Marcz Sharkz Season Blog...

[RiOtChEsS]

Dreamteam Round 10

Score 2047 Rank 2135

Aaron Sandilands out for 4 weeks... Ouch, yet this hurts the vast majority of coaches and there is no clear cut replacement with Cox already in my side, il ride the coat tails of one Zac Smith until the big fella returns. Albeit little Libba had more money to earn i had been eying off Leigh Montagna for weeks, with the cash from Duigan to Puopolo i upgraded Liberatore directly to Montagna, i could have used Curnow instead of Liberatore but i have yet to see Brock McClean really put a stranglehold on that spot in the team and believing he wont be far away i want to hang onto Curnow for the time being. Brandon Matera's next run of games had me convinced he would tread water at best money and scoring wise, i couldnt be left waning on that young buck Thomas Lynch who was averaging an impressive 93ppg and so a downgrade was in order, safe to say i was impressed with Lynch knocking out 66 against the top team, could this kid become that bench cover u want to get on the field over someone you paid good money for? only time will tell. Jim Bartel if i could possibly afford to trade you now i would, seriously Chris Scott you are playing a brownlow medal midfielder in a negating half forwad role? kudos on your teams record, but u ruined my durable fourth midfielder and i appreciate it! (sarcasm). Well the ranking just keeps on sliding and i wonder just how i thought i was a chance for overall a little over a month ago. At the moment it feels like my team is a sinking boat and the water is coming in faster than two trades a week can fix and its got me feeling a little Pete Murray-esque...

'seen better days, put my face in my hands' Marcz Sharkz 'has more holes than you can poke a stick at'

Trades 13 Bank 81,900

Dream Team Round 9

Score 2242 Rank 2117

Paul Puopolo was on the bubble and i had an embarrassment of riches down back between Nick Duigan Nick Lower and Danny Stanley, believing Nick Duigan was the best canditate for the chop as Lower has more money to earn and Stanley just come off a solid 88 and no more byes i decided to designate him my permanent bench cover down back. Downgrading Duigan cost me my Elxam League Match as i would've played him, but it frees up some money for a big inclusion this week.

Shaun Higgins coming back from 'groin soreness' was a welcome inclusion... or so i thought, after keeping him this long i feel as though im obligated to keep the faith but he is seriously giving me grey hair, i remember early last year when i was taking on a good friend head to head and seeing he had Jack Grimes and Shaun Higgins in his team i laughed out loud believing the combination of that fragile pair and his inability to keep his index finger off the trade button would give me the upper hand come finals time and it certainly did. So why the hell did i fall into the tangled web of Frank Grimes and Missy Higgins this year is something il have to chalk up too utter ignorance, id convinced myself this would be the year they would go up a cog and their bodies would have matured to the rigors of the game.



Mistakes made are experiences had, im certain Missy Higgins isnt done punishing me yet...

'could you leave me with a scar'

Trades 15 Bank 152,00

Dream Team Round 8

Score 1983 Rank 1816

After the slide of the previous two weeks i decided to be realistic with where Marcz Sharkz were at, and that was no longer in the running for overall, granted 500pts from the leader isnt that far back but my squad is crumbling around me and it was time to salvage and repair the team for league finals. The temptation early in the week was not too trade at all with Grimes value not deteriorating and the back options wafer thin with durability and form, after considering all options Curnow in the midfield and Higgins in the forwardline played a part in my decision to seek out the most durable replacement for Grimes, whilst there were some in form options Shaw and Adcock that could have been included their durability could really hurt my overall team potential, the last thing i wanted was to replace an LTI with a future one, Grimes was my 5th back and i decided to swap him to Brady Rawlings, durable no nonsense good job security cracked 100 in 3 out of 6 games just what i need to stabilize that spot. Scores from this weekend suggest it was the worst possible inclusion out of those i considered but long term i believe this was the correct decision given the state of my team and limiting injury trades.

With Shaun Higgins ive certainly flirted with the concept of axing him 3 weeks straight given his history, that said those i am looking at are falling in price and he isnt so ive been keeping that idle. Saturday afternoon i heard an interview with Shaun on triple M radio and he has almost turned me into a believer, that could be due to my teams general need to keep him but the worst case scenario is i trade him out so theres no point jumping at shadows il give him every chance to repay the faith.

