I have only included players who are rostered in less than 50 percent of Yahoo fantasy football leagues. A player’s roster percentage will appear in parentheses next to their name. Denny Carter is mercifully handling the kicker section of this article which will be added Tuesday mornings. Updates from Monday Night Football will be added on Tuesday mornings as well. Be sure to check out the Waiver Wire Q&A Monday at 6PM ET.
Quarterback
Will Levis, Titans (5%)
In his NFL debut, Levis was absolutely dealing. He threw four touchdowns on 29 attempts, becoming just the sixth quarterback in NFL history with four or more scores in his first start. He averaged .11 EPA per play and earned a +8.9 completion percent over expected.
Every Will Levis pass attempt from his dazzling NFL debut for the #Titans pic.twitter.com/4jz47XHU7J
— Justin Graver (@titansfilmroom) October 30, 2023
Levis was a questionable prospect and the NFL unanimously agreed on that assessment by letting him fall to the second round of the draft. However, the NFL is also capable of getting things wrong. If they did in this case and Levis is better than expected, he could be the best long-term option at quarterback available off the waiver wire.
Sam Howell, Commanders (45%)
Howell’s efficiency stats have been middling this year, but he pairs them with elite volume. He is averaging seven yards per attempt with a 4.2 percent touchdown rate. Both numbers are outside the top 12 quarterbacks but inside the top 20. Average numbers are typically nothing to write home about at quarterback, but just being competent is good enough for occasional QB1 numbers when you rank second in the NFL in pass attempts.
Derek Carr, Saints (37%)
Carr is one of three quarterbacks with four games of 300+ passing yards this year. He leads all quarterbacks in air yards thrown and is top-10 in passing yards. Carr gets a Chicago defense that ranks 31st in EPA per dropback allowed this week. The Bears have allowed the fifth-most fantasy points to quarterbacks this year.
Running Back
Darrell Henderson, Rams (45%)
In two games with the Rams, Henderson has seen 56 percent of the team’s carries and ran a route on 39 percent of LA’s passing plays. He has split the goal line carries with Royce Freeman in their past two appearances. Freeman closed some ground between himself and Henderson last week, but Henderson was still in the lead role versus the Cowboys. No other LA back has earned a touch over the past two weeks. Henderson is a solid committee back who should provide RB2/3 numbers until Kyren Williams or Ronnie Rivers return.
Tyjae Spears, Titans (49%)
Spears has been a mainstay of the waiver wire column this year and his roster rate has slowly approached 50 percent. Still, he is available in just over half of all Yahoo leagues. Spears has taken the field for half of the Titans’ snaps this year and has run a route on half of his team’s dropbacks. That has been good for the occasional RB3 game. This isn’t particularly enticing, but he has two outs to being the player you need down the stretch this year. Should Derrick Henry get hurt, Spears would see a meteoric rise in the weekly fantasy ranks. The Titans could also move Henry before the Tuesday trade deadline.
Emari Demercado, Cardinals (36%)
Demercado has earned 60 percent of the Cardinals’ carries over the past two weeks. That has resulted in 33 attempts for 136 scoreless yards. The bad news is that Keontay Ingram operated as Arizona’s primary back on passing downs in Week 8, running a route on 54 percent of Joshua Dobbs’s dropbacks. Demercado’s two-down role will make him a touchdown-dependent RB3 until James Conner comes off injured reserve.
Zach Charbonnet, Seahawks (42%)
Charbonnet missed Week 7 but returned to the most prominent role of his young career in Week 8. He earned 31 percent of the Seahawks’ carries and ran a route on 56 percent of Geno Smith’s dropbacks. Both marks represent career highs for Charbonnet. He is only on the fantasy periphery as the direct backup to Kenneth Walker. Should Walker go down, Charbonnet has league-winning potential.
Wide Receiver
Demario Douglas, Patriots (3%)
Kendrick Bourne is done for the year with a torn ACL and DeVante Parker will likely be sidelined with a concussion for at least a week. JuJu Smith-Schuster returned to action in Week 8 but only ran a route on 34 percent of Mac Jones’ dropbacks. Douglas leads the Patriots in yards per route run and Pro Football Focus receiving grade. He is easily the best receiver on the active roster and should see an uptick in usage in Week 9.
