MLS GW17 – Tips Fantasy Major League Soccer

MLS GW17 – Tips Fantasy Major League Soccer

This weeks deadline is Sat 9th July at 1am GMT. (So Friday night going into Saturday morning basically for our UK users)

As of the writing of this article, the New England v. NYC game has yet to go off to close out the previous round. But does it really matter at this point? Chances are that somebody you need from the last game of Round 16 may get benched or play limited minutes anyway, so I won’t get my hopes up (or put off writing the article any longer than I have to). And, while we’re on the subject of chances, it’s highly doubtful that you took a chance on several of the players currently on the Dream Team. In all of our preparations for the DGW and for the byes, the MLS slapped us once more in the face with players scoring big points that simply shouldn’t be.

In short, we got Alberg’d again this week.

Currently on the Dream Team (again, before the final match of the round) we have Ola Kamara for the Crew. Did you pick him up? Probably not, he’s only owned by 2.6% of the league. But 2.6% of the league are pretty pleased with his 14 points. How about Jack Harrison from NYC? Harrison is owned by 1.9% of the league and is on 12 points. You know who else made the Dream Team? Try Michael Salazar and John Goosens, with 12 and 10 points respectively. If you combined their ownership percentages together you would get 0.7% owned by all players in the game.

I’m still a bit confused why anybody would read this article when a dart board and a few dice rolls could probably pick a better Dream Team than I could. But I’ve been told that if I don’t write the article I’ll get Jozy Altidore highlight gifs sent to my Twitter stream until it’s done. So here we go.

#1) Enjoy the break in DGW’s
This week we have a full roster of games going off – and each team will just play the one time. Imagine that. Granted, it won’t be fully calmed down yet because teams are still going to enter GW18 next week after just 2-4 days rest… but it’s a start. We’ll probably still see some roster rotation during this period, but we can now pick players based on their own merit and on the strength of schedule. We no longer have any DGW’s to plan for during these next five rounds.

This is kind of a weak and obvious bullet point, but I wanted to float this out there because the game is going to drastically change now. Maybe more of us would’ve had Ola Kamara on our squads if we didn’t have a pair of DGW’s to skew our choices in the rounds leading up to this. And conversely, maybe more of us wouldn’t have had BWP in the middle of three straight road fixtures just because he was on a double.

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#2) Prepping for the GW18 bye weeks
In GW18 we’ll have 8 teams on a bye. The game will try to trick you and inform you that you have a brand new wildcard ready to use in this round – but you’ll have to resist the temptation to do something stupid. We’re already going to get a universal wildcard in GW19, so there really is no reason to burn your second-half wildcard in GW18. If nothing else, just take zeroes instead of burning a ton of -4’s or using the wildcard.
The only excuse for using the wildcard in GW18 would be to win a bet. And even then, it better be a big bet.

Just so that you start to plan appropriately this week in your buying and selling, the teams that are on a bye next round are: Colorado, DC, Houston, LA, New England, NYC, Philly and San Jose. Obviously the worst of these are New England and NYC because you’ve no doubt bought a player or two that you’ll be forced to sell. But having LA on a bye isn’t great either because they’re finally rounding into form on both sides of the ball. But no worries, you’ll be able to buy them all at your to your heart’s content starting in GW19.

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#3) Who to buy/hold this round
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The first thing to point out is that if you’ve already invested your money into NYRB players, you’d do well to just hang onto them for the next couple of weeks at this point. The Red Bulls have no bye to worry about in GW19, and they’ll be returning home this week to play Portland. NYRB are 6-2-0 at home this year and the Timbers are 0-4-5 on the road. The records pretty much speak for themselves in this spot, keep the Red Bulls players in your side.

Vancouver come into this round starting a 3-game home stand – so they’ll definitely be worth a look. Like most MLS teams, the Caps play best at home, and three dates with no travel will probably net you some points. Now that Octavio Rivero has been sold, the situation up front for Vancouver has changed considerably. In their last match, Hurtado and Mezquida started up front for Vancouver – and both of these players are actually listed as midfielders for cheap prices. Could be some value there.

Even though I poked fun at a few people for picking up Giovinco last week, I think this is the time to buy him. Chicago travelling to Toronto is best case scenario for Giovinco to get back into form. In this post-DGW era of the game, many final rankings will probably be decided more by who bought Giovinco and who didn’t than anything else. He’s the best player in the league, and this is a matchup that deserves his inclusion into your squad.

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#4) Who to sell
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If you haven’t already, start to queue up your bye week players. That sounds obvious, I know. But before you start selling a player you’re simply mad at for underperforming, start to get rid of the players that actually have zero chance to score for you. And if you’ve already done that…

Start by selling your Chicago players (ie, David Accam). The Chicago Fire don’t have a bye week next round, but they’re starting a run of schedule that will see them play 4 of their next 6 matches on the road. They look like a great value team on paper, but the worst team in the East needs a bit better schedule for me to take a chance on them for anything long term.

FC Dallas overtook first place in the West over the weekend, but they may not be the best buy for the next several weeks. Dallas are just 3-5-1 on the road this year, and 3 of their next 4 matches will be road fixtures. Mauro Diaz is probably the only man on their roster that is undroppable, but he’ll probably not put up numbers like he had at home this week while travelling away.

Lastly, maybe ‘sell’ isn’t the right word for Seattle since not many people own their players yet, but it should be said that they wouldn’t be a good buy for a few rounds. Maybe Seattle is riding high after beating West Ham in a friendly this week – but they played against reserve players in that match. The truth is that Seattle will play twice at home in the next couple of rounds against LA and Dallas, two of the best teams in the West. After that, Seattle will be on the road for a pair of rounds. They’re best left untouched by your squad until the conditions become more favorable.

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#5) Captain picks

I think Giovinco has to come first again. Now that the DGW nonsense is over with, it becomes much easier to captain the best player in the best fixture. Giovinco v. Chicago is that matchup.

Sacha Kljestan is my second pick here. NY at home against a Portland side that doesn’t travel well is a pretty easy pick. If Valeri remains out for Portland this becomes an even easier pick if you couldn’t afford Giovinco before the next unlimited transfer window.

Kaka probably isn’t a bad pick at home against Houston. Orlando had a rough go against Dallas in their last match, and it was never close. But use that to your advantage. Kaka was pulled out after 45 minutes in a losing effort and should be good to go this round for an even better score.

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Don’t forget to stop by mlsfantasyboss.com to catch up on their great weekly articles that lead into the deadline.

Or if you are after listening to more of Guy himself then be sure to drop in and give his Married Man’s Guide to Sports Addiction a listen!

To play the MLS game itself it’s fantasy.mlssoccer.com that you need.

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And last but not least, don’t forget to join the FF247 MLS League, Code is: 123-361

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MLS GW17 – Tips Fantasy Major League Soccer This article was written by Guy Sanchez (FootyFantastic)

Follow @Guy_M_Sanchez