TooSerious

TS Best Buys?  Nope, you read it correctly: TS Best Bets is a new addition to the TS Community that will feature the best offerings in the market for AFL based wagers each week.  Many of you out there like to put a lazy $20 on the nose or in a 5 leg multi each week, and this post is designed to help you with your selections.

The m-far-sis will be on statistics, taking out the bias and personal opinion as much as possible, and promote discussion on where the best value can be found.  Given there is only one game this weekend, and the result is already guaranteed (or is it???), this first edition will focus on many of the season-long bets that are on offer: who will be premiers?, make the top 4?, the wooden spoon - and of course the individual medals and this weeks game are there too.

See you over the break!

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2012 Premiership Winner

Past 5 winners:

2011 - Geelong
2010 - Collingwood
2009 - Geelong
2008 - Hawthorn
2007 - Geelong

To win a premiership - you have to be strong in all areas of the ground.  Geelong have been able to take out 3 of the last 5 cups with the only deficiency being an elite tall forward, yet their goal-kicking midfielders and plethora of elite small forwards was about to counter this.  Collingwood have been strong in all parts of the ground over the last 2 years, whilst the Hawks poor ruck division is a key factor in them only making 1 GF throughout this period.

The captains have rated Hawthorn and West Coast the most likely teams to make the grand final, yet the agencies still see it as a three horse race between the 3 teams who have shared the cup over the last 5 years.  For the Pies ($3.50), they have the downside of a new coach - although Geelong have proved that this isnt necessarily a downfall after taking home the cup in Chris Scotts first year.  The Pies also won the flag in the year before last (as Geelong did in 2009), yet they didnt have to lose their number 1 player (again - this has to be an...

Its been a bit of a rush job this week trying to get this out as Ive had some..ahem..studying to do the last few days, but its all taken care of now..I think! Anyway join me over the break for a preview of this weekends games...<!--more-->

Arsenal v Villa

Five weeks ago Arsenal were 12 points behind Spurs now they’re ahead of them and up to third place. No small thanks to Vermaelen who has twice popped up to score the winner. RVP assisted for the Everton winner which is now his 36th goal or assist of the league season.

Arsenal now have a great chance to consolidate a place in the top four with a home game against Villa, while Chelsea and Spurs face off at Stanford Bridge.

Villa – on past performances- will be happy to sit back and hit on the break, which is where Arsenal have often been vulnerable, but three points to the home team should surely be a formality.

Arsenal have no new injury problems while N’Zogbia is doubtful.

Chelsea v Spurs

Chelsea will consider themselves unlucky to lose at Man City after conceding two late goals. Still, nobody has picked up so much as a point there this year. Before that game, Di Matteo had won four games on the bounce, the whole time rotating the squad in a way that would make SAF and Mancini blush.

Spurs have been on a horrible run ever since Redknapp has been linked to the England job. It shows how much of a poisoned chalice the job is that it’s affecting things before he’s even taken it. They managed a point against Stoke after a late VDV goal. Adebayor remains doubtful which could see VDV moved back into the middle where he belongs. Terry  is back for Chelsea, while Ivanovic will most likely miss out.

Liverpool v Wigan

Coates – the half Uruguayan/half Scot (no seriously) – scored an<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zj9umu0H5hI"> outrageous goal[/url] against QPR that showcased his Scottish side. It really was an absolute peach of a  goal but was in vain as his defence let in three goals...

<img src="http://img256.imageshack.us/img256/3699/orffllogo.jpg" alt="" />

OMG, its like finally here! The opening bounce of the first-ever ORFFL Premiership Season! Im more excited than Big Kev (may god rest his giant bones)! Join us over the break for match previews, instructions on how to enter your line-up and ever, ever so much more!
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First of all, I dont think Ive used that many exclamation marks in a paragraph since last week. Apologies. That must have been very arresting for you.

Secondly, some house-keeping. Yes, there was an ORFFL Challenged Cup GF played on the weekend. However, in true pre-season comp fashion, Ive decided to change the rules for the last week. Why? The answer is two-fold. Scraping DT/100 stats off Freako is a pain in the arse for me to do, and perhaps more importantly, no one gives a proverbial about DT/100 now that the "fine people" at the HUN have released SC scores for the NAB Cup. So taking these two factors into consideration, Ive decided to do the scoring on Best 15 SC basis. And the winner is…

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Warburton Wanderers 1340 Def. Torrumbarry Thunda 1324

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Congratulations EV! May it be the first piece in a cabinet of silverware!

Commiserations SKT! May the pain of losing fuel your premiership dreams!

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Thank god thats over with though, now onto the real thing. Walesy, techno-wizard and all round top-bloke that he is, has set up a page so that we can put in our line-ups each week. What a guy! <a title="Click here to pick your 15" href="http://tooserious.net/ORFFL.php">http://tooserious.net/ORFFL.php[/url]

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And just to remind everyone, if you want to field (including emergencies) a Sydney or GWS player this week, you have to pick them BEFORE SC LOCKOUT. You cannot select them after theyve played.

