Tonight the Arizona Cardinals are hosting the Green Bay Packers in the featured Thursday Night Football matchup, and Yahoo Fantasy is offering NFL DFS single-game contests. The general concept of creating a team remains the same, but this is a one-game player pool. The twist is that any position player can be rostered, and one is designated to receive a 1.5x multiplier on their Yahoo fantasy points. Using Awesemo’s expert NFL projections and rankings, these are the top Yahoo NFL picks for the Week 8 Thursday Night Football game tonight.
Yahoo NFL Picks: Week 8 Thursday Night Football
Top SUPERSTAR Options
The SUPERSTAR position will get a 1.5x multiplier on their Yahoo points in the single-game format.
Kyler Murray, Arizona Cardinals – $40
Only Aaron Rodgers ($30) and DeAndre Hopkins ($30) are within $10 of Kyler Murray tonight, and Rodgers is also the only player with a median projection within 10 fantasy points of the Murray. While Murray has not been running much this season, with only 18 yards per game, he has three touchdowns rushing. On the passing front he has been solid, with 286 yards passing per game, 17 touchdowns and five interceptions.
Green Bay has a bend-not-break passing defense, and while they have yet to allow a 300-yard passing performance, four different quarterbacks have multi-touchdown games against them. Additionally, they have not faced anyone close to Murray’s caliber — they have played Joe Burrow, Ben Roethlisberger, Jameis Winston, Jimmy Garoppolo, Taylor Heinicke, Justin Fields and Jared Goff.
Aaron Jones, Green Bay Packers – $28
The Cardinals have done a solid job against opposing running backs, and they have the seventh-best run DVOA. The decision point with the Packers tonight will be choosing between Aaron Jones and Aaron Rodgers ($30) in lineups that start with Murray. Arizona has the second-best pass DVOA, and Devante Adams and Allen Lazard are both out in the COVID-19 protocol tonight. If Marquez Valdes-Scantling ($16) is unable to return from his hamstring injury, the passing game could very well get bottled up. Three different running backs have recorded 100 combined yards against Arizona, including Dalvin Cook (148), James Robinson (134) and Darrell Henderson (116). The Cardinals have allowed just one touchdown to the position, but Jones should be in line for a heavy workload, and he is capable in all facets of the game.
Yahoo NFL Core Picks
Chase Edmonds, Arizona Cardinals – $15
Tonight Chase Edmonds gets the slight nod over his backfield mate James Conner ($20) for his salary relief. While Conner has rolled his way to six touchdowns, Edmonds has more yards rushing on 21 fewer carries and has 33 more targets. The touchdowns will come for Edmonds, who is still looking for his first, and that could happen as soon as tonight.
Christian Kirk, Arizona Cardinals – $14
It is a toss-up between Christian Kirk and A.J. Green ($15) for only one additional dollar. Their opportunities and production have been nearly identical, and while Kirk has one more target and six more receptions, Green is just 2 yards and one touchdown below. While the Murray has not been playing favorites this year, things are spread out equally enough that at their respective salaries both players can be used in the same lineups without any issues.
Yahoo NFL Value Picks
Randall Cobb, Green Bay Packers – $13
Although Randall Cobb is most effective in full-PPR scoring, he should see enough targets tonight to warrant consideration as the best value option on Yahoo. Though he has not made much noise other than his two-touchdown performance in Week 4 against Pittsburgh, Adams and Lazard account for around half of all the Green Bay targets this season, and there is plenty of room for Cobb to see 6 to 8 with upside for a few more depending on the game flow. Robert Tonyan ($11) is also worthy of consideration, though he does not see much work outside of the red zone. That likely will change tonight, with the Packers relying on the short pass if they cannot get the running game going with any consistency. It is harder to recommend playing this duo in the same lineup, as they will need a touchdown to differentiate themselves and will be in direct competition with each other and Jones.
Final Thoughts
Illness and injuries are taking out some key contributors tonight, which should bring in more uncertainty. However, that creates spots to take advantage of by dropping down to the lower-entry-fee contests on Yahoo and making more lineups in the hopes of catching lightning in a bottle.
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