Trades 16 Bank 25,600

Dream Team Round 7

Score 1862 Rank 1484

Leading into round 7 i was going to cop a midfield donut with Liberatore and Smith being rested and Swan and Pendlebury on their bye, with overall all but shot i had planned on just accepting the zero, however after much more deliberation on personel and the eventual structure of the side i decided to make a trade that was going to be made eventually except by doing it now it wasnt going to be very profitable, however by trading A.Smith to B.Jacobs it allows me to cover byes with MPP to the backline and compliment the one i already have to the forwardline.

While the trade is of little profitability i like many others believe that Ben Jacobs could have a huge impact once he breaks into the Port Adelaide side and therefore become solid midfield and backline cover for the remainder of the season, should that not be the case he is already providing me with flexibility to cover both divisions.

After dodging bullets earlier in the year the LTI’s are starting to rear their ugly heads with Grimes now done for the season, Curnow out for the next 4 weeks and question marks over the return of Shaun Higgins- if he misses this week too he wouldve played only 4 of a possible 7 games and it is already giving me headaches.

The last 2 weeks i have dropped 1250 spots in ranking and it has put a massive dent in my overall aspirations, its all but time to review my strategy and take a finals perspective going forward, even though i have those above injury worries im not convinced il be trading before lockout this Friday.

Trades 17 Bank 64,300

Dream Team Round 6

Score 1686 Rank 1098

Monday and Tuesday usually represent trigger happy trading ideas for me and by Wednesday i have calmed down enough to look at the big picture, this weeks short lockout period had me in a tailspin and i was staring down the barrel of a double donut shotgun pointed directly at my forward line thanks to Shaun Higgins general soreness, with minimal money and being rigid as to who i wanted to ship out the main trade i was considering was downgrading Harris and upgrading Prestia to Knights or Jack Riewoldt and taking just the one donut, the main issue was i could not convince myself either of those 2 would be a keeper in Dream Team. Then around noon on Friday more bad news Travis Boak out- ahh i was hoping he would rack it up against The Roos and kickstart his season as he has been disappointing to date, so then my thoughts shift toward Boak, i picked him to break out and provide a straight swap to an ultra premium before his first bye, nothing none are within grasp, i check my forward upgrade list and i notice with the money i have in the bank i can swap Boak for Goodes and switch Goodes to the forward line and then i can bring in Harper for Richardson or Prestia… Yes no donuts, so i pull the trigger and get Goodes for Boak and Harper for Richardson believing Prestia has more chance of regaining his place than Richardson, i leave for work believing ive done the best i could to maintain my overall ranking…

1686 is the most abysmal score i have accumulated since my first year of Dream Team when i ran out of trades in round 19. The most disturbing component of the score is there were no donuts at all, the positive is there were 6 of my finest riding the pine and i believe i made the correct move with Goodes coming in even though he scored poorly he has much more upside than Chris Knights and Jack Riewoldt.

‘Rock bottom is good solid ground, and a dead end street is just a place to turn around’

Current Team:

B: Goddard Gibbs Deledio Enright Grimes Lower Duigan Batchelor Stanley Toy

M: Swan Boyd Pendlebury Bartel Curnow Harris Liberatore Prestia Smith

R: Sandilands Cox Smith McCauley

F: Franklin N.Riewoldt Higgins Fyfe Goodes Petrie Darling Matera Harper Dixon

Trades 18 Bank 44,900


Dream Team Round 5

Score 2135 Rank 232

Common sense and gut feelings are rarely on the same page and this was the case for me with Yarran and Krakouer, I felt like Krakouer would be a sub or dropped and I couldn’t see Yarran playing much better but both wern’t ripe price wise. I wanted to get Fyfe in but his horse was bolting with a low breakeven there would be a chance that the above two couldn’t keep pace with his price rise, I went against my logic and went with my gut feel trading Krakouer to Smith, Yarran to Fyfe on Thursday prior to lockout.

What a round of crazy scores at the low end of the spectrum. I had Cam Richardson and Josh Toy on the field, and at the other end of the scale I had Scott Pendlebury, Matthew Boyd, and Drew Petrie so it all balanced out in the end and I was very happy to make my way back up the rankings...

Current Team:

B: Goddard Gibbs Deledio Enright Grimes Lower Duigan Batchelor Stanley Toy

M: Swan Boyd Pendlebury Bartel Boak Harris Liberatore Smith  Curnow

R: Sandilands Cox Smith McCauley

F: Franklin N.Riewoldt Higgins Fyfe Petrie Darling Prestia Matera Dixon Richardson

20 trades in hand the names in bold represent the inclusions...

