Looks like it’s open

Mah team is in! I’m expecting a million changes between now and 52 days.

Interesting to see the price of the rookies. Things are looking good.

Though it doesn’t look like the eliminator made it across, nor did the multi-positioning stuff.

Ah well, I gotta crash, but I’ll put this here to start discussion.

It’s official. Supercoach is opening the same time as DT this year.

February the First. That’s right- only 5 more sleeps.

I for one am excited! I can’t wait to see what new tricks they’ve got up their sleeves.

(Though I have to ask- did anyone else get a 5 minute TAC commercial sent to them in the email? Wipe off five peoples.)

Looks like reports of the first intra-club match are coming out of Tiger town.

I myself usually find these sessions to be a fantastic indicator as to which rookies will make it through their NAB cup games and into the season proper, so I’ll be trying to track them as the pre-season goes on. If anyone hears any reports that I miss, give me a shout ok?

Anyways, the teams were Best availiable vs The rest.

The yellow team consisted of the following:

B: Edwards, Post, Rance
HB: Newman, Moore, Tambling
C: McMahon, Deledio, Cousins
HF: Hislop, Riewoldt, Taylor
F: Morton, Polak, Polo
R: Graham, Thomson, Martin

With Graham, Browne and Vickery rotating through the rucks on both teams.

While it’s great to see Martin starting right in the guts, you’ll need to remember the following players weren’t participating: Jackson, Cotchin, Foley, McGuane, Simmonds, Nason, Griffiths and Roberts.

But still, the boy is boding well for a round 1 start and is doing everything that could be expected of him, so lock him in!

(ps- A big shout out to RT off BigFooty- quality work man.)

And boy am I a happy man.

I don’t see myself putting this thing down for a while- and plan on digging every last ounce of knowledge out of this lengthy tome.

Did you know, that Cyril Rioli is the best kick in the AFL?

Also, a polish- being part of the No Passenger group on Big Footy, I can find no way to say this without feeling like a knob for stroking my own ego. But I’ve got to say, it is a fantastic read. From team selection strategies, to trading, Injury management and captain selection strategies, the boys have done an outstanding job.

That, combined with the stats and freako reviews, makes it an easy purchase for this time of year.

So what are you waiting for?

(or yanno, if you want to ask a question in the comments, I’m more than happy to “answer” it for you. From player positions to Freako reviews.)

In 2008, 59 players averaged at least 10 more per game in their last 6 games of the season than they did for the entire season.

Of those, 15 players went on to improve their average by 10ppg or more in 2009. Of those, we find the following.

six were qualified defenders.
Duffield, Gilbert, Goddard, Goldsack, Maxwell and LRT.
*Though Goddard scored a move to the midfield.

Two were Forwards
Garland and Davis
*Though Davis scored a move to the midfield.

One was a Ruck – The big Kreuzer.

And the other 6 were mids

Mackay, Gibbs, Selwood, Lewis, Murphy and Morton.

So, why is it important? Because when you sum up every player that improved their average by 10 or more last year (and played at least 10 games), you’ll find a quarter of them coming from that 15.

Also consider though, out of the [b]thirty[/b] players who increased their average by 18 or more last year, only 6 of them came from the above 2008 list so take the following list with the neccessary pinch of salt.

(Just as an aside though, the 2008 finishing average distribution for the best average improvers of 09 went as follows.
50-60: 13
60-70: 10
70-80: 5
80-90: 0
90+: 2 (Which shows how important finding this years Montagna and Swan is! – interesting to note that neither of these players were in the above list.)

This saw a trend away from the year before where the majority of value came from the 60-80 bracket of players.)

So, who are the alumini for 2009, who brought their 2009 season home with a bang?

So, what does this all mean? Maybe nothing- I’m hear to provide the stats, but I would love to hear peoples thoughts on them. Particularly the huge swing in Tom Swift!.

But the comments on that last post have switched off, so I figure will get it back up here.

