Yes, I can provide links if necessary, but PlayerAPI, RenderPlayerAPI, CodeChickenCore, and NEI are all available for 1.8. Also, as a foot note. I can fix the problem (sort of) by calling Class.forName("CLASS_NAME"); which then loads the class and all is good. However, this doesn't fix the problem, more like a hotfix. Also, possibly unrelated. Minecraftforge mistakes CodeChickenCore for being a duplicate mod as seen here.
[13:24:33] [Client thread/ERROR] [FML]: Found a duplicate mod CodeChickenCore at [minecraft.jar, minecraft.jar]