The 2014 CQ Ranking Manager Thread

[skidmark]

QUINTANA ROJAS Nairo Alexander 1634
PORTE Richie 1486
DEGENKOLB John 1166
KWIATKOWSKI Michal 995

I don't see any of these guys double their points to be honest, although I would each of them to do so (Porte excluded). Put, if they do turn out to gain you some big points, well done.
I would estimate they can each gain 500 points extra on average, but maybe that's a little bit underestimating... We'll see.

I used to think that I wouldn't pick a player, regardless of how expensive, unless he could double his points. Then I realized if you pick expensive guys like this, you only need a modest gain to get a massive amount of points, and then you have a ton of room on your roster for cheap guys, who will hopefully multiply their points tenfold. This strategy can work, I think it's just risky because a) any one of these key riders going down for a big portion of the season sinks your team and b) there really aren't that many cheap riders who are going to explode, so you have to hit on a lot of cylinders. But as I said in my last post on this, a scattershot approach towards cheap riders will increase the likelihood you'll have a unique pick that surprises and explodes.

 

[uspostal]

1st time playing so if I was suspposed to pick some guys with a 0 CQ then sorry. I thought the 7500 was to be used as I seen. I have 9 guys under 100 take off as many as needed and insert as many 0 rated riders as I need.

I would like to say thanks to all who are supporting and running the game.

Chuck

 

[LaFlorecita]

1st time playing so if I was suspposed to pick some guys with a 0 CQ then sorry. I thought the 7500 was to be used as I seen. I have 9 guys under 100 take off as many as needed and insert as many 0 rated riders as I need.

I would like to say thanks to all who are supporting and running the game.

Chuck

you don't have to have 0 pointers

 

[Geraint Too Fast]

I've just realised that my team is incredibly light on riders for the cobbles. I've only got Boonen (who everybody else has anyway) and uh, EBH...

 

[Netserk]

I have Boonen, EBH and Stybar.

 

[The Hitch]

QUINTANA ROJAS Nairo Alexander 1634
PORTE Richie 1486
DEGENKOLB John 1166
KWIATKOWSKI Michal 995

I don't see any of these guys double their points to be honest, although I would each of them to do so (Porte excluded). Put, if they do turn out to gain you some big points, well done.
I would estimate they can each gain 500 points extra on average, but maybe that's a little bit underestimating... We'll see.

I used to think that I wouldn't pick a player, regardless of how expensive, unless he could double his points. Then I realized if you pick expensive guys like this, you only need a modest gain to get a massive amount of points, and then you have a ton of room on your roster for cheap guys, who will hopefully multiply their points tenfold. This strategy can work, I think it's just risky because a) any one of these key riders going down for a big portion of the season sinks your team and b) there really aren't that many cheap riders who are going to explode, so you have to hit on a lot of cylinders. But as I said in my last post on this, a scattershot approach towards cheap riders will increase the likelihood you'll have a unique pick that surprises and explodes.

It's a beautiful strategy, possibly motivated somewhat by the player as the defending champ thinking - **** it, I've already won 1, let's try some crazy ****
The aim I think is to maximise the chances of finding that game winning rider. Coquard last year, Moser the year before, guardini the year before (or cobo lol) and hypothetically Sagan before that.

No one knows which of the young riders will explode (though ferminal was quite confident it would be Coquard last year). Most of us have only choose maybe 10 of them if not less. By opening up his spaces to fill the team with young riders and using up the remaining points on trustworthy high scorers he essentially doubles his chances of finding the best of the young riders and if he finds say a Moser then it's worth it even if 3 or 4 others are total duds and Degenkolb loses points.

 

[NairoQ]

I used to think that I wouldn't pick a player, regardless of how expensive, unless he could double his points. Then I realized if you pick expensive guys like this, you only need a modest gain to get a massive amount of points, and then you have a ton of room on your roster for cheap guys, who will hopefully multiply their points tenfold. This strategy can work, I think it's just risky because a) any one of these key riders going down for a big portion of the season sinks your team and b) there really aren't that many cheap riders who are going to explode, so you have to hit on a lot of cylinders. But as I said in my last post on this, a scattershot approach towards cheap riders will increase the likelihood you'll have a unique pick that surprises and explodes.

True, but I still feel like you'd need all of your 4-5 big riders to perform well, if not very good, to have a chance at ending up high. Besides that, i think the hole story of having 'unique picks' which score high is a bit overrated. Of course, it feels good, but from a perspective of winning the game it's not a problem 5 other guys have this same 'Coquard'. I'm not quite sure there are riders coming out of nowhere (unique picks) then scoring high. Or, I don't know, was a Coquard-like rider a unique pick in the history of this game?

