NWSL Fantasy League- Season 2

Thanks for this. I forgot they had provided this group knowledge view. The question is, did anyone else in AWK Eliminator Group captain her this week.... I am consistently borderline in there in terms of maintaining a slot.

 

Yes, I captained her too. Two games against weak teams. I figured it was a slam dunk.

 

At least I have good company.

 

The NWSL scorelines have been weird recently.
This season has flipped upside down in predictability.
I also had Angerer as captain. Whoops.
Thanks a lot Angerer. You will be doing 5:00 am laundry this week.

 

Despite Angerer I had 101.50 points overall, good enough for 45th for the week. I also moved from about 150th overall to 84th.

 

48 points for me. Ouch! And I had 40.5 sitting on the bench... grrr!

The good news is, there were still people who did worse than me in the AWK Eliminator league, so I'm not out of that, yet.

 

Our internet was down, so I just got to check the site. With 91.5 points, I had my best ranking of the season (105). I guess it was a brutal week for just about everyone.

 

So only pulled in 78.50 points but I made ground up on the leader in the fantasy points by 10 points. The leader must of had Portland and Angerer in goal like I did so we both stayed about the same on points. But making 10 points up on the leader is very good since I am now only trailing 110 points to him. Started last week in 37th place, moved up to 29th.

So who would of thought Angerer would of had a very bad week on a 2 game week. Not many I would assume. In fact I don't blame her for any of those goals. She got exposed heavily by her back line to 1v1's and through balls and bad marking by her defenders. A poor defensive performance by Portland.

Here are the match ups for Week 8:

Saturday, May 31
WNY Flash vs Houston Dash - Sat 7:00pm

Sunday, June 1
Skyblue FC vs Seattle Reign FC - Sun 6:00pm
Boston Breakers vs Washington Spirit - Sun 6:30pm

Wednesday, June 4
Chicago Red Stars vs Washington Spirit - Wed 8:00pm
FC Kansas City vs WNY Flash - Wed 8:00pm

So we have a slow week coming up, Washington and Western New York are on a double game week. Portland is the only team with a bye week. Kind of makes me happy after how badly I got burnt with Portland last week. Especially after I captained Angerer.

WNY Flash vs Houston Dash: Very good match up against the Dash, the Dash will not have their internationals until after this match so even then they are a strong possibility with the win and they have their Aussies back from the Asian Cup. Lydia Williams should be back in goal for the Flash.
Skyblue FC vs Seattle Reign FC: Seattle should have a sizable edge here and good shut out possibility as well.
Boston Breakers vs Washington Spirit: Hard to say after the way the Breakers played against Portland. Are we going to continue to see the Breakers improve? My bet is that the Spirit will be the better on form team and since both teams have struggled to keep shut outs, there is a good possibility for goals here.
Chicago Red Stars vs Washington Spirit: This isn't a clear easy match up for the Red Stars. The Spirit have been playing well lately, but the Red Star's defense has been stellar. Go with Chicago here and their defense if your looking for a shut out.
FC Kansas City vs WNY Flash: With both sides defenses a bit wobbly so far this season, its hard to say who will come out on top here. I consider this match a push and avoid taking defenders for this match.

-If your looking to use Flash defenders, then use them for the Dash game only, otherwise go with Seattle since the match ups are very good against a struggling offensive challenged side like Skyblue. Chicago is another option but might be best to use the Flash and Seattle defense for this.
-Pick up Flash forwards for their two matches. Dash are the worse defense in the league and FCKC is right behind them for goals allowed.
-Washington will be in tough against Chicago but should have their chances for goal on Boston.

Defensive Picks for this week:

Abby Wambach: Pretty much forced to pick her up since she will have her chances to score on Houston and against Kansas City.

Carli Lloyd: Another pick that has to be taken. She takes a lot of shots and will score goals. 10 last season.

Hope Solo or Lydia Williams: Pick either to get your shut out. Both the Dash and Skyblue have had trouble scoring. Good chances for a shut out.

Diana Matheson: Playing 2 games and most likely will get picked up by the top fantasy teams. Too risky to not pick her.

Risky Picks for this week:

Jodie Taylor: Could be a boom or bust pick for a fantasy owner. Boston a good match up and Chicago, probably a bad one.

Kim Little: Against a soft defense in Skyblue, might be forced to pick her since she is a fantasy stud.

