We all love the guy who drafts a team defense early in our fantasy league. It’s never a good idea to draft a team defense early; however, a defense that can score you some points can only help you on the road to dominating your league. So, when should you try to acquire the Buffalo Bills’ defense and special teams unit?
I’m a big proponent of waiting until the end of your draft to select a defense. There are so many variables that it makes it pretty impossible to nail one down that’s going to score more than 5-7 points per game. The Kansas City Chiefs were the number one fantasy scoring defense in Yahoo! leagues last year because their defense and special teams combined to score 8 touchdowns on the year. They also led the NFL with 18 interceptions.
Buffalo’s defense, as well all know, was tremendously disappointing over the last two seasons. They were 15th in scoring last year after finishing 22nd the year prior. In 2017, Yahoo! projects that they’ll be the 7th-highest scoring defense in the NFL. They project the Bills to have 34 sacks, a safety, 11 interceptions, 10 fumble recoveries, and 2 defensive touchdowns. They project that the team will not have a kick or punt return touchdown.
While the Bills’ defense/special teams is projected to rank 7th overall in scoring, it’s currently being drafted 20th overall among defenses at the end of the 15th round (pick 139.4 on average). If the run on defenses starts a little before you and you’ve filled out the rest of your roster, adding Buffalo’s stop unit could be a sneaky-good move at the end of your draft.
After watching some preseason games, we’ll revisit these projections and make a few of our own before the season kicks off on September 10.
This is the sixth installment of our fantasy football preview. Our take on the Bills’ quarterbacks, running backs, wide receivers (sans Anquan Boldin), tight ends, and kicker can be accessed via the links in this sentence.