When it comes to cheap riders I think it's more a matter of having many riders getting many points (getting a unique combination of these riders, and hopefully the best) then to try and score many points with some unique riders.

But, of course, the idea of getting THE one rider that explodes and being one of the few to have him, that can be attractive. Not so sure if it's a decision which is 'strategyminded', or a 'honourminded' one. Maybe the creator of this (undeniable) adventurous team could give us his thoughts!

 

[EvansIsTheBest]

True, but I still feel like you'd need all of your 4-5 big riders to perform well, if not very good, to have a chance at ending up high. Besides that, i think the hole story of having 'unique picks' which score high is a bit overrated. Of course, it feels good, but from a perspective of winning the game it's not a problem 5 other guys have this same 'Coquard'. I'm not quite sure there are riders coming out of nowhere (unique picks) then scoring high. Or, I don't know, was a Coquard-like rider a unique pick in the history of this game?

When it comes to cheap riders I think it's more a matter of having many riders getting many points (getting a unique combination of these riders, and hopefully the best) then to try and score many points with some unique riders.

But, of course, the idea of getting THE one rider that explodes and being one of the few to have him, that can be attractive. Not so sure if it's a decision which is 'strategyminded', or a 'honourminded' one. Maybe the creator of this (undeniable) adventurous team could give us his thoughts!

To answer your question, in 2012, I had Bouhanni who costed 136 points and returned 845 (the profit was 709 exactly like Coquard last year). Not a game-winning pick because I fell well short of skidmark in the end but certainly a game-changing pick for my team and one of the main reason I was able to take the lead after the TDF for a week. Only one other person took him that year (Maaaaarten I think) so it is possible to have very rare Coquard like riders (there are probably other/better examples of this but I took this one because I follow my team more carefully than the others).

By the way, it's nice to see that last year's winner shares my faith in Degenkolb.

 

[R_O_Shipman]

I can understand the picking big name rider thing though. I've gone for 3 big name picks as a risky strategy - I know that if one of them get's injured or looses form etc then I stand no chance of doing well, but that's far more interesting than picking a team of riders who all increase their value slightly.

I would be interested if anyone has been able to work out what the best possible team would have been last year, or at least who the 33 riders with the biggest improvement between 2012 and 2013. I'm sure if I was any good with a spreadsheet I could manage it, but I'm reasonably clueless.

BTW thanks to all who are making the game run - I'm looking forward to maintaining my top 10 position!

 

[search]

I would be interested if anyone has been able to work out what the best possible team would have been last year

I did just give it a quick go manually with Excel (just sorted by profit and fitted into a team), I didn't have much time so there is propaby room for improvement, and someone with coding skills (I think cqmanager has coded something last year) can give you a 100% accurate result, but my result was something like that:

first number is points 2012 (or last full season before a ban), second number points 2013:

FROOME Chris 1427 2766
QUINTANA ROJAS Nairo Alexander 707 1634
PORTE Richie 680 1486
ULISSI Diego 567 1132
KWIATKOWSKI Michal 482 995
SPILAK Simon 390 900
SANTAMBROGIO Mauro 344 822
FRANK Mathias 302 678
VICHOT Arthur 293 694
REBELLIN Davide 276 755
MAJKA Rafal 260 773
BARDET Romain 250 703
CIOLEK Gerald 242 798
THOMAS Geraint 181 704
WEENING Pieter 160 772
ZOIDL Riccardo 103 455
MARTINEZ Yannick 101 489
SANTAROMITA Ivan 83 440
HERRADA LOPEZ Jesus 80 399
ROUX Anthony 80 427
BONGIORNO Francesco Manuel 79 399
KANKOVSKY Alois 78 426
HUSHOVD Thor 76 690
MAES Nikolas 72 369
DEBUSSCHERE Jens 65 455
POURSEYEDI GOLAKHOR Mirsamad 49 329
COQUARD Bryan 33 742
REICHENBACH Sébastien 19 277
ACEVEDO CALLE Janier Alexis 9 405
POZDNYAKOV Kirill 6 279
ENGER Sondre Holst 4 202
FINETTO Mauro 0 293
MALAGUTI Alessandro 0 179

22867 points return for 7498 (~305%)

 

[mc_mountain]

True, but I still feel like you'd need all of your 4-5 big riders to perform well, if not very good, to have a chance at ending up high. Besides that, i think the hole story of having 'unique picks' which score high is a bit overrated. Of course, it feels good, but from a perspective of winning the game it's not a problem 5 other guys have this same 'Coquard'. I'm not quite sure there are riders coming out of nowhere (unique picks) then scoring high. Or, I don't know, was a Coquard-like rider a unique pick in the history of this game?