Amy Rodriguez: Even with 8 goals tied with Kim Little. This is actually not a good match up for her. With only a single game this week, its very risky to pick Rodriguez here.

Boston players in general: Hard to guess what formation they will come out in. Will DeVanna start? Will Reeves or Ezurike who both were dominant against Portland start? What about O'Reilly who hasn't been that good recently, should she get benched? Only one I think is safe to start is Lianne Sanderson. When Durkin shuffled the deck against Portland and came out with his new line up and sat 4 starters. The problem, it worked. And now we are left with a lot of questions on who is going to start and play.

Week 7 line up, bolded players are starters. 3-4-3 formation.

Goalkeepers: Hope Solo (Seattle-allocated), Lydia Williams (WNYF)
Defenders: Elli Reed (Seattle), Lauren Barnes (Seattle), Britanny Taylor (WNYF), Julie Johnston (Chicago)
Midfielders: Kim Little (Seattle), Carli Lloyd (WNYF-allocated), Diana Matheson (Washington-allocated), Christine Nairn (Washington), Lauren Holiday (FCKC-allocated)
Forwards: Abby Wambach (WNYF-allocated), Samantha Kerr (WNYF), Jodie Taylor (Washington), Beverley Goebel (Seattle)

Abby Wambach (Captain)

Going heavy with Seattle for the shut out and using Little as my only other single game player. All the others are Washington and WNY players. Western New York has a very good match up against the Dash, the worse defense in the league and then against FCKC who is close behind. Stacked forwards and put Lloyd in there as well. Nairn was put in over Holiday. Risky but she has 2 games to score and she does take all the free kicks and does take some shots on goal. Probably the riskier pick because Holiday should do decent against the Flash defense as well.

 

Reed is an outside back, so she should be in the line up, your right about Barnes, but if Cox starts, she takes the other outside back spot, so to me Barnes and Fletcher full fill the same role. The problem with Cox is that she costs an allocated spot, and I don't have any to give with her, and I am not sure she will start, she is still coming back from injury, she might come in as a sub.

 

Went with a 4-3-3 this week, letting my Seattle homer colors fly

GK: Solo
DEF: Fletcher (SEA), Cox (SEA), Wenino (CHI), Taylor (WNY)
MID: Little (SEA), Matheson (WAS), Llyod (VC) (WNY)
FW: Kawasumi (SEA), Wambach (Captain) (WNY) , Taylor (WAS)

Bench: Wys, Reynolds, Nairn, Hoy

Also I thought I bombed on my lineup for week 7. I was pleasantly surprised to rank 276 for the week, moving me up from 20th to 19th overall. Hooray!

 

Williams is Back for the Flash, so expect her to start over Wys.

 

Yeah its the point leader. He really had a bad week. Picked up only 60 pts and allowed pretty much everyone in the fantasy league to close the gap on him.

 

Anyone else having trouble putting together a week-9 lineup? I definitely am. So far I have a couple questions:

1-2) Who is getting called up for the upcoming international games, and more importantly, when (when will they physically be needed in camp)?

3) Would Boston/WNY players be allowed to play their June 11 matchups?

4) Would people suggest going for non-nt players for teams with a double week?

Here's my current lineup rough draft/headache maker:

GOAL: Williams (WNY)
DEF: Fletcher (SEA), Taylor (WNY), Reynolds (WNY)
MID: Little (SEA), Sanderson (BOS), Losada (WNY), Boquette (POR)
ATT: Kawasumi (SEA), Kerr (vc) (WNY), De Vanna (c) (BOS)

 

When's the England/Scotland/Wales callup? Would those players be unavailable for the June 8th matchup?

 

OK so I completely revamped my roster due to matchup odds, without caring too much about double games (since lots of NT will seemingly be gone on the 2nd game).

GOL: Williams (WNY) / Angerer
DEF: Fletcher (SEA), Reynolds (WNY), Catley (POR) / Marshall
MID: Little (SEA), Losada (c) (WNY), Matheson (WSH), Holiday (FCKC) / O'Reilly
ATT: Sinclair (POR), Rodriguez (FCKC), DeVanna (vc) (BOS) / Kawasumi

 

In what other league would you wonder online whether a player is available and get a response from the player herself?:

No clue if Sanderson's leaving after Saturday's game for England. Going to give me a headache before finalizing my roster.

