2025 Fantasy Draft Strategy Guide: Team Defenses

An Overview of the Team Defense Position

Over the past month here at Footballguys, we have offered up a comprehensive 2025 Fantasy Draft Guide.

We have...

• Queried the quarterbacks.
• Ruminated on running backs.
• Wondered about wide receivers.
• Thought about tight ends.

But there remains one position to go.

This analyst doesn't mean kickers. If your league still uses those, there's only one strategy. Wait until the last round and then pick the best kicker available. Do anything else, and with due respect a fantasy manager needs a slap.

OK, maybe not that hard. But still. Last round.

No, we're talking about team defenses. For many fantasy managers, defenses are mostly an afterthought--and with good reason. Defenses are easily the most unpredictable position in fantasy football. With so many moving parts from season to season, defenses can go from the penthouse to the outhouse (or vice versa) with equal parts quickness and no warning.

In many scoring formats, there also isn't much difference between the "elite" team defenses and the lower-end weekly starters. For example, the difference in points per game last year in ESPN Default Fantasy Scoring between the No. 1 fantasy defense (the Denver Broncos) and the No. 12 defense (the Baltimore Ravens) was all of two points per contest. 

Still, two points is two points. You never know when those won't just matter but can win the day. Back in 2022, the New England Patriots went on a run defensively in the fantasy playoffs that won managers championships.

So, while D/ST strategy may not have the impact on your team that running backs do, it could still have an impact--for better or worse.

Better sounds, well, better.

Team Defense Draft Strategies

Door No. 1: Aim High

Some fantasy managers yearn for a "set and forget" fantasy defense. A consistently productive weekly starter they can roll out without having to bother with matchup research and the ups-and-downs that sometimes come with the other draft strategies at the position. 

The upside is obvious. Not only should elite defenses (in theory) be among the highest scorers in a given season, but they should be more consistent and less matchup-dependent. Hit, and you have an edge at the position. One that could be a lot wider than two points if a league's scoring actually gives defenses some weight.

Yes, I'm an IDP guy. But if you just gotta play with team defenses, at least make them matter. Juice the scoring.

The problem is that it doesn't work, largely because the first defense drafted is almost never the top one at the end of the season.

I could go farther back. But trust me--it doesn't get better.

Over the past five seasons, two defenses came close to their lofty price tags--the 2022 Buffalo Bills and the 2020 Steelers. Three of the defenses drafted first at the position finished 16th or worse. And two of the actual top defenses at season's end were selected 20th or later at that spot.

The edge fantasy managers hope to gain by taking a high-end defense is more likely than not an illusion. And even 13th-round picks matter--hitting on a sleeper wideout or having a running back's handcuff rostered means a lot more than a big bag of nothing defensively.

Door No. 2: The Platoon

As always, there's a middle road where fantasy draft strategy defensively is concerned. And that middle ground with team defenses is actually having depth (of a sort) at the position by drafting a pair--whether it's a pair of lower-end weekly starters, a mid-range starter and a late dart throw, or a pair of late upside plays. Whatever lights your fire, man.

OK, I may have forced that one a little.

The potential benefit here is having a rotation of sorts, where managers can play matchups (or have a backup for their primary weekly starter when their opponent is unfavorable) without relying on the waiver wire. Or hitting on one a dart throw that turns into one of those surprise top scorers that were mentioned earlier.

Get the No.1 defense in the last round, and you could be on to something.

But again, for this analyst, this is a no-go for a pair of reasons.

The first is essentially the same as Door No. 1--good luck figuring out which defense to target. Calling defenses wildly unpredictable is an understatement. Personnel changes every year. Coordinators come and go. Injuries happen. Sometimes, big plays like takeaways and sacks (the foundation of D/ST scoring in many leagues) just drop--they are high-variance stats to the point of being fluky.

There's also the matter of using two roster spots for a position that likely won't afford you any kind of consistent edge. Best-ball formats are one thing. There, two (or even three) defenses make some kind of sense. In most standard 12-team fantasy leagues? It's wasting a roster spot. Period. Too many defenses still on the wire to burn a slot that could be used for depth and/or dart-chuckin'.

