MUT22 - No Money Spent (Madden Ultimate Team)

[SirFozzie]

Cool stuff. I'll ahve to do this with MLB the show 22.

[QuikSand]

Glad you have enjoyed... doesn't seem to me like this would be very fun to read, but if it vaguely exposes another facet of the game that surely some of us play, I'm ok with that.

[QuikSand]

I'm back approaching 2M coins now, with rather little available to do for my CLE team. I have been spinning the component LT Joe Thomas cards into his set and selling them at a profit, it just continues to print if you're a little bit patient and well informed.

[QuikSand]

Five new Veterans cards today… they’re current players who have played on multiple teams and they can, even without the Power Up version, get chemistry with any of those teams. Browns struck out.

[QuikSand]

..oops my mistake. Apparently TE Darren Fells played a season in Cleveland, so his 91 card coming will have CLE chemistry. Wow, how about that, that will be a very nice addition.

[QuikSand]

Rumor is that this Friday will be Team Standouts, another wave of affinity-based content for theme teams, with a new set for each franchise to build a high-end player. If so, likely a big wave of new players who will be a major effect. Hard to tell what the market will do, I'm likely to be cash heavy... I may stock up on decent players from the Browns, including Josh Cribbs, on the assumption they will be part of the set for the new bigshot CLE guy.

For Cleveland... strong candidates for the big new historical player could be: any of several QB (Otto Graham, Bernie Kosar, Brian Sipe), RB Jim Brown (would be a waste), CB Frank Minnifield or Hanford Dixon, S Thom Darden, LB Clay Mathews, D'Qwell Jackson, or Chip Banks, DT Michael Dean Perry, and plenty others.

[QuikSand]

Word coming out that tomorrow's release is a second wave of Team Builders, and the disappointing news is they will only be rated 88, which makes them fill-ins for those of us running theme teams that have big gaps. The Browns will get an 88 Baker Mayfield on offense - a card I would have welcomed a week ago but is now useless to me since I have the Mariota goof card. They'll release an 88 defensive player tomorrow... I'll hope for a "somewhat useful" guy at a position of desperate need, like a DT Malik McDowell.

[QuikSand]

Today a new Limited Edition card of LT Terron Armstead is out… and I expect that’s the end of the fun and games getting people to overpay for the 92 Joe Thomas. Now there’s a clearly better LT for all the god squad types out there who must max it all out. Had a good run with that set.

[QuikSand]

Dolphins get 88 MLB Jerome Baker and RG Robert Hunt, the latter VERY much needed for the theme team.

[QuikSand]

Browns get 88 MLB Anthony Walker. Okay. Still an utter wasteland at DT but okay.

[QuikSand]

Market might be crashing as I type… suddenly seeing lots of cards priced around 15-16 gold/training when that was hard to find the last few days. Trying not to overreact and get broke on the way down.

[QuikSand]

So, definite crash yesterday afternoon into evening… the a minor bounce back… then seems like a selective crash today upon release of the big wave of new set cards. Training price dropped from around 19 early Thursday… to maybe 16 Thursday night… crept to 18? this morning… and now I don’t think I’d buy above 15.

More to come…

[QuikSand]

So, what happened today seems awfully predictable in retrospect. They release 64 new cards all rated 88, and all obtainable by completing a set of lower rated cards. We even got a screenshot yesterday of what does that look like… So it was pretty straightforward to know what cards would be the components needed for these sets. Turns out it was 1x 85-86, 3x 83-84, and 4x 80-82.

The central card here is the 83. You need three for the set. Lots of people are going to want to do those sets. They’ll need lots of 83 cards.

I had accumulated “a lot” of each of these cards over recent weeks. I had been buying 83 cards for under 7,000 coins.

Last night I opened up the market w my son, and we looked at the 83s… 7,500 … 7,800 … I held firm to my buy price of 7,000 and grabbed a few but declined to go whole hog.

