Bonus Points: Getting the bang for your buck with your fantasy soccer picks

The 2015 Fantasy MLS season has kicked off and rosters are beginning to take shape. Managers must allocate $120 million in budget amongst their roster of 18 players. In the first edition of Bonus Points, we're going to dig deep in the numbers to find ways to help stretch that fantasy dollar.

Managers need to know how much bang they are going to get for their fantasy buck. To do this, I've taken the Fantasy MLS scores from the 2014 season and compared them against the players’ respective 2015 price tags. The stat that it spits out is the amount of points a player scored per 90 minutes divided by the player's dollar value.

The “PP90/$” stat estimates for us how many points each player will produce if they are on the field for an entire match. Dividing that number by the player's cost will tell us how many points we're expecting to be rewarded for each fantasy million we're spending on the player. If you spend $80 million on your starting XI and they average one point per million spent, you're looking at a round score of 80 points. That wouldn't be a bad way to start!

Using this stat a few players jump out as potential bargains, and a few players show that their hefty salaries may just be worth shelling out for:

Deric is the only goalkeeper priced at $5.0 that averaged more than five points per round in 2014. Seitz and Busch both did well for their respective clubs last year, but neither are definite starters. Hamid is the safest bet, but at a slightly higher cost.

Managers that were still active in late 2014 know what kind of impact Waston had in Vancouver. Gehrig may not be a starter in for the Chicago Fire, but at $5.0, he's definitely worth keeping an eye on. Powell and Korb are fullbacks that should see significant minutes this year.

When they weren't sidelined with injuries, Silva and Diaz shredded defenses to the tune of 7-9 points per match. Finlay and Shipp both saw significant salary increases in fantasy this year, but should still be well worth the money.

Akindele ended 2014 at around $5 million, and looks like one of the best mid-range forward options at $8.0. The strike partnership of Keane and Zardes may not be fed by Landon Donovan any more, but it's fairly safe to assume that these two will continue to produce results that justify their steep cost. There are questions about whether the same can be said for 2014 MLS Golden Boot winner (and now Thierry Henry-less) Bradley Wright-Phillips. I expect another solid year from BWP.