2010 Team Defense Draft Rankings

When it comes right down to it, I see many people drafting a Team defense way to early on in a lot of fantasy football drafts. Any time you see the Jets Defense go off the board before the 12th round, what you should be saying is "Yeah, more decent WR and RB picks for me.

The truth of the matter is, I've found that any time that I pick a defense in the middle rounds thinking that I got one of the best, it almost always backfires on me.

You go into the season only thinking about how good the defense is. Unfortunately, the defense can fall apart with injuries or your opponent beats you heads up with a defense he just picked up that has a good matchup.

If you ride one defense for the entire year during your fantasy season, the best that you will do is on average about 2 to 3 points per week better than the 10th - 12th best defense. This means that you are not gaining a lot of advantage, except maybe the one or two games that you can steal against your opponent with a huge game from the defense.

Case in point - in two of my three drafts I picked a defense at the end of the draft. I then found out that Chicago's Defense is playing at home against the Detroit Lions. Chicago has done well at home against the Lions and usually gets up by a couple of TDs early. This leads to more chances at sacks, fumbles and interceptions. Also, Chicago is a threat to score on the special teams as well. I then dropped my drafted defense and picked up the Bears.

Rank	Defense	Team	Bye
Team 1	New York Jets	NYJ	7
2	Philadelphia Eagles	PHI	8
3	Green Bay Packers	GB	10
4	Minnesota Vikings	MIN	4
5	New Orleans Saints	NO	10
6	Pittsburgh Steelers	PIT	5
7	San Francisco 49ers	SF	9
8	New York Giants	NYG	8
9	Cincinnati Bengals	CIN	6
10	Baltimore Ravens	BAL	8
11	Dallas Cowboys	DAL	4
12	Oakland Raiders	OAK	10
13	Chicago Bears	CHI	8
14	Miami Dolphins	MIA	5
15	Washington Redskins	WAS	9