The Thursday Scramble: Round 6

5 Rounds down, can you believe it! And not only that we have had DPP’s as well as another “different” looking fixture this weekend. So there are plenty of things that we need to keep in mind this week as we prepare our sides for Round 6. Add to all that the inevitable “Health and Safety Protocols”, Injuries and Suspensions and it means that all we can do is Scramble!

DPP’s Talk

So we have had our first batch of DPP’s entered into the game and for the first time we have now seen this done in RealDreamteam and Supercoach. So those that only play those games will be seeing this for the first time.  It is always really nice to get a nice shiny new toy of a new DPP. But that doesn’t mean that you need to go out and thrash it on the first weekend.  What I am saying here is, don’t use the DPP’s to trigger a complete restructure of your side. The DPPs should be used to give you better flexibility in terms of the trades you make and to give you better cover for injury or suspensions. There are quite a number of relevant DPPs this time and many of you would have had quite a few players that have picked up a second position. Just be careful as if you try and DPP the hell out of your side you can get yourself tangled up and actually cause issues.

The second thing I wanted to mention is that just because someone has DPP now it doesn’t mean that they are instantly a great player that you must select.  What it can do is make someone that was a Mid only who was averaging just under or just on 100 someone that could now be relevant in either the forwards or backs. Still, the key here is to make sure that the player meets your structure and they have a good role and they are someone that we know will still get good midfield minutes or is someone that is still scoring well.

The way I like to use them is that if I have any players in the mids that are keepers who have picked up a forward / defender eligibility I will try and put that player in those lines to take a rookie off the field.  You can then trade out your matured rookie or mid pricer who has nowhere else to go, move your new DPP mid to that line and then bring in a new player in the mids. Usually your second trade would be an upgrade/downgrade in that mid line so you are replacing your DPP premium with a Mid only premium.

My last point on the DPPs is when you are looking at a player to bring in, don’t just bring them in because they have DPP, you still need to be getting the best players you can get. But, if you are looking at two very equal players and one does have DPP then I would lean that way for flexibility.

One more thing….  this will be our biggest bunch of relevant DPP’s usually, this is because our rookies are the ones that mostly get them. As the “DPP Drops” continue the relevance and number of players often drops away as we get more data and players even out where they are playing.

Fixture Fun

Another week and another different set of times for our Fixture!

Firstly no game tonight!  Now that can be a good thing as well as being a bad thing.  It does give us more time to get our teams in order but it is great to have footy to watch on a Thursday night. But this week we have two games that will be played on Monday. What this means for us is that we won’t have the final teams for the Monday games until Saturday about 5pm AET. Thankfully only three games would have started by then so you need to be on the ball.  As always have your trades planned and ready to go and have an option just in case anything changes.  Once we get teams tonight we should be able to see whether the Monday games will cause us any problems.

Next week we get back to a traditionally scheduled round (before we have another Friday night double header thanks to Mother’s Day on the Sunday).

As always, just make sure you know when all the lockouts happen and have your trades planned and ready to go.

 

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What do I focus on?

The key for us now is to get our Rookies off the field and start to upgrade our sides. We have enough data now and hopefully a few fattened Rookies (Make sure you check Fry’s rookie article to get the good advice). A good mate of mine loves the term Upgrade Cadence and this is something that we want to maintain throughout the coming weeks. We need to keep upgrading our field so that we can keep pace with the leaders and then once we have got all the rookies off the field we can start tinkering with the premiums we have. Obviously any long term injuries etc will force a side swap but try and avoid that as much as you can.

If you can keep moving forwards to completing your side you will be in a good spot come the byes…… oh yeah, the Byes are only 7 games away. So while you are doing your upgrades you should be having one eye on your bye structure and making sure your trades put you in a good position for those three rounds.

Things To Remember

• No game tonight. So take your time to study the ins and outs to set your weekend up
• Final Monday Teams won’t be out til Sat afternoon.
• Get that upgrading started in your side, we need to be pushing rookies off the field.

Have fun with your team and the DPP’s and remember, we are trying to use them to make our team better but that doesn’t mean you have to shuffle all of them around in the first week.  Use their flexibility when you are trading. That is where I find the most value from them (apart from covering donuts).  Have a great Anzac weekend and see you all next week.