When it comes to cheap riders I think it's more a matter of having many riders getting many points (getting a unique combination of these riders, and hopefully the best) then to try and score many points with some unique riders.

But, of course, the idea of getting THE one rider that explodes and being one of the few to have him, that can be attractive. Not so sure if it's a decision which is 'strategyminded', or a 'honourminded' one. Maybe the creator of this (undeniable) adventurous team could give us his thoughts!

Ciolek was on an incredibly small number (11 I think) of teams in 2013... for this year I have Senechal, with two other teams. I can easily see him scoring 400 points or so, not enough to break the game open, for me EvansIsTheBest and Reno, but could be pretty good nonetheless. no guarantees of course, but should be a strong performer with Cofidis on the french classics circuit.

I also have to say that Bouhanni is perhaps the best ever pick in this game. who other than the two that picked him could have seen that happening. any other possibilities? so I am glad to have the same near unique french guy as EitB for 2014.

 

[jsem94]

Moser was picked by a bunch of teams, including mine in 2012. Rogers was picked by many in 2012 too, but he was quite an obvious pick that year.

 

[NairoQ]

Well, I didn't even realize Bouhanni was such a 'unknown' rider back then. This can indeed be the way to success, but I still think the tactic is a little bit exaggerated. I think he could've easily let 4-5 low riders out without having to fear he may have left the gamebreaking pick out of his squad. So if i played it that way (don't know enough of young/breakthrough riders to do so anyway) I would at least swap one or two of my big riders for 4-5 cheaper guys to reduce the risk. I highly doubt all five of the big guys can perform as they'd need to. But maybe they don't need to, time will tell. If he has indeed a few cheap riders who score high he might have done really well. It's without doubt more attractive to cheer for the cheaper guys.

 

[greenedge]

Akubra (32 Aussies) and I last year were the only two players to have picked Porte- but neither of us went so well

 

[Skibby the bush kangaroo]

22867 points return for 7498 (~305%)

It is possible to do a bit better:

FROOME Chris 1427 2766
QUINTANA ROJAS Nairo Alexander 707 1634
PORTE Richie 680 1486
ULISSI Diego 567 1132
KWIATKOWSKI Michal 482 995
SPILAK Simon 390 900
SANTAMBROGIO Mauro 344 810
CIOLEK Gerald 242 798
MAJKA Rafal 260 773
WEENING Pieter 160 771
REBELLIN Davide 276 755
COQUARD Bryan 33 742
THOMAS Geraint 181 704
BARDET Romain 250 703
HUSHOVD Thor 76 690
ELMIGER Martin 179 533
IMPEY Daryl 149 498
MARTINEZ Yannick 101 489
DEBUSSCHERE Jens 65 455
ZOIDL Riccardo 103 455
DEHAES Kenny 112 451
ARREDONDO MORENO Julian David 111 446
SANTAROMITA Ivan 83 440
HOFLAND Moreno 115 435
ROUX Anthony 80 427
KANKOVSKY Alois 78 411
ACEVEDO CALLE Janier Alexis 9 405
HERRADA LOPEZ Jesus 80 399
BONGIORNO Francesco Manuel 79 399
MAES Nikolas 72 369
POURSEYEDI GOLAKHOR Mirsamad 0 329
FINETTO Mauro 0 293
POZDNYAKOV Kirill 6 279

Which gives 23172 from a cost of 7497.

I used integer programming optimization to compute that, so it should be pretty close to the true optimum.

 

[mc_mountain]

How about my mistake? I send message with my team with CHAVES Johan Esteban, but i meant CHAVES RUBIO Jhoan Esteban

having now made this correction, your team has jumped into the top 3 of the popularity rankings (scoring 90 'popularity' points for CHAVES RUBIO Jhoan Esteban rather than 1 for CHAVES Johan Esteban).

 

[search]

It is possible to do a bit better:

thanks

POURSEYEDI GOLAKHOR Mirsamad

wasn't a zero pointer though because of returning from a ban. His price was 49 points

 

[EvansIsTheBest]

Ciolek was on an incredibly small number (11 I think) of teams in 2013... for this year I have Senechal, with two other teams. I can easily see him scoring 400 points or so, not enough to break the game open, for me EvansIsTheBest and Reno, but could be pretty good nonetheless. no guarantees of course, but should be a strong performer with Cofidis on the french classics circuit.

