Hi all, first season player here, have appreciated this site a lot! I've seen much talk about team trades/strategies coming up to the multiple bye rounds. I can see why this is important if you're going for overall standing, but does it matter so much if your just after a league win (as I am)? I'm going pretty well, topping my league, and had thought that if I saved my trades over the byes, i should on average win at least one, maybe two games of the three. And have trades to spare at the business end of the season. Any flaws in my theory?
@tmq - as you are on top of your league at first glance you shoudl be right to not worry too much about the byes. if there are 4 other good teams you might find yourself squeezed into 5th if you don't have a good head to head record, so I woudl be doing a sort by total points to make sure that you haven't just been beating the dud teams so far !! definitely keep 5-6 trades for finals as you shoudl cream other temas if they have run out.
It might be a bit late to implement this strategy, but I saw people saying preseason throwing a game. So just say you load up on round 13 players, you go in expecting to lose round 13, but win round 11 and 12.
I wouldn't do any useless sideways trading, but if you have say a round 13 cash cow like Morris or Milera, hang on to them through rounds 11 and 12 for coverage then trade them out for round 11 or 12 Premiums in round 13. Then you're just getting max benefit for trades you were going to do anyway.
First and foremost, don't trade in players that you don’t want, just to avoid donuts. Otherwise you'll end up with a sub-par team come the end of the season. I've tried to structure my team so it will just about have a full team for the first bye round, including cows from the 2nd and 3rd bye rounds such as Richmond and GC. Then once round 11 is finished, bring in WCE and Adelaide guns like Danger, Thompson, Water etc to phase out rookies that will not get a run in the following bye rounds. Same goes for C'wood, Essendon, Freo guns after R12. My backs may be a wee bit thin in round 13, but that’s a small price to pay for a superior defence in round 14-23.
If you want a bye spreadsheet which is fantastic - head over to Dream Team Talk and download the bye spreadsheet. The instructions are very easy to follow and you can map out where you are going to cop donuts each round.
I have reassessed my strategy based on winning my cash leagues (2 of) Based on this I am looking at throwing my round 13 games in my cash leagues as I am playing top of ladder sides and expect to lose these games in any case. This way I will manage a few downgrades in lead up to rnd 11 and maximise most of my donut into rnd 13
I will cop a couple of donuts in Round 11, mainly due to the GWS cows. You have to cop donuts at some point, so basically it minimises the impact if its a Devon Smith 60 or a Treloar 70 your missing rather than a Pendlebury 150. After that round I will try to trade in Rockliff/Thompson/Swallow etc so that barring injury I should only cop 1 or two more donuts over the next two rounds, and still have a good amount of premiums on the park.
Round 11 for me aswell for very much the same reason and having Cox and Giles as my main rucks. Also looking at upgrading my final Mid for round 13 hopefully Horsley has mooed by then or maybe A Kennedy or D Smith.
have everything planned to have no donuts and complete my upgrades at the same time. My plan at the start of the year is still in place. Only thing I have to worry about is rested players or injuries..but hopefully with the byes resting will be minimal.
Have managed to balance the team so that I have a single donut in each round but only in the back line. a cple of upgrades at the right time should see me take one only donut across the entire bye series without having to trade like mad to cover them. Pretty happy with that TBH.