Fantasy Football Start or Sit Week 1: New York Jets defense

When it comes to Week 1 of Fantasy Football, the defense and special teams of the New York Jets serves as a safe sit until this young bunch has time to establish themselves.

Make no mistake about it, the New York Jets Week 1 opponents in the Buffalo Bills, are nothing to fear. Their preseason offense ranked as the 15th best in points scored a game with 15.5 as they also ranked as the 19th best offense in passing yards per game with 189.8. While preseason stats do not matter at all, Buffalo took a small blow below the belt this past offseason losing key offensive assets.

The Bills lost Sammy Watkins, Mike Gillislee, and Robert Woods. They countered those losses with a little help from free agency and the 2017 NFL Draft, by signing Mike Tolbert and drafting rookie receiver Zay Jones. With Tyrod Taylor behind the helm at quarterback, LeSean McCoy manning RB1 duties and franchise endorsed rookie Jones at receiver, Gang Green may be a safe sit until they’re able to establish themselves this regular season as a well-rounded defensive unit.

Like I said, Buffalo isn’t a scary offensive group compared to offenses such as the likes of Atlanta, Oakland or Pittsburgh, but Gotham needs to show the fan base their capable of living up to their solid preseason defensive statistics during the regular season. During the four preseason games, the Jets defense ranked as the 9th best in points allowed with 15.2. They were 6th best in yards allowed with 271.5, 7th best in passing yards allowed with 172, and 16th best in rushing yards allowed with 99.5.

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Granted this is accumulated through the 1st, 2nd and 3rd string defensive groups, never the less, being ranked in the top-9 of 3 out of 4 defensive categories is nothing to be discouraged about.

The Jets have lost quite the number of players from their 2016 roster. Defensively, this team will be without Darrelle Revis, Marcus Gilchrist, Calvin Pryor, Lorenzo Mauldin (IR), David Harris, Erin Henderson, Sheldon Richardson (trade to Seattle), and others.

In return to these losses, New York countered by drafting rookie safeties Jamal Adams and Marcus Maye with their first two picks of this year’s draft, signed free agent cornerback Morris Claiborne, re-signed linebacker Bruce Carter, acquired linebacker Demario Davis via trade with Cleveland and signed free agent defensive end Kony Ealy. While the Jets defense will have new faces on the roster, some familiar and some baby-faced, this unit needs time to mesh together and establish a lights out cohesive unit.

It’s no secret the Jets defensive line is the strongest piece of the puzzle with key assets in Muhammad Wilkerson, Steve McLendon, Leonard Williams, and Ealy. However, their linebacker corps still needs improvement, they have a young rookie safety tandem which I think will pay off in the long run but could take some time to adjust to the professional football style of play.,

Plus the cornerback position is still uncertain. You have a solid yet injury prone Claiborne as your CB1 followed by an up and down Buster Skrine, interception hog Marcus Williams and a second-year cornerback in Juston Burris.

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Despite the tanking theories surrounding this team, their offense and defense is younger than ever and will definitely fight each week for a victory. If the Jets are on your fantasy football roster as we speak, I assume it’s for the usual waiver wire bait. You know, the easy choice to drop in order to add a possible gem to your roster as for now, it’s just pure roster depth in basic terms. Keep the Jets D/ST out of your lineup for this week as I’m cautiously waiting to see how well they perform the first few weeks until they can be deemed possible starter worthy.