MLS Fantasy Boss A Fantasy MLS Community
By: The Fantasy Therapist
Welcome back, hopefully you had a better Week 23 than I did. Family commitments meant I missed a few lineup drops and wasn’t able to make adjustments, and it showed in my score. Like many of you, I captained Evander, which was… less than ideal. Disappointing captain choices have been the case for many of us for several weeks this season, so it got me thinking about the factors that go into choosing a captain and why they are so important.
As you better know by now, your captaincy is assigned to one of your starting players. That player gets a 2x boost to their score, so choosing your captain choice can often make or break your week. On the surface, the decision seems as simple as “pick the player who will score the most.” While that’s definitely a large part of the decision, it doesn’t quite tell the whole story.
Factors to consider
When picking a captain, there are five factors I take into account.
1. Are they the primary focus of their team’s offense? If the answer is no, that usually rules them out as a captain (although they could still be a good pick for your team given matchups and/or form). The MLSFB Discord’s own John Mueller (@John) coined the term xGuy to describe how important a player is and how much attacking play runs through him when a team is trying to score. You want your captain’s xGuy to be as high as possible. Think Riqui Puig in 2024 or Lionel Messi… well, anytime he’s healthy.
2. Are they on sets or penalties? To me, sets are more important since they occur more frequently and nearly always provide a chance for an assist or KPs. PKs are a nice bonus but not always necessary.
3. Do they consistently earn bonus points? This is an important one, because sometimes your captain is going to have a game with few or no goal involvements. But if they are regularly earning BPs, that creates another path of opportunity to earn points. As an example, look back at Hany Mukhtar’s performance in Week 23 against St. Louis. He ended with 12 pts: 2 pts for minutes, 5 for a goal and 5 BPs – 1 for passing, 1 for crosses and 3 for key passes (KPs). 7 points (minutes + goal) would have been an OK return, but the BPs really elevated his performance – an extra 10 points if he was your captain. Nashville fell behind early and spent most of the game chasing, so Hany’s xGuy was extremely high as they searched for a goal. (Side note: Teams who frequently play from behind but still score goals are a good place to look for captains, since that type of game state can absolutely increase your captain’s viability.) And one more consideration here: Very few forwards not named Messi reliably earn BPs, which is why midfielders have a big advantage in this category.
4. Are they a boom/bust player? For me, this is the number one factor I look at. Unless you’re at a point in your season that you’ve given up and are just playing for fun, I don’t recommend putting the captain on a guy who has wild swings in his scores. When it works, it’s fantastic, but when it doesn’t, it can really hurt your rank. Most of my captain fails this season have been due to getting seduced by a boom/bust guy with a “great on paper” matchup. Consistency and a solid floor are very important for those weeks when your captain’s team just can’t seem to get it in the net. Form also plays a little bit of a role here, since a consistent scorer on a hot streak is tough to pass up.
5. Finally, are they at home or on the road? This doesn’t apply to the few matchup-proof players in the league, Messi being the most prime example. But for the most part, players are more likely to score higher at home, so if I need to make a decision between two options, this will act as a tiebreaker. Except for Messi, I rarely ever choose a captain who is playing away.
Decisions, decisions
I will preface this section by saying my captain picks have been pretty bad this year. I keep a spreadsheet (see below) where I track the week-by-week performance of every player I’ve captained throughout the year. So far, I’ve had 8 of 23 weeks this season when my captain has scored 5 points or less. If I remove Messi (captained 10 times) from the equation, that ratio becomes 6 of 13 weeks. Just two or three of those weeks with a successful captain pick could have made a huge difference to my OR! I have not been great at following my own rules, so I’m writing this article for me as much as everyone else.
For instance, by applying the five factors listed above, I could have built a case that Evander wasn’t the ideal choice last week. His scores have bounced up and down all season, and he’s had seven weeks this season scoring 5 points or less, including both of the past two weeks. On the other hand, Martin Ojeda, Carles Gil, and Andres Dreyer (all in my team last week) are on runs of six or seven straight weeks scoring 6 or higher. In Week 23, they all happened to score 14 points, which would have been a huge improvement over Evander’s 3. Captaining one of them wouldn’t have saved my week, but it definitely would have helped make it less of a disaster.
How Does this Apply for Week 24?
For better or for worse, there is one easy decision this season when it comes to picking a captain: If Messi starts, make him your captain. I know many people dislike this since it takes some of the fun out of the game, and I don’t disagree, but the FMLS scoring system basically gives him superpowers. He is the definition of xGuy – his team constantly looks for him, he’s on sets, he’s a BP machine, and when healthy, it’s extremely rare for him to score less than 7 points. He’s probably the most likely player in the game to hit double digits in any given week.
If Messi’s not available, use the five factors above to help make your choice. This week, I expect Martin Ojeda to be a chalky captain if Messi can’t go. As I mentioned above, Ojeda is on a great run of form and checks all five boxes. If you decide to go outside of chalk with your captain this week, hopefully these factors can help you make an informed decision and avoid another week of captain disappointment. Good luck, check back for more tips next week, and don’t forget to have fun!
The “Fantasy Physician” is Ron Birnbaum, @Half Century City on Discord
The “Fantasy Therapist” is Mike Leister, @Kenobi on Discord
