Tampa, Too: Ranking the Top Ten Defenses of 2026

**SPEAKER_1** (0:00)
So you're saying with Hilton Honors, I can use points for a free night stay anywhere?

**Mina Kimes** (0:04)
Anywhere.

**SPEAKER_1** (0:06)
What about fancy places like the Canopy in Paris? Yeah, Hilton Honors, baby. Or relaxing sanctuaries like the Conrad and Tulum?

**SPEAKER_3** (0:13)
Hilton Honors, baby.

**SPEAKER_1** (0:15)
What about the five-star Waldorf Astoria in the Maldives? Are you gonna do this for all 9,000 properties? When you want points that can take you anywhere, anytime, it matters where you stay.

**JP Acosta** (0:26)
Hilton for the stay.

**Mina Kimes** (0:33)
Welcome to The Mina Kimes Show featuring Lenny, the only NFL podcast. One of the hosts pronounces it, Kamari Lassiter. That's Lenny at Mina Kimes. We're gonna talk about Kamari Lassiter today because I am joined by JP Acosta to do the top 10 defenses of 2026 JP, it's been a while since you've been on the show. For the folks who don't know, JP is the co-host of the Pushing the Pile podcast over at CVS Sports.
I can't remember the last time you were on, it's been a minute. I'm excited to have you back.

**JP Acosta** (1:03)
When you asked me to be on for this show, I was super excited because this is exactly what I like to talk about. We're not talking about any of the offense, we're not talking about all the super crazy offense teams. So we're getting our hands in the dirt here. We're talking about defenses.

**Mina Kimes** (1:20)
So this was hard.
Offenses- It was.
Very different experiences from top 10 offenses, which if you're listening to this and you missed it, I did top 10 offenses last week with Nate Tice. So we had a few differences, probably, I didn't count, but I think about 7 of the 10 or maybe 8 of the 10 were the same. But offenses, my experience was I had like 14 or 15, and I had trouble narrowing it down to 10 Whereas defenses, and I want to hear how it was for you, I thought there was a very clear top 5 or 6 And then after that, like, I really- It's not that I think they're all bad, it's just there's so many unknowns, and I was really like going back and forth a million times in those final 3 to 4 spots.

**JP Acosta** (2:02)
I definitely agree. I think outside of the top 5, that we're going to get into, I think once you get past those teams, there are a lot of variables, there's a lot of, you know, what their teams bringing in new coordinators, new pieces on the defense side of the ball. But I think with all of them, there's, like, potential for them to be good either this year or maybe, like, in a few years down the line. There's some honorable mentions, I was like, I want to believe, but I'm going to give it a couple more years.

**Mina Kimes** (2:27)
There's one, I bet we have the same- There's one where I was like, I was so tempted to put them in the top 10, and I was like, I feel like I need another year. So just to revisit last year's top 10 defenses. Oh, and folks, I got some comments saying, you should talk about who you picked last year. So I'm going to tell you for defenses, because I didn't do that last week. So the actual top 10 defenses last year, and I'll do DVOA, which is FDN Fantasies stat that everyone has bought DVOAs, but it counts for strength of schedule and things like that.
Seattle, Houston, Minnesota, the Rams, which might surprise people, and I'm sure we'll get into them today and talk a little bit about what happened last year. I think DVOA really likes the Rams because of the opponents. Denver, Jacksonville, Philadelphia, Cleveland, Detroit, and the Chargers just outside where the Steelers, Falcons, Saints, that's another surprising one, I think, and the Raiders. EPA for play, pretty similar, just a little bit of a reassortment or re-ranking. But the Patriots snuck in at the end there.
KC was actually 12th in that mark. And then success rate, which I also checked. Again, very similar teams. Actually, I think the same top 10 as the EVOA, just in different order with the Chiefs, the Panthers and the Jacks outside. So my actual predictions, all right. So this is what I predicted in 2025 I think Dominique was on the pod.
Denver, fine. Houston, fine. The Ravens who were devastated by injuries. This was, of course, before the Madaweke injury and there was some other injuries which we might talk about later. Vikings, yes. The Seahawks, the Lions also devastated by injuries. I had the Steelers who just missed it. The Packers, which I didn't want to put them in, but they had been good the year before, and then the Parsons injury obviously derailed them. And then my big L. So all of those teams I think are either correct or defensible. The big L I took was on the Giants. I just was so tantalized by that pass rush, and turns out stopping the run matters, JP.