NRL Fantasy 2023 Part 5 - Assemble the base price players

lukeayee wrote:Feels so unusual to see Tolo at that price and not lock him into my team straight away.

He will be popular running into origin. Cowboys have the best schedule and without Cotter he should step up.

Soni Luke has Starling 2020 feels about him. Will he be a classic bench hooker, or will he play big mins off the bench. If i remember correctly those who took a punt on Starling in 2020 were well rewarded. Will the same happen with Luke?

Brandon Smith will be the biggest trap/disappointment this season.


There I said it. But im still picking him.

lukeayee wrote:Brandon Smith will be the biggest trap/disappointment this season.


There I said it. But im still picking him.

He'll be there for me but I won't be relying on a Smith/Boyd combo.

Rabbits21 wrote:

Not bad mate but personally for me running with 7 guys at 250k is far too risky for my liking especially in a year with all these byes now meaning squad depth is likely more important.

I currently have 9 players $250k or less. Not just any players, but ones I consider to be most fantasy relevant. Will see how many appear at TLT, but it's looking likely that there will be more cows this year than any other recently, and some quality to choose from. 

It allows me to start with 6 x 700k+guns, that we would normally consider keepers, but most of them are likely to get traded during the season based on bye schedules.

Add in Hopgood and butcher and I should have 8 guns to start the season. 

With the byes, it is going to be more efficient trading gun to gun, than moving 2 mid rangers. Most of my strategy this season is likely to revolve around bye planning, and already have some surprises up my sleeve that I haven't heard anyone talking about. Will announce them during round-1.

My only non dead set guns or cows are NAS, Boyd, Miller and Smith, and they all have the potential to be High scorers with value that are very playable in your 17.

mattnz wrote:


With the byes, it is going to be more efficient trading gun to gun, than moving 2 mid rangers. Most of my strategy this season is likely to revolve around bye planning, and already have some surprises up my sleeve that I haven't heard anyone talking about. Will announce them during round-1.

Maybe we're not talking about them, for the same reasons you're not talking about them?

mattnz wrote:
I currently have 9 players $250k or less. Not just any players, but ones I consider to be most fantasy relevant. Will see how many appear at TLT, but it's looking likely that there will be more cows this year than any other recently, and some quality to choose from. 

It allows me to start with 6 x 700k+guns, that we would normally consider keepers, but most of them are likely to get traded during the season based on bye schedules.

Add in Hopgood and butcher and I should have 8 guns to start the season. 

With the byes, it is going to be more efficient trading gun to gun, than moving 2 mid rangers. Most of my strategy this season is likely to revolve around bye planning, and already have some surprises up my sleeve that I haven't heard anyone talking about. Will announce them during round-1.

I went this approach last year, and it fucked me.

The guns I expected (key word) to do well started reslly slow, on top of that I backed only half the decent cash cows. Was a huge set back and was chasing my tail all year. Was losing huge money on my guns, couldn’t afford to go “gun to gun” as a result. Ended up with a heap of mids and playing 250k players every week.

Your tolerance to risk must be high in this approach, and if you continue to expect an to occur outcome based on all your research/hunches and don’t move quick enough, it’ll kill your season.

GarethEllisismyDad wrote:

I have one final factor, choosing players I like watching/want to cheer for

My final factor, I refuse to put in players I don’t like or think are over rated. Or if they are hyped up based on speed, looking at you Hammer and Saab.

Last year everyone got on Edric, I couldn’t get around it after he fumbled the ball over the line for the raiders back in day. He killed it for like 6 weeks. Was so frustrating.

Yes I have a very high risk tolerance. The bye schedules are what could allow the idea to work this year, but not last year.

Picking the right guns will be just as important as the right cows. I am going really heavy on the Mids, as that is where I see most of the gun value - Cotter, Tapine, carrigan, Haas, along with NAS, Hopgood and Smith. Except for NAS, all highly owned, just taking on more of them than others will be.

mattnz wrote:Yes I have a very high risk tolerance. The bye schedules are what could allow the idea to work this year, but not last year.

Picking the right guns will be just as important as the right cows. I am going really heavy on the Mids, as that is where I see most of the gun value - Cotter, Tapine, carrigan, Haas, along with NAS, Hopgood and Smith. Except for NAS, all highly owned, just taking on more of them than others will be.

You'll need to change your team name

If you do though, please PM a Mod, haha!

Just going on to "value of a trade"
It was a simplistic calculation of desired end team value minus starting team value divided by number of trades (leaving a few trades spare for injuries)
Wasn't perfect, but was good enough to give people a base to work off.

