For one more week, the tables below will feature the 2016 stats and ranks. The analysis below the tables will address what happened in Week 1. As will often be the case this year, the bulk of the featured defenses as streaming options are at home, however, one of the four teams suggested this week gets the nod on the road. Each of the defenses should be favored squads, too, which is ideal for setting up point-scoring opportunities via turnovers and sacks.

*Spreads and totals from Pinnacle and 2016 statistics and ranks from Pro-Football Reference in the tables below.

Get free start/sit and waiver wire advice for your fantasy team

Ravens

 
The Ravens did a great job of forcing miscues from opponents last year, but they couldn’t plant quarterbacks on their rear end. In Week 1, they continued their ball-hawking ways from a season ago intercepting Andy Dalton four times and forcing a lost fumble from Dalton, but they also pinned their ears back and sacked him five times in a shutout victory. They’re more than a touchdown and successful PAT favorite at home this week after thrashing Ohio’s other football team in Cincinnati, and they’ll be in a prime spot to tally more sacks and turnovers against rookie DeShone Kizer. The Notre Dame product took seven sacks in Cleveland’s loss to Pittsburgh, and he also threw an interception. With the game’s over/under total at just 41 points and the Ravens favored by 7.5 points, Cleveland’s implied team total is 16.75 points. Baltimore’s defense’s ceiling and floor are both extremely high this week, and they’re jostling with the last suggested stream option in this piece for my favorite stream option this week.

Raiders

 
Every week the Jets face a widely available defense, that defense will be featured in this piece. That’s basically a lock. Gang Green totaled a pathetic 214 yards, eight first downs, 3.9 yards per play, and 12 points against the Bills, according to ESPN’s box score. Josh McCown was sacked one time and threw two interceptions, but the Bills held small leads throughout the game due to turnovers and the lack of an explosive offense. The Raiders have an explosive offense that hung 26 points in the season opener. The Jets lack the personnel to slow the host Raiders down. Oakland’s defense forced zero turnovers and recorded only one sack in Week 1 after finishing dead last in sacks last year, but they did hold the Titans to 16 points in Tennessee. With a larger lead this week, the Raiders should do a better job of picking up sacks and turnovers this week. Furthermore, the Jets implied total of a pathetic 15 points is eye opening.

Titans

 
The game’s only a pick ’em, but I suspect with news that Allen Robinson is out for the year the line will move in favor of the Titans as the week moves on. They surrendered 26 points in a loss to the previously highlighted Raiders, but Jacksonville’s passing attack led by Blake Bortles is not in the same stratosphere as the Derek Carr-led Raiders. The Jaguars’ 29 points against the Texans might look intimidating, but the defense was responsible for one of those scores, and they played a ball-control offense with Bortles throwing just 21 times and the team running 39 times. The subpar — putting it mildly — play from Houston’s quarterbacks allowed Jacksonville to force feed Leonard Fournette. Tennessee’s offense is far better than Houston’s, and if the Titans move out to an early lead — which I believe is highly possible, even against Jacksonville’s talented defense — then Bortles will be forced to air it out more. That brings us back to the absence of A-Rob. Bortles is a turnover-machine with 51 interceptions and 12 fumbles lost in 47 games (46 starts), and he led the NFL in sacks his first two years in the NFL (2014 and 2015) with 106 taken in 30 games. Without his best weapon in the passing attack, Bortles’ turnover-prone ways could be exacerbated if Jacksonville is stuck playing catch up. The Titans’ inclusion as a stream option is primarily about the opponent as opposed to Tennessee’s defense’s talent.

Buccaneers

 
Hurricane Irma forced both the Buccaneers and Dolphins to move their Week 1 matchup to what was each team’s initial bye week in Week 11. Sure, Roger Goodell cares about player safety having both teams play a minimum of 16 games in a row instead of having them play at a neutral location in Week 1. Anyway, getting back to the topic at hand, Tampa Bay’s season will begin opposing a familiar face. Mike Glennon returns to Tampa Bay as the starting quarterback of the Bears. He and Chicago gave the defending NFC Champion Falcons everything they could handle, but they came up just short with Glennon taking a sack in the red zone that resulted in the clock running out. He was sacked four times by the Falcons. The statuesque signal caller is no stranger to taking sacks having been sacked 56 times in 19 games (18 starts) his first two years in the NFL, and the Buccaneers were aggressive racking up a top-10 sack total last year. They also did a great job of forcing turnovers, as the table illustrates. Already without Cameron Meredith, the Bears thin receiving corps was dealt another blow with Kevin White breaking his collarbone against the Falcons. Chicago’s offense lacks weapons, and they have only an 18.25 point implied total. The Bucs’ ability to rush the passer, force turnovers and a matchup with a lackluster offense puts them on par with the Ravens as the top streaming defense option this week, but they’re much more widely available than Baltimore.

Subscribe: iTunes | Stitcher | SoundCloud | Google Play | TuneIn | RSS

Josh Shepardson is a featured writer at FantasyPros. For more from Josh, check out his archive and follow him @BChad50.