3 Daily Fantasy Football Players to Avoid in Week 8

We have a lot of pieces on numberFire geared toward helping you figure out which players you should roster in your DFS contests on FanDuel, but an important aspect of the DFS process is figuring out who you shouldn't play.

Narrowing down your list of potential plays by avoiding those who are destined to underwhelm can go a long way toward helping you create winning lineups.

Inevitably, some of the players I feature in this article will blow up and pop for a big game, but that comes with the territory of doing a piece like this one -- unless I'm going to tell you to avoid playing dudes who aren't on anyone's radar. I'm trying to avoid that. I want this piece to be useful.

Here are some players I'm fading this week.

Sam Ehlinger, QB, Colts

FanDuel Salary: $6,000

Early draft percentage projections have Sam Ehlinger being fairly popular. I get it -- he's $6,000 and has some running ability. But I'm not going here.

Ehlinger might completely faceplant in his first NFL start. This isn't an easy matchup. The Washington Commanders' defense has the seventh-best sack rate and is seventh in pressure rate. The Commanders' defensive line could feast on an Indianapolis Colts offensive line that ranks next to last by Football Outsiders.

A first-time starter with blah weapons who might spend a lot of time under duress? I'll pass.

I'll say this, though -- a lot of the top fantasy quarterbacks are off this slate, so it's not a bad time to get weird. But there are a handful of value quarterbacks who are in good spots, including Tua Tagovailoa ($7,700), Dak Prescott ($7,200), Derek Carr ($7,200), and Kirk Cousins ($7,800), so if I'm trying to save salary at quarterback, that's where I'll go.

I just don't want to risk a total dud from my signal-caller, and I think that's fully on the table for Ehlinger.

Garrett Wilson, WR, Jets

FanDuel Salary: $5,400

Garrett Wilson has really slowed since the first few weeks. He hasn't topped 5.1 FanDuel points in any of his previous four games, and overall this season, he's hit for double-digit FanDuel points just once.

The poor stretch has pushed his salary down to a point where it looks like he'll garner some popularity this week, but I'm staying away.

In addition to Wilson just not doing much of late, he has a tough matchup with the New England Patriots, a defense that has conceded the seventh-fewest FanDuel points to wideouts.

I am not backing Zach Wilson -- who has passed for 231 total yards over the previous two games -- against Bill Belichick. Zach Wilson faced the Pats twice last year, throwing for 210 yards and four picks in one game and 51 yards in the other before exiting early with an injury. The New York Jets scored a combined 19 points over those two games.

Brandin Cooks ($6,100), D.J. Moore ($6,200), Michael Gallup ($5,800) and Drake London ($5,600) are salary-saving receivers I prefer to Garrett Wilson this week.

Mike Gesicki, TE, Dolphins

FanDuel Salary: $5,400

The Miami Dolphins-Detroit Lions game is one people are going to flock to this week, myself included. The total is 51.5 points and the spread is just 3.5. It could be perfect for DFS. While I definitely want exposure to Miami's slate-best 27.5-point implied total, I won't have much of Mike Gesicki.

Gesicki has some significant win-loss splits in his career. In 2021, he averaged 28.2 receiving yards per game in victories, compared to 65.8 yards in losses. Both of his 2021 touchdowns came in defeats. It's mostly held true this year, too. He's gone for more than 27 yards in only one of Miami's four wins, and that was a 41-yard game in the crazy shootout with the Baltimore Ravens.

It's far from a lock that Miami wins in Detroit this week, but even if Miami gets down, it's not like Gesicki's role is that good anyway. Gesicki has played between 53% and 64% of the snaps in each of the last three games, and he's seen more than four looks in a game just twice this campaign.

Gesicki is mostly an afterthought in this offense as Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle gobble up targets. Hill and Waddle are great ways to get in on Miami this week, and Raheem Mostert is a superb play, too. That's where I'll be.

We project Gesicki for just 5.2 FanDuel points. Among the 10 highest-salaried tight ends, we rate him as the worst point-per-dollar play not named Taysom Hill.