— Chris Henderson (@chris_awk) June 6, 2014

@chris_awk yes I am leaving after the game 👍 hope that helps ha

— Lianne Sanderson (@liannesanderson) June 6, 2014

 

Week 8 results are out.

I did better than expected, but still not good.
Week 8 Points: 72.00
Week 8 Rank: 1094
Overall Points: 746.00
Overall Rank: 311


Somehow Abby still managed to be positive points... so I got 6 points from her.

Going crazy with week 9, and not using any allocated players...

 

Picked up 107 pts this week and moved up from 29th over all to 27th but fell behind the new points leader by a now whopping 147 points. So I lost 30 points this week. Part of that is the top fantasy teams this week picked up Jodie Taylor and captained her and also they picked Ashlynn Harris and used several Spirit defenders and racked up good points for their shut out on Chicago. That was actually surprising to me since the Spirit had few shut outs this season and they were playing against a hot team like Chicago that has scored a ton of goals the last few matches. Obviously some of them were fans of the Spirit and you will see this. The top point fantasy team seems to be a Spirit fan but that team also reached the top 10 in points for this week and that is a large reason why that team leap frogged the previous fantasy leader.

I'm not too worried though, you have to go with the match ups available and Seattle vs Skyblue was just too good to pass up and WNYF vs Houston should of been a win for the Flash. And then Wambach's injury probably hurt many teams, since I captained her as well. The problem for us fantasy owners now is how good is the Flash now? The Houston loss and now against the Blues, albeit they didn't have Wambach, but its just how weak offensively they looked and on the defense they look very soft as well. I may have to stay away from the Flash for a bit until things improve.

Here are the match ups for Week 9:

Saturday, June 7
FCKC vs BOS - Sat 8:00pm
SRFC vs CRS - Sat 10:00pm
PTFC vs WNYF - Sat 10:00pm

Sunday, June 8
SBFC vs HOU - Sun 6:00pm

Wednesday, June 11
BOS vs WAS - Wed 7:00pm
HOU vs WNYF - Wed 7:30pm

Double games for Boston, Houston and Western New York have double games. No teams are on byes this week.

FC Kansas City vs Boston Breakers: Kansas City looked very good against the Flash last match and with Boston inability to keep out goals. FCKC has a big advantage here. Good shut out chance.
Seattle Reign FC vs Chicago Red Stars: Very hard to go with any team here. Even though the Reign are leading the league standings. Chicago's defense is very good. Will we see Christen Press start her first match for the NWSL? I'm going to give this match a push and call it fairly evenly matched if Press starts.
Portland Thorns FC vs WNY Flash: With the way the Flash have looked recently you would think the Thorns have the decided edge. The problem is the Thorns are on a 2 match losing streak. They should have Morgan, Boquete and I think Heath as well. And maybe even Van Hollebeke who is training now. Have to go with Portland here.
Skyblue FC vs Houston Dash: Skyblue actually looked very good against the Reign last match. Scored the first goal and made the Reign work for their win. The Dash looked good against the Flash in their win. Its really hard to say if the Dash have turned the corner but they now will have their 2 national team defenders returning and joining them so their defense should look much improved. Have to go with a push here and I wouldn't be surprised if we see a shut out in this match. The one caveat will be the national team players. They are being called up on June 8, this match. Will the players play and then go to camp? If they do then the match is even, if not, then I think Skyblue is in the stronger position.
Boston Breakers vs Washington Spirit: One of those ambush matches for the Spirit. NT players will be gone, which means no Harris, Krieger and Dunn. All 3 on their defense. For the Breakers they lose 3 players as well, O'Reilly, Sanderson and Mewis. But the last time the Breakers played with another line up, they threshed Portland for 4 goals. Expect Jazmine Reeves to play a prominent role in this match without the Spirit defense, this could get ugly.
Houston Dash vs WNY Flash: The Flash probably will be looking for revenge but without their national team players, it may be harder to do so since the Dash will have the same players they had when they beat the Flash who had their NT players. With the Flash's current poor form, I am actually going to give the Dash an edge in this match.

