DT Dreaming with The Cuz

A Cautionary tale of what not to do in DT Land!

Part 1 – Calvins Captains

By Cousins Coke n Ice

It was the best of times… It was the worst of times… WTF! Who am I kidding! There are no best of times stories to write after the pathetic DT year I am having!

Round 16
Year: 2010

It was the end of this round that I went searching for the delete button on my DT team. How much worse could it possibly get. For the third week in a row, I had locked in Ablett Junior as captain. WTF was I thinking! Before I go on, Ill bring you up to speed on why your reading the dribble your reading now.

3 Weeks ago I endured what I can only describe as a ridiculous amount of pain. It all started 11 years ago when I dislocated my shoulder playing for Irymple in the Sunraysia Football League. I went to see a surgeon who informed me that ill be $4000 outta pocket if I wanted to fix it properly. Being the stubborn 18 year old who had just moved out of home, I decided that I would not bother wasting my money on such scurrilous surgery, I mean that’s a lot of nights out with the boys on the frothos chasing skirt, something I was much more interested in than playing football! This decision of mine would in future lead to a shoulder that was looser than Barry Halls temper so it was decided that (with the benefits of Private Health insurance and heaps of sick leave up my sleave!) I would finally get fixed what I should have all those years ago.

Anyway, my old mate Warne “+4” Dawg Shoots me an SMS yesterday “hey man, You still layed up in bed? If ur bored and feel creative….feel free to write an article for our website! We are massively under the pump with work!” Seriously, school teachers in Tassie busy? Being the obliging bloke that I am, and the fact that I am sick to death of Watching Ellen and Oprah being stuck at home chewing down morphine tablets, I figured, what the hell! It’s the least I could do for them seeing as I take more than I give from this site!

Thinking of what more I could possibly offer up for the gents that they don’t already provide the masses, I started thinking about my season as Coach of the infamous team “Cousins Coke n Ice” and got to thinking, there just has to be a cautionary tale I could tell that will help all the followers in DT Talk world in not making the same stupid decisions I made all year! So sit back and relax, and enjoy my first ever lesson for anyone interested in reading on!

Where it all began. Selection – Pre Season – 2010.

“Who is the smart one now??!!” I thought to myself as I surveyed the awesome team that I had assembled prior to round 1.  Forums all over the internet are running hot on who is the better walk up start to have in your team for Captain selection. Being the Twilight era, some knob jockey decides to coin the phrases “Team Ablett” and “Team Swan”. “Wankers” I thought to myself as I read the forums posts. Why would you consider picking between the two of them! Pick Both! Oh Yes, Cousins Coke n Ice, You are a genius! No one would think for a second to pick both of them up! Yeah Ya! Top 500 here I come!

Captain Selection – You have both, easy pick yeah!

Each week, some Pirate who calls himself “Calvin” gives all the Lazy pricks in DT World a heads up on who is the best choice for captain selection based on simple Math. Without going into the logistics of how Calvin puts this together, I look at this Weekly column as a differential tool. Who is the guy that Calvin is tipping the rest of the world into! That will be my point of difference. Don’t follow Calvin!

With Calvins Captains regularly hitting 1000 votes and more per week, I have noticed that “Team Swan” has been the most popular pick in the recent weeks. Why don’t I do something different I think to myself, I have Swannie and “Sweet Merciful Jesus”! I know exactly what ill do, Ill not be the sheep that follows this pirate Mutha F#$ker and ill stick to old Boil Boy Ablett!

Long story short, I have seen my ranking slip from 12k (I know, not that good) out to 17,075 in the past 3 weeks and there is a direct correlation (along with a couple of injuries) between my decision to not heed the advice of that Pirate “Arghhhh Barghhhhsted” Calvin.

In the past 3 weeks, let’s look at the scores and the difference in what points I would have got if I had followed Calvin’s advice rather than try and be cool and follow the beat of my own drum!

Calvins Choice Rd 14: Swan #1, Ablett #3

Points Scored:

• Swan – 161
• Ablett – 108

Calvins Choice Rd 15: Swan #1, Ablett#3

Points Scored:

• Swan – 141
• Ablett – 109

Calvins Choice Rd 16: Swan #1,Ablett Not Rated!!!!

Points Scored:

• Swan – 138
• Ablett – 81

The differential in points in just the past 3 weeks by changing the captain to Swan as per Calvin’s advice would have tallied me a total of 142 more points in just the past 3 weeks alone! 142 points does not sound like much does it? Well, let me tell you, after clicking on the Overall ladders page for 20 minutes to get to where my ranking would be, I was surprised to see that 142 points is a difference of 2583 positions in the world! That’s 2583 people I coulda shoulda woulda been in front of at this stage of the season!

So, the point of my rambling above is simple. YOU MUST FOLLOW Calvin’s Captains! It could be the difference between winning or losing league matches or even the entire comp!

Calvin, “Moving forward” (Thanks Ranga Gillard!) I will pay your column the respect that it deserves. My apologies for not keeping the faith and attempting to re invent the wheel myself!

So which team did you start on? Did you start with a Swannie, or did you kick off with Ablett, or were you real smart and begin the season with both?! Depending on how well this is received, I may write more!

Cheers

Cousins Coke n Ice.