22 down, two to go!

Preliminary final weekend is upon us and with Brodie Grundy/Zach Merrett poised to miss the upcoming round, no one is focusing on rookies right now. As we aim to maximise on-field points for the final fortnight, now feels like the perfect time to shift our focus to the cash cow award season. To start the process, I’ve dug through the numbers and chosen the nominees for the MVP award at each position (defence, midfield, ruck, forward), with your votes determining which players are named as the finalists. Make sure to cast your votes before the end of Round 23 and I’ll be back next week with the full award ballot to acknowledge the best rookies from 2025.

Rookie/cash cows are typically defined as players who started the season priced at $400,000 or lower

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Cash Cow King – Round 22

And just like that, the race for CCK honours is back on! Heading into the final fortnight of the fantasy season, there is currently a tie for 1st AND 3rd place and the performances (plus your votes) from the contending cash cows will see this award race go down to the wire. Forgotten Tiger Tylar Young and St Kilda pair Hugh Boxshall and Max Hall added themselves to the list of nominees for their efforts on Saturday morning – but the scoring output from Levi Ashcroft and Tom McCarthy in Round 22 has thrown this award race into flux. My vote is siding with T-Mac, who gave me a nice 15-point boost over Callum Mills, but another triple-figure score from Levi is hard to ignore.

*If you’re having issues submitting your vote try clicking “view results” first and that should resolve the problem 🤞

Who's gets your vote as the most important cash cow in Round 22?

• Hugh Boxshall (74)
• Max Hall (74)
• Tylar Young (76)
• Levi Ashcroft (100)
• Tom McCarthy (88)

View Results

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Round 22 Power Rankings

After 22 weeks of action, these are the top 10 cash cow performers in season 2025!

Power Ranking 2025 #AFLFantasy Cash Cows Round 22 💰🐮

1. Tom McCarthy ⬆️ 1
2. Daniel Curtin ⬇️ 1
3. Levi Ashcroft ⬆️ 1
4. Max Hall ⬇️ 1
5. Elijah Hewett ⬆️ 1
6. Harvey Langford ⬆️ 1
7. Jy Farrar ⬆️ 2
8. Clay Hall ⬇️ 3
9. Hugh Boxshall (NR)
10. Murphy Reid ⬇️ 2 pic.twitter.com/Qo6Vjcrhoq

— SportsbyFry (@sportsbyfry) August 12, 2025

Award Nominees

Anyone chasing cash at this point of the season will downgrade straight to a $230K player or the cheapest green dot – so instead of focusing on cash cow trades, it’s time to talk awards! Reliable rookies once again helped propel coaches to success in 2025, with a stellar crop helping us “complete” our teams earlier than in previous fantasy seasons. Before I release the final ballot next week for all the rookie/cash cow awards, make sure you contribute your votes for the deserving players in the mix for the positional MVP awards.

Make 2-4 selections (depending on position) for the finalists of each award race.
Voting closes at the conclusion of Round 23

DEFENCE

There was a time this season when the backline was flush with reliable rookies. A lot of successful coaches started with Bombers’ duo Zach Reid and Jaxon Prior in defence while Luke Trainor was also quick to establish himself as an important cash cow. Following stellar scores from Riley Bice (125) and Connor O’Sullivan (94) in Round 4, we were shuffling magnets to get as many DEF rooks on field as we could! The stellar scoring rate tailed off for most of them around the mid-season byes, but we were gifted with another elite source of cash gen when Tom McCarthy was added to West Coast’s list.

In eight games, he has increased by a whopping $489K and there is a portion of the fantasy community still trusting T-Mac as we near the final few rounds of the season. Angus Clarke (11 games, 54.5 AVG) and Riley Hardeman (17 games, 48.1 AVG) were unlucky to miss out on a nomination, but the top-6 all played a much more prominent role in our 2025 successes. Narrowing it down to just three finalists for the honour of ‘Cash Cow Defender of the Year’ is going to be a tough ask and I’m predicting a tight vote for those podium places.

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MIDFIELD

There’s Levi Ashcroft, then everyone else. The Lions cub has had an incredible first AFL season – registering the 3rd highest average out of all the nominees while featuring in every game for the reigning premiers. Added to the team via a late change back in Round 1, he has produced nine scores of 80+ and was likely one of the final rookies that coaches moved on from. Choosing a deserving second place behind Levi is a much harder task. Melbourne duo Harvey Langford and Xavier Lindsay has successful cameo’s for coaches, with Lindsay establishing himself as one of the must-have rookies earlier in the season.

