Chiefs vs. Commanders Fantasy Football Worksheet, Week 8

The Worksheet, a comprehensive fantasy football preview by Rich Hribar, breaks down everything you need to know about the Week 8 matchup between the Chiefs and Commanders on Monday Night Football.

Find a breakdown of every Week 8 NFL game in our Worksheet Hub.

Trust = spike production for that player

Quarterback

Patrick Mahomes (TRUST): Mahomes is on a heater.

This is as close as he has felt to the Mahomes of fantasy lore who regularly pushed for QB1 overall output every week.

Mahomes has been a top-five scorer in four consecutive weeks with over 25 fantasy points in each game.

Mahomes did not even play in the fourth quarter on Sunday and was the QB5 (26.2 points).

He has a higher completion percentage than the week prior in five straight games.

Over the past four weeks, Mahomes has completed 71.3% of his passes for 7.9 yards per pass attempt with 11 touchdowns and 1 interception.

He is also rushing for a career-high 35.7 yards per game.

This is a spot where Mahomes should keep lighting up the scoreboard.

Kansas City is a heavy favorite against a Washington pass defense that has allowed a league-high 8.3 yards per pass attempt, the most yards per completion (12.9 yards), and a 5.6% touchdown rate (22nd).

Washington is allowing 16.8 passing points per game (29th).

To compound matters for Washington, Dorance Armstrong was just placed on injured reserve, who led the defense in pressures (22) and sacks (6).

Marcus Mariota: Jayden Daniels was forced from last week’s game with a hamstring injury and is not expected to play this week.

Daniels had already missed two games earlier this year due to a knee injury.

Mariota filled in those weeks and was a viable fantasy scorer.

He was the QB6 (20.3 points) and QB16 (16.2 points) in his starts against the Raiders and Falcons.

Before even knowing which Washington wideouts will be active on Monday night, Mariota is a quarterback I would handle as a floor-based QB2 over going all in on having a spike week.

The Chiefs are allowing 6.6 yards per pass attempt (11th) and a 3.6% touchdown rate (8th) to opposing passers, resulting in 10.2 passing points per game (3rd).

Mariota faced the team second in passing points allowed (Atlanta) and only managed 5.8 yards per pass attempt and 156 yards.

What gives Mariota floor appeal is his rushing ability.

The Chiefs are 29th in rushing points allowed (5.2 per game) to quarterbacks.

They have allowed productive rushing lines to Justin Herbert (32 yards), Jalen Hurts (15 yards and a touchdown), Russell Wilson (27 yards), Lamar Jackson (48 yards), and Trevor Lawrence (54 yards and 2 touchdowns).

The Chiefs are seventh in pressure rate (40.3%) and ninth in blitz rate (29.1%).

Running Back

Bill Croskey-Merritt: After his breakout in Week 5, Croskey-Merritt has bricked the past two weeks.

He has rushed 30 times for 94 yards (3.1 YPC) over those two games.

He has just 1 run of 10 or more yards and has averaged 0.80 yards before contact per rush.

He has handled 78.3% and 66.7% of the backfield touches in the past two weeks, but Washington running backs have 46.5% of the team touches in total, the second-lowest touch share for a backfield in the NFL.

Croskey-Merritt does not have a role in the passing game, giving him no floor insulation.

He has 7 receptions on the season, with 2 or fewer receptions in every game.

With Croskey-Merritt dependent on rushing efficiency, we have to proceed with caution here, attached to a massive road underdog.

He is a touchdown-dependent FLEX for me this week.

The Chiefs face 16.9 running back runs per game, the second-fewest in the league.

Kansas City RBs: The Chiefs are using all of Isiah Pacheco, Kareem Hunt, and Brashard Smith.

Through three quarters on Sunday before the Chiefs pulled starters, Pacheco led the group with 61.3% of the snaps.

Pacheco has had a larger role in recent weeks, handling 13 and 16 touches the past two weeks, his highest totals of the season.

Pacheco got into the end zone on the ground for the first time on Sunday, a seven-yard rush.

He still is limited as a receiver (11 receptions for 43 yards this year), and we have not seen him lock down the goal-line runs.

Pacheco has at least moved into touchdown-dependent FLEX territory when he was looking close to being a drop.

He still has not reached 60 total yards in a game yet, so the floor remains low.

Smith had a season-high 19 touches on Sunday.

10 of those came in the fourth quarter as salt-away runs.

His rushing volume came in garbage time, but Smith was involved as a pass catcher early in the game.

Smith had 4 catches for 29 yards in the first half.

All three backs played on the opening drive of the game.

Hunt had a season-low 4 touches, but he also injured his ankle early in the game.

Hunt avoided significant injury and returned, but that may have had an impact on his usage moving forward.

This remains a committee backfield and one attached to the offense that is throwing the ball at the highest rate in the league.

Smith is still a stash and a low-ceiling FLEX in full-PPR formats.

Hunt is a touchdown-or-bust FLEX.

We are catching Kansas City as a massive favorite to chase potential volume in a heavy bye week.

Washington has struggled the past two weeks, allowing 225 yards and a touchdown to the Chicago backfield in Week 6 and 155 yards and a touchdown to the Dallas backfield on Sunday.

