NRL Fantasy 2023 Part 1 - Just open up already

if Eels are the best team to own for bye reasons - no early byes and play every origin round, who would be the best players to start with?

Hodgson has potential value but a big risk coming back from injury. Hopgood seems to the cheapie people are banking on. Is there any other value amongst there guns?
Maybe hope Moses drops some cash early and pick him up for origin? Possibly not a heap of value but Shaun Lane really finished last season well.

Milchcow wrote:
if Eels are the best team to own for bye reasons - no early byes and play every origin round, who would be the best players to start with?

Hodgson has potential value but a big risk coming back from injury. Hopgood seems to the cheapie people are banking on. Is there any other value amongst there guns?
Maybe hope Moses drops some cash early and pick him up for origin? Possibly not a heap of value but Shaun Lane really finished last season well.

Haze Dunster could be a good option at WNG/CTR 250k and actually has tended to score relatively consistently previously

Milchcow wrote:
if Eels are the best team to own for bye reasons - no early byes and play every origin round, who would be the best players to start with?

Hodgson has potential value but a big risk coming back from injury. Hopgood seems to the cheapie people are banking on. Is there any other value amongst there guns?
Maybe hope Moses drops some cash early and pick him up for origin? Possibly not a heap of value but Shaun Lane really finished last season well.

Note that if you are loading up on Eels players, in round 14 both Manly and Knights also have the bye, so you then don't want many from those teams, or you will be playing short that round.

Eels also don't play the final round, which is when many stars are rested, so this could create further issues.

At least in the main bye rounds (when the Eels are playing), there is a max of 13 allowed to play.

Not sure that loading up on Eels is going to be as good as it seems at first.

I don't think any of the Eels players I mentioned were season keepers, (maybe Moses if you can get him cheap, there's a non-zero chance Shaun lane will be elite) so you'd be trading them out before the end of the season anyway

One of the biggest issues trading this year is going to be that cash cows are unlikely to time their maximum value around when they have the bye (for everyone, not just Eels). Going to be a lot of decisions as to whether to cash someone out before the bye when they are still making cash, or keep a guy who has a good bye schedule even if he's peaked and his starting to drop cash.

Milchcow wrote:
if Eels are the best team to own for bye reasons - no early byes and play every origin round, who would be the best players to start with?

Hodgson has potential value but a big risk coming back from injury. Hopgood seems to the cheapie people are banking on. Is there any other value amongst there guns?
Maybe hope Moses drops some cash early and pick him up for origin? Possibly not a heap of value but Shaun Lane really finished last season well.

There's Doorey as well who's been talked up as their second row starter on iPap's edge. Obviously if he is he'll be in everyone's squad at base price whatever the byes.

which 2 out of Cotter, Fifita, Grant and Doeuhi do you lads think are worth starting the year with? assuming cover in every position

Matterson played great off the bench last season - 59 average in 51 minutes. The weird thing is that as starting lock, he only averaged 45 in 56 minutes.

Anyone know if he had a significantly different role when starting off the bench?

Jasonb-pt wrote:which 2 out of Cotter, Fifita, Grant and Doeuhi do you lads  think are worth starting the year with? assuming cover in every position

I am going with Cotter and Douehi.

We saw glimpses of what Cotter is capable of, with injury hampering his scoring last season. Seems to be getting lined up for the big minute prop role. Something that really impressed me with him was that he played huge minutes in extreme heat. Should start the season on fire when most are struggling.

If Douehi is given the reigns to run the Tigers, his scoring could be anything.

Not seeing a lot of upside for Grant this year from last year. I had him all season and remember a number of times when he was on 30 points late in the game, only to pull out a decent score with some junk points. Would prefer to spend the cash on someone with upside potential.

If Holbrook gets fired, Fifita is straight into my team, but as long as he is running things, he doesn't know how to get the most out of Fifita.

Cantbeatwinners wrote:Will Penrith be as dominant as a team without Kikau and Api, 2 big holes to fill. Will clearys fantasy points therefore be affected? Unsure who replaces those 2 players yet, but kikau on the edge was a big go to

You can still be dominant with 2 holes to fill

mattnz wrote:

I am going with Cotter and Douehi.

We saw glimpses of what Cotter is capable of, with injury hampering his scoring last season. Seems to be getting lined up for the big minute prop role. Something that really impressed me with him was that he played huge minutes in extreme heat. Should start the season on fire when most are struggling.

If Douehi is given the reigns to run the Tigers, his scoring could be anything.

Not seeing a lot of upside for Grant this year from last year. I had him all season and remember a number of times when he was on 30 points late in the game, only to pull out a decent score with some junk points. Would prefer to spend the cash on someone with upside potential.

