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Week 8 fantasy football waiver wire pickups for Tyjae Spears, Kareem Hunt, Bhayshul Tuten in 2025. Read their waiver wire outlooks for fantasy football.
There isn't a wealth of good running back options to pick up on the waiver wire, but even after seven weeks, there often remain some good options with the potential to put up big production late in the season.
An NFL season is not a sprint, but a marathon, and often players are overlooked until it's too late. Sometimes, they have their first big game in a run of nice weeks.
Tennessee Titans RB Tyjae Spears, Kansas City Chiefs running back Kareem Hunt, and Jacksonville Jaguars tailback Bhayshul Tuten are three backup running backs who have secured their teams' RB2 jobs, but should you secure them onto your rosters with waiver pickups? Let's dive in.
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Tyjae Spears Week 8 Waiver Wire Pickups
Rostered: 42% of Leagues
Baller Move: Add in 14+ Team leagues
We're in the third season of Spears' career, and at this point, we're pretty familiar with who he is as a player. He's not as good a pure runner as the starter ahead of him, Tony Pollard, and he functions as a third-down back that occasionally catches passes.
That's simply not good enough to be relevant in fantasy football outside of very deep leagues. And even in his absence for the first four games of the season, the Titans were so bad that Pollard hardly did anything at all. This is an anemic offense, and right now, zero of their players are strong fantasy starting options.
what a cut by Tyjae Spears pic.twitter.com/Y4sSnZaeQz
— Nate Tice (@Nate_Tice) October 15, 2025
Spears could be much more productive in a good offense. You can see from the play above that he's quite shifty and can make defenders miss with very sharp cuts. He did have a nice pass-catching role last year for the Titans, but he only caught three passes for 18 yards and rushed five times for 22 yards in Week 7.
The Titans were once again blown out, losing 31-13 to the New England Patriots. They fired their head coach after Week 6, but the quarterback play has been absolutely abysmal -- rookie No. 1 overall pick Cam Ward has played arguably the worst football of any QB in the NFL, ranking near the bottom of the league in accuracy statistics and taking too many unnecessary sacks.
Players are often largely a product of their environment, and the Titans' environment is very bad. Even if Pollard were to get injured, Spears could struggle to put up decent fantasy points, so he's worth adding only in deep leagues right now.
Kareem Hunt Week 8 Waiver Wire Pickups
Rostered: 53% of Leagues
Baller Move: Don't Add
Hunt did very little in his team's blowout win over the Las Vegas Raiders on Sunday. He carried the ball four times for 18 yards and wasn't targeted by Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes.
The backfield is a bit of a mess for Hunt. Veteran RB Isiah Pacheco is handling most of the rushing duties, and rookie Brashard Smith, a converted wide receiver who switched to RB his last year in college, is handling most of the pass-catching work. In the last four games, Smith has been targeted 16 times, while Hunt has seen just three passes come his way. Last game, Pacheco had 15 carries.
Before the season it was controversial here to say Brashard Smith, a converted WR, was the best pass-catching back in the 2025 NFL Draft class. But Smith had the 2nd-highest target share for the Chiefs on Sunday, beating out Xavier Worthy and Travis Kelce https://t.co/fCAkCJrwY0
— JohnJohn Analysis (@JohnJohnalytics) October 20, 2025
Hunt's role evaporated even before the game got out of hand. It looks like Pacheco is taking on more of the primary rushing role while Smith plays a PPR-scam type RB role in which he runs routes out of the backfield and catches screens and dump-offs. The Chiefs have been designing looks for him, too.
There is no reason to pick up Hunt when Smith appears to have a higher floor and has been getting an increasing workload in the receiving game. Most of the rookie's 11 carries happened in garbage time, but receptions are gold in PPR leagues.
Bhayshul Tuten Week 8 Waiver Wire Pickups
Rostered: 35% of Leagues
Baller Move: Add In All Leagues
Tuten continues to play second fiddle to lead back Travis Etienne Jr., but Etienne's hot start to the season has faded recently. Tuten only had five carries last week, which he took for 22 yards, while Etienne rushed eight times for 44 yards while catching one pass for 11 yards.
Etienne's advanced efficiency metrics actually suggest he's one of the league's least viable running backs when playing against solid defenses. His statistical production has absolutely plummeted since his games against the extremely porous Panthers and Bengals defenses in Week 1 and Week 2.
Weeks 1-4:
+394 Yds (RB3/49)
+6.06 YPC (RB1)
+7.7% Explosive Rush Rate (RB6)
+0.17 MTF/Att (RB24)Weeks 5-7:
+3.75 YPC (RB31/41, min. 15 att)
+0 Missed Tackles Forced on 41 carries
+1.34 YACon/Att (RB38)Extremely inefficient vs any decent defense
— JohnJohn Analysis (@JohnJohnalytics) October 20, 2025
His overall numbers haven't been horrific, but they're boosted heavily by the elite offensive line play of the Jaguars. Over the last three weeks, Etienne has forced zero defenders to miss a tackle against him. He's just gaining a ton of yards before contact, thanks to his offensive line and the blocking schemes.
Tuten has made a few rookie mistakes and dealt with an injured shoulder, so he's been slow to come along. But he has massive potential if he starts getting more work. The Jaguars were just absolutely demolished by the Los Angeles Rams in Week 7, so perhaps the coaching staff might make a change.
Rookies often see production bumps after the bye week, so Tuten should be a priority stash in all leagues either now or after the bye if you think he'll remain unclaimed. He's one of the best athletes ever at his position to be drafted.
Who Should I Pickup Tool
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