2023 NFL Weekly Survivor Pool: Week 8 Top Picks & Plays
Week 7 was… something. A lot of upsets and upset Survivor pool players, with the 49ers dropping a get-right game to the Vikings and the Bills losing to a weaker Patriots team. Anything can happen in the NFL, which is the beauty of the sport but also a curse. Let’s hope Week 8 goes better!
We will help you get to the promised land one week at a time with our picks, but in case you’re not familiar with Survivor pools, here’s a quick rundown:
Pick a team that wins in each NFL week. Typically, you choose a team just once, so each selection is incredibly important. Some survivor pools have double-elimination so that you can slip up and still be in the running. Make sure you’re checking out our weekly matchup previews and our Survivor League Strategy in the Fantasy Alarm Draft Guide as guides toward picking the best winners for each week and developing a strategy.
Let’s dive right in with Week 8’s picks!
2023 Survival Pool Picks Record
Week 7: 2-3 (.400)
Overall: 26-9 (.742)
NFL Week 8 DraftKings Odds, Implied Totals, Spreads, and Over/Under
*All lines current as of 11:00 PM ET, 10/25/23, courtesy of Vegas Insider*
NFL Week 8 Survivor Picks
Baltimore Ravens
Joshua Dobbs has backslid after a hot start, and now the Cardinals have started the window for Kyler Murray to return from IR. That will not be this week, so that’s a great thing for the Ravens, who are on the road but are clearly the better team as 8.5-point favorites.
Lamar Jackson and company have been rolling on offense and will continue their hot run against the Cardinals, who sport one of the lowest implied point totals (18) of the Week 8 slate. I trust this offense for Baltimore to put the game out of reach and make this one comfortable.
Miami Dolphins
Miami does what they do: crush the easy teams. They put up 70 points on the Broncos, then two weeks later, beat the Giants and Panthers handily as they put up 31 and 42 points, respectively. Their Week 8 opponent is the Patriots at home, where they’ve won all three games so far, and historically, New England has had issues with Miami playing at Hard Rock Stadium.
With Miami as 8.5-point favorites at home against a Patriots team with an implied point total of just 18.5, they should be able to cruise as the Dolphins are also averaging 29 points per home contest. While the Patriots have looked slightly more competent, they don’t have the team speed or offensive firepower to hang with Tua Tagovailoa, Tyreek Hill, and company. Not in this economy.
Los Angeles Chargers
The Chargers could just go full-blown Chargers That is definitely in the realm of possibilities.
But the Chargers are too good on offense with all of their pieces at home against a bad Bears defense and an offense starting Tyson Bagent. Bagent, he of a 2.0-yard aDOT, may have to sling some passes farther than six feet in front of him if he wants to go toe-to-toe with this high-powered Chargers offense. The Bolts are 8.5-point home favorites against Chicago, who allows the fifth-most points in the NFL.
This spot is so good that even the Chargers can’t spoil this. One would think.
Other NFL Week 8 Survivor Pool Options
Detroit Lions
The Lions return home to lick their wounds after a 38-6 drubbing at the hands of the Baltimore Ravens. Opposing them in Week 8 is the Las Vegas Raiders — a sight for sore eyes. They’re asking one of Brian Hoyer, Aidan O’Connell, or a hampered Jimmy Garoppolo to go into Detroit and put up enough points to counter the offensive prowess of the Lions.
The Lions are eight-point favorites at home against the Raiders, and the Raiders just cannot keep up with the Lions or stop them, frankly. I trust Dan Campbell to get his team ready for this game vs. trusting Josh McDaniels to put on his coaching hat and lead the Raiders to a road upset on national TV.
Houston Texans
Both the Texans and their opponent — the worst team in football (if you ask Kevin Tompkins and the NFL standings), the Carolina Panthers — are both coming off of their Week 7 byes. Carolina has been downright abysmal this season on both ends of the ball, and the 0-6 Panthers have a new play-caller as head coach Frank Reich has already ceded those duties to offensive coordinator Thomas Brown. Whether it’s “scapegoatism” at its finest for a Panthers team looking to turn it around with a new play-caller, the fact that they’re likely to be overmatched by a plucky Texans team favored by a field goal seems wild. But that is where we are in 2023, where the Texans are three-point road favorites.
