NFL

3 Fantasy Football Defensive Streaming Options for Week 17

I'm one of the 10 or so weirdos on the planet who has a passion for D/STs. In truth, it's a difficult passion to explain to people. Fantasy football is already a niche within a niche, and defensive streaming adds a couple of layers of obscure on top of that. Indeed, even a certain chunk of the fantasy football community is vehemently opposed to defensive streaming.

Whether you share my passion for the D/ST position, or you're gritting your teeth and bearing with your league's decision to keep the spot in spite of your repeated requests to the contrary, I'm here to help.

A few housekeeping matters: lines are courtesy of NFL odds, and roster percentages and scores are from the Yahoo! fantasy platform. Assume that the listed order is the preferred order. I'll try for defenses on 40% or fewer of Yahoo rosters.

Chicago Bears

vs. New York Giants
Spread: Bears -6.0
Roster Percentage: 16%

The Chicago Bears have commonly shown up as a "stream against" option, but find themselves on the positive side of the ledger this week, taking on the New York Giants. We'll see whether Mike Glennon or Jake Fromm are under-center for the G-Men, but not much is expected either way as the Giants see just a 16.0-point implied total in Week 17.

The Bears have an average defense at 0.09 Net Expected Points (NEP) allowed per play. That should be enough to put up a strong performance in this favorable matchup.

The Bears, according to our model, are the 4th-best D/ST in Championship Week.

Tennessee Titans

vs. Miami Dolphins
Spread: Titans -3.0
Roster Percentage: 41%

Looking at options outside of the Bears, I really hope you planned ahead. These next two teams have some positives but are nothing to write home about. If you do find yourself at this portion of the list, you'll want to stay vigilant. The Miami Dolphins, for example, just saw the Covid list bring a major downgrade to the New Orleans Saints at quarterback and saw their D/ST cash-in as a result.

The Tennessee Titans have an above-average defense at 0.04 Defensive NEP allowed per play, and a decent matchup with both the implied point total (19.0) and over/under (41.0) being low.

Still, we project the Titans as just the 13th-best D/ST this week, so alternative options are advised.

New York Giants

At Chicago Bears
Spread: Giants +6.0
Roster Percentage: 3%

This isn't a true pick-your-poison matchup. The Bears are near touchdown-favorites, and thus clearly the superior play.

However, even at 6.0-point favorites, the Bears have an implied point total of just 22.0. Assuming Justin Fields is back under-center, his high sack and interception rates make the Giants at least a modestly interesting streamer.

The Giants project as our 10th-best D/ST on the week.