Nick Riewoldt – Lefty’s Leftfielders

Welcome to the first edition of Lefty’s Leftfielders – the blokes that you may have passed over without taking a serious look. The aim of the game here is to go beyond the obvious “vanilla” choices (Gibbs, Rockliff etc) and consider some of the lesser likes.

First up on Lefty’s Leftfielder’s is Nick Riewoldt.

Name: Nick Riewoldt

Club: St Kilda

Position: Forward

Price: $441,400

 

Argument For

In 2012, Roo played 19 games for an average of 85 (including a vested score of 30).

On 7 occasions he scored 100 or more which means he tonned up 36% of the time. To put this in context it is only one less 100 than Stevie J (and SJ played 2 more games…..).

With 4 scores over 125 last year, Reiwoldt can still cash in when having a good day which is exactly what you want from an effective POD. Nothing is more satisfying than a hunch/ calculated gamble that pays off and wins you a tight league match.

Not bad for an old bloke who was hobbling around on one leg most of 2012. Are you suddenly a bit more interested?

Put simply, Roo loves to beat up on the kids in lesser teams. Last year he smashed 126 and 136 against Gold coast (Warnock), 133 against Bulldogs (ok Lake is not a kid but he was already ¾ out the door by this stage of the season) and 135 vs hooker when the bombers were in free-fall.

The saints first 4 games in 2013 and Roo’s averages are:

Team	Nick’s Average
Gold Coast	131 (average from 2 games)
Richmond	98 (average form 11 games)
GWS Giants	100? (Never played GWS but I think 100 is very realistic
Essendon	108 (average from 12 games)

So if St Nick hits his average (including the 100 prediction for GWS) he will be averaging 109 after the first 4 rounds. Pretty handy for a bloke priced at a sub 90 point average and as well as being unique he should make you some reasonable cash by round 6. Given the dearth of viable forward rookies this year I am trying to find a way to fit an extra “premo” into my forward line and a 109 average definitely has him in premo territory.

Also note there has been little off field drama this year at St Kilda compared to the horrors of the last few years

 

Argument Against

It gets a little tougher for Reiwoldt in Rounds 5 to 7 with Sydney, Collingwood and Carlton (85, 80 and 99 career averages respectively) I think the saints are getting a little better with their forward delivery from blokes like Siposs, Stevens, Milera etc but they still have Armitage, Hayes, Montagna etc who have a tendency to spray it. Nick has never been a big tackler and the improvement of Beau Wilkes (sorry Maister) and Rhys Stanley may result in fewer kicks to Nick which cuts down his scoring potential.

 

Lefty’s Call

With 2 trades a week( to use or lose), I personally see a massive potential gain in starting with a POD like Roo who I believe will outscore Buddy over the first 4 weeks and is every chance to be vying with Rockliff for the highest averaging forward after 4 weeks.

Do I see Roo staying in my team for the whole year? Probably not, like any aging forward I expect him to have lean patches – particularly when he isn’t 100% fit. Nick suffers more than most here as he relies on his +6’s from mark and kicks on the wing to build his score when he isn’t kicking bags of goals. This is where the 2 trades a week use them or lose them change this year makes a guy like Roo more appealing as I think you can afford to take a chance and if he doesn’t work out you can simply give him the flick – you will know by round 3 if he is paying off so you can offload him for a performing rook(??) or mid pricer on the bubble if he flops in the first 2 rounds.

There you have it – if Nick simply does what he has done before, you will be ahead of the pack. If he flops, you can off load him before his price drop with one of your two ‘forced’ weekly trades in round 2 or 3. Pretty good punt in my book – will you take a chance on Roo?