Progress in updating the site for all the Oh10 new features is coming along very slowly. Not helped by my laptop deciding that it doesn’t want to turn on anymore.

But if things just stop working for no good reason in the not-too-distant future, you’ll know why.

Also, I hear that DT is supposed to be opening in 2 weeks. (Feb 1.) and pre-registration, with additional prizes is already open.

I guess DT is trying to catch up for the ground lost in the 08 schamozzle.

Looks like those boys over at DT Talk have dropped the first bombshells of the preseason.

Rumours of a rolling lockout and positional swapping.

Now, firstly, the Rolling lockout. This will be delicious. Getting your team sorted at 2am Friday morning will be fantastic (well, except for your Carlton/Richmond players- but they will already be sorted!). I feel that it will be a big positive to the game, removing the sadness caused amongst players who aren’t able to get into their teams on the Thursday night.

Secondly, position swapping. It seems the assumption is that you will be able to swap an M/F sitting in the mids with an M/F sitting in the forward lines. And so on.

Which looks to be a huge boon to coaches who put in the fore-thought and plan their teams well.

With one particular caveat- for there to be much benefit, you’re going to need multi-positional rookies who also make good cashcows.

Otherwise, the only coverage gained is if the actual multi-positional goes down injured AND you don’t have coverage for him where he’s positioned AND you have additional coverage availiable that you can move over. (aka- unlikely.)

Whether or not VS decide to give us those, would be another kettel of fish!

The funny thing is though, To this caveat, there’s also another caveat to consider.

What position don’t you care about making money? The worst cashcows in history? Who, by virtue of having the worst cashcows in history, also have the worst bench coverage of all the positions. And play in a position where injuries should be expected?

Yes, I’ve hinted enough- the rucks.

Throw in a multi-positioned rookie ruckman on your bench, with a Clark (or if you’re feeling daring, a Tippett or Kosi) in the forward line.

And suddenly, your backup ruck becomes Clark, this years highest scoring ruck, and your forward bench then goes on to cover for that lousy Ruck division.

Add to that the posibility of decent multi-positioned rookies, and you might even have your midfiled bench covering for your rucks.

A very tasty prospect for coaches who are paying attention.

That said, who knows if the same rules will apply to Supercoach, or if they will just keep it DT specific.

Happy new year everyone!

And with the new year, I figure- why not throw out my very-early first cut of a team.

I reckon, even at this stage of the year, this team will be competitive next year- but to be honest, I’m expecting a lot of changes (Particularly if Jesse Smith can stay fit!!)

Anyways, without further ado-

Defenders.

Keepers.
Sam Fisher
A solid defender who suffered a handful of bad games last year. He’s making the squad for his durability and my belief that he will raise in average next year a good 5-10 ppg.

Luke Hodge
Carrying an injury through most of last year, and averaging 118 the year before, I can see Luke Hodge be the single most popular player in every team next year. (With the exception of Ablett).

Grant Birchall
Should bring at minimum an average of 80+. Showed through the start and end of last year just what he has the potential to do.

Jason Gram
With runs through the a star studded midfield, Gram won’t suffer any issues with a tag. has historically held a 115% ish SC/DT percentage, but a 14ppg DT average increase brought that ratio to 86%. If he can keep getting as much of the ball, but lift his disposal again, a 105 average is not unachieveable.

Speculative.
Rick Ladson
Will need to watch his preseason, but it’s hard to go past paying a 58 average+ discount for a player who averaged 91 over 22 games in a premiership team.

Tadhg Kennelly
Again, been missing a year, and will depend a lot of the discount earned. Even with his shoulders, if he can return to his 85 over 20 average of 08, then we’ll be laughing!

David Myers
So I’m biased. Perhaps I want him to do well. Played last year for Bendigo as an inside mid and being groomed to assist Watson. So if he can get gametime, he should be well worth it.