I also have to say that Bouhanni is perhaps the best ever pick in this game. who other than the two that picked him could have seen that happening. any other possibilities? so I am glad to have the same near unique french guy as EitB for 2014.

Ciolek was the last guy I took out of my team last year
To be fair, I had advance warning that Bouhanni was very fast from someone from the same hometown so that's the reason I picked him. I unfortunately don't have that kind of knowledge about Sénéchal though Omega Pharma seemed pretty annoyed that he left for Cofidis so they must have been confident in his abilities. Of course that's the team that turned down Sagan so they aren't the most reliable source there is when it comes to youngsters.

I started to look at teams that have all the must-pick riders this year and I'm surprised only 12 teams have all of Contador, Van den Broeck, Boonen and Ewan. Actually, if you add LL Sanchez, Goss and De Gendt (who should all turn a decent profit) to the mix only 5 teams have all 7 riders : The_Hitch, skidmark, mc_mountain, Netserk and myself. If you consider the fact that the three best players in the all time ranking are among those 5 teams (and that Netserk was in the top 10 in 2012) that's some pretty good company

 

[LaFlorecita]

I didn't pick VDB and De Gendt because I don't like them I am not sure De Gendt will be a great pick anyway

 

[Netserk]

Ciolek was the last guy I took out of my team last year
To be fair, I had advance warning that Bouhanni was very fast from someone from the same hometown so that's the reason I picked him. I unfortunately don't have that kind of knowledge about Sénéchal though Omega Pharma seemed pretty annoyed that he left for Cofidis so they must have been confident in his abilities. Of course that's the team that turned down Sagan so they aren't the most reliable source there is when it comes to youngsters.

I started to look at teams that have all the must-pick riders this year and I'm surprised only 12 teams have all of Contador, Van den Broeck, Boonen and Ewan. Actually, if you add LL Sanchez, Goss and De Gendt (who should all turn a decent profit) to the mix only 5 teams have all 7 riders : The_Hitch, skidmark, mc_mountain, Netserk and myself. If you consider the fact that the three best players in the all time ranking are among those 5 teams (and that Netserk was in the top 10 in 2012) that's some pretty good company

I remember before the start of last season, Hugo picked 11 or 12 teams IIRC that seemed most promising. My team was among those teams. I think I ended outside of the top-100

 

[NairoQ]

I don't think it's good I left Ewan out, but calling him a must-pick... That's what I call confidence
How many points do you guys think he'll make? Same question for Contador.

 

[Netserk]

Contador between 1800 and 2400.

 

[LaFlorecita]

I don't think it's good I left Ewan out, but calling him a must-pick... That's what I call confidence
How many points do you guys think he'll make? Same question for Contador.

Ewan 300-400
Contador anywhere from 800 to 2300
Is my opinion

 

[Skibby the bush kangaroo]

thanks

POURSEYEDI GOLAKHOR Mirsamad

wasn't a zero pointer though because of returning from a ban. His price was 49 points

Whoops. Would this team have been kosher?:

FROOME Chris 1427 2766
QUINTANA ROJAS Nairo Alexander 707 1634
PORTE Richie 680 1486
ULISSI Diego 567 1132
KWIATKOWSKI Michal 482 995
SPILAK Simon 390 900
SANTAMBROGIO Mauro 344 810
CIOLEK Gerald 242 798
MAJKA Rafal 260 773
WEENING Pieter 160 771
REBELLIN Davide 276 755
COQUARD Bryan 33 742
THOMAS Geraint 181 704
BARDET Romain 250 703
HUSHOVD Thor 76 690
ELMIGER Martin 179 533
IMPEY Daryl 149 498
MARTINEZ Yannick 101 489
DEBUSSCHERE Jens 65 455
ZOIDL Riccardo 103 455
DEHAES Kenny 112 451
ARREDONDO MORENO Julian David 111 446
SANTAROMITA Ivan 83 440
HOFLAND Moreno 115 435
ROUX Anthony 80 427
KANKOVSKY Alois 78 411
ACEVEDO CALLE Janier Alexis 9 405
HERRADA LOPEZ Jesus 80 399
BONGIORNO Francesco Manuel 79 399
POURSEYEDI GOLAKHOR Mirsamad 49 329
FINETTO Mauro 0 293
POZDNYAKOV Kirill 6 279
REICHENBACH Sebastien 19 277

23080 from 7493.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Contador between 1800 and 2400.

That seems very optimistic to me. There is definitely a chance he'll be just as bad as this year.