Fantasy Football Trade Targets For Week 8: Buy Carnell Tate & More

We may be halfway through the fantasy season, but it’s never too late to try making trades.

Except after your league’s trade deadline. Then it’s probably too late.

As we approach the start of Week 8, here are four fantasy football trade targets I’d be looking to add to your rosters.

Target Targets For Week 8 In Fantasy Football

Brock Purdy | QB | San Francisco 49ers

After a scorching start to the season, Purdy has now failed to reach 20 fantasy points in each of his last three games, finishing on average as fantasy’s QB15. A road matchup with Seattle in Week 5 is a tough spot to thrive, but as for the last two weeks, there’s no mystery to Purdy’s sudden decline.

Where is Mike Evans?

Per usual, San Francisco has been depleted at the wide receiver position, missing Evans, Deebo Samuel and rookie De’Zhaun Stribling. If you go back to the first half of the Washington game in Week 6, Purdy was rolling, but he came to a halt in the second half, throwing for 50 scoreless yards. Evans, of course, aggravated his Achilles right before the end of the first half and did not return.

San Francisco's offense hasn’t been the same since.

With Evans off the field this season, Purdy is averaging 7.7 yards per attempt and 0.48 fantasy points per dropback to go along with a 4.9% TD rate. But with Evans on the field, Purdy’s much better, averaging 8.9 yards per attempt and 0.75 fantasy points per dropback, while the touchdown rate climbs to 9.3%. Evans has been one of the best third-down receivers in the league, so it shouldn't come as a surprise to see that the 49ers average just 1.42 points per drive with him off the field this season.

The good news? Evans has a good chance of returning after the team’s Week 8 bye. And overall, Purdy has still been one of the five best quarterbacks in football over the course of the season, trailing only Lamar Jackson and Josh Allen in EPA/Play (0.23). From a fantasy perspective, he’s also providing a solid floor with his rushing, recording at least 25 yards on the ground in five of seven games. Now that he’s unavailable this week, this is a perfect time to try acquiring Purdy, especially with Las Vegas and Dallas on tap after the bye.

Carnell Tate | WR | Tennessee Titans

Once again, Tate operated as Tennessee’s clear WR1 on Sunday, catching 5 of 7 targets for 69 yards. Tony Pollard and the rushing attack stole the show against Cleveland, something that won’t happen very often the rest of the way, especially if the 1-6 Titans decide to move the veteran running back at the trade deadline. And yes, Tennessee’s passing game is leaving plenty to be desired right now. But the good news?

Tate is absolutely dominating.

On the season, Tate has accounted for 45% of the Titans’ air yards, the fourth-highest rate in all of football. His 27% target share ranks 11th among all wide receivers, while his 74% weighted opportunity rating (WOPR) trails only Puka Nacua, DeVonta Smith, and Jaxon Smith-Njigba through seven weeks of action. Despite playing in an offense averaging just 157.4 passing yards per game (31st), Tate has still managed to average a respectable 11 PPR PPG. Over the past two weeks, the Titans have been competitive, beating the Colts before nearly taking Cleveland to overtime. That’s limited Cam Ward to just 22 and 31 pass attempts during that span. The upcoming schedule is awesome for wide receivers, but more importantly, these teams will absolutely force the Titans to keep up:

Tate may not have the highest ceiling each week given the offense he plays in, but the volume should be massive the rest of the way.

Luther Burden | WR | Chicago Bears

Full disclosure: Coming off an island game where he posted 130 yards and a touchdown, Burden may be difficult to trade for. And if he saw any targets at all during the second half of that game, it may be impossible.

But damn it, you need to try.

We know Burden is electric with the ball in his hands. We know he draws targets at a high rate, and we know Ben Johnson is scheming this entire passing attack through him and Colston Loveland. But what we didn’t know on a weekly basis was just how many routes he was going to run. The Bears have had a bunch of strange games that have impacted Burden’s route shares this season. A blowout win where the run game did the heavy lifting, a rainy/windy game in Chicago, a game where the Bears went up 31-7 and coasted in the second half, etc. Between that and the combination of Chicago deploying 11 personnel at a bottom-seven rate in the league, Burden’s route rate sits at just 69% on the season. With Rome Odunze dominating snaps and routes in one-receiver sets, and Burden (for some reason) splitting 12 personnel snaps with Kalif Raymond, we haven’t seen the emerging star on the field as much as we’d like.

That’s about to change.

The Bears lost tight end Cole Kmet for the season last week, a huge loss that will alter their personnel on offense. With Kmet sidelined, we should expect to see more 11 and 12 personnel from Chicago, which means more routes for Burden. And considering he’s been targeted on 25% of his routes this year, that’s an exciting development. In a bit of a limited role, Burden has flashed high-end WR2 potential in fantasy. But if his route share can climb into the 85-90% range, he could be on the WR1 borderline.

DJ Moore | WR | Buffalo Bills

Moore found himself in this column last week, but because he was on bye, it’s possible people have forgotten about him. So let this serve as a reminder …

Go trade for DJ Moore.

A shoulder injury has limited him to just two full games this season, but when he’s been on the field, the results have been strong. In the two games Moore ran at least 70% of the routes, he posted target-per-route-run rates of 27% and 43%. During those two contests, Moore has seen target shares of 38% and 27%, averaging nine targets per contest. Buffalo’s passing attack has not been the same without him, so I expect Josh Allen to go back to looking his way early and often. With the Bills coming off the bye, Moore should be able to return to the lineup for a Week 8 matchup with the Ravens in what could be a high-scoring affair. And if he does what I think he’s capable of doing against this pass defense, it’ll be a lot more difficult to acquire him heading into Week 9.

Now is the time.