Three & Out

I’ve heard it jokingly said before that one was playing defense on fantasy football against their opponent.  I think this is more of a reality / possibility than one might think, however.  It looks a little different from traditional defense, but inevitably there comes a time when you are faced with a decision where a player you own and a player your opponent owns will significantly impact each other’s performance, leaving you with a choice to make.

The most clear cut example of this is when your defense is going against one of their studs, or vice versa.  Or your QB will be tossing to their receiver.  Or your RB will be battling it out for possessions against their WR.  You get the idea.  So what is the best way to ‘play defense’ in this situation?  How can we ensure we get the most points possible, while still playing it safe in case things do not go as expected?

Let’s use a real life example from this season: the week two showdown between the Cowboys and Eagles.  In this scenario, I have the Cowboy’s defense and my opponent has Brian Westbrook.  On the one hand, I have confidence, after Dallas’ week one performance, and the general hype surrounding their defense entering the 2008 season.  On the other hand, Westbrook is a lit fuse, and you never know quite when he will go off.  Using hindsight to analyze the situation, one would say that this would be a slugfest, with teams exchanging TDs left and right, and whenever that happens, Westbrook tends to be in the thick of things.  Knowing that, I would decide to bench the ‘Boys, and grab a temporary defense off waivers.  Thus my defense against Westbrook is to create a lineup that he cannot destroy.

Now let’s look at an example from Week 15: Stephen Jackson and the Seattle defense.  Conventional wisdom (and hindsight) says that in amatchup like this, Jackson will probably yield somewhere around 100 yards and a score.  And yet, outside of Jackson, the Rams are not a team to fear.  So in this case, Jackson can get his 100+ yards and a TD, and you can still manage profitable production from theSeahawks defense (yes, ideally you have better options in the first week of playoffs, but sometimes matchups are just too enticing to pass up).  Up to this point, the examples have been somewhat straight forward, but let’s examine a more complex one, again from week 15.