MLSFB Player Roundup – Round 19

I can’t think of a better way to end last week. We had an amazing World Cup and over 30 goals scored in MLS. This season has been a wild ride so far and I have high hopes that we’ll see a lot of the same in Round 19.

So let’s jump right into it,

Keepers:

31 goals, 3 clean sheets… ouch. I hardly even want to attempt to make a suggestion. With the number of goals that we have seen, I fell like the case for going with a DGW keeper is even stronger. Even if you have two non clean sheet games, you should still end with more points than a SGW keeper.

After earning a clean sheet last week, Jamie Panedo come in near the top of my list. With the form that New England is on, you may be able to get some good points out of that game, but the SKC one will be a challenge. I’m sure many of you read the impressive stats the Luis Robles has racked up this season. He’s definitely one of the top keepers to look at this round but pricy. My two favorite keepers for this round are Joe Bendik and Andy Gruenebaum. Both have a shot of at least 1 clean sheet and both are under $5.0m.

Defenders:

My favorite picks are coming from Toronto again this week. They’ve been on some impressive form, they have a couple of cheap options that should be very budget friendly, and they both have respectable CBI numbers. So be sure to have at least Doneil Henry or Nick Hagglund in your lineup.

If you’re a frequent reader, you know that I’ve been hard of expensive defenders this season. Currently my most expensive defender is $7.8m and most of that has ben from price gains. I actually have 2 in the $7.Xm range and I would be hesitant to recommend anyone more expensive than that. I think this is another good round to just have 3 defenders and Dan Gargan is the ideal choice… though, he’s also a yellow card worry.

Midfielders:

Now that, almost, everyone is back from Brazil and playing, Midfield options are again plentiful. With some of the best teams having DGWs, this is not a good week to stray too far from some of the tried and true picks. Pedro Morales, Cristian Maidana, Graham Zusi, and even the off form Landon Donovan will all be popular picks. I’d say you’d be taking a risk to not have at least 2 of these players. There are also some equally popular SGW players who have the potential for a good showing Javier Morales and Dillon Powers are the top prospects. Javier has a home game against LA and I believe that gives him the edge over Powers who is playing away at Portland.

So who can you get to help set you apart? I think Toronto and New York have the best chance for a great round, and they also each have a player that is both budget friendly and in good form. Toronto’s Jonathon Osorio has scored 1 goal and earned 2 assists in his last 4 games and is under the $7.5m mark. New York’s Eric Alexander has racked up 2 goals and 2 assists in his last 4 games and is a bargain at $6.7m. Both also have an ownership under 6%. If you want to take a big risk, you could go with Brad Davis. Under 2% ownership, 3 goals in 2 games, but Houston have horrid form and they are on a bye next week.

Forwards:

I’ll start with the usual suspects for this week. Bradley Wright-Phillips, Jermaine Defoe, Robbie Keane, and Dominic Dwyer. All of these guys have double games this round and all except Robbie Keane have been on form. I think this is a good round to have 3 forwards, if you were not planning on it already, and you’d be foolish to not have 1 or 2 of these guys in that line. Keep in mind that Defoe is 1 yellow away from a 1 game suspension, so he could only get 1 game this round. My favorite two are Defoe and BWP.

So who do you look at if you want to shake it up some? If we’re staying with DGA players, the top choice is Fderico Higuain. I know he has not done much recently, and has had injury issues recently, but he still has the potential. He’s also been sold by around 300 managers over the past 2 rounds, so he could be a differential for you. As for Philly and Vancouver, they just don’t have a forward option that I like enough to recommend and there are no SGW players that I’d be willing to go with either. What about Henry? Well yeah, 1 goal and 3 assists last round. That was against Houston, so I’m not sure if that is the best test, but he’s just an expensive bandwagon pick for this round for me.

Did I miss any players that should be on this list? Please leave us a comment. You can also send a message to me on Twitter @MLSFantasyBoss, or join the Live Chat in the sidebar. Keep checking back for more updates throughout the week. Good Luck!