Wide Receiver

Rashee Rice: Playing in his first game since Week 4 of last season, Rice caught 7 of 10 targets for 42 yards with 2 touchdowns.

He was on the field for only 47.5% of the dropbacks with Mahomes in the game, but he was targeted on 52.6% of his routes with 2.21 yards per route run.

Over his past 10 games played, Rice is averaging 19.9 PPR points per game with 2.91 yards per route run.

He has been targeted on 31.3% of his routes over that span.

The last time Rice was targeted on less than 20% of his routes was Week 11 of the 2023 season.

We should anticipate that Rice will run more routes moving forward, and this offense has a clear plan for using him as an underneath target.

Rice has added appeal in full-PPR formats, but if he is already back in play as a WR1 in all formats, given how hot this offense is.

Rice played 43% in the slot, which is the enticing part of this matchup.

Washington is 30th in points allowed per game to slot receivers (16.7), allowing a league-high 10.8 yards per target and 5.6% touchdown rate (23rd) to those receivers.

Xavier Worthy: Worthy caught 3 of 4 targets for 35 yards on Sunday, rushing once for 13 yards.

After posting a WR16 score in his first game back, Worthy has been the WR37, WR29, and WR48 over his past three games.

After being targeted on 27.6% of his routes in Week 4, Worthy has dipped to 24.3%, 13.8%, and 13.3% rates.

Going back to last season, this is still a receiver who has only three games with 80 or more yards receiving.

There may be some sentiment that Worthy is cooked now with Worthy back, but he did have more overall yardage than Rice on Sunday.

Rice only averaged 0.80 air yards per target, so Worthy is still being used to attack the defense downfield.

There is room for both of these receivers to coexist, aid each other, and be productive.

I want to let things breathe a bit.

With the Chiefs looking like a passing juggernaut moving forward, I am bullish on their core pieces being viable in fantasy.

What you do not love, however, is that Worthy is still clearly playing through a torn labrum.

He made a contested catch in the third quarter and appeared to aggravate that injury.

He did return to the game for a rushing attempt, but the Chiefs are managing him to a degree around that injury.

He has hovered around a 75% route rate since returning, compared to his 80-plus percent weekly rate to close his rookie season.

We know that his injury will not improve this season while he is playing, so a per-play basis is volatile.

If it were not for the shoulder injury, I would be more bullish, but I remain optimistic that he is an upside WR3 moving forward, which could be shortchanging him.

Washington WRs: Deebo Samuel missed Week 7 with a heel injury.

He has an extra day to get back this week, so we will follow his status throughout the week.

We could also see Terry McLaurin finally return, who has not played since Week 3.

If one or both of these wideouts are expected to miss Monday night, circle back here.

If both players are back, they are more in the back-end WR2/high WR3 range.

With McLaurin on the field, Samuel has been targeted on 23.2% of his routes with 1.40 yards per route run compared to a target on 25.5% of his routes with 2.13 yards per route run with McLaurin absent.

Before injury, McLaurin was off to a slow start, catching 10 of 17 targets for 149 yards over his three games played.

When he was on the field, McLaurin had a team-high 38.1% of the air yards.

The Chiefs have allowed a 26.3% completion rate (5 of 19) on throws 20 or more yards downfield, which is third in the league.

They are allowing 6.7 yards per target (3rd) and a league-low 10.1 yards per catch to wide receivers.

Chiefs WRs: All of Marquise Brown, JuJu Smith–Schuster, and Tyquan Thornton rotated in on Sunday despite the return of Rice.

Brown (2-14-1) and Smith-Schuster (3-35-0) each ran 19 routes (47.5%) with Mahomes on Sunday.

Thornton ran 13 routes (1 catch for 39 yards).

In the short term, I believe we will still see all of these wide receivers mix in.

Rice was limited, so this is all still very fluid, making all of these wide receivers touchdown-or-bust options in single-game DFS.

Tight End

Travis Kelce: Kelce caught all 3 of his targets for 54 yards on Sunday.

He led the team in receiving yards with Mahomes on the field, running a route on 72.5% of the dropbacks with the starters.

Drawing a target on 13.3% routes with Rice back was in line with where we left off last season.

Kelce has been targeted on 15.7% of his routes with Rice on the field, going back to last season, compared to 24.4% with Rice absent.

Kelce was already operating as a back-end TE1 before Rice returned, but I do not want to move him down much further with Rice back in the lineup.

Especially in a week with so many bye weeks.

The difference is that this Kansas City passing game is significantly better than it was a year ago.

That offers some added upside, even if Kelce is no longer a major target.

We have seen this in recent weeks.

Four of Kelce’s five highest yardage totals have come over the past month as things have ramped up.

He is not going to manifest into the apex version of himself, but he can still be a viable fantasy option.

Washington has had issues with tight ends, allowing 9.2 yards per target (30th), an 80% catch rate (26th), and a 10% touchdown rate (29th) to the position.

Zach Ertz: Ertz collected 3 of 7 targets for 37 yards and a touchdown on Sunday.

Ertz is averaging 32.7 yards per game, so he is living as a touchdown-dependent TE2.

He has been targeted on 16.6% of his routes outside of the red zone, but that jumps to 21.1% in the red zone.

The Chiefs are allowing just 3.6 receptions per game (third fewest) and 33.1 yards per game (fourth) to tight ends.

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