Breaking the Code of the Game (BCG) Matrix: The Stars, Question Marks and Dogs of T20 Leagues

This is the second article in the series in my attempt to unravel the mysteries of the T20 cricket. I’ll try and pick up from where I had left in the last article. For your recapitulations and better understandings, you may read the earlier article post once again.

Before I go into the details, I want to draw the attention of my readers to the fact that though these articles take references or use the fantasy league contexts, I believe these are not purely fantasy league articles. The analysis and concepts used here are very much applicable to the larger cricket and IPL landscape.

After all, the off the field fantasy league is a great emulation and replica of what happens on the fields. So the readers who are not playing the fantasy leagues too have a lot to take away from this, the only prerequisite is the love and passion for the sports.

In this article, I will analyse the remaining elements of the BCG matrix which are the ‘Stars’, ‘Question Marks’ and ‘Dogs’ respectively in similar styles as I did in the earlier post.

The Stars:

As defined in the concept framework, these are players who are valued less but extremely effective in their capacities. They are not only the ‘Stars’ in fantasy league context but also real life heroes who would have announced their presence to the cricketing arena with tremendous potentials and talents.

Let us now have a look at those who have emerged out as ‘Stars’ from the recently concluded ICC WT20I:

Below are some of the interesting findings from the above set of players:

1. Almost all of them have made their debuts for their respective national sides before playing the tournament, however, they are yet to become big and well-known names.
2. They are mostly specialists in any one form of skills that is either bowling or batting. Many of them may have potentials to become good all-rounders in future, however, probably because of their lack of experiences, their captains or team management are yet to show full confidence in their all-round skills
3. Their inexperience works both against them and in their favor. Them not getting enough chances as compared to the senior campaigners (or Cash Cows) at times works against them. On the contrary, they enjoy the mysterious ‘X- factors’ because they have not been seen enough or figured out well by their opponents.
4. They may not be as consistent as the ‘Cash Cows’ but do reasonably well with whatever opportunities they get. It is to be seen if they remain as ‘One season wonders’ or go on to become the ‘Superstars’ (read Cash Cows) of the generation.

What to do with the ‘Stars’:

1. In the IPL contexts, many of the successful Indian uncapped players will be labelled as the ‘Stars’. Do not miss to slot them in your team as ‘Free’ subs. These ‘Free Subs’ at the end of the tournament will make a lot of difference. For example, in a fantasy tournament where 85 scheduled subs are allotted for 56 games, one free sub in each game means approx. 40% of total no. of subs (Calculations: 56 free subs, 85 scheduled subs, total allowable subs=56+85, hence, % free subs=(56*100)/(56+85) )
2. As stated earlier, the ‘Stars’ bamboozle their opponents with some of their mystery skills. Many of them are also confidence players, hence, there might be a pattern of their performing exceptionally well in the block of matches. Before they get sized up or figured out, make the most of their dream runs.
3. Because, they are yet to be proved as seasoned and consistent as the ‘Cash Cows’ are, ‘Stars’ are a bit risky bets as your ‘Power Players’.
4. Do not just limit them as ‘Free’ subs, use the stars as buffers and budget cushions to accommodate the ‘Cash Cows’ and enables of team combination.

The probable list for IPL Stars this season could be as below:

The Question Marks:

As explained earlier, The ‘Question Marks’ players are great value picks but yet to be consistent and regular picks ,hence, you cannot totally rely on them to fetch points.

Most of them are decent Indian uncapped players, capped players who are in the reckoning to come back to national side, franchise retained players but in bad form this season, overseas players with a low budget and less experiences etc.

The ‘Question Marks’ Players have all the potential to be the ‘Stars’ if they exploit the chances given to them in the best ways. Let us now have a look at those who have can be classified as ‘Question Marks’ from the recently concluded ICC WT20I:

Some notable characteristics of this set of players are as below:

1. These players are relatively well known but failing to do justice to their talents. Many of them are somewhat experienced but yet to peak in their career.
2. They are inconsistent performers and may often undergo chopping and changing in their respective squads to make way for their peers. This is where they lag behind the ‘Stars’ packs.
3. On their days, these players may show whacky, glittering and eye exploding performances and one may regret not to have them in one’s team.

