Dreamteam - a week in regret.

I promise I will post about other things, just as soon as I stop spending 60+ hours a week at work.

After so many decisions to be made last week, Josh Hill and Nathan Bock scored very well and rocketed up in dollars and points averaged.

Okay, okay, that's cool. I researched them and both will raise significantly monetarily so it's not too late to grab them, they haven't peaked yet. My new plan was to forget about Bock and trade Tippett (Adelaide) for Hill (WBD). That way I can still cash in on Hill and improve on a 30 points scoring player to a 100 points scoring player.

With this plan, I settled into the week, calm in the knowledge that I still had more trades than anyone else I knew. I was in a very good spot for the very first round of our Broadyboys competition. I am playing Bev, who scored about 100 points lower than me in Round 3. Not significant, but enough to make me feel pretty good, especially since I had chosen badly captain-wise. We made a bet for 6 Crown lagers on the outcome of the match, and while I'm not a massive drinker, winning is something I don't mind so much.

The team lists came out. I still had no emergencies in my backline, that's okay, my backline performed fine without them. Then disaster struck, I couldn't at all afford Hill. I could my spare money confused with my Supercoach, Josh Hill had skyrocketed out of my grasp. At the same time, word on the street was that my most expensive Backman Joel Bowden wasn't going to play. A player down, time to take action.... Goooooo trades.

What to do? I couldn't afford Hill, I could swap one of my emergencies with Harry Taylor (Geelong) who is another rookie set to play this week and make a fair bit of money, but I wasn't convinced.

Instead, I did something that I'm already regretting, something I've never done before. I traded one of my guns (expensive high scoring players) for a rookie. I traded Steve Johnson for Josh Hill, allowing me to trade Jake Edwards (Carlton) for Michael Osbourne (Hawthorn). I basically went against my strategy, all guns and rookies now has a mid-priced player. Both Josh Hill and Michael Osbourne just have to play to make money, and both are listed to play. Steve Johnson was bugging me, he was scoring so badly that he had gone down $40,000 in value, and he had to get 174 in Round 4 just to maintain his current price. Not going to happen.

What probably is going to happen is that he might take a couple of weeks and start getting good, real good. He was awesome in my team last year. Oh well, I can always buy him back and make a profit. I'm not happy that my team is now very similar to almost everyone else's, but I've now got emergencies covering every position, making it unlikely I'll score a zero.


I've chosen Money and Points over Trades. This time.

Round 4 Captain: Chad Cornes
Round 3 Score: 1,919
Overall Ranking: 3,957 of 162,898

Dreamteam - Before the prices change

Firstly, thanks to Keeks who convinced me to get Paul Chapman instead of Jonno Brown. Chapman scored more points in Round 2 and is looking very likely to score more against Melbourne in Round 3.

I won my first pre-season match, and then lost my second. It seems like everyone else had surpassed me in scoring. I put it down to Port Adelaide playing Sydney with the Cornes brothers being kept very quiet.

My starting plan was to pick a good team with some superstars and some hopefully well-chosen rookies. I was then going to use 2 trades just before Round 3 to capitalise on whomever was about to make lots of money, then sit on my team until about Round 12 (10 rounds to the Grand Final) and then start trading so that I'd have a monster team going into the finals.

My advantange is that most people trade a fair bit and end up going into the finals with injured players. Knowing this, I'm intending to restrain myself.

Anywho, I had to use a trade on Scott Lucas - 12 to 12 weeks is just too long out of the game to keep on the bench. My plan wasn't going so well.

This week I had to make some decisions:

I wanted to use trades to improve my side. Currently my backline is my trouble spot. I put 4 rookies in to boost my money making abilities, but the backline rookies very rarely play. Going into Round 3, Jake Edwards isn't playing, neither is Scott Thompson but Pfeiffer and Nathan Brown are. So I have no emergencies.

The prices of all players are established by their average from the last three rounds they've played. The price will change at the completion of the round - this makes right now the perfect time to trade in some injured or underperforming players and pick up some players that have played much better than their average (or starting price as rookies) and my intention was always to use the full trade allocation (2 trades) this round.

Josh Hill (Western Bulldogs) is set to make the most money in the forwards. Michael Osborne (Hawthorn) and Bret Thornton (Carlton) are set to make a lot of money in the backs. There has been a bit of talk around that these backmen are flash in the pans, and will be out when other players return, others see them as dudes that should be in for the long haul - I have no idea.
My plan was to trade Dale Thomas (Collingwood) for Josh Hill and then Scott Thompson (North Melbourne) for Nathan Bock (Adelaide).

Josh Hill and Nathan Bock are both set to go up in price fairly dramatically. Both can potentially score more than 100 in a game.

Dale Thomas has been slightly underperforming but is a good, proven player. There are many different views on how many games Scott Thompson will play, anywhere from 15 to 5.
In the end though, I'm just not sure there is enough long term benefit in this move. My backline will miss Bock for sure but my forward line is solid and doesn't need to make space for any fashionable player. I've decided to keep my two trades and go it alone with what I've got. All my emergencies are playing except for the backmen and I do expect the rest of my backline to play. It's a gamble, but I now have more trades up my sleeve then anyone else I know which could just win me a final.

I've chosen Trades over Money + Score. This time.

Round 2 score : 1812

Ranking : 4,934 of 157,249