Lessons of a first year (or is that second) DTer

Playing DT is possibly not the best move for those who suffer from compulsive disorders, such as myself, but I did it anyway. To be totally honest, this is actually the second year that I have had a team, but my 2010 team was a randomly selected team of Swans with a few other players I respected or enjoyed watching. I neither understood or cared about the trading system and sat lazily watching my team limp into the low thousand type scores week after week courtesy of multiple players not playing most weeks. I put in as much effort to season 2010 as Chad Cornes, and you get what you give.

I suppose that this is why I was not really taken in by the whole dt thing during that season, but, by virtue of working in a pub with lots of screens, and lots of people talking about their dream teams, I did become curious as to why they were all so into it.

Now I know.

Along comes season 2011 and I thought I should have a crack and put a little effort into it this year. Little was I to know what this ‘little effort’ would become

My name is zappabanjo and I am an addict. Apparently the first step is to admit it. I still do not believe I have a problem with it, but I am sure my wife will tell a different story. More of that later.

So I thought about what I should do to at least be competitive in my league. No delusions of grandeur at this stage, so rule one became; attempt to select players that will get a game, preferably more often than not. So zappabanjo was created and after I had selected the first fifteen or so players, “sorry you cannot afford that player”, forced a rethink of my initial tactics.

So I started looking at the cheap players, now known to me as rooks or cash cows. David Swallow, heard of him, tick. Daniel Harris, ditto. Ummmm…….ummmmm, shit.

Who are all these pricks. Being a one eyed Swan the only young blokes I knew were ours, and I had learned just enough from season 2010 to know that not one of them was ever to warm warm the pine, or garner a zero for my squad this year, thanks Rohan and jetta, love ya to death, but no thanks.

It was obvious that I was going to need a look at some of these young blokes in the NAB Cup.

Delete team.

I live in Adelaide, which is great for news on Crows and Power players, but rather bereft of anything going on outside the border, so I decide to head to the AFL website for some information. The only website in the world that loads slower than Latvian porn, with more advertising as the kicker. Note to afl; use some of that money to fix your website as I can unload, and wipe my derrière in the time it takes your site just to load: and if my booze riddled brain can remember my username and password, why can your site not.

So to Dr Dream Team I head. I now know better. His advice of a few guns, a few mid price players with a few rookies appeared to have merit. So after many, many hours of research I settled on a very ordinary looking team.

Then a mate told me about Fantasy Freako, and sent me the link. Hallelujah, praise the lord. This is what I am talkin’ about. At this stage I should have started over again, but fatigue had set in, so I went about fixing what I had as best I could. I then looked over the draw for the season and saw that I could not field a team on a few of the multiple bye rounds. So after a little more juggling, I finally had a team that I was happy with. Oh boy, was that feeling about to be replaced.

Round one, 1899. Wow, I had never seen a score like that next to my team name, so I called my mate that put me onto Freako and thanked him. We got to talking and he told me about a couple of sites called fanfooty and dttalk. And this, my fellow junkies, is why my wife now hates me. “are you on that f—–g iPad with your f—–g football again!”.

“I can look up porn if you prefer!”. “anything but f——g football, I am sick of it”.

As it turns out, I was not supposed to take THAT advice literally. Oopsy daisy. Shop closed for a while.

So I would like to thank all you DT Talkers for your advice and musings over the season helping me to a somewhat successful 3rd place in my league: a 20th & 21st round placings: and a thoroughly enjoyable first (serious) season of dream team. Special thanks to Albert for most of my audible “ba ha” moments; as I am over 40 I am too old to qualify for a lol.

Which brings me neatly to the purpose of this article. Lessons I have learned and would like to pass on to first time players.

• Do not take any notice of Dr Dream Team.
• Guns and rookies is the way to go, good luck with picking the correct ones.
• Melbourne Football Club has no guns, do not confuse them with Melbourne coppers, who have too many guns and are not, I repeat, not, afraid to use them.
• Do not start the year with Adam Goodes in your side, he will get cheaper.
• Port Adelaide is where dolphins reside, not dt worthy players.
• School children should seek out the oldest teacher they can find and ask them the difference between, there, their and they’re.
• POSTERS MUST STOP SHOUTING AT ME AS I AM READING, NOT LISTENING.
• You need at least four trades come finals, preferably six.
• You do not get extra trades when the finals commence for having a small brain and poor grammar.
• Your partner is being sarcastic when offering a preference to you looking at porn instead of football, and take it from me, you will go a while without!
• Steer clear of girls like Kim, no one I know has lost their job for doing the job ‘Hans Solo’. Remember it is your willy and you can wash it as fast as you want.
• Please stop taking yourselves so seriously and lighten up.

Cheers and bring on season 2012.