Bench.
Phil Davis
With Ottens going down, it has been hinted that Phil is on a short list to step into the role. Will be delicious if he does.

Andrew Moore
Picked for no other reason than being a high draft pick. Will be replaced with the best looking rookie defender as we get closer.

Midfielders

Keepers.
Gary Ablett
Used to be Selwood, but I just can’t go past the GAZ. There will be many posts on this man by the start of next year.

Bryce Gibbs
A mindnumbing finish to last season, with the Blues midfield looking as it does, I feel that Bryce is set to explode.

Scott Pendlebury
From the same draft, read Bryce’s bio and replace Blues with Pies. Proven that he’s able to handle a tag, and has Diddles running around drawing it from him.

Speculative.
Rhys Palmer
The hero to all our 08 midfields, is getting himself another guernsey in our squad for Oh10.
Priced at roughly 300k, he’s can run all day and rack up the possesions. It’s just a question of how he comes back from that ACL.

Now, there’s a lot of value in the midrange speculative players, so Rhys will be hard pressed to hold his spot. But there is just *so* many rookies I was to get into this squad.

Rookies.
Jack Trengove
One of Melbournes big two picks this year, and my pick to be the rookie that most will be holding at the end of oh10.

Dustin Martin
Playing at a rebuilding Tiges, he should get plenty of game time.

Bench
Anthony Morabito
Built well and playing for the Docker, who we know are looking to play thier youth. Lock him in boys!

Ryan Bastinac
Smashing it so far in training. Will need to watch over summer, but I can see him playing 6-8 of the first 10 games. Which really, is all we need!

Rucks

Keepers.
Aaron Sandilands
He’s big and he just keeps getting better. Lock him in and leave him there.

Darren Jolly
With a move to the Pies, I’m not 100% sold on him, however, he’s extremely durable in a position where the bench *sucks*, and he has a smashing good average when playing at Melbourne. Who knows, might just rub off.

Bench
Matthew Lobbe
With Brogan now the #1 ruck, Choco has mentioned that Lobbe should be getting a run in the #2. nom nom nom nom om.

Trent West
The obvious #4 ruck would be the other Port ruck (and yanno, I’m tempted.) But with Mumford gone and Otten having a heroric ability to injure himself bizarely, there’s a good chance the boy could play some football this year.

Forwards

Keepers
Adam Goodes
Since moving to CHF, the has been dominating. Well worth spending top dollar on.

Lance Franklin
Sure, he’s missing round 1- but after coming down in average 20 ppg last year, he’s defintely got room for growth. And if you expect the Hawks to improve next year, then get on board.

Robbie Gray
Rumoured to be moving into the midfield and “training the house down”. He’s ticking all the boxed to be selected this year.

Cyril Rioli
As above- but with the words “this little genious” in there somewhere.

Tom Hawkins
Following the trend of big forwards, and with immaculate delivery coming from the potent Geelong mids, Hawkins is ripe to come into his own next year.

Speculative.
Big questions over both of these players, but their positions in the team will be reconsidered as we approach round 1.

Chris Yarran
Has all the potental in the world, and a Cartlon board full of praise- could he be turning a corner in attitude and onfield performance?

Patrick Veszpremi
A high draft pick coming into his third year at the Swans. Will be interesting to see if he can demand more game time as the Sydney list continues to turn over.

Bench
Luke Tapscott
The third of the Melbourne three, and rumoured to be the most “AFL” ready. Hopefully that equates to delicious early games.

Scott Gumbleton
It’s a tough year with forward rookies, I’m gunna lock in Scott and pray, both as a Supercoach and as a Bombers fan.

And roughly 50k in the bench for emergencies.

Honestly though, I’m also thinking for turning Palmer into another rookie and spending more on that #6 forward, but only because though mid rookies look just. that. good.

So that’s it. My first team of the year. Give thoughts, suggestions, changes, critisism, whatever. But let’s get a little talk going on!