Week 7 MLS Picks
The heater continues! Hopefully you’ve been following along through the first six weeks of the season as we’ve been absolutely sun running to begin the year. Can’t get a big head, the grind continues.
Before we get to the picks as normal, another reminder that we’ve got an addition to this weekly article in 2025. If you’ve been following along with the podcast during the offseason, you’ll know we’ve partnered with Underdog Fantasy. If you want to play along with us at Underdog, you can sign up today using this link and when you use promo code "NORTHEND" at sign up you'll get up to $1000 in bonus cash plus a free pick!
The official league injury report for Saturday’s games came out Friday afternoon, let’s dive into the Week 7 picks.
Underdog Fantasy Entry of the week
Each match week, we’ll have an Underdog Fantasy entry for you to tail if your heart desires. Last week, our entry came through in somewhat frustrating fashion. While Rafael Cabral and Cengiz Ünder started and came through on their props, Kevin Denkey came off the bench for FC Cincinnati. Underdog Fantasy grades props of soccer players who come off the bench as DNP’s, so even though Denkey was subbed on at the half and went over his shot attempts number, our entry was relegated to a 2-pick payout. But we’ll take the positive result and move on to Week 7!
We’ll start with the record breaking incoming transfer from this past offseason in Atlanta. Emmanuel Latte Lath has been on a tear to begin his MLS tenure, sitting at second in MLS with five goals scored, only behind Philadelphia’s Tai Baribo. The Five Stripes welcome FC Dallas to town and we’re going to take Latte Lath’s shots on target prop for a 1.39x multiplier. Latte Lath has averaged 1.47 shots on target per 90 minutes throughout his career and 1.5 per 90 in his last two seasons in the English Championship with Middlesbrough. But in 2023-24 with the English side, Latte Lath averaged 1.77 shots on target per 90 and judging by his short six week sample with Atlanta, that may be a number that ends up being closer to his MLS reality. He’s averaged 2 shots on target per 90 through six MLS appearances, going over this number in four of those six games. Atlanta are 8th in MLS in shots on target per 90 minutes and Latte Lath has provided 35.4% of Atlanta’s shots on target this season. Dallas are dead middle of the pack in shots on target conceded per 90 and with this game having the second highest implied total on the slate just behind San Jose Earthquakes and DC United on Sunday, we feel good about this selection for a 1.39x multiplier.
Next we’re going to Columbus where the Crew are the biggest favorites on the board in Week 7, hosting a CF Montreal side that has yet to win a match this season (although they’ve yet to play at home, this is the last game in their season opening road trip). Rossi has taken on a much larger role offensively with Cucho Hernandez being transferred overseas in the offseason. Even with Cucho on the team last year, Rossi averaged 2.36 shot attempts per 90 minutes. But this season he’s right at 3 per 90, in line with the 3.02 he had in his return to MLS with the Crew in 2023, when Cucho was also present. There’s an even longer track record of this number being too low for Rossi in MLS competition. While he was with LAFC from 2018-2021, Rossi averaged 3.35 shot attempts per 90 minutes, meaning he’s averaged 3.11 shot attempts per 90 across his seven career MLS regular seasons. It’s fair to have minor concerns with this prop, since it wouldn’t be crazy to see the Crew run it up early on Montreal and Rossi not being needed much on the offensive side of the ball, but he’s driving so much of what this team does to begin the year, we’re confident taking this line at a standard 1x multiplier.
Closing out this week’s entry with a pick from the late window on Saturday. We’re going to Albert Rusnak, as the Seattle Sounders visit San Diego FC for the first time. Seattle is getting healthy, with Pedro de la Vega expected to play off the bench this weekend and the injured Jordan Morris being upgraded to questionable on Friday’s injury report. Rusnak has averaged exactly 2 shot attempts per 90 minutes across his four seasons with the Sounders. San Diego is third best in MLS at limiting opponent shot attempts, but they’ve played two games against teams with 10 men and also against Austin FC where they had 75% of the ball in a 2-1 loss. Rusnak has taken on a much larger role offensively to begin this season with the laundry list of injuries the Sounders took on early, averaging 3.93 shots per 90 in 2025. He’s gone over this number in all six of his appearances this season and we think that trend continues tonight.
Using the standard payout selection on Underdog, this 3-pick entry will payout a prize of 8.34x your entry fee if successful.
Results
Underdog Fantasy (Last Week): +1.7 U
Underdog Fantasy (Season): +7.66 U
Week 7 Picks
ATlanta United To Win + ATL/DAL OVER 1.5
-115
This season there has frequently been cross-over between the Underdog Fantasy entry of the week and our picks at the books. Week 7 is no different as we’re going to back The Five Stripes to win at home against a Dallas team that has plenty of attacking talent, but lacks depth to defend consistently. With ATL heavily favored on the money line and a team that has given up the second most goals this season, we’ll add in the over 1.5 total to bring that line down closer to even money.
Austin FC to Win + ATX/POR Over 1.5
ML +105
Austin are heavy favorites at home as the line has inched more and more in their direction as the week has gone on. With no new major injuries to speak of for the Verde and Black (Diego Rubio was a surprise addition to the injury report on Friday, but was not expected to start), we like ATX to get the job done at home. With this game -155 to go over a 2.5 total, we’ll add the over 1.5 total to Austin to win to bring this number to a plus-money line.
LAFC DNB
ML +105
LAFC are coming off of the first leg of their CONCACAF Champions Cup quarterfinal matchup against Inter Miami in the midweek. They held serve at home, winning 1-0. Now they’ll travel to Houston, where LAFC have surprisingly struggled historically, with their last win in H-Town coming in 2019. But this Houston team is straight up bad right now. Even if LAFC rotates, they should have the leg up both in the field and in goal. The Dynamo are starting Blake Gillingham in net, a third string option who was playing in the NCAA for Creighton last year and spent the early parts of training camp on trial with Austin FC. He was peppered with shots in Portland last week and while Houston should be able to put on a slightly stronger performance at home, especially if LAFC rotates, they’re still clearly the undermanned side. We’ll hedge a bit and take the draw-no-bet option for the Black & Gold on Saturday night.
Minnesota United
ML +210
We believe in the Loons. They’re a very talented team with quality depth on both sides of the ball. They’re on the road this Sunday in NYC to take on the The Pigeons. Minnesota is on a five-match unbeaten streak while NYCFC has won just two of their last five. This is purely a value play with the number on Minnesota feeling a bit too high for how we view the trajectory of each of these teams going forward. We’ll take the Loons to win on the road.
Goal Scorers
Every week we’ll pick a few of our favorite goal scoring options in the betting market. Here are the Week 7 shouts.
Wilfried Zaha +240
Joseph Paintsil +310
Emmanuel Latte Lath +100
Emil Forsberg +180
Hugo Cuypers +235
Luca Orellano +210
Myrto Uzuni +210
Osman Bukari +280
Denis Bouanga +255
Cengiz Ünder +330
Hirving Lozano +270
Kelvin Yeboah +170
Christian Benteke +120
To Score 2+ goals
Denis Bouanga +1700 (0.5U)
Cengiz Ünder +2500 (0.5 U)
Myrto Uzuni +1200 (0.5)
To Score Or Give Assist
Petar Musa +125
Results
Last Week: +7.35 U
Season: +17.35 U