…

And now today… the sets are out, the market is crazy. These new 88 cards are reliably selling for around 90-100k, mainly because the demand for 83s has inflated their price to around 14k each.

So.. cool that I built these sets 11 times and am on my way to selling them off at a nice profit. But when I sat there I easily could have bought, say, another 60 copies of those 83 cards for 400-450K and I’d probably be selling off another 20 of these 88s at a genuine profit of 25k each.

Anyway… I made a good hit out of a potentially great one. Sitting on about 2.6m, a new high for me, with a few more pieces outstanding to sell, so I’ll approach 3m. Not bad. More guts and I’d have cleared an extra million, maybe.

[QuikSand]

Unexpected good news for my Browns theme team... the defensive player in tomorrow's two-player Legends drop is RE Willie McGinest, who played for the Browns a while after his NE time wrapped up. I have been itching for DL help... he's not really thicc enough to drop in as a DT, but it should give me another good piece to play around with. The 92-rated Myles Garrett still costs over 600K, so this guy coming along - maybe with a 92 card costing me more like 275K? - is awfully welcome.

And it gives me stuff to think about- how to juggle these guys, where to slot everyone, etc. The theme team doesn't account for very much imagination, so I'll take it where I can get it.

[QuikSand]

3.3m heading into the weekend

[QuikSand]

McGinest cards might be in high demand, by initial prices. Speed kills and he’s fast for a DE.

[QuikSand]

Spent down to 2.4m, mostly buying components to build 12x sets of 88 Tesm Builders… trying to sell at 15-20k profit each.

McGinest will have to wait but he may drive down the price on DE Garrett…

[QuikSand]

So I have the McGinest power up card revved to 91, and that’s good enough to start him at RE ahead of Garrett who moves inside to DT. Working on the McG set for profit and hopefully a 93 to keep and use.

[QuikSand]

The high end cards for WMcG are still in short supply so by being patient and diligent I’ve assembled his 93 card once and sold it for about 60k profit. Have a second one up for 616k now, which would clear around 50k if it sells.

I’m not wealthy enough to just keep those cards and bump my 91 to a 94 but will get there in time. He looks very good fully powered up.

[QuikSand]

Decided to take the plunge and max out Willie McG, still could sell back that 93 card if the market blows up, but i got good deals on the components to build the set for my third time and decided to stand pat.

Have been splashing around trying to buy low on some of the cards I'd want if I were to build out my Dolphins theme team. Several in hand and back on the block... i'm fine just flipping them, but also potentially okay if I "get stuck" with guys I need anyway for that other roster.

My plan had been to finish the challenges for the 92 Jaelen Phillips LOLB card, and start with the Miami team then. Fast forward through some insomnia, and voila I'm there ahead of plan. Brick by brick, the Dolphins' best roster will require a LOT of training, and several medium-price cards -- 90 or 91 guys including SS Eric Rowe, LB Robert Quinn, LB Kyle Van Noy, DE Ndamukong Suh, TE Mike Geisicki, and LY Laremy Tunsil. I'm inching my way there, and will then debate plunging in fully on WR Brandon Marshall to round out the roster, more or less.

[QuikSand]

BRING ME THE DENZEL WARD TEAM OF THE WEEK CARD

[QuikSand]

So, I'm making a play on the 92 WR Miles Austin set from Week 5's TOTW release. He remains popular - basically the same logic as what got me after Andre Rison: WR is a premiere position, Austin is 6'2" and pretty fast, he played for three popular franchises (DAL, CLE, PHI) -- and so instead of "training value" of around 200K, his card is routinely selling above 300K.

The set for him is part of the reason why... it's 12 total cards, including 3x of the 88 Marquise Brown which is itself important for a Ravens theme team, and is a pretty good (fast) card regardless. So, that card is selling at well over its training value, also, and it in fairly short supply. The 85 Ekeler card (you need 4x for the Austin set) is also useful for those at that level.

