G’day Guys,
After about 5 years of banter between mates in our private DT leagues and an overdose of watching US sitcom, “The League”, last year we decided to kick it up a notch and enter a DT Pro League. DT Pro (free when subscribed to Assistant Coach) opened up our minds to selecting unique teams based on a Live Draft format (i.e. a player is drafted to 1 team only and remaining players are available via the trade pool).
Once a DT Pro League is filled (10 teams), a draft order is randomly determined and then be prepared for a couple of hours of Draft anxiety! The 60 seconds allocated for picking your unique player in either the Back, Mid, Ruck or Fwd positions feels like 15 seconds and before you know it, it’s your turn again!
We initially had our reservations of the draft format. That is, once our teams were drafted, we did not expect any team trades to be offered. However, we were pleasantly surprised! With player injuries and the advent of last year’s bye format, we were forced to offer trades to better our team or fight tooth and nail to be first to snap up an up-and-comer from the trade pool (aka ‘the Scrap’). This brought on a new meaning to the banter experienced. Tongue in cheek terms like ‘tip rat’ (~someone who bottom feeds on the Scrap to pick up the next DT stud) and ‘trade rape’ (~a team trade offer that is disproportional on paper) became the norm.
In our League, my team was by far the true underdog going into the Grand Final. The following video was presented as the Inaugural Champion acceptance speech during our “DT Pro Presentation Night” (an excuse to tell the wives, but a Lad’s p!ss-up really). The boys got a kick out of it, so thought we’d share the video.
Oh and the 10 Commandments to Winning your DT Pro League…
- Thou shalt always know the injured players prior to the live draft! (It was a classic moment watching picks 110 and 111 go to Mzunga and Malceski, both LTIs!)
- Thou shalt remove injured players from the ‘auto pre-draft selection’ (Round 2, pick 14 – Michael Barlow! Brought the house down!)
- Thou shalt ensure a full functioning wireless connection and back-up iPad during live draft (Kepler Bradley, enough said!)
- Thou shalt set a daily alarm for11.58am for release of players into the trade pool (otherwise the ‘Tip Rat’ will beat you to the likes of Suckling and Redden from the ‘scrap’)
- Thou shalt not book a 2 week Canadian holiday during the DT season (to awake to 300+ whatsapp messages about trade offers)
- Thou shalt not waste early draft picks on 2 Ruck positions (Round 2, pick 19 – Patty Ryder)
- Thou shalt give greater consideration to DPPs during draft strategy (Drew Petrie was greater value being able to cover 2 positions)
- Thou shalt consider premium players that are playing against GCS (and now GWS) during the finals weeks.
- Thou shalt not accept a trade based on a couple of hyped up games and inflated average (D Giansiracusa for J Hill, following his early good form, aka ‘trade rape’)
- Thou shalt not spill beer on opponent’s laptop keyboard during the live draft!
Happy DTing
Cheers
Vinegarstrokes
If you would like to advertise your DT Pro League, do so in the comments. We’re pretty confident that there will be heaps of DT TALK readers who would love to be invovled in a league with other like minded coaches!
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