Rashid Shaheed, Saints (36%)
Shaheed is the perfect boundary receiver for Carr’s air yards Ponzi scheme. His average target depth is 19 yards downfield and he has seen at least 125 air yards in two of his past three games. Shaheed’s route rate has ebbed and flowed depending on the other personnel available to the Saints, but he is good for a few deep throws every week. There are worse FLEX flyers to take a shot on in Week 9.
Khalil Shakir, Bills (1%)
The Bills have experimented with a variety of configurations ranging from their 11.5-personnel look to using the likes of Trent Sherfield and Deone Harty as their WR3. With Dawson Knox out for Week 8, they worked out of a base 11-personnel look and made Shakir their full-time No. 3 receiver. Shakir returned the favor with six catches for 92 yards. I can’t say with any confidence that this setup will hold, but Shakir is worth a one-dollar bid in deep leagues.
Quentin Johnston, Chargers (19%)
Johnston’s route rate didn’t budge in Week 8, standing still at 66 percent, but he did manage to earn season-highs in target share (17 percent) and air yards share (28 percent). In his final season of college ball, Johnston ranked fourth among Power Five receivers in yards after the catch per reception with 8.993 YAC a piece. The Chargers finally showed some interest in unearthing that player in Week 8.
Ooh! Ooh! 🥶 @MrJohnston____
— NFL (@NFL) October 30, 2023
📺: #CHIvsLAC on NBC
📱: Stream on #NFLPlus https://t.co/afiiMv70VD pic.twitter.com/23T1Mf2hJX
Tight End
Trey McBride, Cardinals (20%)
McBride took hold of the starting job with Zach Ertz on injured reserve last week and blew up. He caught 10 balls for 95 yards and a touchdown. His 14 targets were good for a whopping 40 percent target share. He ran a route on 88 percent of his team’s passing plays. With Dobbs back under center for Week 9, the check-downs will continue to flow, bolstering McBride’s fantasy value for another week.
Taysom Hill, Saints (35%)
The return of Juwan Johnson put an end to Hill’s role as a pass-catcher. Hill ran a dozen routes and was targeted once. Not content with seeing his secret weapon on the sidelines, OC Pete Carmichael dialed up nine carries for Hill. He amassed 63 yards and scored twice. McBride is the top pickup at tight end this week, but Hill is a cheaper option for fantasy teams that only need a bye week filler.
Logan Thomas, Commanders (45%)
Thomas is the ultimate one-week bandage. He has played six games this year and has finished as a TE1 three times. Thomas is 12th in targets and 11th in receptions among tight ends. There’s nothing exciting about adding Thomas, but he’s the cheapest player with weekly TE1 potential on the waiver wire.
Kickers (Sponsored by Denny Carter)
Blake Grupe, Saints (17%)
We’re back to being Grupe groupies this week. The rookie kicker has a plush matchup against the down-bad Bears: The Saints are 7.5-point home favorites and (very) likely to see four quarters of neutral and positive game script. That’s what we need for our precious kickers.
Grupe is averaging a solid 2.1 field goal tries per game in Saints wins this season. The Bears, meanwhile, have given up multiple field goal attempts in six of their eight games. Try your best to ignore that Grupe has missed four of his 21 attempts and trust the process in Week 9.
Dustin Hopkins, Browns (60%)
Hopkins, a Not In My League special, is in an incredible spot this week. The Browns are eight point home favorites against the Cardinals. Unless there’s some sort of apocalyptic wind or rain or ice storm in Cleveland -- it’s after Labor Day, after all -- Hopkins should have a safe floor, at worst.
Six of eight kickers to face Arizona this season have scored at least eight fantasy points. The Cardinals are allowing a league-high 4.7 red zone possessions per game. Hopkins should be fine in Week 9.
Joey Slye, Commanders (1%)
If you think the Commanders can hang in there with the Patriots -- New England is somehow a favorite here -- Slye should make for a good process-oriented fantasy option. We love those, folks.
Slye has averaged 2.4 field goal attempts in Washington wins this season and the Pats have allowed the fifth most field goal tries through Week 8. Four of the eight kickers to face the Patriots in 2023 have scored more than ten fantasy points. Consider Slye a reasonable fallback option if, for some reason, you can’t get Hopkins or Grupe off the wire.
