Cow Talk R1 –> R2

Small or Far Away, Father Dougal on Cows

 

Hi Everybody!

I’m Father Dougal, and I write about Supercoach stuff. Mostly maths-ish things and strategy and theory. I’ll also do cow price change projections once we get a bit farther into the season. 

I’m also part of the Cow Talk Advisory Panel, aka the C-TAP, along with my Imaginary Interlocutor and my hamster, To Mini Therion .666 – The Little Beast.  Say hello guys. 

Hello guys! I’m Father Dougal’s Imaginary Interlocutor! 

(Muffled squeak) 

Little dude, don’t talk with your mouth full…. And what are you wearing? Are those leather pants? And a vest?

No, not pants. Chaps I think….is that a berry in his mouth?

I think not….unbuckle that thing and take it out this instant! What the heck! 

(Muffled indignant squeak) 

Hmm, you did say that today we were going to talk about “tying down the knee” and “restraining” ourselves. 

That’s right, so I did some research on the internet! I had to borrow your credit card though. 

Oh no. 

It was very educational. I’m going to need to go to confession later.

Please stop.

Oh yes please let’s!  We are going to move on now, or at least try to. 

For sure!

 

So, tying down the knee, not like that, was intended to be a reference to the whole knee-jerk reaction thing, where managers make trades based on just one week of data. 

Two weeks for the players who played in Round Zero. 

Ok, which is nice to have, but I’m more talking about the guys with just one week of data.  And maybe two to some degree. 

Isn’t one week of data better than no weeks of data?

Mostly yes but maybe not? If we did a bunch of research before the season, like, months of research, and came to conclusions based on that, and the pre-season fit that research, then those are probably at least reasonable conclusions based on a lot of data. Maybe even many previous seasons of data. 

So you add what we learned since the start of the season and?

And then you mess yourself up.  Over the course of a season, most players will score well over and well under their average some weeks.  Since there are 23 weeks in a season, that means that 1 of every 23 players just had their best week and another 1 of 23 just had their worst week.  So, with 31 players, very likely one of them just had their season high and another one had their season low. 

Oh, dearie me, can you imagine how awful it would be to have made a good decision on starting with a player, only for them to have their season low score right away and trade them out when they would have been fine if you had held them?

Or maybe to have held for another week only for them to have another bad score, and it just happened their worst two week toptal was weeks one and two?

Yeah, like I did with Nick Martin last season?  His lowest score of the season was his round one 63, and then he scored a 93 in week two for a two round total of 156? Which was his worst two week period of the whole season? When he averaged 105, meaning his average after being traded out after round two was 107.6? Yes, that is exactly what I mean.  Lots of people correctly thought he would do well, then most of them panicked and traded him out, me being one of them. Yes, I do in fact remember that. 

How nice that we can all learn from your mistakes.

Like Hayden Young last season! 

Yes, who scored a 70 round 1, which was his third lowest score, and then scored a 62 week 2, tied for his lowest score, which was a two week total of 132, his season low, and he averaged 104.7 for the rest of the season after I had traded him out.  

Right, two perfectly good pre season decisions ruined by a jerking knee. 

If only we could somehow tie down that knee, restrain it somehow….

We will metaphorically tie down that knee, not literally thank you. And I am going to do that this season. 

Is there no performance so bad you would refuse to act on it?

I am not willing to say never, but it would have to be something special. Even a cow could have had an off week. Now, the thing is, if a cows gets sent to the VFL because they couldn’t cut it, or they were a one week fill in for someone returning,  then I’d be far more open to replacing them. I mean, if I had missed a good cow and I had a cow who lost his job, then I might well just make that trade now. 

What if a cow had a really bad round 1 score?

Since the round 1 score is only in the price cycle for one rise, I don’t much care, as long as they still play round 2.  If they have two horrible scores in a row, then I’d have to think about swapping them out if there was someone I really wanted to bring in. Depends on the player and situation.  Back in 2019 Noah Balta had an epically bad start. Here are his season scores:  18, x, 31, 14, 49, 31, 59, 82, 101, 83, 47, 29, 51.   I remembered that because for whatever reason I didn’t trade him out, probably too much else to worry about, and I just let him play and hoped he would get better someday. 

And he did!

Yeah, his price rose to $327,000 from $123,900, and made good cash for round 12. That is not going to happen often. He was mostly playing and having a job meant maybe getting better. But, the point, I think was, that trading someone like that out only makes sense if there is someone better to bring in. It could also be that a cheap enough guy is better off as a loophole than being replaced. I had Zach Reid in my team all last season as I recall. Not worth trading out. 

Anyways, if trading out a cow, whoever you bring in will need to be enough better to be worth the loss of a trade. Anyone who faded Harry Sheezel his rookie year for sure should have found a way to get him in after two tons in his first two matches. But for most cows, how sure can we be that they are not just going to drop right off, and the guy you sold won’t go mad? 

No way to know. 

So, be careful before letting the knee jerk. 

How about players you don’t own who did really well? 

Well, again, could be a season high score and maybe they are not really as good as that one score. I’d often want to see another week to be safe. But, a high score is proof a player can score what they did, because they just did. If, for example, you faded someone because you had doubts about something, and then they prove you wrong, well, maybe more data is not needed. 

Like anyone who didn’t start with Bailey Smith or Jack Macrae? 

Right. Even if Smith does not score a 147 again, we now know he for sure can score well in his role on the new team. If Jack can score a 127 in a blowout loss for his new team, it seems safe to assume he’s worth getting in. 

Since we’re talking about former Dogs, what about Caleb Daniel? I like him, he’s small like me!

Well, he scored 81. He could easily score a 119 and then he’s averaging 100.  A player with a 105 season average could easily have a few 81’s in there. So to me he just has a lower score in his first game. If he really averages 81 he is still a hold and sell once his price goes up. But, the point is an 81 is not at all incompatible with his being a fine season long keeper. 

What if you have so many issues you can’t fix them in three trades?

Like in the tech league? Yeah, well, in that case, you have to go early.  If I had three trades I wanted to make next week, I might consider making one now just in case of injury. Depends on how confident I am in that one move. That would be a bring in move, not a get rid of move, barring injury.  If I really want to bring in three guys, I might go early on one. If I had someone not playing I need to get rid of, then maybe early too. 

So like usual, it depends on each team?

In the end, yes. I have a lot of guys off to dodgy starts and I am not going to panic on any of them. I’d rather give them time to get right and see how they go, maybe upgrade them later,  than swap out someone who had a bad start but ends up fine. But that’s just me. 

Back to being careful with trades?

Yeah, I let myself go mad last season with all the trades and seeming mistakes and ran my real team too much like my partner’s tech team. I’d rather have a little while of slightly lower scores and have an extra trade, then burn through trades and run out. Especially when a lot of those trades moved me backwards. 

 

 Dodgy Advice: Aside from, well, everything above, not this week. Just “Don’t Panic.”

 

Oh! And as it is the first Cow Talk of the year, here is the annual link that explains the “Small or far way”  thing.

 Small or far Away – Father Dougal on Cows

 

Remember the Cow Talk guarantee: “All predictions wrong or triple your money back!”  (Offer not valid if money is actually involved.)

I am time zonally challenged.  When Cow Talk goes live, I’m probably asleep, so replies from me may take a while.

Thanks for reading!