Final Say: Round 12, trade plans + tactics

I hope you’ve been preparing well for this upcoming month of absolute hell.

Yep, we’ve been talking about it for weeks but it’s now finally here… The byes!

Keeping up-to-date with current pop culture references, I feel as though it’s appropriate for me to associate the byes with the Demogorgon from Stranger Things: A ferocious beast with a killer instinct that serves no real purpose to the world… However, if you get on its bad side, you may not live to see another day.

Extreme? Yes. Relevant? Absolutely.

I feel like Will Byers the first time he enters the Upside Down… Lost, confused, and really wanting a hug from my mum.

I’ve been dreading this writeup for months now, but we’re here.

So, I guess all I can do now is move on, assemble my bunch of ragtag Dungeons & Dragons playing friends, and tackle this Demogorgon head on.

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GAMEPLAN

This week I scored 2235 which moved me down a whopping 7217 spots to 28,386^th and yep, you guessed it, this was officially my worst weekly ranked score of the year.

Well… Where to start?

I’m honestly not quite sure I can express my detest for Luke Ryan in a PG-13 way.

A guy who has scored 106 and 141 since I traded him out – after scoring 62, 75, and 63 in the weeks leading up to the trade – is a guy who I want nothing to do with.

Yeah look… Honestly, my team is in a bad way at the moment.

It’s in free fall and as a result, so am I.

I could blab on about the shock and horror that hits me every time I cast an eye at my week-by-week rankings, but does that really help anyone?

Sure, you might get some entertainment out of it.

Hell, even I might get some entertainment out of it!

But… It gets worse.

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Now I’ve also got to try and scrape through until Daicos’ bye so I can upgrade him to Sinclair which would be the ideal scenario.

The fact of the matter is, my team sucks and there’s nothing I can do about it.

Last week I decided to bring in Bont in anticipation of his imminent forward status (which he did get), and while he didn’t score incredibly well, in hindsight it was a great trade.

This week, I’m looking a little more left field and will be bringing in a point of difference (POD).

It’s been a tough decision deciding whether to keep my trades or go guns blazing throughout the byes. In a perfect world, I’d be making no trades this week, but this is not a perfect world.

So, Sean Darcy is going to come into the team at the expense of Brayden Preuss who played full back in the VFL last week and looks like no chance of coming back into the side anytime soon.

To fund this whole operation, Mitch Owens will come into the side for Josh Rachele who has just about peaked in price.

Josh Rachele -> Mitch Owens

Brayden Preuss -> Sean Darcy

Remaining Salary: $79,000

Trades Left: 13

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PODs & SUPER PODs

As we’re nearing the byes, PODs are slowly becoming a bit less relevant and instead ,super PODs are where you need to direct your attention to fully leap past the competition. Generally, super PODs are anyone owned by less than 2%, but for the sake of having a little more breathing room, I’ll bump that up to 3%. Here’s my top three picks (based on who I think is the best to take a punt on).

Top-3 Super PODs

• Jackson Hately ($353,900, 73, 2.1%) – I’m not sure I’ve ever seen someone show so much promise as a youngster than Jackson Hately. He dominated at both junior level and NEAFL level, yet was never able to replicate his form in the AFL. However, he got his move to Adelaide in the offseason, and while it looked like his AFL hoodoo had joined him at the Crows, he’s all of a sudden come back into the side and has dominated as a result. He had 13 centre bounce attendances (CBAs) last weekend on his way to a score of 108, taking his three-round average to 102. He’s coming in at an extremely valuable price for the scores he’s putting up but I’m inclined to wait a week to see how he plays and perhaps look to trade him in next round.

• David Swallow ($468,000, 75.8, 1.1%) – Holy moly it’s satisfying when I’m spot on with a POD, let’s goooo!! Swallow, yet again, racked up the centre bounce attendances CBAs with 17 on the weekend; meaning he’s fully involved in that Gold Coast midfield rotation. Since being injected into the middle, he’s scored 123, 101, 119, and 94. While his Round 13 bye is a major put-off for me at the moment, I am very keen to bring him in after his bye for Daicos. The Suns keep winning with him in the engine room, so they’d be silly to take him out… Right?

• Oscar McInerney ($496,000, 89.2, 1.7%) – Is ‘Big O’ SuperCoach relevant now?? Hmm not entirely I don’t think, but you certainly can’t discount his past month. Since Round 7, he’s scored 82, 84, 142, 98, and 112 suggesting he’s in some unbelievable form. Before you buy, I think it’s important to take these scores with a grain of salt, particularly his last three. For his 142, he was playing against Kieran Strachan (who, let’s be honest, is quite an average footy player), his 98 was against Jacob Koschitzke (a third choice tall forward), and his 112 was against Matt Flynn. In their own respect, each of these ruckmen are absolutely good enough to play AFL, but they are definitely not in the conversation of “above average players”. Despite this, I can’t deny McInerney’s form, and the fact that he has the Round 14 bye makes him a very attractive option.

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CHARLIE’S ANGELS – CAPTAINS

Mills was on track for a monster score on Friday night before being moved to what looked like fullb ack?? Still, he scored 117 and would have been a very serviceable vice captain (VC) option if you took it!

Lachie Neale deserves all the plaudits in the world for his performance against the Giants with a 164, even with a slight tag from Harry Perryman. I unfortunately didn’t have him captain (hence why I dropped so many rankings), but I think it’s safe to assume that if you did captain him, you would’ve climbed some spots for sure.

In the first of the bye rounds, our options are limited, so it’s important to narrow our selections down to some trusty choices.

I think Josh Dunkley will love the rough & tough game against the Cats on Friday night at Marvel Stadium. He should rack up a ton of tackles and will be able to run the old boys off their feet.

It’s hard to look past Rory Laird against the Eagles. I have slight concerns over a potential tag, but they chose not to tag any of the Doggies midfielders last week so we should be ok!

Touk will have a field day against the Roos. I’m expecting 130+.

I thought that Jarrod Berry would tag Josh Kelly last week, but he didn’t, so that gives me some hope that Andy Brayshaw will manage to run free on Sunday arvo.

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Top-3 Vice Captains

1. Josh Dunkley
2. Rory Laird
3. Tim English

Top-3 Captains

1. Touk Miller
2. Andrew Brayshaw
3. Tom Mitchell

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