What to do with the ‘Question Marks’ players:

1. No doubts, you will be in a lot of selection dilemma to deal with these set of players. The positive part is that they are less valued, however, the negative is that they may underperform for matches in a row. The best, hence, would be to pick them as ‘Free Subs’ or to tailor fit your team combinations. They are your not-so-good-performing assets, hence, you may have to keep flushing them on a regular basis.
2. Because of their inconsistencies, many of them would come under axe and may not be part of the playing XIs on a regular basis. If possible, pick some of your favorite ‘Question Marks’ players after getting to know the playing XIs of the day. To be specific, select them after the toss.
3. If you do not find them in the playing XI, replace them with others (Possibly with the ‘Stars’, for example, replace a Hardik Pandya with a KL Rahul, an Amit Mishra with a B Sran etc). Treat them as your ‘Horses for Courses’ players
4. They are very risky bets as Power Players, hence, it’s recommended to NOT take chances with them as Power Players/Captains

The probable list for IPL ‘Question Marks’ this season could be as below:

The Dogs:

Unfortunately, the present day ‘Dogs’ are mostly the past days’ ‘Cash cows’. They are big names and marquee players still getting good bargains mostly because of their legacy, good knowledge of the game, longstanding relationships with their franchises.

Unfortunately, none of these qualities give you points in your fantasy league. Because the cost of acquisition is extremely high, there are chances that the franchises will be forced to phase them out from the market in a season or two.

Let us now have a look at those who can be classified as the ‘Dogs’ from the recently concluded ICC WT20I:

Some notable characteristics of this set of players are as below:

1. Unfortunately, many of them are captains of their respective teams. They cause double whammy for their teams: they cannot be replaced and they potentially obstruct a good reserve bench player to make the cut.
2. They are assumed to play pivotal roles in the teams but their failure may badly jeopardize the team’s combinations and success rates. Presence of many of them in a team would dent their team’s chances to progress in a tournament (For example, India faltered in many occasions in the WT0I in spite of Virat Kohli’s heroics).
3. They do not possess quality all-rounders’ skills (when you are in bad form, you drop catches too) to compensate for their bad forms in any one form (batting or bowling). Darren Sammy is the only genuine all-rounder in the above list.

What to do with the ‘Dogs’ players:

1. Because they are too big names to ignore, they will inevitably be always in the playing XIs, sometimes even as team captains. Though they will misfire more, when they fire they may very well compensate for bad performances. It might be a good idea to give them not just one chance but to select them for a block of matches looking at the schedule (For example, select a Suresh Raina only if his team plays 2-3 matches in a short span).
2. IPL is a long tournament, it is possible that many bad starters would rediscover their forms and good starters would lose their good shape during the highs and lows of the tournament. Because the Dogs are very experienced and almost the regular picks, it is possible that they would take that extra time to settle and come back to some forms.
3. Keep an eye of their touches and nicks and rope them in when they get going. For example, it might not be a bad idea to get a cautious and risk averse Shikhar Dhawan in your team after his couple of run a ball 50’s.
4. If you are good at Murphy’s Law or the Law of averages, you can risk them as your Power Players once in a while but they are NOT recommended as Power Players otherwise. You may remember, “In a game of Boxing, It is not the punches that land, but which don’t, make the pugilists tired and exhausted”. Your continuous persistence with them may cause frustration and exhaustion.
5. You may ignore the overseas ‘Dogs’ almost blindly. They are too costly to be in your teams not only because of their budget but also because of 4-overseas limitations. It will be nothing but a gamble to get the Maxwell’s, Guptill’s and Faulkner’s in your teams. In the IPL list of ‘Dogs’, you will see a long laundry list of overseas big names.

The probable list for IPL ‘Dogs’ this season could be as below:

Note: IPL fantasy player points as shown in the above tables are updated till match 45, KKR Vs RPSG. These are not exhaustive lists of players but indicative.

Conclusion:

Before I conclude writing this, I must reiterate the objective I set out with this (these) article(s). I should say, the fantasy leagues are bit too complex than just conceptualizing these four set of players and follow the recommendations mentioned here.

The Do’s and Don’t’s mentioned here with the Cash Cows, Stars, Question Marks and Dogs may not necessarily guarantee you the top position in your leagues, however, they would certainly open up your thinking process and make you more mature in your decision-making process. One may also note that, as IPL is a marathon league, during the course of 14-16 matches, many players would move from one cell of the matrix to the others.

The judgement and analysis of such movements will indeed be the test of the fantasy players’ cricketing and analytical minds.

In future, there might be advanced models developed, complex simulations designed to decode the game to its core, however, the objective of these articles was to follow a relatively simple and lucid ‘Pareto principle’ of addressing 80% of team selection tricks with 20% equivalent of these simple strategies out of hundred selection dilemmas.

Food for thought:

The historical analysis of my past fantasy games (wherever data is available) says, one may not use more than 60-70 unique players in an approximately 60 match long IPL tournament.

60 unique players from a universe of 200 odd players (8 teams each with approx. 25 members) is just 30% of all in contention. It is not too difficult to map these 60 players in this BCG matrix, is not it? I leave my readers with this thought.

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and they do not necessarily represent the views of Sportskeeda .