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Fantasy Football Fantasy Football Drake Maye's advanced metrics are off the charts. MVP, anyone? Maddie Meyer / Getty Images Week 8 made Drake Maye a stronger MVP candidate after destroying Cleveland’s top-tier defense. Jalen Hurts threw four TDs on 20 pass attempts. Saquon Barkley and Tank Bigsby ate. Jaxson Dart isn’t prolific, but he is the future of the Giants, who lost Cam Skattebo to a dislocated ankle. The Dolphins handled the Kirk-Cousins-led Falcons, and veteran Andy Dalton also had a bad day. Josh Allen completed only 12 passes in the Bills’ 40-9 routing of the Panthers. But James Cook rushed for 216 yards on 19 carries, scoring two TDs. Bo Nix looked better than Dak Prescott, and the Daniel Jones-Jonathan Taylor Colts are 7-1 after an easy win over the Titans (what a misnomer). New (and younger) names are leading narratives this year, while for the most part, bad organizations have remained … bad. Advertisement But here, we discuss the data behind the results, shocks, surprises, stalwarts — touches, air yards, team target percentage and more — the predictive stats that can show how often a player is being utilized by his NFL team to get ahead of future trends. Broken down by skill position, this report analyzes the meaningful metrics that can help you with the waiver wire, start/sit decisions and much more. In each positional breakdown, we’ve included the full usage report for additional research. Let’s get to it! Stats are via Tru Media unless otherwise stated. For waiver wire and streaming consideration, players must be under 50% rostered on Yahoo.   * Denotes a suggested waiver wire addition or streamer for the coming week. What a week. Tyler Huntley pulled out a win for Baltimore, finishing with the second-highest completion percentage of the week and had an 18. 8% designed rush rate, higher than Josh Allen, Justin Fields and Jaxson Dart. After weeks of seeing a lot of pressure, Justin Fields let the ball go and faced the lowest amount of pressure of the week (along with Cincinnati’s Joe Flacco). Bo Nix and Maye led their teams to statement wins, and Jordan Love led all QBs in fantasy scoring. It was quite a week for running backs. They dominated Jake Ciely’s recap podcast, and KC Joyner focused on RBs in his Monday feature. Cam Skattebo is out for the season. RJ Harvey and Tre Veyon Henderson continue to make their cases for more touches, and Rico Dowdle looks better than Chuba Hubbard — despite the latter’s much higher salary. Breece Hall is back, baby! And certain teams *cough, Saints, Titans* should be looking to sell off high-paid players for whatever they can get. Three of the top five fantasy receivers were lost in Week 8 to Bye-mageddon, but the position’s headliner, Ja’Marr Chase, continued to put on a show as the love connection with his new (old? ) quarterback continues to grow stronger. And Kansas City’s recently returned Rashee Rice hasn’t skipped a beat from his year-plus layoff since re-entering the Chiefs lineup a couple weeks ago. Chargers second-year wideout Ladd Mc Conkey continues to steal Quentin Johnston’s early-season thunder (lightning? ). Rome Odunze is burning (secondaries) again. And there’s a couple upcoming attractions in Denver and New England worth waiver wire attention this week. It was National Tight Ends Day on Sunday, and some of the big names at the position responded. Tucker Kraft, George Kittle and Dallas Goedert showed out. Newcomers Harold Fannin, Mason Taylor and Gunnar Helm secured touchdowns — Taylor’s from Breece Hall. And Mr. Perpetual Fantasy Letdown (until this season, when his ADP matched his production), Kyle Pitts, scored 14. 9 PPR points. Tyler Warren, Hunter Henry, Mark Andrews, Theo Johnson and Dalton Schultz didn’t capitalize on the TE holiday, but such is the tight end’s life. Some big weeks, some average weeks, some 0. 0 weeks. Looking at you, Jake Ferguson. Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms Play today's puzzle