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Ranking the top 10 NFL defenses for 2020 season

We've spent a lot of time this offseason talking about offenses. Before the draft, we used our weighted system to run through the league's offensive infrastructures, separating them into buckets that included six teams who were not set up for success, nine teams who looked like they would struggle to reach average, 11 teams that should be good but not necessarily elite, and five teams who seemingly could only be held back by injuries. Naturally, the 2020 NFL Draft changed things quite a bit, so we ran those rankings back for an update earlier this week.

Now, it's time to move to the other side of the ball. Because while offense has a greater effect on overall team performance -- and is more consistent year over year -- than defense, you still need to put up some resistance in order to actually win football games. Rather than go through every team from 32-1 on this side of the ball, however, we're going to reveal our top 10 defenses here, and then debut a list of team from outside that group that have the best chance to crash the party as the best defense in football.

Without further ado ...

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5. Saints

The Saints already had a very good and extremely underrated defense, but the additions they made this offseason should take them up a level. Vonn Bell was a perfectly fine fit for them at safety next to Marcus Williams, but the addition of Malcolm Jenkins makes for a dramatic upgrade. A full season of Janoris Jenkins should mean improvement at the No. 2 corner spot, and allow Chauncey Gardner-Johnson to move back into a hybrid corner/safety type of role. Throw in their heist of hybrid linebacker/edge rusher Zack Baun in the third round of the draft and one of the league's more dangerous defensive fronts just has another key piece to play around with. Using Baun, Cameron Jordan, and Marcus Davenport on the outside, with Sheldon Rankins, David Onyemate, Malcom Brown, and Margus Hunt up the middle should be incredibly tough for opposing offenses to deal with.

Read the rest here ...

“The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity. The optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.” — Winston Churchill