that could literally be the difference between winning your league or going home empty-handed.
Last week, the model was extremely high on Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford, saying he’d finish as a top-five player at his position. The result: Stafford completed almost 70 percent of his passes for 334 yards and three touchdowns against the Lions. Anybody who had him in their lineup was well on their way to a huge week.
Now, the model, which simulates every NFL game 10,000 times, has revealed its Fantasy football rankings for Week 8 of the 2021 NFL season. Head to SportsLine now to see them.
Top Week 8 Fantasy football picks
One player the model is extremely high on this week: Eagles wide receiver DeVonta Smith. The Heisman Trophy winner and No. 10 overall pick in the 2021 NFL Draft has shown flashes of the incredible playmaking ability that made him the first wide receiver to win the Heisman since Desmond Howard in 1991. He has 32 catches for 406 yards and a score through the first seven games.
The Eagles have struggled at times, but his big-play ability makes him hard to overlook as Philadelphia takes on Detroit in Week 8. The Lions have given up 24 pass plays of 20 or more yards this season and five passes of 40 yards or more. Detroit allows 8.4 net adjusted yards per pass attempt (31st in the NFL), so the Eagles should be looking Smith’s way early and often.
And a massive shocker: Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady, who leads the NFL with 2,275 passing yards and 21 touchdowns, stumbles big-time and doesn’t even crack the top 10 at his position. Brady is coming off a record-setting performance last week against the Bears. throwing four touchdown passes and becoming the first quarterback to toss 600 touchdowns in his career.
Brady has thrown 11 touchdown passes in his last three games, but now he’ll face-off against the Saints, one of the NFL’s stingiest defenses. The Saints are giving up just 16.8 points per game this season, which ranks third in the league. Plus, Brady struggled against New Orleans in the regular season last year, completing 22-of-38 passes for 209 yards, zero touchdowns and three interceptions on Nov. 8. With such a tough matchup on Sunday, Brady is a player to consider putting on the bench in Week 8.
How to set your Week 8 Fantasy football rankings
The model is also calling for a surprising quarterback you aren’t even thinking about to finish in the top 10 of its Fantasy football rankings. This pick could be the difference between winning big and going home with nothing. You can only see who it is here.
So who should you start and sit this week? And which surprising quarterback could lead you to victory? Visit SportsLine now to get Week 8 Fantasy football rankings for every position, plus see which QB is going to come out of nowhere to crack the top 10, all from the model that has out-performed experts big-time.
