League win: Round 11 – Sacrifice Round

Most of my family and friends have asked me what’s the best structure to use this year with the BYE rounds if they were just trying to win their League. I told them they can’t go wrong with the standard Guns & Rookies strategy but then I started thinking a little more….

Most people will try and spread their teams across the BYE and try to minimise the number of donuts.

On FanFooty Monty wrote an article about possibly only using 6 trades to not eat a donut but you would then have to structure 3 of your Rucks and FWDs accordingly and hope that Lycett plays.

So I thought from a different angle and came up with my “Sacrifice Round 11 Strategy” where you load up on Round 11 BYE players.

Why Round 11? – Because most people will try and really minimise the number of Round 11 players in their teams to 2 per position and possibly have a full squad for that first week of Byes – but there is less chance that they are able to do that for either Round 12 or 13 – as per Monty’s strategy.

I think if you sacrificed Round 11 – you would definitely win Round 12 and 13 since for each of those rounds your opponent will most likely have at least 1 donut – you’d have to say a lot more – when have people ever had a full playing bench in fantasy footy – probably only in the first few rounds – very unlikely for Round 12 or 13. So I’m assuming people may have 2 or 3 donuts – possibly 200-300 points down from their average just on that – but then they’re also playing more cheapies from their bench as well – so that’s another maybe 100 points. So all up 300-400 down on their average – makes it an easy win for you if you have a full squad.

Here’s my round 11 Sacrifice Team. As you can see – you can still have one GUN for each position from Round 12 & 13 Bye players – but by doing that – you’ll need to make sure the Round 11 rookies/mid-pricers in your team are all playing. The less Round 12/13 Guns in your team – the less need for this.

If you have rookies/mid-pricers from Round 12/13 bye – you need to make sure that you have traded them out by Round 12. Also – if you do choose1 or 2 Round 12/13 Guns – you will be limited to not being able to upgrade to anymore until after the BYE Rounds.

As you can see – you still have a solid structure of Guns (14 in total if you count Doughty & J. Brown as Guns).

Total spent:

Defenders: $2,501,100
Midfielders: $2,657,600
Rucks: $1,207,600
Forwards: $2,395,800
TOTAL: $8,762,100
Cap left: $17,900

Cons:

• Less of a range of Guns to choose from for your starting Squad – Slight weakness in your DEF & FWD is noticeable.

• Chance of a slightly lower average score for the First 11 Rounds – without the likes of Lids in your DEF & some of the Mid-price MID/FWD breakout propositions this year in your FWD line could mean that you might be behind the eight ball before the Byes come around. But then again – this could be a good thing not having them  – anything can happen to these players as well – with Leagues – it’s all about the Structure of your team for the first H & A (17 matches) – and less about Guns in your team – only affects finals…

• Finals – you’ve got your team limited to a lot more Round 11 Bye players so there is less chance you will have all the Top 6/7 players per position – i.e. From the above team – you really can’t see Doughty & Giansiracusa being in the Top 6/7 players for their positions – but, how many of your teams in finals in the previous years have had all the Top 6/7 players for each position. Having PODs in Finals may help.

• Virtually no chance at winning the car.

Pros:

• Pretty much guaranteed 2 wins for Rounds 12 & 13 since you have a much higher chance of having no doughnuts during these rounds and having a much stronger team because only maybe one Gun (if you have picked one from Round 12/13) will be missing – if you haven’t then – like the Rucks above – then even better.

• Rookies – most of them are from Round 11 due to GWS – so if you haven’t been able to trade them out for whatever reason before the Byes – having them available for Round 12/13 will help – also – many of the downgrade targets will most likely come from GWS as well.

• The BIG ONE – not needing to waste trades – Your opponents will surely use between 5-9 trades during these rounds to minimise their doughnuts – and hence the art of trading will go out the window for a lot of your opponents with them having to make wasted sideway trades. You can continue with building a good solid team structure full of Guns for the finals – the trades that you save as everyone knows are absolute gold during DT Finals.

No chance I’ll be using it – I’m going for overall this year. First time I’ve decided to put in a long preseason for fantasy footy – I’m hoping it pays off.