With four teams on bye, and three other games being excluded from the main-slate, that leaves the pickings rather slim for us building our lineups. Today, I’ll help you navigate the slate by looking at my favorite tool for cash games. It may be simple, but our projected ownership rates not only have a high correlation with actual ownership rates, but also with fantasy production. The reason, of course, is that people tend to make wise investments with their money rather than flushing it down the toilet with unresearched bad plays. If you want to take a shortcut and still be successful, these expected ownership rates are your ticket. Today, I’ll give you our model’s top five players at each position. These numbers may change between the publishing of this article and opening kickoff depending on injury report updates so make sure to keep that in consideration.
Get our complete projected ownership report here 
Quarterback
The value plays at other positions are not as strong as other weeks so you can expect many to try to create room in their budget by using Andy Dalton or Jameis Winston who are both in great matchups, but neither will be as popular as Aaron Rodgers, who despite a more difficult matchup, is expected to hit value because of game script. Green Bay is a 9-point underdog which may lead to 40+ passes from Rodgers on Sunday. The other top-five plays will also be expensive with Patrick Mahomes gearing up to take on Denver’s defense at home and Jared Goff on the opposite side of that Green Bay game.
With four teams on bye, and three other games being excluded from the main-slate, that leaves the pickings rather slim for us building our lineups. Today, I’ll help you navigate the slate by looking at my favorite tool for cash games. It may be simple, but our projected ownership rates not only have a high correlation with actual ownership rates, but also with fantasy production. The reason, of course, is that people tend to make wise investments with their money rather than flushing it down the toilet with unresearched bad plays. If you want to take a shortcut and still be successful, these expected ownership rates are your ticket. Today, I’ll give you our model’s top five players at each position. These numbers may change between the publishing of this article and opening kickoff depending on injury report updates so make sure to keep that in consideration.
Get our complete projected ownership report here
Quarterback
The value plays at other positions are not as strong as other weeks so you can expect many to try to create room in their budget by using Andy Dalton or Jameis Winston who are both in great matchups, but neither will be as popular as Aaron Rodgers, who despite a more difficult matchup, is expected to hit value because of game script. Green Bay is a 9-point underdog which may lead to 40+ passes from Rodgers on Sunday. The other top-five plays will also be expensive with Patrick Mahomes gearing up to take on Denver’s defense at home and Jared Goff on the opposite side of that Green Bay game.
Running Back
Home favorites is the name of the game this week as each of the top-four fit the description. Kareem Hunt should see plenty of touches as the Chiefs look to grind out the clock in the second half, and he’ll be doing it versus a weak Broncos’ run defense. Likewise, James Conner takes on a Cleveland Browns’ run defense that has been much worse this season than last. Both of these workhorses will likely be north of 30% ownership with Hunt potentially surpassing 40%. Another chunk of lineups will turn to Joe Mixon, or perhaps in addition to the other two. Mixon is game-script proof and under $8,000. While Todd Gurley has been the top-owned back almost every single week this year, that may change for Week 8 because of his $11,000 salary. Still, a quarter of lineups will be plugging him in and the same is true for Saquon Barkley in a tough matchup versus Washington.
Wide Receiver
As you might expect with Aaron Rodgers being the likely top-owned quarterback, his primary target, Davante Adams should see plenty of ownership as well. He isn’t our top name, however, since Antonio Brown is in a plus-matchup and is somehow just $200 more expensive. Both of them will likely be around 40% ownership with value play, Jarvis Landry right behind them and coming in third on the list. Rounding out the top five, we are projecting A.J. Green in that juicy matchup versus the Bucs and Tyreek Hill, who despite his lofty numbers is priced under $8,000 this week.
Tight End
There are a handful of excellent plays this week at tight end, but none that especially stand out above the rest. David Njoku is projected to be at the top because of his great price and all the targets thrown his way the past month. We project him to see a quarter of all lineups this week. Behind him, George Kittle and Travis Kelce are also expected to be used in over 15% of lineups. Kittle is C.J. Bethard’s top target and while he doesn’t have the greatest matchup, being the #1 option in an offense is always useful. Kelce, meanwhile, is only $500 more expensive than Kittle and happens to be in a fantastic matchup versus the Broncos. Also at over 10% projected ownership, we’ve got Jared Cook and Eric Ebron. Cook should see a boost in targets with Amari Cooper gone and Ebron will still be heavily involved even with Jack Doyle returning.
Defense
There aren’t any top-notch, world-beating options this week, but two prices set the Ravens and Cardinals apart from the rest of the pack. Baltimore has been playing out of their minds defense and with a salary well under $4,000, you can understand why many would use them. Arizona has a promising matchup as well and a great price to go with it. Also under $4,000, Pittsburgh is expected to be popular versus the Browns. While not in double-digits, both Washington and Chicago sneak into the top five despite lofty prices, but both take on turnover-prone quarterbacks.
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Thanks for reading. If you haven’t already, please check out the FantasyPros Football Podcast (below) that I co-host with Mike Tagliere. Good luck this season.
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