Anyway... I have been speculating a lot with the 88 Brown, but right now I am buying up both Brown and Ekeler cards with an eye toward a combined squeeze play: limit the supply of them and try to sell mine at a premium... and simultaneously build copies of the Austin card to try to sell them at high prices fueled by the shortage of the component parts which I am basically creating myself.

It's risky, a bit... but can be profitable if I'm reading the thin supply correctly.

[QuikSand]

...plus, it's just a matter of time before these afterthought TOTW cards gain life again as the things you need to build the new Team Standouts sets, or whatever is the next franchise-based roll-out. Could come in a week or two, and sitting on a ton of otherwise mostly useless TOTW cards will pay off when suddenly everyone's out there tryna get the new bigshot 93 card for their theme team, etc.

[QuikSand]

at this very moment, on XBox, there are:

88 Brown
71,000
72,100
77,999 (me)
88,888 (me)
88,888 (me)

85 Ekeler
24,250
25,000 (me)
26,600 (me)

...so I have bought up all the copies at reasonable prices (<60 and <20) and if you want to buy you almost have to buy from me. A patient market would wait it out and find a better time to buy, but... well, I'm hoping the market is impatient and fueled by the fact that the cheapest 92 Austin card is for sale at 344,000 right now, and these are the missing pieces for them to complete their set and sell their copy for a big price.

[QuikSand]

Originally Posted by QuikSand

BRING ME THE DENZEL WARD TEAM OF THE WEEK CARD

The top card for the week belongs to LB Josh Allen, who was a nightmare for QB Josh Allen. Cool, cool.

One of the historic TOTW guys, though, is a 93 rated RB Willis McGahee, who oddly enough rounded out a nice career with a stinker quarter season in Cleveland. So, we could go get him, perhaps - there will be a set to build him, he'll need a power-up to get CLE chem. But honestly, RB is on the short list of positions we really did not need.

Hard to complain, but... meh.

[QuikSand]

Market seems settled around a training price of 15, easy to remember and calculate. So, frex, a 90 rated player quicksells for 5,000 training… so if he has no other real value, I should be open to buying around 75,000 gold, knowing that I’m at least getting a good deal on the training units.

That ratio was more or less 20 for quite some time, so I’ll be mentally readjusting.

[QuikSand]

CB Troy Hill got an 82 card in the TOTW batch this week, I’ll take it he’s on the field as my CB4. Hoping this points to a big Denzel Ward forthcoming.

But ohhhhhh very exciting, while I was distracted they’ve put out a 91 Rising Stars card for my Browns CB Greedy Williams. Bingo! And I think I can get him free after doing some challenges today. Awesome addition!

[QuikSand]

Big upcoming series announced, “Harvest.” Waves of new players.

Of most interest to me: a LTD 95 SS Jabril Peppers. I typically don’t spend to buy the limited edition cards but maybe this is an exception.

DE Ogbah getting a 92, he’s a double benefit for both Browns and Dolphins teams.

Should be lively.

[QuikSand]

I’ve built and sold the 93 Willis Mcgahee set four or five times now, it’s been mildly profitable (buy pieces for around 290K, sell the results for 380K, clear maybe 40-50k each time. Eventually I’ll just power him up and install him as our HB1 and ball out.

[QuikSand]

Mini spending spree here… bought the 95 Peppers for 403K (in hopes that’s close to the floor amidst the first rush of supply), and the max Redux DE Garrett for 400K. Down around 1.5m, but this defense could get exciting with Peppers as my user-controlled player dropped down to play MLB.

[QuikSand]

95 Peppers now selling at ~500K, wish I’d had the conviction to buy 4 of them when it was at 400. Dang.

[QuikSand]

Yesterday was an unexciting Legends release, but the market dropped down... as always the "training price" is the simplest measure, and it got to untested waters for much of the day, down near 12. Online trackers put it back to about 14 today, so it was partially a dip, but still if they say 13.76 then a "good deal" is maybe 13 even... do I want to keep from attaching to the 15 number as a mental barrier.

