First in the League: A look at what players to pick up for Fantasy Football this week

Last week, NFL teams are finally getting past their growing pains and power rankings are starting to stay set — except for the Chiefs — I’m sorry, but that was just sad.

This is unfortunate because in week eight you lose the ability to gamble on a player’s performance. You aren’t going to have any hidden gem players like RB Devon Achane, and everyone who will do good has already done good. I’m no longer able to pull a wild card from my back pocket like I did with RB Alvin Kamara or WR Adam Thielen — both of whom I was able to trade for lesser valued players before they had their amazing performances.

 I’m just upset that I traded  TE George Kittle and my beloved Kamara for RB Raheem Mostert, TE Mark Andrews and WR Brandon Aiyuk — and of course, Kittle and Kamara both had 20+ fantasy points while my end of the deal had a sub-par performance. 

The only thing preventing my tears is the fact that I’m still first in my league with a 6-2 record, but I don’t know how long that will stand with the upcoming week. Given my luck, my Golden Boy — Christian Mcafferey — has a bye week when I’m facing the number two team in my league. I was able to pick up RB Cam Akers off of waivers this past week and he was able to put up a TD on Sunday and has had decent production for the Vikings for what he’s worth.

Looking from a long-term perspective, I want to trade for arguably the best WR in the league, Justin Jefferson, but the circumstances have to be just right. You don’t want to trade your WR 1 for an IR who might not play for four more weeks, depending on if the Vikings keep their winning streak and shoot for a shot in the playoffs.

Someone I also think you should look to pick up is WR Davante Adams. If you pick him up quickly while he’s in a slump, he could help your team.  I’m 99.99% positive the Raiders have realized that they need to give him the ball if they want to win. You could get him with a package deal of a lower WR1 like Thielen or Evans along with a somewhat decent WR2 like Tyler Lockett or Chris Godwin — you could get a top 5 WR for fairly cheap.

It’s time to start thinking about playoffs and how each team will be affected. Will they start a questionable player if they need a win? Will they bench a player because they’re saving them for the playoffs? You need to start thinking about how each team’s playoff interest will affect the playing time of the players, because no matter how good the player is, they can only score points if they’re in the game.