Dream Team Round 4

Score 2038 Rank 653

One trade made last week with Zach Smith replacing Joel Tippett. With a big bye this week, I had Goddard, Boyd, Riewoldt and Higgins on the bench. With less than elite opposition for my bench cover, I was happy to show some faith in Prestia, Matera, Harris and Krakouer. Unfortunately none of these names put up a reasonable score and consequently I dipped in overall ranking nearly 300 places. For Round 5 I will be missing Grimes and Cox only, so I hope to stop the steady decline and power back up the overall ladder.

Dream Team Round 3

Score 1997 Rank 359

With Hibberd riding the pine and giving me no real value, I shipped him out for Curnow in my only trade for the week. Unfortunately I played Harris over Curnow, seemed to be a terrible trend for me as I also had Krakouer on over Prestia and Lower instead of Duigan which amasses 104 points missed, alas. My rank hasn’t suffered too badly and I’m still around 200pts off overall…

Dream Team Round 2

Score 2259 Rank 247

Yarran bounced back with 114 and looks  like he may be able to average that 80 a game I’d hoped. Enright is on fire averaging 115 over 2 rounds, while Harris and Liberatore exceeded expectations and so was my leap into the top 1000…

Dream Team Starting Squad:

B: Goddard Gibbs Deledio Enright Grimes Lower Duigan Batchelor Stanley Toy

M: Swan Boyd Pendlebury Bartel Boak Harris Liberatore Prestia Hibberd

R: Sandilands Cox J.Tippett McCauley

F: Franklin N.Riewoldt Higgins Yarran A.Krakouer Petrie Darling Richardson Matera Dixon

Dream Team Round 1

Score 2160 Rank 2233

Happy with everyone bar Yarran (21pts). No trading yet though, keeping the faith, overall reasonably solid start…

[Spite]

Good read. Keep it up :)

[Andrew]

May I ask why you got in Zac Smith for Tippett?

[Ziplock]

I guess smith was looking like better cover than the jippett swap at the time, coupled with the potential CC goodness :P

[RiOtChEsS]

cheers lads ;)

May I ask why you got in Zac Smith for Tippett?

basically he was/is going too well not to have and can cover all year long...
with the combined age of 57 between my 2 starting rucks depth is a must, remember Sandi's DT finals series last year :-X should Smith become injured or dropped etc i buy back Tippett for the same price banking the cash and Petrie covers again win/win imo...

[Andrew]

Yeah fair call. I was pretty tempted myself to get in Smith for Tippett but I've ended up getting Petrie because I feel he could score a few 100s this season and won't be any cheaper than his $244k price this round. It brings Tippett into play and hopefully McCauley can put in a few more scores and be a decent downgrade for me. Be interesting to see how both strategies go - my forward line is certainly loaded now :)

[RiOtChEsS]

Petrie will be a keeper if he doesnt suffer a setback imo...

prior to last year he had averaged 80 over a 4 year period hardly missing a game, thats a bargain for 6/7th forward

[RiOtChEsS]

updated...

[Ziplock]

I wish I'd thought of this before you, would have given me something to do at work :P

[RiOtChEsS]

I wish I'd thought of this before you, would have given me something to do at work :P

whats that a season blog?

[Spite]

Bad luck - I would have done the same, probably the best trade possible to do, just very unlucky this week.

[Ziplock]

yeah Marcz, a season blog lol. I'd still do one, but I'd feel like I was copying you lol.


WHich I would be

:-X

[RiOtChEsS]

Bad luck - I would have done the same, probably the best trade possible to do, just very unlucky this week.

Cheers Spite 8)

yeah Marcz, a season blog lol. I'd still do one, but I'd feel like I was copying you lol.


WHich I would be

:-X

nah do it fellas its a learning tool, even if u dont post it do it dont waste all the crazy thoughts feelings etc ur going thru bcos at years end it will make u that much a better coach to be able to relive it without the pressure/temptation of the situation ;)

[Ziplock]

lol, alright, I'll give it a shot when I get home for the weekend. :D

[RiOtChEsS]

M: Swan Boyd Pendlebury Bartel Curnow Harris Liberatore Prestia Smith

all the bold r out this week >:( dont want to trade Libba and the other cows arent even close...