Finding the Top Week 8 Fantasy Football Pickups with Predictive Analytics: Jauan Jennings, Jalen McMillan, Russell Wilson

Perhaps the most powerful tool available here at Fantasy SP is Predictive Analytics, courtesy of the Fantasy Assistant. Today, I'm going to be talking about my favorite of those Predictive Analytics: Expected Waiver Interest.

Expected Waiver Interest (EWI) is a measure of how much interest each player will generate on waivers, generated before each week's waivers have been run. The EWI tool provides an EWI rating for each of the week's hottest wavier pickups, as well as a projection of how heavily rostered they will be after waivers are run. This can help you know what players to prioritize with your pickups and how much FAAB you'll need to get your top choices. 

The easiest way to understand the power of EWI is with examples, so let's take a look at this week's leaders in EWI:

Things are heating up on the waiver streets this week, unfortunately mostly as a result of injuries. Both San Francisco and Tampa Bay lost their top two receivers over the weekend. Brandon Aiyuk and Chris Godwin are done for the season, while Mike Evans (hamstring) and Deebo Samuel (pneumonia) have less clear timetables but are looking likely to miss multiple weeks. As a result, three of our top four EWI leaders are WRs from those two teams, but there are also some other interesting names. Let’s break them all down!

Top Predicted Week 8 Fantasy Football Adds

WR Jauan Jennings, San Francisco 49ers (58% EWI)

This is not Jennings’ first time atop the EWI charts, as he led the way in Week 4 after exploding for over 40 fantasy points in Week 3. Since then, Jennings had fallen back down the 49ers’ pecking order with the return of Deebo Samuel. He caught three or fewer passes in each of Weeks 4, 5, and 6, then was actually sidelined with a hip injury of his own in Week 7.

Now, Jennings is back on top of the EWI charts, and this time it’s actually warranted. Aiyuk, at least, is out for good, and we have no idea when Samuel will be back. That means Jennings is locked in as one of the 49ers’ top two WRs for the rest of the season, with a shot at multiple weeks as the team’s top receiver. And when he’s been on the field, Jennings has produced, with his 2.91 yards per route run ranking fifth among receivers with at least 50 routes. He’s a priority add in all formats.

WR Jalen McMillan, Tampa Bay Buccaneers (47% EWI)

McMillan is in a very similar situation to Jennings. With Godwin out for the season and Mike Evans likely out until at least Week 11, the third-round rookie is now the Buccaneers’ WR1 for the foreseeable future. He doesn’t have anywhere near the same efficiency as Jennings so far this season, with just 0.7 yards per route run, but the WR1 on a pass-happy offense is still a must-add.

QB Russell Wilson, Pittsburgh Steelers (34% EWI)

The NFL world was shocked by Mike Tomlin’s decision to start Russell Wilson over Justin Fields, but the veteran made his coach look good on Sunday night, passing for 264 yards and two touchdowns. Extra important for his job security, Russ also did not turn the ball over and took just one sack.

On the fantasy front, Russ added a rushing TD on a goal-line QB sneak, bringing himself to 24.86 points on the day. This was obviously a good debut, but I’m not actually that excited about Wilson’s fantasy prospects. After all, Fields, an undeniably better fantasy quarterback, wasn’t exactly lighting the world on fire in Pittsburgh. The Steelers rank second in the league in rush rate over expected at 5.8% — this didn’t change with Wilson in the lineup. In traditional QB leagues, I don’t see Russ being anything more than a matchup-based streamer, with extra risk as Fields looms over his shoulder.

WR Ricky Pearsall, San Franciso 49ers (29% EWI)

As I mentioned in Jennings’ blurb, he also missed Week 7’s game for the 49ers. That meant San Francisco’s top healthy receiver was Pearsall, a first-round pick in this year’s draft. Week 7 was also Pearsall’s NFL debut, as he started the season sidelined by a gunshot wound sustained in an attempted robbery (the 49ers have had some awful luck this season). 

Pearsall, a route-running specialist, was likely drafted to be the 49ers’ slot receiver behind Deebo and Aiyuk. Right now, he will likely be their WR2 alongside Jennings. When a player with first-round capital gets a shot on a good offense, that’s something to notice — Pearsall is absolutely worth adding.  

WR Romeo Doubs, Green Bay Packers (27% EWI)

I was a Doubs truther before the season even kicked off. However, I’m not actually that excited about him this week. The thing that makes great waiver pickups great is almost always some sort of change in role. Doubs’ role doesn’t have much room to grow, as he has already led the Packers in route participation rate in five of his six active games. 

To be fair, that’s the exact reason I was in on Doubs before the season. He’s the top route-runner on a good offense with a gun-slinging quarterback. The issue is that the Packers have multiple weapons, and Doubs is not the type of talent to earn consistent weekly targets. Coming off a season-high 30% target share in Week 7, Doubs’ overall share for the season is still just 18%. He’s worth adding (and always should have been rostered) in deeper formats. But in shallow leagues, it’s hard to see a path for Doubs to force his way into fantasy lineups, as he will still have his share of off weeks in this crowded offense. 

QB Bo Nix, Denver Broncos (27% EWI)

On the bright side, Nix ranks fifth among starting quarterbacks in rushing yards per game, with 36.4. Those 3.5 points per week are a non-negligible boost to his weekly fantasy output. The issue is that, even with those rushing points, Nix is QB19 in points per game for the season. He has posted just two weeks inside the top 12 fantasy quarterbacks and zero inside the top six. His EWI is likely high this week due to a juicy Week 8 matchup with the Panthers, but I don’t see Nix being more than a matchup-based streamer this year unless he takes multiple big steps forward.

WR Rashod Bateman (27% EWI)

Bateman’s 20.1 Half-PPR points on Monday night were enough to rank him as the WR2 in a very lackluster week of receiving scoring. A first-round pick in the 2021 NFL Draft, Bateman has flirted with fantasy relevance before, and he does have some intriguing metrics. For the season, his 2.20 yards per route run actually leads all Ravens pass-catchers (except Charlie Kolar). He also ranks sixth among all receivers with at least 50 routes in Fantasy Points Data’s adjusted separation score … although that lands him right behind Kalif Raymond, so take this metric with a grain of salt.

The issue with Bateman is that he just isn’t seeing many targets in a run-heavy Ravens offense. His 15% target share translates to just 4.3 targets per game. Even in his big game this week, Bateman saw just four targets. He can be added in deeper formats, but low volume means he is likely nothing more than a dart throw flex play.  

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