By CASEY CANNON
Hello and Welcome to the Soccer by Ives Fantasy Corner – now with fewer bed bugs! Every week I dig through statistics, news, and rumors to provide the reader with fantasy advice like: go that way really fast. If something gets in your way, turn.
Today I would like to share my tale of woe. Last week I used an extra trade and took the four point hit for an investment. You see, I remembered what LA was like last year without Gonzales and Keane: horrible. At the time both Landon and Beckham playing were playing but were just bad. The math said this is the same awful team only without Landon and Beckham. They were playing the injury devastated Colorado. I saw a chance to pick up a back-up goalkeeper on the cheap and recover all the points this week. So I snapped up Colorado Goalkeeper Clint Irwin and started him over Nielsen. Not only that, I bet against LA. I put Magee on my bench.
It was perfect right up until Drew Moor lost his mind IN THE BOX. Magee – the guy I benched – buries the resulting PK out of spite and ruins the shutout. The only goal all night and horrible fantasy pain because of Drew Moor. Meanwhile Nielsen was pitching a shutout against the New England Revolution. I hear Moor apologized to the Rapid’s fans and his teammates but I am waiting for my personal apology. I am the only person in the world to bet on Colorado last week and he betrayed me. Drew Moor, I am offended.
The only good thing to come out of this? Irwin still only costs 4.1M. I didn’t say anything last week because it seemed a little too high risk. Now I will recommend picking up Irwin as your second keeper. Put him on your bench for most of the year. If your keeper of choice goes down suddenly the GK spot won’t be a total loss.
Gratz to this week’s SBI winner DallasTillIDie with 88 points. Submersiblegoat is in the SBI league lead and in second in the overall race with 297 points.
Here is a rundown of this weekend’s top picks in Fantasy MLS:
Team Picks
Take Three – Portland Timbers. The fully charged Portland Timbers travel to face the best reserve team in Colorado. I expect them to get two goals this Weekend.
Take Three – Houston. Sadly spreadsheet doesn’t say it will be a shutout but I’m expecting a 2-1 Houston win. My hunch is Houston can keep Wondo from scoring and steal the unlikely shutout.
Avoid – Chivas, Montreal, LA, New England, Seattle. These FIVE teams are off next week. Remember how bad it was last week with international call ups? Add payers from these teams and you will have to go through it all again. With that in mind I have excluded players from those teams from my picks below. With those five out and the other three bye weeks it is slim pickings.
Individual picks
Captain – Sebastien Le Toux, Philly. 8 points per game. Yup, good as it gets with the above constraints. Don’t get me wrong, Frenchie isn’t bad; he just isn’t a player I’ve wanted to pick up this season. Still if you need a Keane replacement you should celebrate like Lane Myer with French fries, French dressing, French bread and Sebastien Le Toux.
Value – Michel Pereira, Dallas. He is averaging 6 points per Game for 5m. A bit more than two dollars but still a good value. The fantasy bandwagon is leaning towards Frisco the last few weeks and this is one of the players to pick up.
Overpriced – Thierry Henry, Red Bulls. 13.4% of you have him on your squad. He sits there eating Baguettes and 10% of your salary Cap. Often hurt, doesn’t like to play on turf and hasn’t scored a goal this season, why is Henry still on your team?
The Three Player Monte
The three card Monte game has two elements selecting three players to score goals and creating a streak of picking captain who scores every week. The players can be awful, tossed out of the game for reprehensible fouls, and singlehandedly responsible for costing his team the game so long as he scores a goal. We only need care that he passes that one test – just like the education system.
1. Captain: Earnshaw, TFC.
2. Bruin, Houston.
3. Valeri, Portland
Tiebreak: 18
Our time is almost up to provide the USMNT the attacker they need: Federico Higuaín. Only 99,956 signatures left to go! Oh well, if one of you starts a petition for Zakuani I’ll sign.
Click here to help our team get that Magic Piece: Expedite the Emergency Citizenship of Federico Higuaín.
That’s all for today. Come back next time for more MLS fantasy notes.
Performance last weekend:
Trips down the K2 this year – 0
Number of days till spring outdoor soccer starts – 9
Number of days I need to get in shape for spring outdoor soccer – 45
I am all set up to upgrade from Sam Cronin to Le Toux, but I can’t seem to pull the trigger, like casey, i’ve avoided him – and picking him up would deplete my funds for getting a striker or two after this round (I’m waiting to see if any team rallies around a fwd … so far only Higuaín seems to fit the bill, but he is off this week and starting to get pricey)
so Le Toux this round, or Higuaín next?
Higuian for sure. He’s proving to be consistent and crew are better than union.
Next week is going to be SO ROUGH.
I have 2 MTL, 2 Goats, Magee, and Soares. though, Looking at it, I may be able to get away with just taking one -4 penalty (I need to transfer Iraheta, Soares and a keeper. Thankfully I’ve got 3.2 mil in the bank so I can pick up some decent players off the transfers.
‘better off dead’ quotes make everything okay.