91 card is worth 7,000 training, so good price now would be around 90K
89 card is worth 3,150 training, so good price now would be around 38K

I was tied up during most of the crazy period yesterday, but managed to sneak some cheap pieces for the DE Willie McGinest set. Am sitting on more cards than I'd like had I know there would be a 10-15% price correction. So it goes.

[QuikSand]

So, with the 95 Jabril Peppers card, I’m upside down but it might work out. The in-demand limited editions tend to rise in price after they’re no longer being supplied to the market. I got mine at what felt like a low point of 400k, then lamented here when the card was selling at 500k a few hours later.

Anyway, it calmed down, and when it gradually got back to 400 I bought two more copies… planning to hold for a week or two and sell somewhere higher. But the card bottomed out around 330K, and that’s been grating on me. No point is writing an expurgated version of the story, so there it is… I messed up. It’s back up to 360k now, and the card is no longer available in packs, so… maybe I’ll end up clearing some coins. But not even close to the max.

Alas. Can’t win them all.

[QuikSand]

Spent down to around 200k in coins. Just on…trash. 30k cards I wanna flip to 45k, Darius Slay on spec he gets a big TOTW card tomorrow… pieces of the McGahee set… idano.

Dumb, probably.

[QuikSand]

Back up over 800 K in cash… Training price continues to cover around 13, so this looks like where the market is now… I have been bringing down my hope for price on various cards I own, and listing a bit lower here and there.

The most interesting development in the team of the week is that offensive lineman Robert Hunt from the dolphins, mini viral for his heroic near touchdown reception on Thursday night, was granted a fullback card, which is pretty cool.

[QuikSand]

This week, the TOTW cards bumped up by one point. So, the main card of interest today will be a 90, rather than the 89 it has been for the last few weeks. These have been the cards that drop and get very inexpensive for a day or so, offering a real money making opportunity… Or at least an opportunity to buy low for later resale at a profit. The current market price for a 90 rated card is around 70 K, maybe 60 K if you are lucky. I am not sure what the cards released today will sell for…, But it is possible that I will be angry I have so few coins available to invest in them… If there are a zillion 90 rated cards out there, independent of the player, I might be frustrated if they are selling for 52,000 coins and I can only buy 10-15 of them.

[QuikSand]

TOTW just dropped. Super messy. I have bought 90-rated cards (WR Lamb, LB Reddick) for 62, 60, and 50K... have seen them going even cheaper, it's just a race to click BUY first. Yikes.

The desire for these cards is motivated by not only themselves (90 is a playable card for most of us) but also that you need 3x of them to build the set for the new big deal cards that just dropped, including a 94 Mahomes that looks like it might become the new default meta QB to use. So, these should stay in fashion for a while. Buying all I can at good prices.

[QuikSand]

So, with what cash I have, I'm just maxing out the copies of CeeDee Lamb that I can get for 55K or less, and listing them immediately for 69,999 (nice). Flipping for profit within an hour of 8-10K each is nice, if it works out.

[QuikSand]

ok, 13 copies of CeeDee bought for
63.6
60.6
53.0
51.1
53.1
60.3
60.0
59.6
59.3
55.0
54.1
47.3
49.9
...and I'm nearly broke. Have 7x up for sale for 70K, and at some point I'm hoping they are in the going, going, gone stage and look attractive to some under-prepared buyers.

Otherwise, I may be looking for training re-rolls, where you quicksell cheap cards for training, use the training currency to buy packs, and hopefully get higher value in the pack contents than what you spent to get them.

Regardless, each card is worth 5,000 training, so even 60K is 12 coins per training, a pretty good deal right now, even after a recent market drop.

[QuikSand]

My first six posted at 69,999 all sold, go figure. Have another batch up for sale.

