I'm curious to get others' opinions and considerations about risk management when picking your squad.Some areas I consider carefully are: Players returning from injury, especially the tempting discounted ones (Malcheski and Kenelly served me well last year). Also those with a history (Higgins, Kerr etc). If you get it right you gain a keeper cheap as, but if you get it wrong with one or two players it can really hurt your season. Players under 23 yrs or over 30- a few reasons for this -young guys take a few years to biuld the body up and over thirties are more of a threat to hurt you in injuries (gun rookies and superstar oldies like Dustin Fletcher the obvious exceptions) Aggro Factor - Buddy is the perfect example. Plenty of trips to the tribunal - lots of drama for coaches. Not having him when he's on fire may cause more drama tho! I think that too many hot-heads in your team is to be avoided. That said Buddy will be starting for me - I'm a sucka for the pain! GoldCoast coming in is also a huge shift in the dynamic of the game. How many GC'ers to pick? I feel this will prove to be THE crucial question of the year- especially with extra trades potentially allowing for extra upgrades.
Forgot to add that I usually allow myself 2-3 picks in each of these areas but no more. Worked out well last year but I'm wondering if it was just luck? Guess we'll find out this year. Go the mighty Swans!
The limit is probably a good way to go - forces you to pick the best of the bunch, either the lowest risk or highest reward. It also means that if your luck turns that your season isn't over before it started.
It is an interesting question but to my mind you have to take a few risks generally more rookies rather than under priced is the way to go. Hodge last year was a rare example of a very under priced gun. Malceski was great early but got tagged and lost effectiveness. This year I see Drummond as being the type of risk and reward player. He and Hurn look like past guns who have had a hard year of injuries in a poor team. On the aggro factor well I think you can't afford regular absences from any in your team no matter how good. If your team has Franklin you will need to spend money on being more conservative in having cover, which may compromise your team in other areas. The no fossil rule generally works but Boomer and Goodes did ok last year. No one from 23 or under is a good thought unless they are a rookie. Unlikely you will get a good enough ppg improvement from a younger player, though someone like Jack Riewoldt makes you think. Seriously. Good post topic
Make it right..... Sounds obvious doesn't it?? My point is, that we spend all summer looking into, one of my MAJOR rules is: NO TRADES IN ROUND 1 & 2....
I agree with Lucas. Rookies over underpriced is the way to go. I am concerned about the number of GC players too. There's a gold mine to be had, but how laden can you be?
On GC you'd say 6 maybe 7. I would have 2 per position and a ruck. I am sure I am way under what some would have. It's probably more who rather than how many. How many of us had Hannebery last year as he got no hype compared with the two demons or even Barlow? I don't agree with no early trades. If you can fix a rookie in rounds before appreciation then a good move is to do it then as you will rarely get better value from a trade as the year progresses.
<blockquote>Quote from Lucas on January 22, 2011, 09:45 I don't agree with no early trades. If you can fix a rookie in rounds before appreciation then a good move is to do it then as you will rarely get better value from a trade as the year progresses.</blockquote> Too true, I was stuck with Relton on the pine all year last year, because I did not cut him early. At this stage, I am trying to avoid players in the 300-400k range. Picking breakouts from these players is too hard and too expensive.
Round 2 and 3 are the most important trades in the whole year. You cut your bad picks and pickup the ones you missed. I agree though after the first round you need to back your team in.
I'm with Lucas on the number of Suns players to have. At present have 7 - 2 one each line with 1 in the ruck. As it turns out they are all rookies. I know I will be able to cover Round 1 and hopefully I will have traded a couple out by round 9. Essendon, Richmond and Port rookies are more enticing because you can trade them out before their first bye but you know for a fact that most of the good Suns rookies will play almost every game.
You don't know if the Suns rookies will play any games at all, as they have the bye in round 1. You can't be sure which are going to get selected, and which you will have to trade out of. Keep it to the certs I reckon.
GC bye Rd1 is going to prove interesting. Still think 7 is about the number, provided we get the interchange upgrade we are seeking. That said, I think some of the GC rookies are certs Griff to play pretty much every game. The question is whether their output will be Hannebery good or Masten bad.
