Stats Summary – Week 1, Goals Scored and BCC

Week 1 is in the books. A lot of people are already kneejerking: Should I drop Villa? Is Steres a long-term starter?  The answer is no to both. Breathe, one week is not enough sample size to already declare a player a boom or a bust for anything more than that week. Don’t rush out and make your transfers. Sleep on it a couple nights and come back to the idea on Thursday or Friday.

The first stat that jumps off the page is big chances created (BCC). There were a total of 41 BCC points awarded this week, for an average of 4.1 per game. That is almost 3 times more than last year’s average. Nine players earned 2 BCC points. This could be a massive boon to attacking teams and give us further reason to avoid picking players from teams like DC and Colorado that just don’t have any creativity going forward. I’m not sure if the criteria for a BCC is less strict than last year or this week was a pure anomaly, but it is something to keep an eye on. Oh, and Chicago alone accounted for NINE BCC points – Those of you who listened to the the preseason MLS Fantasy Insider Podcasts know how big I am on Chicago’s attack this year, that I love what Paunovic is doing, and think Accam is the real deal. They won’t be as good as they were week 1 (Thanks NYCFC’s lack of defense in midfield!), but they should continue to be good, especially when Goossens gets his visa sorted.

The second stat that jumps off the page is the sheer number of goals scored. Apparently, it was a record for most goals scored in a single week in MLS. It won’t last. This week saw 33% more goals scored than last year’s average. In the same vein, 25 percent of teams (5) kept a clean sheet this week. That is right in line with the average number of teams keeping a clean sheet for the last 5 years. I saw a lot of people claiming that the start of the season has more clean sheets than the rest of the season when there really isn’t anything to back that up outside of last year, which I believe was an anomaly.

Some random observations:

There was an average of 1.35 tackle points awarded per game. Most of them going to defensive midfielders.

There was a grand total of 7 foul points awarded, less than 1 per game. Last season averaged about 1 per game. Foul points should largely be considered irrelevant in our fantasy decisions and just an occasional bonus.

Seven players earned 2 passing points. Four of those were SKC players who played up a man for 50 minutes.

League-wide PP90 was 5.10