Happy Mothers Day to all in AFL Fantasy land.
Celebrate the day by the AFL deciding to bury the West Coast/Suns match on Friday night which means just the two games on Sunday. ‘Tbetta’ is back after a whirlwind Saturday to breakdown 4 teams for today’s ‘Stargazing preview’.
MAIN CONTESTS:
$70,000 Main ($15 entry, 115 max)
$10,000 High Roller ($150 entry, 3 max)
$5,000 Fiver ($5 entry, 50 max)
$3,000 Mini ($2 entry, 15 max)
$2,500 Buck Hunter ($1 entry, 100 max)
$2,000 Micro ($0.50 entry, 100 max)
SATELLITE:
ADE vs STK – Adelaide Oval: Fine.
COLL vs GWS – MCG: Fine.
INNER CORE:
FWD
Close enough is good enough on a two-game slate, so maybe the first CBAs of Toby Bedford’s ($6,920 FWD) entire career is worth tracking? All 7 of his centre bounce attendances were in the fourth quarter following a tactical move from GWS, with the former Demon finishing on 77 for the match. Maybe the switch sticks? For a few extra gumnuts, his teammate Xavier O’Halloran ($8,920 MID/FWD) has been reliable salary relief for us over the past month.
It’s pretty grim in the premium price bracket up forward, so you might need to get creative. Former full-time midfielders Ben Keays ($9,650 FWD/MID) and Taylor Adams ($10,840 MID/FWD) are both priced modestly enough to take a swing at their ceilings, but their floors make them hard to rely on as “core” selections.
MID
There’s a watch on our sole basement midfield option in Ryan Angwin ($6,000 MID) after a late ankle injury last week, which is not ideal given GWS vs Collingwood is the late starter. Be careful with his ownership, as you wouldn’t have anyone to Late Swap him with (unless Josh Fahey was to replace him from the emergency list).
Chayce Jones ($8,980 MID) and Lachlan Sholl ($9,020 MID) are in play as wingmen against the Saints, who give up the second-most marks of any side this season. I especially like this pair as connectors in Adelaide DEF stacks. The veteran Rory Sloane ($12,320 MID) is another option as the hybrid midfielder for the Crows over the past month, posting a lowest score of 82 in his past five starts.
A pair of Saints are worth considering this week too. Jack Steele ($15,500 MID) is the obvious candidate as he works back to his consistent best following that collarbone break earlier in the year, but I also like his veteran teammate on a value basis. Seb Ross ($13,140 MID) will get more midfield minutes this week with Jade Gresham confirmed out, and last week’s 42 in a bizarre game against the Roos might scare off a few suitors. If it’s safety you want however, any of Jordan Dawson, Rory Laird and Tom Green around the $16k mark would fit the bill.
DEF
With a spicy average of 98 in his past 5 games VFL games, Cameron Fleeton ($6,000 DEF) will rightfully be one of the most owned players on this slate. Isaac Cumming’s injury opens up a spot for him across half back, and we’ve seen GWS’s gameplan able to sustain the scoring of 3-4 Giants back there each week. He looks good for a 60, with the ability to go even higher. Patrick Parnell ($6,820 DEF) is the main alternative here, with an opportunity to capitalise on St Kilda’s loose forward press. He’s scored 109 and 112 in his last two SANFL outings, so don’t sleep on him even if he does look about 13 years old.
Speaking of backline Crows, Brodie Smith ($10,650 DEF) is still the prime mover back there and has a very generous price-tag. He’s Adelaide’s kick-out king with 7 amongst his season-high 93 fantasy points last weekend.
Cumming’s absence frames Lachie Ash ($11,900 DEF) and Lachie Whitfield ($13,740 DEF) as players to target with a great slice of the distribution rights. In the only game of 2022 where Isaac missed, they scored +22 and +11 on their season averages respectively.
RUC
Matt Flynn ($10,810 RUC) looms as a popular ruck pick on this slate given that Collingwood are wheeling out anyone over 6 foot as a potential ruckman these days, but I just wanted to flag the awkward Harry Himmelberg ruck share from last week. They ended up with a 45/38 split in total ruck contests – including a counter-intuitive 48/52 at centre bounces – which sparked Himmelberg’s best score for the year with 80. Hopefully this was just a one-week tactic against the tireless English, but it certainly warrants monitoring.