If Holbrook gets fired, Fifita is straight into my team, but as long as he is running things, he doesn't know how to get the most out of Fifita.

I think Fifita doesn't know how to get the best out of Fifita. I'd love to have in my team because it's great fun watching your player score 40 points in 30 seconds sometimes, but watching him for Tonga in the World Cup, he was *terrible*: slow, uninterested, probably unfit, ultimately dropped from starting pack to bench.

In a football sense, Foran should be good for him, he's one of the smartest halves around for his outside men, but it's still mainly down to Fifita himself and I wouldn't mind seeing evidence that his head's on right.

No Worries wrote:

You can still be dominant with 2 holes to fill

From experience if you've got two holes filled you're anything but dominant

While I'm talking about Foran, I know he's one of those Cooper Cronk guys where footballing ability doesn't translate to fantasy scoring so is regarded as a rookie-error "pick for the name" selection from fantasy newbies BUT...

DCE did all the kicking and much of the playmaking at Manly, and Foran is priced at his average of 30. Fair enough, if he was playing next to DCE again this year. But you'd imagine he'll be chief playmaker at the Titans, as well as taking over half of the kicking if partnered with Brimson. And he'll have Difita outside him.

At the Bulldogs, when *not* partnered with DCE, he averaged 40 and 45 in 2018 and 2019. He was fantasy irrelevant not because his scores were bad but because he started the seasons in the mid $500s a had a 5 in front of his price all year. If he gets to £570k from $430k while scoring ok, that's pretty much job done for a mid-price cow.

tl:dr Kieran Foran might have ten points of value

Holy Moly wrote:I've read that Woolford is likely to be the raiders starting hooker. Does anyone expect him to get more minutes than last year?

Depends if Canberra want to actually win some games this season.

Look forward to Starling chat at some point this year NOT.

mattnz wrote:


If Holbrook gets fired, Fifita is straight into my team, but as long as he is running things, he doesn't know how to get the most out of Fifita.

Holbrook was his coach in 2021 where Fifita averaged 63. The problem is he didn't score 17 tries last year and probably won't again any year in his career. If he hangs around as a try every 2 games kind of player he is going to average mid 50s

Milchcow wrote:
I don't think any of the Eels players I mentioned were season keepers, (maybe Moses if you can get him cheap, there's a non-zero chance Shaun lane will be elite) so you'd be trading them out before the end of the season anyway

One of the biggest issues trading this year is going to be that cash cows are unlikely to time their maximum value around when they have the bye (for everyone, not just Eels). Going to be a lot of decisions as to whether to cash someone out before the bye when they are still making cash, or keep a guy who has a good bye schedule even if he's peaked and his starting to drop cash.

One of my early calls is Hopgood turns into a keeper this year, one of the only guys to not leave my team so far. Will make the 13 jersey his own. I wouldn't be surprised if he is in Origin conversation this or next year. Qlder too

rhinoceroo wrote:. If he gets to £570k from $430k while scoring ok, that's pretty much job done for a mid-price cow.

Would that mean he's gone to super league if he is suddenly being paid in ££

Milchcow wrote:

Would that mean he's gone to super league if he is suddenly being paid in ££

Haha, mistype but even with the weak pound £570k is $1m, so that's a season keeper and a captaincy option.

my tv broke wrote:https://www.nrl.com/news/2023/01/12/no-new-rules-for-2023-season/

This first one is sure to go down well lol

Grounding the Ball
Tries will now be awarded if the ball rotates from the hand to the wrist or forearm provided there is no obvious separation between the ball and the hand or arm. The new interpretation will allow further clarity for officials when adjudicating grounding."


Operation of the 18th player rule
The number of failed head injury assessments will be reduced from three (3) to two (2) to trigger the activation of the 18th player.

Intervention of Bunker in Foul Play
The Bunker may only intervene for acts of foul play which it deems to be reportable.

Few other minor things in the link.

Two feet behind the ref for offside is gonna be a big one (assuming it's enforced). Hookers who love to burrow over could enjoy that one (Danny Levi 1 try per game, season keeper????)

From a general footy fan standpoint all good amendments, the balance of the game was pretty good in 2022 and I'm glad they're building off of that.

Lchy wrote:
Two feet behind the ref for offside is gonna be a big one (assuming it's enforced). Hookers who love to burrow over could enjoy that one (Danny Levi 1 try per game, season keeper????)

Play the balls 1m from the line could be very dangerous if they actually enforce this.

The Captain's Challenge rule is basically just being changed to match the interpretation that they said was already the rule when they justified the Cowboys win over the Tigers last year.