NRL Fantasy 2024 Part 1 - Gates are open, come on in

mattnz wrote:

Just keep in mind that sometimes he talks shit, like saying he would play Paulo for huge minutes at the start of the season, then didn't.

Yeah - but in that case, MattNZ, I think he did it just to mess with you

White Lightning wrote:https://discord.com/channels/1074150254443769967/1089402271474925639/1198413175633227936

ba on how he likes his hookers

How can we see this?

The Dolphin Conspiracies wrote:

How can we see this?

How do you see the battle for the dummy half spot between Brendan Hands and Joey Lussick?

BA: Handsie has done a good job with some of his opportunities that he got in ’23. And Joey Lussick finished the season there. At the end of the day I have never been real keen at just picking a specialist hooker on the bench. I like our hookers to be able to play 80 minutes and both of those guys are training really well and they are helping each other. They are confident in their own ability and both comfortable that they are competing with each other. We can only have one of them so the trials will work it out and pre-season.

The Dolphin Conspiracies wrote:

How can we see this?

join insight fantasy sports discord

Last year's averages in brackets

Paulo - 45 (54.3)
Lussick/Hands - 80 (68.6) Brad says (80)
Campbell Gillard - 45 (54.9)
Cartwright - 60 (75.0)
Lane - 60 (60.9) non-injury affected (78.9)
Hopgood - 80 (65.

Matterson - 60 (64.2)
Ofahengaue - 40 (32,6)
Tuilagi - 20 (58.3)
Grieg - 10 (27.3)

Lane will be playing more than 60mins I’d say 70.1-72.8mins somewhere in that range.

Rabbits21 wrote:Lane will be playing more than 60mins I’d say 70.1-72.8mins somewhere in that range.

All for the attempts at humour, but that joke might have peaked a few days ago Rabbits. Got anything new?

The point is there are a lot of big minute forwards and not so many minutes to share around

Rabbits21 wrote:Lane will be playing more than 60mins I’d say 70.1-72.8mins somewhere in that range.

Not worth it without those extra 12 seconds to get him to 73 mins

The Dolphin Conspiracies wrote:

Full article... it may appear to some people like Harper has the CTR role over Simmonson too

https://www.1eyedeel.com/forum/topics/i-ll-embrace-the-pressure-on-us-to-deliver

Maybe the minutes are something like this

Paulo - 45
Lussick/Hands - 80
Campbell Gillard - 45
Cartwright - 60
Lane - 60
Hopgood - 80

Matterson - 60
Ofahengaue - 40
Tuilagi - 20
Grieg - 10

Puts a dampener on any of the Eels EDGs or MIDs except for Hopgood & Lussick

Paulo and RCG averaged 55 mins last year I doubt Hopgood will be playing 80 given they lost most of the first games at the start of 2023 due to pushing him too far

Camo123 wrote:

Paulo and RCG averaged 55 mins last year I doubt Hopgood will be playing 80 given they lost most of the first games at the start of 2023 due to pushing him too far

Just going of the BA interview linked above. Seems like 80 is the intention. Perhaps BA just uses 16 players again most of the year?

The Dolphin Conspiracies wrote:

Just going of the BA interview linked above. Seems like 80 is the intention. Perhaps BA just uses 16 players again most of the year?

By the end of the year he was able to play out a full 80 minutes and stay on top of his detail and (keep his) concentration levels. That is not easy for a middle forward to do that. Obviously people started to work him out at the back end of the year. People know a bit more about him. So he is just going to have to find ways to combat that.

That doesn’t sound like giving him 80 consistently to me

The Dolphin Conspiracies wrote:

Just going of the BA interview linked above. Seems like 80 is the intention. Perhaps BA just uses 16 players again most of the year?

