With defenses, probably best not to pay too much attention to what happened last year. It doesn’t tend to be much of a barometer. In recent years, in fact, it’s been downright crappy.
Consider the fantasy scoring system of 6 points for touchdowns, 2 for takeaways and 1 for sacks. Using that scoring system, in each of the past five years, only one of the teams finishing in the top 5 in defensive scoring has even made the top 10 the next season.
Pretty startling.
Here are the numbers, and let me offer an explanation, since they’re not typical numbers you might look at.
Listed are the 20 defenses that were top-5 defenses entering the last five years. First column is NFL points – 6 points for each TD scored on a return (including special teams) plus 2 points for safeties. Next comes fumbles, interceptions and sacks. The “F Pts” is the fantasy points, combining all those columns. The final column is the rank, showing how they finished in that season – 1 is good, 32 is the worst.
The four teams that made it into the top 10, I’ve got them in bold.
HOW TOP-5 DEFENSES FARE THE NEXT YEAR | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Year | Team | Pts | Fum | Int | Sack | F Pts | Rk |
2011 | New England | 24 | 11 | 23 | 40 | 132 | (6) |
2011 | Oakland | 14 | 8 | 18 | 39 | 105 | (17) |
2011 | Arizona | 24 | 9 | 10 | 42 | 104 | (18) |
2011 | Dallas | 6 | 9 | 15 | 42 | 96 | (22) |
2011 | Pittsburgh | 16 | 4 | 11 | 35 | 81 | (30) |
2012 | Chicago | 60 | 20 | 24 | 41 | 189 | (1) |
2012 | Green Bay | 24 | 5 | 18 | 47 | 117 | (14) |
2012 | San Francisco | 20 | 11 | 14 | 38 | 108 | (18) |
2012 | Buffalo | 26 | 9 | 12 | 36 | 104 | (21) |
2012 | Detroit | 2 | 6 | 11 | 34 | 70 | (29) |
2013 | Chicago | 42 | 9 | 19 | 31 | 129 | (9) |
2013 | New England | 18 | 12 | 17 | 48 | 124 | (11) |
2013 | Denver | 30 | 9 | 17 | 41 | 123 | (12) |
2013 | Tennessee | 18 | 12 | 13 | 36 | 104 | (24) |
2013 | San Diego | 6 | 6 | 11 | 35 | 75 | (31) |
2014 | St. Louis | 30 | 12 | 13 | 40 | 120 | (5) |
2014 | Carolina | 18 | 12 | 14 | 40 | 110 | (12) |
2014 | Seattle | 20 | 11 | 13 | 37 | 105 | (18) |
2014 | Kansas City | 18 | 8 | 6 | 46 | 92 | (25) |
2014 | Cincinnati | 12 | 6 | 20 | 20 | 84 | (26) |
—Ian Allan