Waiver Wire Watch: Week 8
Editor’s Note: We’re happy to announce the arrival of 4for4 Contributor Pat Fitzmaurice (formerly of Pro Football Weekly), who will work in conjunction with Senior Editor John Paulsen to compile this list of the top waiver wire pickups each week.
Here is a look at the top waiver wire pickups for Week 8. To be eligible for discussion, the player must be owned in 50% or fewer ESPN leagues, though we’ll stretch the rules a bit for the RB position, which is usually very thin. We’ll also include suggested bid prices (with a $100 budget) for those leagues that use Free Agent Acquisition Budgets. Of course, player value depends on league characteristics and team needs. Players are listed by position in order of importance. For extremely shallow or extremely deep leagues, be sure to review our Rest-of-Season Rankings (updated every Tuesday) to get an idea of how to value players not on this list.
* Players with an asterisk next to their name were mentioned in last week’s Waiver Wire Watch.
Raiders QB Terrelle Pryor* ($4)
Welcome to the Week 8 bye-pocalypse. Six teams will be off this week, leaving holes aplenty for fantasy owners. Philip Rivers and Andrew Luck are among the quarterbacks who take a break in Week 8, and Pryor, fresh from a bye himself, makes a decent stopgap for QB-needy fantasy owners. The Steelers have been tough on opposing QBs, but Pryor’s running ability helps mitigate a bad matchup.
Next up: Steelers, Eagles, Giants
Bengals QB Andy Dalton* ($4)
Dalton is generating some serious heat these days, falling somewhere between the Scotch bonnet pepper and the dreaded ghost pepper on the Scoville scale. He’s thrown three TD passes in consecutive games and has more than 700 passing yards over the last two weeks. Dalton is averaging 274.9 passing yards per game and is on pace for nearly 4,400 yards. He’s owned in just 24.5% of ESPN leagues, with all those heat units going to waste. He’ll be a popular addition this week.
Next up: Jets, Dolphins, Ravens
Dolphins QB Ryan Tannehill* ($2)
TANNY-hill, as Jon Gruden pronounces the quarterback’s name, threw a season-high three TD passes but had a season-low 194 passing yards and threw two interceptions in Miami’s home loss to Buffalo on Sunday. Not a day to remember for the second-year passer, but his job is secure, and he’s a solid QB2 whom you wouldn’t mind spot-starting in a bye-heavy week like this one.
Next up: Patriots, Bengals, Buccaneers
