KFC SuperCoach 2022: Everything you need to know about SuperCoach Draft

Ready to graduate from KFC SuperCoach to the exciting world of SuperCoach Draft, where mate v mate rivalry goes to a whole new level? The Draft Doctors are here to help.

AFL CEO Gillon McLachlan gets the AFL Draft started.

So, you’ve finally done it. You’ve graduated from your KFC SuperCoach apprenticeship playing with a funny-money salary cap, and have decided to move to the big leagues. I’m proud of you, really, I am.

At this point in time, you might be asking yourself, ‘What have I got myself in for, and who the **** are you?’, and that’s fair. I ask myself those questions daily. My name is Cam, and I’m from The Draft Doctors, a podcast focused on the draft format of fantasy football. All through the pre-season I’ll be bringing you some tips and tricks to hopefully win your league, and take out bragging rights over your mates.

We’ve got a truckload of additional content including a 151 banter-filled pages of 2022 research known as the Draft Kit, and our weekly podcast is on all your favourite listening spots.

There are a lot of things to consider as a beginner in Draft, so let’s get down to basics.

AFL draft night has nothing on the strategy and banter of a SuperCoach Draft. Picture: AAP Image/James Ross

EXTREME BASICS

SC Draft is a format where only one coach per league can have each player, and salary cap is irrelevant.

PREPARATION

You could go into draft day really green and unresearched. You could also choose to eat two-minute noodles with mayonnaise. Both of these things are probably unwise. Get the most out of your year by conducting a little research before your season, and creating a spreadsheet or document ranking players in each position. When creating your ranks, try to go a little bit further than just, ‘Whatt did they average last year’ and consider things like:

WHAT has changed at the club?

WILL the player have the same role?

WAS their team good or bad last year, and will it continue?

HOW has their pre-season been? Any injury concerns?

ARE there any young stars that may be breaking out?

ARE there any older guns who may be slowing down?

I generally rank 90 midfielders, 70 defenders, 70 forwards, and 20 rucks. Depending on your league settings (more on that in the next column for commissioners) this should be deep enough to cover your needs on draft day. If you can’t be bothered with this step, keep an eye out for expert draft rankings on your News Corp masthead and the Draft Doctors ranks will be available on the website to download later in February, and are currently available in the Draft Kit as a downloadable Excel.

DRAFT DAY

This is basically Christmas.

Although it can be harder with the pandemic, drafting in person is a truckload of fun – you and the rest of your league all in one place, potentially having a beverage or two, and bantering about who took whom.

Depending on your pick timing settings, this can be a long or short event – but just know the clock is ticking. This is when having done the research and having a list of ranks can be crucial when the pressure is on.

The main thing here is, if you have a bit of a bad draft, and all of your league mates are throwing banter at your terrible team – DO NOT DESPAIR.

You do not win your league on draft day. I cannot emphasise that enough. It helps put you in a good position for the remainder of the year, but there are so many uncertainties that it’s foolish to celebrate a win, or dwell on a loss after draft day. Covid is going to continue causing headaches for coaches in 2022, then you have injuries, surprise breakouts, new coaches, new game plans and so on. Be patient, don’t be complacent or disengaged after draft day. Trade and waiver your way to victory!

One last point on draft day – avoid drafting injured (or suspended – I’m looking at you, Toby “five weeks” weeks Greene) where possible. They take up a bench spot that will be crucial for using the waivers (more on that later), and in a year that is going to be disrupted by Covid, you want as many fit players as possible each week.

Get your mates together (in a Covid-safe way) for a SuperCoach Draft.

TRADING

Trading in SuperCoach Draft is very different to SuperCoach Classic. There is no trade limits and deals are done between teams.

New drafters get taken advantage of at the trade table in every league they join. It’s just a fact. Every drafter is a sleazy salesman – if they are proposing a trade, it’s because they see upside in the player they are requesting. If you’re on the receiving end of the offer, be critical, and assume the trader doesn’t have the best intentions to “help you out”.

That said, take each offer on its merits, the needs of your team (they might offer you a defender for a forward, and you might be in dire need of a defender) and most importantly do your own research! Some things to consider:

Early in the season – if a player has come out of the blocks extremely well, look at their history of scoring in previous years and question what has changed to allow it to happen. This happens every year, where someone comes out averaging well above their scoring ability in the early rounds, and eventually drops back to how they have historically performed.

Buy low, sell high – Just like the stocks. If a player is well under their historical averages, consider throwing a like-for-like offer to the coach.

Two-for-one – can present really good value to both coaches in a win-win. You may have a bench player that would be good enough to end up on someone else’s field. Consider packaging them with another semi-good player to upgrade one of your on-field players.

Don’t be “that guy” in the league that throws out offers like Jade Gresham for Clayton Oliver. It’s just annoying.

A role change like Callum Mills’ move to the midfield in 2021 could provide an opening for a SuperCoach Draft steal. Picture: Phil Hillyard

WAIVERS

One of the most integral parts of the draft format – the waiver wire – consists of all the players that have not been drafted.

After each round (and in the lead-up to round one) players can opt to delist players from their team, and add other players from the waiver wire. Once you’ve delisted a player, anyone else in the league can pick them up, so be careful.

Importantly, the waiver generally presents the most value at the start of the season – this is when you might find a player that is breaking out and was off everyone’s lists in the pre-season.

Good examples of this in years gone by are Riley O’Brien (became No.1 ruck at Adelaide through injury), Bailey Dale (position switch to half-back), James Worpel (rare second year breakout) – every year there are players where something just goes right for them and they dominate.

That’s it for this week. Check out SuperCoach Draft and if you have any questions, hit me up on Twitter @thepotatobake.

Listen to the latest podcast from The Draft Doctors below: