The Recap - Messy Without Messi
Gameweek 4 Review
Last week was another week of sad and underwhelming fantasy returns for most managers as the average score for fantasy teams was 48. FlavorTownSC was not doing well prior to the Miami and Atlanta match. I refreshed my Messi google alert Sunday night repeatedly to make sure that Messi wasn’t injured in warmups or changed his mind about playing after lineups were announced as he was my captain for the week. The match kicked off and there he was, walking, running, and playing soccer. Then he scores and the overall ranking and weekly ranking for FlavorTownSC went soaring. FlavorTown finished the week with 70 points, 22 points above the average of 48, with a week rank of 191 and overall rank of 529, moving up 872 spots in one week and 16 points away from the top score for the week. A great showing and the top spot got a little closer - 66 points out of first, 29 points away from the top 50, and 21 points away from the top 100. Team value stands at $115.1M.
The Good, The Bad, The MLS
The Good
Captaining Messi and I guess, having him in the lineup made all the difference. According to the game and not sure the accuracy of this, Messi is, was owned by 36% of fantasy managers but more than likely not hugely owned by the fantasy managers ranked higher than FlavorTownSC.
Getting 5 to 6 points from Benteke (D.C.), Dreyer (San Diego) and Hartel (St. Louis) without a goal contribution, are the returns that I like to see from my fantasy picks.
Getting a fresh sheet from a less than 2% owned Totland (St. Louis) and 4 points from a less than 2% owned McVey (San Diego) in a 1-1 draw against Columbus at home. Totland gave everything and his hamstring for the win and fresh sheet, which St. Louis were very lucky to keep. Hope he’s not out for a long time, get better soon, I’ll miss you.
Getting 9 points from a 4% owned Lukic (Philadelphia), who scored the only goal for Philadelphia and quite the banger it was.
And lastly, a 7 point performance from Da Costa (Portland), who got an assist and some bonus points as the offensive leader for a very out of sorts Portland squad.
The Bad
Defensively, Portland are not good and there was no way that they were going to beat LA at home and keep a fresh sheet. I started Pantemis and he alone saved the Timbers from losing the match. Like the paint cans, I’ll stay away from Portland defenders until Portland sort themselves out.
This really isn’t bad as his goal scoring streak was inevitably going to end, however, Baribo finished the 1-3 loss against Nashville with 2 points. Going to monitor his shot creating actions and see if he offers more than just scoring goals or not scoring goals.
Forsberg (New Jersey Red Bulls) was another disappointment and the entire New Jersey squad made Orlando look amazing. He finished with 3 points and glad he was on my bench and not starting.
The MLS
There’s lots of #becauseMLS moments from gameweek 4, but the most glaring MLS gaffs have to do with the game and the league. In this moment in history, how can Twitter be a more reliable source on squad lineups than the MLS app? For San Diego, the MLS app had Manu Duah, a 6’4” midfielder starting in goal, when there was never a doubt that CJ Dos Santos was the starter all along. Duah would probably make a good goalkeeper, given his height but he probably prefers to play in the midfield. Another lineup, just listed “player” in two starting positions. Is that apathy from managers and coaching staff or is it a super secret tactic to help win matches? “We won’t tell you who is starting, ever”.
Then there was the question of if the fantasy MLS team at MLS headquarters, was going to add the starting goalkeeper Rocco Ríos Novo for Miami to the game prior to kickoff, but they never did - denying fantasy managers the option of adding a budget goalkeeper to their lineup.
On the field, the most startling fantasy implications were Philadelphia losing 1-3 at home and Dallas losing at home two weeks in a row. Not only have they lost two games straight at home, they were held scoreless by a Vancouver squad that rotated their starters after playing in Champions League midweek. It’s hard to tell if it’s just a case of Acosta needing more time to get use to Dallas and his new teammates or if it’s indicative of something else. At $8.4M with an average of 4 points per match, he’s a risky play for managers as without a high return, he’ll lose value.
Strategy and Data
Gameweek 4 was the first time this season, where there were less than 9 fresh sheets across all matches - there were only 6 last week. Like last week the fresh sheets were split evenly between home and away teams. Based on the data I have (week 12 to the end of the season), home teams averaged 5.3 shut outs per week and away teams averaged 3.3 shut outs. Right now the averages are roughly the same for the 2025 season - 5.5 and 3.5 respectively. So odds are somewhat good that defenders will get those fresh sheet bonuses…?
It was also the worst week for home teams, there were only 3 home wins and it was the best week for away teams - there were 7 wins on the road, the highest so far this season. Who was winning and who was losing? Teams that were ranked higher in the supporter shield standings than their opponents accounted for 60% of wins both at home and away. Compared to the previous two weeks, this is a 10% increase or more - so far higher ranked teams are accounting for 50% or more of wins either as the home or away team.
Who’s getting the fantasy points? Right now the range for the top ten forwards in terms of total points is between 24 to 39, Baribo (Philadelphia) and Martinez (NYCFC) are the only non-designated player in the top ten. For midfielders the range is between 23 to 37, and the only non-designated players in the top ten are Segovia (Miami) and Vite (Vancouver). Still waiting on the big TAM signings to take over. When looking at defenders, the top ten score range is 26 to 34. There’s no surprise that 4 of the top ten are St. Louis defenders as they now own the MLS record for most consecutive shutouts. Vancouver are the best club in the league, so 2 of their defenders are in the top ten and my man Andy Najar (Nashville) is also there.
Onwards and upwards to more fun. Praise be.