Secondly, if you do not pick a team at all, you will receive no points. Further to that, there may be some AndyD/STrigg like discussions about your ongoing role...

Wow, it doesnt feel right typing that! Can you believe that in just a few short days, the 2012 season will be kicking off!!

Bloody pumped!!!

So lets fire up the ol team chat and get it on!

Welcome once again to the Best Buys.
Its a little bit late this week due to the SC scores only coming out yesterday, and just to make sure tha masses have some more info on the guys in this weekends game, Ive decided to do a brief Sydney Special. I will have a look at 15 or so of the better options for The Giants and throw in a few Swans while Im at it.
Next week there will be a full NAB wrap-up (excluding GWS and Sydney) but for our look into the Sydney-siders join me over the break.

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The stats used here are quite basic and meant as an indicator of form over anything else. All aspects should be considered when selecting your starting line-up but hopefully some of what is here should help. The "dollars per point" rating is provided by the HUN and is based on the players price divided by their average over the full NAB cup games. It does not take into account TOG or substitutions so if considering a player a little more research is recommended.

These players are listed in order of the HUN released "dollars per point" stat starting at the top, meaning that the higher the player is listed the better value for money they appear to be from their average over the 3 full-game NAB rounds.

Tomas Bugg (GWS) DEF $113k
Bugg missed NAB 2 but played well in 3 and 4, scoring 58 and 87 points respectively. The fact that he did only play the two games means he has the highest average for any GWS rookie priced at $113k, which as a defender this makes him almost a must have for your team. Should get plenty of games (for a GWS player) and should be able to score consistently well. Lock.

Devon Smith (GWS) FWD/MID $131k
Smith has impressed many with scores of 89 and 74 in his two games, which as a GWS forward is even better. The ball may not be in the forward line that much this year but runs through the midfield should help with his output. Best forward option from the Giants based on pre-season form.

Anthony Miles (GWS) MID...

The choice of captains in Supercoach became a difficult exercise during 2010 and moreso last season. Gone were the days of everyone picking Gary Ablett Jnr in their Supercoach team at the start of the season and everyone locking him in as captain every single week.
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Flashback: Round 5, 2008 – Sydney versus Geelong. Ablett had scored 115 in each of his two previous games and was going to be tagged in this game by Kieran Jack. Put the captaincy on Ablett or someone else? History shows that Ablett went on to score a mammoth 254 SC points. Since that moment, for the next season or so, Ablett became everyone’s permanent captain. (A popular alternate choice as captain for that round was Luke Hodge (who had the second best average in 2008). Sadly for those who selected Hodge that round, he only managed 89 SC points against Brisbane).

Ablett would finish the 2008 season averaging 132. His closest rivals were Hodge who averaged 118 and Bartel who averaged 116. In 2009, there was a similar story. Ablett’s average for the season increased to 140 and his nearest rivals were Montagna with 126 and Swan with 123. The “perma-captain” was still alive and well.

In 2010, the field was evened. Ablett averaged 130 for the season but so did Goddard. Swan averaged 127 with the next best being Judd with 119. Last year, 2011, Ablett did not have the highest average for the year. His average of 127 was second to Pendlebury with 129. Cox and Swan both averaged 122.

For the 2011 season, the “perma-captain” was no more. This point was emphasised with Ablett not being picked in many teams prior to the season starting due to the uncertainty of his scoring potential with the Gold Coast Suns.

This season, with the absence of any perma-captain, we have to look for other factors to assist us in picking our captains. The main determining factors include: recent form, form against an opponent, and whether the particular player is likely to be on a winning team. In my...

[span style="">In my previous articles I provided a run-down of the players at Alberton from the main defence training group in part 1, and the midfield training group in part 2. In this, the 3rd instalment of the series, I will scrutinise the players in the forwards training group and then put the rucks under the microscope. So without further ado, I present part 3 of the Port Adelaide Update.<!--more-->[span style="font-weight:bold">Forwards Group[span style="">The main forward group at Alberton, training under the experienced eye of assistant coach Gary Hocking, comprises the following players – [span style="font-style:italic">Brendon AhChee; Mitch Banner; John Butcher; Brett Ebert; Cameron Hitchcock; Ben Newton; Simon Phillips; Jay Schulz; Daniel Stewart; Justin Westhoff; Chad Wingard; Aaron Young; Jarrad Irons (r); Daniel Webb (r).[span style="">As to be expected at an AFL club, several of these players have also spent time training with either the defence, midfield or ruck groups, with several members of those groups also training occasionally with the forward group.[span style="">
Port Adelaide’s forward group want to be a super competitive unit in everything they do in 2012. As a group, they made a decision at the start of pre-season training by “drawing a line in the sand” and put together a set of key values to define how they wanted to be perceived. These values are about accountability to each other and the team, and they are focussed as a group and determined to be a competitive force on the training track and out on the field. Be it training, weights or pilates, they just want to be able to physically challenge the backs in a contest. This competitive determination, as with the defence group, was best demonstrated earlier in the pre-season with the much publicised stoush between Schulz &amp; Trengove. Gary Hocking recalls his time at Geelong where Cam Mooney &amp; Matt Scarlett got involved in a bit of biffo on the track now and then and he says,...

