The Minnesota Vikings will face the Los Angeles Rams in Week 8. Here’s fantasy football start-sit advice for every Vikings skill player who has the potential to make a fantasy impact during the game.
Looking for more lineup advice? Head over to our Week 8 Fantasy Start-Sit Cheat Sheet, where we cover every fantasy-relevant player in every game.
Sam Darnold, QB | MIN (at LAR)
After three straight finishes inside the top 10 at the position, this is three straight outside of it, as regression seems to be setting in. Even if you don’t want to regress his efficiency in a major way due to your trust in Kevin O’Connell’s system, the fact that he doesn’t run and has cleared 28 pass attempts just once makes him a bad bet based on math alone.
The Rams offer very little in the way of resistance, and that has Darnold ranked as a low-end QB1 for me this week, a tier I expect him to occupy for the next few games with similarly positive matchups awaiting him (Colts and Jaguars in Weeks 9-10).
Aaron Jones, RB | MIN (at LAR)
We weren’t 100% sure that Jones would give it a go last week. Any concerns about his health were dashed after exactly one carry, as his first touch was a 34-yard score. The big week resulted in Jones’ fourth game returning starting value to his fantasy managers, and that’s more than enough of a résumé to play him with confidence against the fourth-worst rush defense by EPA in the league.
Four times this season a running back has produced at least 24% over expectation against Los Angeles this season (David Montgomery, Josh Jacobs, James Conner, and D’Andre Swift), and with Jones pacing for his best boom/bust season since 2018 (the difference in percentage of carries that gain at least 10 yards with the ones that don’t get past the line of scrimmage), he’s flirting with top-15 status assuming that there are no lasting health concerns.
Jordan Addison, WR | MIN (at LAR)
Week 7 was the good and the bad of Addison within a 60-minute window. Unless you were watching the game closely, you could have been convinced that, through three quarters, the second-year playmaker was inactive. He had a pair of catches for 15 yards, but nothing that was noteworthy or all that impactful.
Boom.
In Minnesota’s first full fourth-quarter drive, down eight points with the lead of the NFC North at stake in a drive starting from their own nine-yard line, Sam Darnold hit him with a bomb. Detroit had single coverage without significant help over the top, and that was properly identified. Addison tracked the ball perfectly, making the catch on his way to the ground while the cornerback was in position but unaware of where the ball was.
It was a work of art. He proceeded to not earn a target for the remainder of the game. When all was said and done, Jalen Nailor finished Week 7 with more catches, targets, and yards than Addison, and that’s the issue. Consistency is a major concern, and with T.J. Hockenson expected to be back in the mix, the target count is more likely to trend down than up.
The Rams allow the fourth-most yards per deep pass attempt (15.3) this season, and that hope is enough for Addison to crack my top 40 receivers this week, but I can’t go much higher than that with all 32 teams in action. He’s a viable option if you lost Brandon Aiyuk, but he’s far from a must-play, and I expect that to be the case for the remainder of 2024.
Justin Jefferson, WR | MIN (at LAR)
Jefferson is as good as it gets, it really is that simple. He’s scored in five of six games this season and has a 40-yard catch or six receptions in nine of his past 10 games dating back to last season. There are a dozen receivers in the league today with a similar weekly best-case scenario that is competitive with that of Jefferson, but few offer the floor of Minnesota’s WR1.
The Rams have been better against opposing passing games of late, but we caught a glimpse of just how productive big-play receivers can be against this defense in September (Jameson Williams, Marvin Harrison Jr., and Jauan Jennings combined for 99.9 PPR points). If there is a player who can mirror that level of success, it’s Jefferson.
T.J. Hockenson, TE | MIN (at LAR)
Updated at 4:30 PM on Thursday, October 24
We’ll have to wait another week for T.J. Hockenson as he has been ruled inactive for Week 8’s game against the Los Angeles Rams.
Hockenson is nearing his return from the devastating knee injury that ended his 2023 season. Once he is back for the Vikings, he is back for you. Sam Darnold is completing 74.3% of his short passes this season with a 106.4 passer rating on those looks. Hock should walk into the secondary role in this passing game and be as good a bet for 5-7 targets as anyone at the position.
I expect there to be some slow weeks in the beginning, but 75% of Hockenson in an offense that is far better than we assumed when we were drafting this summer is better than the vast majority of tight ends in the sport.
The tight end position isn’t one to be cute with — you play the options with elite upside and Hockenson is certainly on that list.