Good Trade, Bad Trade: Round 20

It’s the time of year that 99.9% of us (realistically) have been waiting for all year.It’s finals time! Now begins a month where bragging rights between mates, spouse rivalry, family member supremacy and dodgy cash leagues start to come to the fore. The best thing is,  there is a whole summer to let people know how they were bundled out in the first round because they went Dean Cox as a ‘smoky’ captain choice! So have you got everyone playing? Is it time to pull the trade trigger and strengthen your team as you anticipated? lets see what options are out there this week

Defenders

This week, for once,  dodgy defenders are NOT causing us massive headaches and money loss in laptop repairs (yet). While there are 5 defenders (Broughton, Ellis, Hargrave,Clarke and Lake) in the most traded out players this week, none of them injured themselves this week, or did anything stupid. All these guys are likely bench fodder in teams and are being traded for cash generation and upgrading (apart from Lake, he’s just a spud). One defender is currently the second most traded in player this week…..

Beau ‘Jangles’ Waters ($436,100, b/e 79)

The ‘Chuck Norris’ of the west. Turns 5 week injuries into 2 weeks and gives Kurt Tippett concussion for 3 weeks with his own head. This man is a machine. Is actually quite expensive for a defender (4th most expensive), but is worth every cent. Playing Geelong this week where he has averaged 128 in his last 3 against them (not including a 140 in last years prelim) and is likely to go the same if he stays loose in defence. If you are after a smoky captain choice this week, I would definitely consider Waters.

 

 Alex Browne ($104,200, b/e – 54)

This boy is on the bubble and really cheap if you need cash. Was named in the best for the bombers last week vs the crows (thanks Jeppa). Should likely go round again, especially with the bomber virus that seems to be spreading like wildfire throughout the club – the hamstring strain. I wonder if ‘The Weapon’ will take credit for this too?

 

Midfielders

Dane Swan ($617,900)

Swanny has pretty much been the king of DT for 2012, running round freely collecting +6s and sausage rolls like they’re going out of fashion.  Then, at the most crucial time of the season, ‘the black swan’ rears his ugly head and gives the 90,000 DT coaches the big finger with a Sunday session full of ‘water’ and 2 weeks off. The big question this week is whether to trade or not. Swan is currently the most traded out player this week, but the stats suggest he has been traded by about 2000ish people, which suggests a lot of people are holding. The good news is if you are in the top 4 and win, the second week will be moot. On the other hand, if you do trade Swan, you make at least $40k out of the trade (if you trade to Ablett, a lot more to others). So far,  Swan has been traded to all the vanilla options (Ablett, Watson, Beams, Pendlebury, Boyd) which @tomcraigie covered yesterday. I want to look at other options to add a point of difference to your team.

Andrew Swallow ($489,200, b/e 78) ‘Spitz’ can go big with Swan like scores (160 2 weeks ago) and loves picking on weaker teams (160 v Melbourne and 138 vs Port) and has Collingwood in week 2 and GWS in the grand final week.

Lenny Hayes ($436,700, b/e 57) Lenny plays Melbourne and GWS in the finals and decided to clock his biggest score for the season (130) 2 weeks ago. Could be start of a late season run?

Sam Mitchell (476,400, b/e 126) went under 100 for the first time in 7 weeks last week, so is likely to bounce back. The hawks are at Aurora against a degenerated Port.  Plays GC and WCE in the finals too so should score big there. Sydney in the prelim week is a worry,  as it is at the SCG.

Rucks

News out yesterday was that big Roo Hamish McIntosh will be out for the rest of the season after opting to take LARS surgery on his knee. While we wish the big man a speedy recovery and hope to see him back in 2013 fit and raring to go, it’s time to jump on (pun intended) his fellow roo Todd Goldstein ($383,100 b/e 63). Goldstein has averaged 95 in his last 3 rounds and has been super durable all season. Another really good ruck option at the moment is Saint Ben McEvoy ($418,500 b/e 65). McEvoy has been going pretty well in the second half of the season, having 3 tons and 2 90’s in the last 6 weeks. last week McEvoy pumped out a 120 against Jolly, showing what we had hoped of him at the beginning of the year. with Koschitzke showing his spud like talents, McEvoy should be the lone ruckman for the saints and hopefully keep up the high scores.

Once again a big ‘screw you’ to Jon Giles

 

Forwards V.2008

Who would of thought at the start of the season that we would be speaking about Matthew Pavlich($485,400, b/e 98) and Ryan O’Keefe ($475,700, b/e 98) as gun forwards and the best options as trade ins to our teams? While both have proven their worth over the years, it was widely acceoted that the mantle had been passed on to other fwd/mids such as Sidebum, Beams and Danger  as the premier forwards of DT. Turns out they are ageing well! Pav has averaged 116 in his last 5, while ROK has averaged 105.  Both in great form and reminding us all of why they were some of the first picked in our teams a few years ago.

The blokes mentioned above as well as Nat Fyfe ($392,500) b/e  68) will be great replacements for Jason Porplyzia($373,700, b/e 126) whose shoulders gave way early on in the match on the weekend. While Adelaide have said he should be ok to suit up this week, a player with an average of 75 shouldn’t be in your first 7 fwds at this time of the year.

Steve Johnson ($402,800 b /e 159) is another popular in this week, due to his new role as a pure midfielder. Stevie J still has that sausage from 2 weeks ago in his average and has another price fall to go, so can wait another week. He also doesn’t score well against the eagles historically.

Well that’s the run for this week. Good luck to all in the finals.

 

Let us know what you are doing with Swan!