The 11th overall pick in last year’s draft produced epic numbers across the first half of the season, with sub-vests and injuries derailing his potential success. Sam Lalor can relate to those issues, with his maiden campaign interrupted by injuries. He had averaged 63.3 points from the first nine AFL games of his fantasy career, only for a troubling hamstring to sideline Lalor for the rest of the year after just 11 matches. Murphy Reid and Finn O’Sullivan found a way to feature consistently for the Dockers and Kangaroos respectively – however, their sporadic scoring may have left a sour taste in the mouths of some coaches.

Reid may very well have a legitimate case to win this 2025 Rising Star award, but from a fantasy standpoint, he only surpassed 60 points on five occasions in 21 games thus far. O’Sullivan had similar scoring mishaps, with Round 13 marking the first time the budding Roo produced a score over 55 points. Rounding out the ballot were Christian Moraes and Zak Johnson – two cash cows who didn’t have the longevity of some of their midfield peers, but were still important pieces regardless. Moraes rose to fame after his second appearance when he gathered 27 disposals and posted a score of 93, while Johnson’s third match of the season saw him drop an impressive 104 points fuelled by 29 disposals and eight marks. Hugh Boxshall (9 games, 52.3 AVG) is another name worth mentioning, although it’s fair to say he left his run too late for award season.

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RUCK

Let’s be honest, the rookie rucks were underwhelming this season. When Harry Boyd scored 68 on debut in Round 1 we thought we may have a RUC worth discussing as a legitimate cash cow. Little did we know that would be his only AFL game for the season. His teammate Max Heath has had a decent run of games in recent times, while Nic Madden also had a short cameo that aided coaches during the best-18 rounds. Archer Reid technically scored the most points for ruck-eligible rookies, although an average of 35.7 doesn’t exactly jump off the page. Thomas Sims narrowly edged out Finnbar Maley and Lachlan Blakiston to earn the final nomination for his somewhat consistent efforts this year, but I doubt he’ll add that accolade to his career resume. None of these players would have changed the fortunes of your season, so let’s keep it moving…

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FORWARD

The forward line has been a position that troubled coaches for the bulk of the season. DPP additions throughout the season helped plug the gap, but that didn’t make life much easier. One such player who eased our pain in the front six was Sam Davidson, with a Friday night special in Round 3 forcing non-owners to make him a priority trade-in. Davidson torched the Blues for one 125 points – recording one of the best rookie scores of the entire fantasy season in the process! Coaches who opted to field a few rookies in their forward line were also boosted by the presence of Max Hall, with St Kilda’s budding prospect posting a pair of 80+ scores in the first three rounds.

Hall’s numbers dipped during the middle portion of the season, but he refound his mojo to record a stellar average of 81.4 points. He wasn’t the only cash cow in our forward line to post impressive scores across the last seven weeks, with Daniel Curtin chalking up an 88.6 AVG. The late-season form from both Hall and Curtin saw them re-enter the fray as potential F6 options and it’s fair to say the coaches who rolled the dice would have been fairly chuffed with their output. Coaches who invested in Elijah Hewett would have also been pleased with his output, with the oft-injured Eagle managing to appear in 18 games this year while recording a respectable 60+ average.

Caiden Cleary and Isaac Kako earned the final few nominations, with different issues stopping them both from reaching great heights as rookie-priced options in 2025. Cleary didn’t show his face until Round 4, but an 83-point game in his second game of the season saw him rise to relevance in the forward line. His stay in Sydney’s senior side was short-lived lived though, with sub vests and subpar scores ruining his fantasy potential. Isaac Kako didn’t have any issues with job security – playing every game for Essendon so far this season. However, he has only produced a score over 55 ONCE in his 20 games as a rookie, which led to a lot of coaches jumping off the promising small forward in the effort of finding a better cash cow. Still, Cleary and Kako deserve some credit for the role they played in the fantasy landscape this season.

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Remember the Name

In no particular order, here are some of the other rookie-priced players to consider throughout the season.

DEFENDERS

Josh Gibucs (Tigers, $230K)
Luke Beecken (Lions, $230K)
James Barrat (Saints, $247K)
Charlie Edwards (Crows, $230K)

MIDFIELDERS

Luke Urquart (Kangaroos, $230K)
Josh Smillie (Tigers, $322K)
Lucca Grego (Eagles, $230K)
Cody Anderson (Hawks, $230K)
Ben Camporeale (Blues, $230K)

RUCKMEN

Taylor Goad (Kangaroos, $230K)
Tom Campbell (Demons, $316K)
Kayle Gerreyn (Bombers, $232K)
Lachlan McAndrew (Crows, $302K)
Coen Livingstone (Eagles, $230K)

FORWARDS

Jordan Croft (Bulldogs, $230K)
Oliver Hannaford (Giants, $289K)

Fry

An Australian coffee/burrito enthusiast who is the frustrated owner of 16 fantasy teams. Writer for SportsbyFry and DT Talk ?