Want to name names Lucas? Swallow, Toy, Smith, N Ablett? I have those 4 plus Fraser & Harris in my side from GC at the moment.
Griff no names so far, because I guess I need more of a look at the general structure they will be setting up with. That said, GC will have 22 players getting a game (even 1 as sub) and of them 10 or so will be rookies. You'd like to think they will have a nice F/M/D/R spread but I'm not certain that will happen.
I'm personally thinking 7 is at the low end of how many GC players you will need to win the comp. Looking at the value of each teams best 22 (solely going by highest salary players to be in the best 22, and taking into account 7-6-4-7 position wise) the order of 'highest value teams' are as follows (from memory, did this at home last night): Geelong (about 9.3m) St Kilda Carlton Sydney Collingwood Western Bulldogs Fremantle Hawthorn Essendon Adelaide North Melbourne Port Adelaide Melbourne Richmond Brisbane West Coast (7.2m) Gold Coast (about 5m) That is a massive difference between 16 and 17th - the forward line for example has the second most valuable player at $200k, and the 4th most valuable player at $100k... Don't underestimate the amount of game time some of these guys are going to get. I liken this issue with how many rookie mids you had to have last year. Correct me if I'm wrong, but those who finished towards the top had around 4 rookie mids starting. Risk = Reward. At this stage, I'm going with 11 GC players - all rookies, 3,3,2,3 (so they can still be covered for byes 1 & 9). Have the best few rookies from the likes of Essendon, Adelaide, Brisbane and Richmond, and it allows you to start with 14-15 v strong premiums. The only question that remains is which GC players to pick. There are probably 4-6 locks at this stage, hopefully the NAB cup will uncover the rest.
The main query I have with GC players is that you're aiming to have them for cash cowing, and the two byes will push the tempo back. Now sure the season goes 24 rounds, but will the loss of tempo hurt you? I can understand that GC has rookies that will get game time, of that there is no doubt, and therefore I'd see them as being premium rookies that you're looking to use as your more "final upgrades". Essendon/Port/Richmond have the last byes, after a point where cash cows become viable, around Rd9, so the whippets should look at getting a better mix of these teams in. The way I see it, more GC rookies is a more conservative rather than risky policy. 11 GC is not risky, it's conservative 9 is probably the average 7 is probably risky, where you're going to have to nail your other team rookies Am I making sense here?
Making sense. All depends on if the 2 byes versus 1 bye (I'll still have Essendon/Port/Richmond rookies even with the 11 GC, so remaining rookies would have come from a team with 1 bye at rd 9) is a bigger negative than the positive you get out of the GC rookies having huge opportunities at game time = higher scoring than the other rookies. Going with less GC rookies is a higher risk - agreed, but I'm not convinced the potential reward is there...
...just to explain my point, a player only has to average 5ppg more for their price after 7 games be higher than the alternative after 8 games. At 10ppg more they're worth an extra $25k - still with one less game.
I'm down to two GC rookies - Zac Smith & Brandon Matera. I may find a defender once the NAB kicks in but there's no way I'll start 7. We should have a reasonable idea who'll be preferred choices in their line-up but a week's a long time in footy. Having 10 guys in my squad who haven't been named to play at Rd 1 lock-out is risky in my mind. There's nothing surer than at least one popular GC rookie not getting named Rd 2. With so many unknowns people will be burnt. Add to that the fact GC rookies are 'retarded' by byes when it comes to early growth and I'm confortable taking less of them. There seem to be a lot of good options at other clubs. Also, it should be remembered that we will have until Rd 4 to pick up any GC player that's firing early. So I'm thinking rather than grab a heap of them and hope I get the right ones, I'll minimize my starters and grab a couple of early bolters in Rd 3/4. I'd rather use a trade or two to grab the cream of the early crop than sit on a bunch of guys slow burning and hope they come good. Sideways trading of GC rookies will be rampant early.
Is anyone else concerned that GC will use a rotation policy with their rookies in order to (a) get experience into as many of them as possible (b) avoid the best ones burning out by R12?