Don’t set your defensive fantasy lineups for the opening games of the NFL season without consulting the IDP Guys’ Week 1 IDP start/sits article!
Welcome to the NFL Week 1 IDP Start/Sits article! We know it’s long, so we’ve added something new this year — a handy table of contents! If you’re looking for a specific match-up, click on that game, and it will take you right to it!
Table of Contents
- New Orleans Saints (0-0) at Atlanta Falcons (0-0)
- Cleveland Browns (0-0) at Carolina Panthers (0-0)
- San Francisco 49ers (0-0) at Chicago Bears (0-0)
- Pittsburgh Steelers (0-0) at Cincinnati Bengals (0-0)
- Philadelphia Eagles (0-0) at Detroit Lions (0-0)
- Indianapolis Colts (0-0) at Houston Texans (0-0)
- New England Patriots (0-0) at Miami Dolphins (0-0)
- Baltimore Ravens (0-0) at New York Jets (0-0)
- Jacksonville Jaguars (0-0) at Washington Commanders (0-0)
- New York Giants (0-0) at Houston Texans (0-0)
- Kansas City Chiefs (0-0) at Arizona Cardinals (0-0)
- Las Vegas Raiders (0-0) at Los Angeles Chargers (0-0)
- Green Bay Packers (0-0) at Minnesota Vikings (0-0)
It shouldn’t be necessary to say this, but these are only suggestions. We don’t sit in on team meetings; we simply absorb as much information as possible and then make calls based on that knowledge. If you don’t agree with our suggestions, by all means, go in a different direction. Nobody makes these decisions for you.
Article Key
Trust
These players have the best outlook based on their opportunity, past production, talent level, and matchup. They usually have a solid floor and an excellent ceiling. These guys should be the nearest to guaranteed production you can find.
If You Must
These players should earn a reasonable amount of points. Their opportunity, talent, or matchup is typically not on par with a trusted player. Tier two players are usually a good option in deep leagues that start multiple players at each position.
Bust
Sit these players unless you’re desperate. You should not start these players for any number of reasons. They aren’t necessarily bad players. We just don’t predict them to be scoring well this game week. In the case of rookies, for example, they may simply need time to earn more playing time and, therefore, our trust as fantasy starters.
Any player not listed in these three categories should probably be considered a “sit.” If they become IDP relevant on a week-to-week basis, they will likely end up in one of the categories above.
No Cornerbacks?
Johnny writes a separate article for CBs that drops on Fridays, you can find it here once it is published.
True Position Designations
In some IDP leagues, certain positions are grouped in a suboptimal way, primarily because of outdated interpretations of what players at each position do. Many IDP leagues are turning towards True Position formats to address that problem.
In true position scoring, outside linebackers and defensive ends (ends that predominantly line up outside the tackle) are grouped as ‘edge’ (rushers). Defensive tackles and defensive ends on the interior are grouped as IDL (interior defensive linemen). This leaves all remaining linebackers as off-ball linebackers or inside linebackers (ILBs).
The advantage of this approach is that we compare groups of players who, in modern defenses, essentially perform near-identical roles.
Players with EDGE designations in such leagues, and this article, can vary in value from leagues that still use traditional DE and OLB positions. The same is true of IDL vs. DT designations and is complicated further by platforms that simply use DL positions to lump all defensive linemen together (the worst!). There is no easy way to cater to all of these leagues here. Whatever we choose to do, someone would be missing out.
While there is no one-size-fits-all approach to value translation between these different designations, we can at least offer to help adjust the IDP start/sit advice mentioned here for your league’s scoring system. If you need help in that sense, or if this is just too complicated, please send us a Twitter DM or ask in the IDP Guys start/sit channel in Discord. We answer every question I receive.
This section will be replaced with a link to an article after Week 1.
Let’s get into the NFL Week 1 IDP Start/Sits.
Thanks for taking the time to read our NFL Week 1 IDP Start/Sits article We hope you find it useful. You can find more of our work here at IDPguys.org, and you can follow us on Twitter @DynastyDVM and @FFIDP_Jase. We will do our best to be available for questions or feedback. Our DMs are open.
For start/sit advice for players on offense, please check out the article here from the IDPGuys’ @DynastyBison.
