The dog days of summer can be treacherous territory for the MLS Fantasy treasure hunter. Even after navigating through international absences and suspensions, there’s always a surprise - like the undisclosed injury which kept San Jose Earthquakes DP Matías Pérez García ($8.6m) out of the lineup against the Portland Timbers.
Despite the setback, several Quakes have put in good fantasy performances as of late. Clarence Goodson ($8.1m) was great in rounds 14-17, with two shutouts and an assist. Those shutouts, of course, also came from goalkeeper David Bingham ($5.4m), who showed against Portland that even in defeat he can be a big earner. He tallied 26 recoveries while sweeping up along the back line, part of a four-point defensive bonus.
San Jose still need to figure out their attack without Chris Wondolowski ($11.3m), and fantasy owners need some clarification on the status of Pérez García, but defensively they’re worth a look through this stretch.
Fantasy owners are not sleeping on Columbus Crew SC, with Ethan Finlay ($8.9m) on about 20 percent of all teams and Kei Kamara ($9.5m) the most-selected player in the game. They’re in the lone midweek match next week with the Chicago Fire. Not many fantasy points are coming out of Chicago lately. Even the popular Harry Shipp ($8.1m) has struggled, but keep an eye out for Mike Magee ($8.0m) in the upcoming weeks as he continues his comeback.
Will any of this help my patient this week? Dawson Delk submitted his entry via Twitter. Let’s see what ails him.
Hey Fantasy Doc, Save for Keane, my team did poorly this past round. With $1.6 in the bank, any suggestions?
Your team presents a challenge, as your best performer last round is on a bye in this coming round. Not only do we need to replace some poor performers, but Keane’s production as well. This would be a great group to throw down the wildcard on, but we’ll have to take the penalties and hope for the best.
With Cyle Larin ($6.0m) on international duty, let’s transfer Keane ($11.4m) to get you a starting forward. Kamara ($9.5m) handles that easily and sets you up for next round as well. That’s one down, but we’ve still got three must-transfers to go just to have a full starting lineup for this round.
D.C. United are also on a bye, so Kofi Opare ($5.2m) will have to be swapped out. He's not a regular starter at the moment, anyway. Our now $8.7 in the bank is enough to bring in Goodson. Juninho ($8.8m) will need to be swapped out, but luckily we have enough to add in Columbus’ Finlay. Finally, Seattle’s Stefan Frei ($5.8m) suffered a left shoulder strain and is expected to rest this weekend. Let’s go ahead and bring in Bingham to complete this week’s starters.
That’s an eight-point transfer penalty for going past our free transfers, but Kamara and Bingham should cover that and be even more useful next week. San Jose’s solid defensive performances, plus the inevitable bounce back of Sebastian Giovinco ($12.3m), should see this round go much better.
Hope this helps!