Door No. 3: Living the Stream

This is it. The way to play. Winner winner chicken dinner.

This is a strategy that is as simple as it is effective. Wait until the draft's penultimate (Word of the Day toilet paper--the gift that keeps on giving) round, and draft a defense that has a good matchup over the first week or two of the season. Then, when those tasty matchups dry up, just dump that defense and grab one with a favorable matchup off the waiver wire.

It's the only way to fly. 

The advantages? Um, all of them. 

The cost being paid is minimal--slightly more than for a kicker. It's minimal risk chasing maximum reward. If you happen onto a defense that pulls a 2024 Denver Broncos, jackpot. If you don't and have any success at all playing matchups, you can build a top-10 (or even top-five) "Frankendefense" for pennies on the dollar. Get an edge (however slim) without paying for it.

It's not risk-free. There will be weeks where managers whiff on a matchup and get a bad score. Those start stacking up (along with a close loss or two), and it can be frustrating. It's that much harder early in the season when matchup calls are driven more by potentially outdated data and speculation. There will also be multiple other teams trying to do the same thing--that $1 FAAB bid won't always work.

But value wins fantasy leagues. And Living the Stream is the best path to getting value with team defenses.

Values, Busts, and Sleepers

After 37 dart references over the last month (this article, whatever), y'all had to know where this was headed.

D/ST Values

Pittsburgh Steelers (ADP: D/ST 7)

This is the absolute earliest that fantasy drafters should consider taking a defense. The fighting T.J. Watts were a top-five fantasy unit in 2024 and have three top-10 finishes (including the top spot in 2020) over the last five seasons. Unless injuries hit the Steelers' edge rushers, this is a team with a fairly lengthy history of racking up sacks. It fuels their (relative) consistency.

Dallas Cowboys (ADP: D/ST 12)

The Cowboys are coming off a wildly disappointing season, have legitimate issues at all three levels of the defense, and are probably the third-best team in their own division. But last year's fourth-place finish in fantasy points among defenses was the team's fourth straight inside the top five. Dallas thrives on big plays, which are unreliable in every way. And yet, somehow, Micah Parsons and the 'Boys keep making them.

D/ST Busts

Denver Broncos (ADP: D/ST 1)

After adding safety Talanoa Hufanga and linebacker Dre Greenlaw to an already stacked unit, the Broncos are as well-positioned as any defense in recent memory to repeat as kings of the D/ST mountain. But that's as rare as the first fantasy defense drafted actually finishing there. Barring disaster, the Broncos will finish top-10. But paying retail for the eighth-best fantasy defense is just silly.

Philadelphia Eagles (ADP: D/ST 2)

Seriously. Someone explain why Philly is the second fantasy defense off the board at this point in the summer. A solid NFL defense? Probably--although the Eagles have real questions on the defensive line and at linebacker opposite Zack Baun. In last year's Super Bowl season, the Eagles were 13th in the league with 41 sacks and 11th in fantasy points at the position. That's closer to their fantasy ceiling than their floor in 2025.

D/ST Sleepers

Washington Commanders (ADP: D/ST 22)

It was an up-and-down season for the Commanders from a fantasy perspective a year ago--for every big week the team had, there was a dud. But Washington still finished the season 12th among defenses in fantasy points. The team will have a healthy Marshon Lattimore joining some sneaky-good additions in the offseason, and the Commanders open the season against a New York Giants team that is fixing to make Russell Wilson retire.

He'd best be able to still run a little.

Cincinnati Bengals (ADP: D/ST 24)

Bluntly put, the Bengals sucked last year defensively--25th in both total defense and scoring defense and 26th in fantasy points. But assuming that the team removes it's head from its (yeah) and fixes the Trey Hendrickson and Shemar Stewart impasses (which will happen--the bigger question is when for Stewart), this is a defense that played in a Super Bowl not that long ago traveling to the Factory of Sadness to face the Clowns in Week 1.

The game will be a blowout. The Bengals will score on defense. 

Yeah, I said it. And I'm a Browns fan.

Gary Davenport is a two-time Fantasy Sports Writers Association Football Writer of the Year. Follow Gary on X at @IDPGodfather.