Yea, BA's response in the interview isn't very ambiguous.
"His first few games for us he was really good. But as the games wore on he would lose a little bit of detail and we would come up with key words just to sort of trigger him. By the end of the year he was able to play out a full 80 minutes and stay on top of his detail and (keep his) concentration levels. That is not easy for a middle forward to do that."
Makes it seem like the only reason Hopgood didn't play a regular 80 mins was a lack of concentration and fatigue. Sounds like iI Hopgood can handle it this season, BA will play him the 80.

* lol Camo beat me to it but even so, quote is obviously open to interpretation.

The Dolphin Conspiracies wrote:Last year's averages in brackets

Paulo - 45 (54.3)
Lussick/Hands - 80 (68.6) Brad says (80)
Campbell Gillard - 45 (54.9)
Cartwright - 60 (75.0)
Lane - 60 (60.9) non-injury affected (78.9)
Hopgood - 80 (65.

Matterson - 60 (64.2)
Ofahengaue - 40 (32,6)
Tuilagi - 20 (58.3)
Grieg - 10 (27.3)

Matto's mins reduced to 52 when playing off the bench and Joe O was closer to 27 mins once transferred to the Eels.
I think the remaining bench will be quite limited and Lane and Carty should be 70+ mins (at least until they lose the first few games cause BA ran the starters into the ground and then is forced to mix things up )

GreenSchist wrote:
Yea, BA's response in the interview isn't very ambiguous.
"His first few games for us he was really good. But as the games wore on he would lose a little bit of detail and we would come up with key words just to sort of trigger him. By the end of the year he was able to play out a full 80 minutes and stay on top of his detail and (keep his) concentration levels. That is not easy for a middle forward to do that."
Makes it seem like the only reason Hopgood didn't play a regular 80 mins was a lack of concentration and fatigue. Sounds like iI Hopgood can handle it this season, BA will play him the 80.

* lol Camo beat me to it but even so, quote is obviously open to interpretation.

Regardless - it makes it hard to pick Lane or Cartwright with confidence that someone is not going to eat into their minutes

In 70+ minutes, Hopgood averaged 72, priced at 61. Just made my team.

In 8 games, 1 score under 60 and 4 of 80+.

Planning to start with him and JDB.

mattnz wrote:In 70+ minutes, Hopgood averaged 72, priced at 61. Just made my team.

In 8 games, 1 score under 60 and 4 of 80+.

Planning to start with him and JDB.

Most of Hopgood’s 70+ min games came without at least 1 of RCG/Matterson/Paulo

All are fit at this stage

Camo123 wrote:

Most of Hopgood’s 70+ min games came without at least 1 of RCG/Matterson/Paulo

All are fit at this stage

See the posts above.

mattnz wrote:In 70+ minutes, Hopgood averaged 72, priced at 61. Just made my team.

In 8 games, 1 score under 60 and 4 of 80+.

Planning to start with him and JDB.

Yip, he’s a lock in my team as well.
Massive upside with minimal risk. Worst case scenario he plays 60-65 mins and scores high 50’s to low 60’s. Not likely to drop a huge amount in cash if that were to happen.

GreenSchist wrote:

Yip, he’s a lock in my team as well.
Massive upside with minimal risk. Worst case scenario he plays 60-65 mins and scores 60’s. Not likely to drop a huge amount in cash of that we’re to happen.

Only marginal for origin selection too, while the other options for premium MID in Yeo, Haas and Murray are all certainties.

For EDG, Hopgood and Fifita have daylight 3rd in that position.

Camo123 wrote:

Most of Hopgood’s 70+ min games came without at least 1 of RCG/Matterson/Paulo

All are fit at this stage

It’s a valid observation but might be more coincidence, rather than causal.
BA’s interview response seems to indicate Hopgood’s playing time didn’t have much to do with forward pack rotations and more to do with his ability to maintain a high intensity for 80 mins. Based on what I can remember from last seasons Eels games, Hopgood did go missing at times and looked fatigued through the early to middle part of the season after his hot start, which does correlate to his lower minutes (and bench role).