Fantasy Strategy Clinic Round 7: How Do I Assess Matchups?

By: The Fantasy Therapist

Well, we’ve made it through the first FCL qualifying round. Congrats to all those who qualified! If you didn’t get in, and qualifying is important to you, this week I’m going to talk about an important strategy as we get deeper into the season: assessing matchups.

The Sacred Art of Matchup Analysis

Strengths, Weaknesses & Variables

One of the biggest champions of this approach is Christian Ward (aka @xward on Discord). He’s been banging the drum of assessing matchups for quite a while, so I asked him for his thoughts on why this is such an important strategy. He said:

“A good attacking matchup is one where the player you’re considering has a decent chance of exploiting the opponent’s defensive weaknesses in order to create chances or to score outright. As a fantasy manager, your job is to discover what those defensive weaknesses are, compare them with the attacker’s capabilities, then decide if the comparison favors him or not, while accounting for a number of variables, such as home field advantage, absences, fitness, weather, team tactics, fixture congestion, etc.”

Those variables in MLS often carry a lot more weight than they do in other leagues. MLS differs greatly from a lot of European leagues where an away match is just a 2-hour bus ride away, and good teams can win anywhere, home or away. The size of the league, the travel time required to get around North America, the league’s commitment to parity, a stronger-than-average home field advantage, owners’ varying willingness to spend, a wide gap in experience among both players and coaches and even the wild unpredictability of weather patterns across much of the continent all play a role in determining what kind of matchup a specific player will have each week. But before taking any of these factors into account, there are three basic questions to ask that make a good starting point to figure out who has a matchup to target. I like to begin simply by looking at the schedule:

Question 1: Are good teams playing bad teams at home?

This week, Miami hosts Toronto. Even though Miami has a CCC game midweek, when a first place team hosts a last place team, that’s a pretty obvious match to target. Cincinnati hosting New England and Columbus hosting Montreal are two more matchups that ought to heavily favor the home team.

Question 2: Are there any games that seem like they may be a goalfest?

Philly-Orlando is one that I circled immediately this week as a game where both teams have a chance to put up multiple goals. San Jose-DC is another one that has strong potential in this category. You can often check current betting lines to get an idea of expected goal totals.

Question 3: Are there two strong defensive teams playing each other?

This is a good place to start looking for cheaper defenders who have good CS chances. Vancouver-Colorado and San Diego-Seattle both have potential in this regard.

Statistics, Statistics & Statistics

After I go through the schedule and identify the matches I think could yield good results, I tend to dig into the numbers a bit. Depending on how deep I want to dive, this can involve looking at various expected stats and player heat maps. If you’re not big into stats, it can be more simple than that. The Fantasy Physician also likes to do some matchup assessment before building his teams, so I asked his advice. He responded with this:

“Sometimes I do a simple analysis that goes like this – I look at all the matches – I take the home teams’ goals-for and add them to the away team’s goals-against. Then I look at attackers from the highest total teams (and occasionally look at attackers from the away team with the highest total, too). I also take the home team’s goals-against and add that to the away team’s goals-for, then look at the defenders and goalkeeper from the home teams with the lowest total. The same can be done with xG (expected goals), it just takes more work. Then I kind of mentally adjust for variables like missing players, dead legs, etc.”

The last point is one I want to drill down on a bit, because this is where the “MLS variables” really come into play. Let’s use Denis Bouanga as an example. Bouanga, if you’ve been living under a rock, is a pacey goal-scoring winger who bombs up and down the left side for LAFC. This season, LAFC have struggled to get things going offensively. They’ve had CCC to juggle, as well as some injuries and international call-ups. But when it comes to looking at specific matchups for Bouanga, the wide variety of experience in MLS can present him with very different scenarios from one week to another. One week, Bouanga could be lined up against a TAM-level right back who came through a European academy and has Champions League experience, on a team coached by a former European international who’s willing to commit two defenders to shutting him down every time he touches the ball. If you go into the week armed with this knowledge, it’s easy to identify this match as a red flag for picking Bouanga, especially if LAFC is coming off a midweek game when he may be tired. But the next week, he could be lining up against a 21-year-old fresh-out-of-college with no professional experience, coached by a former journeyman player who made a decent career in MLS based on “grit” and “hustle” and looks for the same in his players. This second scenario is a matchup where Bouanga seems like an obvious choice – there will be a huge difference in how those two coaches prepare their team to face him, and he’s been eating young, inexperienced defenders like that for breakfast his whole career. Great choice, right? Well, just to make sure, this is the time to start evaluating the “MLS variables.” Did Bouanga see significant minutes midweek? Will his minutes be limited as a result? If he’s playing away, how far did LAFC have to travel? Are there any key players missing from their squad that might affect their style of play? For instance, are they missing someone to get Bouanga the ball, or a key defensive piece that means they’ll be on their heels for the whole match?

How Does this Apply for Week 7?

I’ve already pointed out some of the key matchups for this week, but once you’ve looked at the schedule and made initial decisions about games you want to target, follow the steps above. When you’ve identified a group of players with ideal matchups you want to fit into your team, go down the list of “MLS variables.” Miami, both LA teams and Vancouver have CCC matches – will they have dead legs on the weekend? Leo Messi, who is notoriously matchup-proof, could still be affected by playing midweek since Miami may feel like they don’t need him to be able to beat Toronto. Also, look at what players are returning from injury – will their return nerf someone on their team who’s been performing at a high level (Anders Dreyer and Onni Valakari could be affected by Chucky Lozano’s return for San Diego, for instance). And as always, keep one eye on the weather for the weekend (or look for @Storminator’s excellent weather predictions in the MLSFB Discord) to make sure a game you’ve heavily bought into won’t be disrupted by severe weather.

One important trap to avoid: Just because a player didn’t perform the week before, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t consider them if they have a good matchup. For instance, last week Brooks Lennon put up 1 point against NYCFC even though Atlanta scored 4 goals! That will scare a lot of people off of him, but I like his matchup this week against a Dallas team that’s in the top 10 for allowing crosses into the penalty area, and second in the league for progressive passes allowed. Both of these stats should play to Lennon’s strengths, which should open up some more space on the wing for Lennon.

One of the best parts about FMLS is that it’s not as simple as just sorting by total points and picking the top-15 players. Knowing how to assess all the different factors that make MLS matchups different is just one more way you can gain an advantage as you try to qualify for FCL, win your H2Hs, or chase whatever else your goals may be this season. Good luck, check back for more tips next week, and don’t forget to have fun!

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The “Fantasy Physician” is Ron Birnbaum, @Half Century City on  Discord 

The “Fantasy Therapist” is Mike Leister, @Kenobi on  Discord