-National Team call ups come this week. Your safe for the first game, then all hell breaks loose after that. US players leave on the 8th, Canadians will be gone for the mid week games and Lianne Sanderson, Kim Little and Jessica Fishlock will also be gone by the midweek.
-FC Kansas City, Portland Thorns FC and the Houston Dash surprisingly have good opportunities for shut outs. Remember the Dash will probably be missing their national team players so use their normal defenders they have been using this season.
-Very difficult to figure out who will step up for the Dash in scoring, so avoid them unless you want to take a risk on a player like Nina Burger, but players like Kaelia Ohai, Noyola, Masar have all started or come off the bench. So it can be risky using them.
-Probably not a good idea to pick Seattle or Chicago this week, unless its Kim Little. But with both defenses playing well, its very hard to predict where the score line will be. Going to avoid them for this week.

Defensive Picks for this week:

Kim Little (Seattle Reign) Its hard not to take Little since she has been a fantasy stud all season long. But with so many options now available and Seattle up against a tough Chicago defense. There may be better options now for midfield. Still its hard to load up on Flash players with how poorly they performed last week. Little is still a top option for every fantasy owner and should probably be taken just to defend that pick up.

Nadine Angerer (Portland Thorns) My pick to hopefully get a shut out. Against the Flash, without Wambach, and a better midfield, there should be a good chance for a shut out.

Optional picks for this week:

Amy Rodriguez (FC Kansas City) Only playing one game this week, but its against the Breakers. Pretty good pick but there are also other options out there now.

Nina Burger (Houston Dash) On a 2 game week and has some good match ups, Skyblue and WNY Flash should provide her with some scoring chances.

Jodie Taylor (Washington Spirit) Turned into a scoring dynamo with her 3 goals last week. Playing the Breakers, so a very good match up.

Alex Morgan (Portland Thorns) Back and healthy, will she start? She will most definitely sub in if she doesn't. And against the Flash, should get her chances to score.

Christine Sinclair (Portland Thorns) With Vero Boquete in the midfield, she should finally have a play maker willing to feed her the ball on a constant basis and Morgan can take a lot of marking pressure off Sinclair.

Vero Boquette (Portland Thorns) Can be a risky pick, only a single game, but she is a starter. Hard to say how much of an impact she will play, but she should be able to finally provide that link to the star forwards like Sinclair and Morgan.

Christen Press (Chicago Red Stars) She is here and will more then likely start against Seattle. How will the Red Star offense transform with her in the line up? This is why its so hard to think there will be a shut out with this match or what the score line will be.

Jazmine Reeves (Boston) Could be a good pick up against a depleted Washington defense with their starting goalkeeper, Harris, defenders Krieger and Dunn away on NT duties.

Week 9 line up, bolded players are starters. 3-4-3 formation.

With so many national team players leaving by the midweek. Your in essence left with one game players with the national players available. So picking up a single game player isn't as bad as it looks especially with the match ups that are available. Picking the right player though is a very interesting question since many of these players are either coming in from Europe or in Alex Morgan's case is coming back from injury. There will be some risks in trying to figure out if these players will start or who should be picked up for the midweek games.

Goalkeepers: Nadine Angerer (Portland), Lydia Williams (WNYF)
Defenders: Stephanie Catley (Portland), Leigh Ann Robinson (FCKC), Kassey Kallman (FCKC), Nikki Marshall (Portland)
Midfielders: Kim Little (Seattle), Lauren Holiday (FCKC-allocated), Veronica Boquete (Portland), Erika Tymrak (FCKC), Christine Nairn (Washington
Forwards: Christine Sinclair (Portland-allocated), Amy Rodriguez (FCKC-allocated), Jazmine Reeves (Boston), Jodie Taylor (Washington)

Nadine Angerer (Captain)

-Focusing on Portland and FCKC as my main 2 teams to try to get some shut outs. Captaining Nadine Angerer, with so many single game players on my roster. My hope is that Angerer comes through with the shut out. Very hard to predict who will score, so staying safe with my Captain pick.
-Stephanie Catley is in Portland and with Kat Tarr red carded, most likely she will start in her place and if not then Marshall will take over as she is my sub.
-Vero Boquete is also in the line up. Almost positive she will start and be a contributor. If somehow she doesn't start, Tymrak will slot in and has a good match up.
-Thought long and hard about using Christine Nairn and Jodie Taylor but with their NT players away, I think I am going to go with Jazmine Reeves. Risk pick, but possibly very rewarding one.

Good luck for this coming week. Will be curious to see how the line ups change with the new incoming players from Europe.

 

Kat Tarr not only was red carded, she's just had knee surgery and is out for for 4 to 6 weeks.