Streaming Defenses - Week 3

I'm barely sneaking Bob's streaming D advice in before Tuesday night waivers...hope this reaches you all in time. By the way, Bob is so awesome that he worked on this article while sailing around on vacation. Cheers to Bob and good luck with your streamers this week!

Welcome back fellow streamers. Last week played out about as we predicted except for one hiccup. The top 5 owned did as expected with two of them posting big weeks. Our streams did well except for the Jets. I’m beginning to hate those Thursday Night matchups, they’re unpredictable, so I may shy away from those teams for streams. Here are the results from last week, showing three that exceeded one of the highest owned.

Team	Opp	Owned	Actual
CAR	SF	100%	16
DEN	IND	100%	26
SEA	@LAR	100%	9
ARI	TB	99%	25
HOU	KC	96%	16
Average			18.4
NYJ	@BUF	37%	3
BAL	@CLE	8%	10
NYG	NO	10%	14
GB	@MIN	52%	11
Average			9.5

So did we learn anything more from last week? SEA is now a new target. They’re offensive line woes are very real, and it looks like that will continue. MIN is better than anyone thought preseason, and not only because they murdered the packers, but because they are racking up DEF points and now lead the league in fantasy points, even after playing two pretty good teams. 

This is the time of the year where streamers should start thinking of holding two defenses if your bench will allow it. The streaming defenses strategy includes finding and holding the year’s emerging gems on defense. This usually takes 3-5 weeks of consistency to make that commitment. If you picked up MIN as a stream, it’s time to keep them rather than trade them off for another stream for the week. I’m not ready to identify any others in that category yet, but keep an eye on the Rams, Ravens, and 49ers as newly emerging top defenses for 2016. Losers that you should no longer hold onto are the Chiefs, Steelers, and Bengals. They’re just not what they were last year and it would be better to stream than hold onto them.

So here’s how I see this week, and it’s another week of matchups that favor the highly owned. I’ll give you 5 good streams but once again, don’t expect them to beat out the top 4 highly owned. And I’m giving you a trap game to stay away from.

Week 3 Highly Owned
Team	OPP	Proj Pts	% Owned	Comments
DEN	@CIN	16	100%	Hard to bet against this DEF right now, although CIN will provide a better opponent this week, DEN is still a clear start
CAR	MIN	14	100%	CAR keeps chugging along with solid returns on DEF in spite of their sputtering offense, another must start
SEA	SF	13	100%	SEA off is appalling right now, but you have to stick with their def, must start against a struggling SF team.
ARI	@BUF	14	99%	ARI is also a clear start, although BUF has been stingy giving up def points lately.
HOU	@NE	10	95%	You better temper your expectations this week against NE, they just keep finding ways to protect and win, even with a 3rd string QB. But I would start HOU anyway even though it’s a Thursday Night game.
NE	HOU	12	93%	I like NE this week in spite of them scoring only so-so on DEF, I think NE will rally the DEF for their 3rd QB. But beware the Thursday Night curse.
KC	NYJ	4	86%	Nope, KC still is hurting on Def and the Jets are proving to be a wise play calling team. There are better choices.
MIN	@CAR	14	82%	You've got to start MIN against CAR and expect the same returns DEN had against them, this could be the biggest scoring Def this week.
Streams for Week 3
SF	@SEA	12	3%	This is the sneakiest, but probably the best stream of the week. SEA has the worst Off line, and now they're starting to lose. SEA is our newest target, and SF is starting to roar, start as best stream of the week, even though only owned in 3% leagues.
BAL	@JAC	11	39%	BAL has had two good outings as a DEF against lesser teams and JAC is still a lesser team; this is a good stream this week.
MIA	CLE	10	7%	MIA had a bad week last week but it was against NE, and now with CLE as their victim, start with confidence.
LAR	@TB	9	74%	The Rams showed they still have some gas in the Def against SEA; they seem to have gelled and are a good start against a young TB team.
OAK	@TEN	8	57%	TEN remains a great target and although OAK hasn't really been a great DEF they have played well and are a good start against a plummeting TEN off.
PHI	PIT	3	49%	Beware starting the surging Eagles Def against PIT. I think it's a trap, stay away.

There you have, signing out from St Thomas in the Caribbean where internet costs more than Single Malt Scotch. Bon Voyage.