Weve left it a bit late, but its time for the donors to pick the starting team for UCantBeTooSerious MK2. For those that dont know, we had a team last year where all decisions related to it were collectively decided by the TS Donors and it was a lot of fun and really interesting. If anyone is interested in reading a review of last season, head over <a href="http://tooserious.net/ucantbetooserious-donor-team-season-review" target="_blank">HERE[/url] and have a look see, but in short, we finished 737th overall and won a couple of grannies (although highest OA was always our aim).

This team is just one of the many benefits you get for donating to TS - the other big ones being extra viewable rows on the stats page (a whole team at once! ), access to the Donor Forum, and less ads. <a href="http://tooserious.net/donate.php" target="_blank">If you want to donate, click on the DONATE tab up next to the FORUM one, or click anywhere on this text .[/url]

Head over the break for details about the coming season and how you can help to set up the team:::::::::::::

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Unfortunately for me, I dont have time to facilitate this team this season; however JPK has committed to facilitating the weekly discussions and decision making and shanaz has committed to doing the weekly changes to the team. A HUGE thank you to both of you! I reckon its fantastic that this team can continue on for another year.

Before handing over the reigns though, I will be setting the team up this week.

I have made an executive decision (I think the 2nd since starting this team haha) to keep the same team name, so now we just gotta pick our starting players.

We are gonna go with a similar method to last season as it worked really well. Its really quick and easy - much quicker and easier than posting which players you think we should have.

Whether you are a Donor or not, you will be able to participate in this process, so im not gonna let the cat out of the bag here in...

Supercoach Season Preview 2012 - St Kilda

2012 Supercoach Player Ranking Chart

<a href="http://tooserious.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/StKilda_SC2012.jpg"><img class="alignleft size-full wp-image-5231" src="http://tooserious.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/StKilda_SC2012.jpg" alt="" width="484" height="605" />[/url]

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2012 List Analysis:

St Kildas list is WYSIWYG.   You know you will get a lot of quality in the older guys, and a bit of a patchwork quilt about the youth.

Its this factor that makes the Saints a hard team to judge this year.   Looking at their top end quality, there is reason to suggest that on their day they can beat any team in the competition.   The problem is that the best form isnt always there from each of these players for whatever reason, be it age or temperament, and the guys who have to patch the gaps just havent been good enough, an unfortunate side-effect of short-term drafting for a flag.

This season I see Watters working with what hes been comfortable with at Collingwood.  Relentless forward pressure.  Nothing new for the Saints, but at least his open and fresh approach will lift what has been an unfortunate burden on this club under Ross Lyon.  There will be less "us against them" attitude, and though it might hurt them in the short term, in the long run, their players will find turning up to work a lot more enjoyable, and I think that will actually translate to good results.

St Kildas list rating is 44 and a depth of 21.  The list rating is 4th in the league, and depth 8th.  By this measure, and because of a nice early run of matches to get their groove going, I see St Kilda making the 8 again this year.  That means 12-13 wins.   Unless they sort out their KPDs though, thats as far as the journey goes.<img src="http://tooserious.net/wp-includes/js/tinymce/plugins/wordpress/img/trans.gif" alt="" />

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So, last night I managed to sneak along to the HUNs offices to check out their latest, slightly contriversial offering, the behind the paywall, <a href="http://live-footy.heraldsun.com.au/matchpredictor/index/20120120120140101">Live HQ[/url]

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So anyways, the HUN put on a bit of a do, invited a bunch of figures in the online space, a little bit of nosh went alright, then sat us down to take us through the product.

Im gunna break here, the vast majority of what I want to write has been covered very well by the folk at SCTalk, so check out their <a href="http://supercoachtalk.com/superfooty-live-hq/">article[/url] on it first.

Its alright, Ill wait til you get back.

Still reading?

Cools.

Anyways, for my take on it, its mostly pretty standard for what youd expect, stats, a bit of user interaction, and your SuperCoach team plugged in live. Which is nice.

For mine though, the absolute hero of the piece, was the live, play-by-play reporting on what each action is scoring, highlighting of course, when its your player doing the scoring.

Now of course, we know that scores in the first quarter can be altered by what happens later on in the game, so the value of this is always going to be a little questionable - and I reckon the HUN are going to deal with a bunch of question from people asking why their players score has gone down for not doing anything - but for something to run side by side with your usual online viewing I definitely think it can add to the experience.

For me, Ill be firing up the 2 month free trial and seeing how it goes - I mean it all comes down to a personal preference on how much value it adds to your experience, and if after that, the $3 a week isnt worth it, its easy enough to just not follow through with it.

So yeah, while I still love a free internets, it will be interesting to see how this works out for them - particularly when it hits round 12 and people are dropping out of the hunt for the overall...