Opening weekend challenge is just around the corner. This will be the first post in a 4-post series where we look at each position to try to find value players who are priced less than what last year’s production says they should be priced.

Points Per Start

Veterans of my Stats Summary articles will know that I’ve long been a proponent of using points per 90 minutes played instead of looking at the total points a player scored. This helps normalize things so someone who didn’t play every game, like Lodeiro, still ranks high in our analysis. I also don’t like using the points per game metric since it penalizes a guy who comes off the bench for a couple games as they return from injury. This year, I’ve settled on using the metric of points per start, where we still normalize scores like in using the points per 90 stat, but we don’t over-estimate guys who consistently get subbed out early.

Note: the “Residuals” column accounts for any changes to a player’s designated position and also any changes in fantasy scoring. Also, this analysis only includes players with at least 10 starts.

Value Over Replacement Player (VORP)

This is a common valuation for players in other fantasy sports. Basically, it is a way to measure how much better a guy is than the best player left off our roster. Fantasy MLS is a bit different since we have to also wrestle with the salary of players. So, I measured everyone against the cheapest players available at their same position who I think has a reasonable chance of playing a significant amount of time. For forwards, we’re comparing how much better a player is in terms of points per start than the average of forwards priced at 6.5. I simply subtracted that average from the points per start for every forward to find their VORP. I did the exact same thing for the cost, where I subtracted 6.5 from the cost of each forward to find the cost over replacement player (CORP).

Using VORP and CORP allows us to not only account for individual players’ value, but it also accounts for the strength of each position. This allows us to better compare across positions and prices to answer questions like who gives us the most value out of Larin, Nagbe, or Collin. (Collin)

Finding Value

I then ran a regression between the VORP and the CORP for every player in the league. It gives us the expected VORP for each CORP and also how much better each player performed than their expected VORP. This is the rightmost column labelled “Residuals” and it is the important column. The higher the residual, the better value a player is.

Okay, done with the boring math. Here’s the result:

name 2017 Price position team starts score pps vorp Residuals Giovinco 12 FWD TOR 27 255 9.41 5.39 1.61 Villa 10 FWD NYC 32 243 7.59 3.57 1.15 O. Kamara 10 FWD CLB 20 153 7.4 3.38 0.96 Shelton 7 FWD NYC 12 88 5.08 1.06 0.67 Badji 6.5 FWD COL 16 89 4.63 0.61 0.55 Wright-Phillips 10 FWD NY 32 223 6.91 2.89 0.46 Mullins 8.5 FWD DC 14 88 5.86 1.84 0.43 Hamilton 5.5 FWD TOR 11 45 3.82 -0.2 0.42 dos Santos 10 FWD LA 26 183 6.77 2.75 0.33 Boateng 6.5 FWD LA 17 81 4.29 0.27 0.22 Manneh 8 FWD VAN 11 67 5.27 1.25 0.18 Plata 9 FWD RSL 28 166 5.86 1.84 0.09 Oduro 7 FWD MTL 21 108 4.48 0.46 0.06 Gashi 9.5 FWD COL 25 155 6.16 2.14 0.06 Movsisyan 7.5 FWD RSL 24 122 4.71 0.69 -0.04 Solignac 6 FWD CHI 24 96 3.67 -0.35 -0.07 Agudelo 8.5 FWD NE 16 97 5.31 1.29 -0.12 Barnes 7.5 FWD VAN 20 95 4.55 0.53 -0.2 Akindele 7 FWD DAL 14 96 4.14 0.12 -0.27 Amarikwa 6.5 FWD SJ 20 79 3.8 -0.22 -0.27 Altidore 9.5 FWD TOR 15 114 5.8 1.78 -0.3 Larin 9 FWD ORL 28 157 5.43 1.41 -0.34 Dwyer 9 FWD SKC 31 175 5.42 1.4 -0.35 Urruti 8.5 FWD DAL 28 144 5.07 1.05 -0.36 Zardes 9 FWD LA 18 97 5.33 1.31 -0.43 Wondolowski 8.5 FWD SJ 30 149 4.97 0.95 -0.46 Herbers 7 FWD PHI 13 84 3.85 -0.17 -0.57 Bruin 7 FWD SEA 18 85 3.78 -0.24 -0.64 de Leeuw 9 FWD CHI 16 84 5.13 1.11 -0.64 Sapong 7.5 FWD PHI 28 122 4.07 0.05 -0.68 Mattocks 6.5 FWD POR 11 51 3.36 -0.66 -0.71 Dempsey 9.5 FWD SEA 16 91 5.25 1.23 -0.85 Melano 7.5 FWD POR 26 106 3.88 -0.14 -0.87 Morris 9 FWD SEA 32 154 4.75 0.73 -1.02 K Doyle 8 FWD COL 24 104 4.04 0.02 -1.05 K. Kamara 9.5 FWD NE 30 150 5 0.98 -1.1 Adi 9.5 FWD POR 30 159 4.7 0.68 -1.4

Even though Giovinco is priced $2 more than any other forward, he’s still the best value at the position. With how frequently he scores enough points for a price rise, I think he’s a must own for almost all games where he’s healthy. The other darlings of the fantasy world last year, Villa and Ola are also great value. Badji is the budget choice assuming he can lock down a starting role.

Some of the guys at the bottom came as a bit of a surprise. Adi and Morris present awful value based on their price and last year’s production. I think both perform much better this year than last, but I’m not sure it will be enough to warrant grabbing them instead of paying up for the premium forwards.

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