Deck of Dream Team 2012: Zac Smith

Name: Zac Smith
Club: Gold Coast Suns
Position: Ruck
Assistant Coach 2012 Price: $355,400
Bye Round: 13
2011 Average: 71.9
2011 Games Played: 20
Predicted Average: 86

Why should I pick him? Before I started researching info on Zac… he wasn’t on my radar one bit, things have changed and here are the reasons why.

1. Zac Smith averaged 71.9  for the year with an average of 80 in the first half of the season only to tire to an average of 63. He’s fitter and stronger now and this should not happen again.
2. Gold Coast have an awesome start to the 2012 season playing 7 of the bottom 8 teams in their first 9 games of the year. What a start!
3. Zac Smith is thier only ‘good’ ruckman! Yeah they have Fraser (16 games in 2011) but at the end of the day… Zac is a future star, franchise player and he’ll go bang one year very soon.
4. Check out when the good big boys have their byes.

Rd. 11 = Cox, Goldstein, Leuenberger, NicNat, McIntosh, Jacobs
Rd. 12 = Sandilands, Mumford, Jolly, Ryder
Rd. 13 = McEvoy, Kruz

Whoop de doo bazil… Hang on, this is mega important this year. You can’t have all your ruckmen sitting out at the same time. Picking a Cox/Berger combo would be just stupid because of this. Basically, Zac Smith shares a bye with hardly any other ‘good’ rucks and will sit nicely next to a big name premium in your team.

Why shouldn’t I pick him? It takes rucks a long time to develop. Here is the perfect example for you. It took DT superstar Dean Cox, 5 years to boost his average from 77 to 95 in his break out year and took the exact same time (5 years) for Leuenberger to have his break out year (2011) knocking his average from 77 to 93. Goldstein (75 to 95) and Mumford (80 to 91) broke out a little quicker, but it still took them 4 years to do so. Amazing really!

Deck of DT Rating. QUEEN – Zac is a ‘Queen’ because he comes with so much uncertainly of whether or not he can actually rise his average to an acceptable level for your #2 ruck. In the past, the Sandi/Cox combo was your goal by the end of the DT season… but with the rise of the younger rucks and the byes in place, it’s not that simple anymore. Is Zac a star ready to go bang or will it take him a few more years on the track and in the weights room to bump this average of his towards the 90 mark? It’s not 5 years away, let’s clear that up… but it may not be next year either.

TWITTER: @CalvinDT to chat dreamteam and stuff!