I’ll touch on Mason Cox below, so what about the early game? I’m not sure I can justify Rowan Marshall given the swirling injury cloud and swollen price-tag, but Reilly O’Brien is interesting at $13,720. St Kilda have conceded the 3rd-most points to RUC’s this season so I’m already liking ROB in a vacuum – but if the Pride of Portland doesn’t get up and the Saints need to bring in ruck reinforcements, O’Brien would approach lock levels.
BLACK HOLES:
Jack Sinclair ($14,000 DEF/MID)
Whilst it’s a positive indicator for the majority of ball winners in the AFL, more CBAs do not always equate to more scores – and that’s an important fact to remind ourselves of every once in a while. Sinclair’s best fantasy role has always been quarterbacking for St Kilda, but Ross Lyon is starting to lean on him more and more as a midfielder in 2023. Sinclair’s season-high 63% CBA action last week coincided with a season-low 79, so with Gresham ruled out already, Jack could see himself stuck in the guts against the Crows this week.
Nick Daicos ($16,210 DEF/MID)
After being held to season-lows in 99 (Keays) and 84 (Ryan Clarke) over the past fortnight, GWS would be crazy not to consider sending a tag his way, with Harry Perryman the most likely candidate. Regardless, GWS rank as the hardest for defenders to score against in the league. There’s no denying that Daicos is a footballing freak, but the price-tag is way too high with these factors stacking up against him.
STAR SIGNS:
Big Cox
GWS has been giving up a truckload of points to ruckmen over the past fortnight, starting with Ladhams’s monster 130 and continuing with English’s 151 last weekend. I’m not suggesting that Mason Cox ($8,460 RUC/FWD) is as talented a ruckman as that pair by any means, but with Darcy Cameron, Dan McStay and now Billy Frampton all out injured, someone has to pilot the skies. The American Pie is worth a long look on this two-game slate, especially with the DPP flexibility.
Steely Resolve
This one is simple – Brad Crouch ($15,240 MID) does not play well with others. After scoring 122, 125 and 118 in the weeks where his skipper Jack Steele was out with a collarbone issue, Crouch has returned totals of just 75, 77 and 83 since his return. There will be an inflection point sometime in the future simply because Brad has been a ball magnet from birth, but I’m not paying over $15k gambling on it coming this Sunday.
Dawson’s Creek
Jordan Dawson ($15,760 MID/DEF) has certainly settled back into life in his home state of South Australia – if we’re judging from his output playing at home, anyway. He’s pumped out monsters of 122, 133 and 112 in his last three games at Adelaide Oval where he meets St Kilda this week, who have been famously leaky outside of their defensive 50 this season.
GALAXY CLUSTER:
Adelaide – Full Stack
Yes, St Kilda are the highest scoring side in the league currently, but they also concede the 2nd-most points to opponents. They like to play that retention-style footy that Ross Lyon preaches, which arranges the chess pieces such that their opponents are incentivised to make the easy move and do the same in counter attack. The result? Plenty of easy +6’s for both sides. With Adelaide a much better team at home than away, they have an excellent opportunity to capitalise, with their defensive distributors and outside midfielders the blokes to target in DFS.
GWS – Full Stack
GWS have topped the fantasy ledger in each of the last five matches, while Collingwood have lost both of their last two. While I think that the Pies are locks to win the actual match at their MCG fortress, wins in the past two weeks (despite losing the meaningless stat battle) is a great sign that GWS can still rack up fantasy numbers in a defeat.
MULTIVERSE THEORY:
In a parallel universe:
- Rowan Marshall is a late out with that ankle issue, thrusting Tom Campbell into the solo ruck role at a bargain price-tag…
- GWS don’t exactly have excess star midfielders anymore, so can they realistically afford to move Perryman around to follow Daicos? None of their named small forwards have tagging experience, either…
- This is the first time St Kilda have been able to name two key forwards in the same match in 2023, and Max King isn’t far away – will the crazy numbers they’ve conceded to opposition defenders continue…?
Tbetta.
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