This year we have more trades, and only 2 extra weeks to use them in. So we have a few options for our extra trades
a) Trade for a higher team value by bringing in more cash cows for profit
b) Trade for more points by trading players out and in again for byes/short term injuries when in previous seasons you would have just held them
c) Trade as normal, but actually have some trades left over for the end of the year rather than limping home

I think the ideal would be to have trades combining a) and b) and get lucky enough with injuries to no need c) but that will be difficult to achieve. Even if you map it all out injuries will stuff you

eg I had a vague plan to start with Hynes, trade him to Cleary before Hynes's bye and then trade Hynes back in a couple weeks later (ideally by cashing in cows, but potentially for Cleary just before origin) Hynes injury cloud has thrown that plan in doubt and we haven't even started the season yet.

In general the best plan will be to trade out peaked cash cows just before their bye and bring in a player who has had a recent bye and has either bottomed out or has a bunch of cash to make

I think an ideal scenario would be John Bateman starts off the bench for 3-4 weeks loses a bunch of cash, before stabilising then in round 8 after Tigers R7 bye you can trade him in for someone like Will Warbrick who could be about max value and is about to have a bye.
Chances of things working out like this are low, but its what we should all be keeping an eye out for.

My season start rests on Cookies shoulders, his price tag limits my choices somewhat just hope he starts with a bang .......

And another point about making money.
If its anything like previous seasons, most of the best money makers will not be named in round 1.

Your round 1 team is unlikely to define your season. Almost any starting team named here could win the comp if they make the right trades. Last year I missed Taylan May and that was a bigger mistake than anything in my round 1 team

mattnz wrote:


With the byes, it is going to be more efficient trading gun to gun, than moving 2 mid rangers. Most of my strategy this season is likely to revolve around bye planning, and already have some surprises up my sleeve that I haven't heard anyone talking about. Will announce them during round-1.

Mulvy wrote:
Maybe we're not talking about them, for the same reasons you're not talking about them?

I haven't really looked closely at byes yet, but I will gladly talk about them. I only really seriously started looking at players after the 2nd trials, and haven't gone as far as planning a bye strategy beyond knowing the first couple of teams on a bye.

I don't care too much about keeping super secret PODs or whatever though. If your strategy for winning involves hoping other people don't make good trades, then that is probably not a winning strategy.

Mulvy wrote:

He's registered mate.

I guess I am gonna have to give up my new avatar and my team name then. I will be sure to DM a MOD

rhinoceroo wrote:

I find this important. We're supposed to enjoy this game. Would get more enjoyment (and frustration counts as enjoyment, right?) from picking a TPJ than a Tolman.

Meanwhile, if you are accountancy/finance aligned, there's probably a detailed calculation you could do with ten years data over the optimum amount of cash to leave in the bank in your starting team, and the expected value of that cash, that allows you to jump easily onto the lowest BE players you missed in the first two/three rounds. 40k is worth a lot more than 40k if it allows you to go from HSS (scored 10, new BE 25) to Talau (scored 50, new BE -10) for example.

Haven't done anything approaching a calculation on that, but definitely want to run a sizable bank this year to begin with.

I duno about you but players making 4 tackles a set gets me hot under the collar.

robelgordo wrote:

We’ve all been given some solid gold in the last few pages and I don’t think you’ve registered

7 250k players is not risky in itself. It’s down to who those players are.

Be interested to know the 4-5 you rate up there and the 2-3 you don’t? Rather than a gross number.

For me personally, I don’t like AKP and Luke there, but if you make it Warbrick and AN Other it might fly.

I don’t like AKP, Luke, Sloan, Stone and Moale. If you pick 7 guys at 250k and 2-3 of them flop you can be in strife whilst needing to trade them out whilst having other fires to put out in your team on top of that. And more often than not teams that pick 7-8 cheapies at 250k flop and fall behind from what I’ve seen.

B/L wrote:

I duno about you but players making 4 tackles a set gets me hot under the collar.

Takes all sorts. Let a thousand flowers bloom.

Milchcow wrote:
And another point about making money.
If its anything like previous seasons, most of the best money makers will not be named in round 1.

Your round 1 team is unlikely to define your season. Almost any starting team named here could win the comp if they make the right trades. Last year I missed Taylan May and that was a bigger mistake than anything in my round 1 team

The 3x ive finished in the top 20 (those were the days) ive always nailed my rd 1 team. Picked the right cashies and pick the guns that played like guns. It meant i didnt have to trade rd 1 and id always feel one step a head, e.g. the flavor of the week id already have in my team.

I get what you are saying but nailing your rd 1 team is not only satisfying, but goes a long way to having a good season. So no pressure everyone!

As we know we never get the perfect round 1 team.

How much is ideal to leave in the bank to fix up our cock ups?

I usually set aside 100-150k or is this wasted potential points in the bank.