Houston has some impressive wins against Jacksonville and Pittsburgh under its belt, so the #2 overall pick, C.J. Stroud, should have a much easier time picking apart the Panthers than his counterpart, #1 overall pick Bryce Young.
Player News
Philly Voice’s Geoff Mosher believes Eagles RB Will Shipley is the offensive player most “under the microscope.”
Shipley was a fourth-round pick out of Clemson last year and played sparingly out of the RB3 role. Mosher is watching how the 22-year-old will step up to fill the back-up running back role that Kenneth Gainwell - who departed for the Steelers - occupied last season. Gainwell was important in pass protection and a good presence when Saquon Barkley was out on possessions for blitz pickup and pass-catching. Mosher says, “if Shipley can show growth in those areas, he could undertake Gainwell’s role and give the offense even more optionality.” The Eagles added AJ Dillon in the offseason, though Dillon is more of a downhill-runner than a third-down back for the RB2 role. Shipley won’t have much value in redraft leagues, but could find his way to production through filling in an open role in the Eagles backfield.
Titans coach Brian Callahan said “I think we can do a better job managing that load so they both play a little more evenly” when asked about Tony Pollard and Tyjae Spears.
Even when Spears was healthy last year, Callahan used him as more of a third-down back. Through two years, Spears has played on 253 running plays (blocking 63 times) and 626 passing plays (blocking 119 times) per PFF. Callahan also seems to always preface this with something along the lines of “in a perfect world,” as he did in both this quote and in one we blurbed earlier in May. It’s not completely out of the range of outcomes that Tony Pollard loses major snaps and carries this year — losing a few carries should be the expectation given how many games last year he played as essentially the only back Callahan trusted to run the ball. But we’re not completely sold on the idea of Spears as a 1B just yet. Spears is going to have to show more in camp or Callahan is going to have to actually give him a real snap share as a runner with Pollard active before this becomes more than offseason talk.
ESPN’s DJ Bien-Aime believes Christian Kirk “looked like a potential safety blanket” for C.J. Stroud in OTAs and minicamp.
That’s the smell of a PPR scam in development. Kirk, who has been called the “slot demon” by Texans defenders in the early offseason camp, looks like a clear No. 2 behind Nico Collins in the Texans pecking order coming into the season. It remains to be seen if Jayden Higgins or Jaylin Noel can make a real push for targets early in the season, and Kirk’s experience figures to make him at least a big part of the early-season plan for the Texans.
ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler reports the Bengals and Trey Hendrickson have “resumed talks” in recent weeks.
Hendrickson “wants more long-term security” from the Bengals per Fowler, who also notes that Hendrickson is “dug in” and “prepared to miss time.” It’s good news for Bengals fans that the sides are at least talking again, but it sure sounds like the Bengals are going to have to give Hendrickson more than their recent offers have been to get him into training camp.
The Athletic’s Colton Pouncy believes a Jameson Williams trade “could be on the horizon in 2026" if the sides can’t agree on an extension.
This subplot had a brief little surge ahead of the draft that led nowhere, but the Lions did trade up to take Isaac TeSlaa in the third round of the draft. While the team has publicly prioritized extensions for Aidan Hutchinson and Kerby Joseph, GM Brad Holmes has been more muted while talking about Williams. Williams is entering the fourth year of his rookie contract ahead of his fifth-year option. The actions here are speaking loudly to the idea of dealing Williams after getting one more productive year out of him. It should be said, none of this speculation impacts Williams’ fantasy value this season, and coaches have raved about him all offseason in John Morton’s more downfield-focused attack. But the Lions have not appeared to prioritize a Williams extension and this could shape up to be the last dance for him in Detroit.
The Athletic’s Mike DeFabo believes Cordarrelle Patterson “could find himself on the outside looking in” for a roster spot in 2025.
“The Steelers’ backfield is full with rookie Kaleb Johnson and offseason signing Kenneth Gainwell joining Jaylen Warren. It remains to be seen if OC Arthur Smith will lobby for the hybrid RB/WR to remain on the roster as a Swiss Army knife,” DeFabo continues. Patterson only had 32 carries for 135 yards last year, but it would be a little surprising for the Steelers to cut bait with one of the greatest kickoff returners in NFL history. Entering his age-34 season, Patterson will need to keep impressing in camp to retain his spot on the roster.