Market down around 12 now, I’m guessing it’s temporary…

[QuikSand]

So I’m back up to a bit over 1.5m in cash, the second wave of Harvest cards dropped today, and Legends tomorrow should make for another buying opportunity.

Market kept wilting all week, now down around 11, maybe going lower.

[QuikSand]

With the market particularly week, and cards fairly cheap, I started acquiring some of the pieces for a dolphins theme team. I powered up a few of their players as well. It is, I will confess, deeply uninspiring to do this. Especially, when I know that my best play for quarterback will still be Marcus Mariota, and my best play for running back without a massive investment will still be Marshawn Lynch. That’s going to make this team feeling awful lot like the Browns team, so what is really the point?

I think my life would be better served if I cut by 2/3 the amount of my attention I spend on this.

[QuikSand]

So, the 5 day xgiving weekend is the “Blitz” promo, arguably the biggest of the year. Last year it saw a drop in the market from about 13/training to around 8. The same effect here would drop prices from 10-11 to maybe… 6-7?

I’ve resold my Dolphins and hopefully have just set that aside for good. I’ve sold off lots of other cards to get up around 2.3m in coins, liquid is where you want to be if the Market crashes.

There’s hope for my 2x Peppers cards bought at 400 each. While they dipped around 330, they’re back around 400 now and I might get out soon with only modest losses.

We’ll see. The weekend could be nuts if it’s like last year.

[QuikSand]

�� Bo Knows Legends ��

Bruce Smith ��https://t.co/mDlMzs7u0D

Everson Walls ��https://t.co/5nPmOIA6LU

Charle Young ��https://t.co/sUVTjrEaWZ

Dan Dierdorf ��https://t.co/wIfXvnmmU1 pic.twitter.com/fcu9iCWKUY

— MUT.GG (@MUTdotGG) November 22, 2021

Okay, a whole new wave of players, apparently, attached to this "Bo Knows" promo. We knew there was a slow-rolled build toward a big Bo Jackson card, apparently maybe also some big players who were contemporaries of his.

Everson Walls not known as a Cleveland Brown, but he did tack on a couple late years there so his Power Up card will be eligible. We're getting (over)stacked at DB now. Really need a true DT.

[QuikSand]

Training down to 10, 9 if you’re patient and selective.

Crash comin’.

3.3m coins, I’m ready.

[QuikSand]

Market is hanging around 10, all signs continue to point toward a massive realignment later this week… The slow crawl in that direction should be an indication of people like me selling off what they can while the prices are still reasonable. I am up to an all-time high of 3.7 million coins, and don’t really have much else to sell at this point without meaningfully disrupting my roster.

[QuikSand]

So, there is a quirky thing happening right now in the market. They released this new set of cards Monday, centered on bo Jackson, called “bo knows.” For the new players released, each rated 94, you can complete a set of 30 copies of the 85 rated cards to get one of the 94s, plus his power up card. The problem is, there are so many 85 rated cards out there, but the market is completely flooded… There are well more than 100 copies of each of them available. Because the auction viewer can only show 100 at a time, it defaults to showing the 100 most recent… I do not know of any way to access newly introduced cards, that might be a good prices. It is weird.


(please forgive audio typos)

[QuikSand]

Blitz program starts 8pm tonight, I’m cash heavy and ready.

I know the big CB Everson Walks is out there, we could use an OLB as well. Maybe a boost at RG Wyatt Teller? TE Austin Hooper? Toss us a couple of random guys who wandered through Cleveland over the years?

[QuikSand]

Only small pieces of the Blitz program are active now, but some cards are now selling at a training price under 8. Looks like it’s happening.

[QuikSand]

Market seems to have settled at around 7. A 94 rated card (19,000 training) that went for nearly 400K a couple weeks ago… now with some patience maybe as low as 130K.

Last year these prices lasted a few days then the market rallied back up and sat around maybe 10-12 for a couple of months. So, even if I’m not in love with the cards in deep supply now, i think I do plan to spend down even if just as an investment in cheap training or later sell-offs.