Noticed we are sitting in a similar position to same time last year after 10 rounds 

5-5 with similar percentage 

have we improved? You would have to say yes seeing as our biggest loss before round 10 last year was 45 and this year it was 29, we also have had to go about it with our 2 best players missing, so I think with a little luck get hogan and gawn back we can make a run at September, we have a tough month coming up I would say we will know if we are finals bound after that, pies is a must win game and then see what happens after that.

i would hate to finish the year in 9th and ponder the what ifs over the off season 

im hoping we do a western bulldogs of 2015 after round 10 they were 5-5 then went on a run to make finals, they did lose that final but just want to make it, last final I went to was 1998 when we smashed Adelaide only for them to win the flag 

5-5 with Gawn playing only 2.5 games and Hogan only 4.

We have had no ruckmen.

If that were the case last season, no way we would have been 5-5 after 10 rounds. More like 2-8.

So after round 10 last year we went 5-7 we would have to beat that, 7 wins will almost get 8th with our percentage so 2 wins more than last year should do it easy I reakon 

Vexed question

there might be two questions here:

Have WE improved ?

Has our fortunes improved ?

Yea sorry if it's confusing my wife is in Labour getting ready to push out a new baby dee, so I'm a bit bored thought I would post a new topic with zero sleep so if it's confusing I have a good reason 

We've definitely improved even though we haven't had the rub of the green. 

If Gawn doesn't go down before half-time against Geelong we win and we lost two players before half-time against Richmond, including our number one ruckman that day.   We win those two and we're comfortably in the top 4 with 7 wins. 

We're number 2 in the competition for disposals, 2 for contested possessions, and we're the number 1 pressure side in the AFL.  We've also won the 4th most quarters without our two most important players.  It's not an insignificant stat.  Check previous years and you'll note that the best teams win the most quarters. 

Get Gawn and Hogan back, and in time good form, and if Petracca can really start stepping up then I have no doubt that on our day we'll be capable of beating anybody. 

  On 31/05/2017 at 23:26, ProDee said:

We've definitely improved even though we haven't had the rub of the green. 

If Gawn doesn't go down before half-time against Geelong we win and we lost two players before half-time against Richmond, including our number one ruckman that day.   We win those two and we're comfortably in the top 4 with 7 wins. 

We're number 2 in the competition for disposals, 2 for contested possessions, and we're the number 1 pressure side in the AFL.  We've also won the 4th most quarters without our two most important players.  It's not an insignificant stat.  Check previous years and you'll note that the best teams win the most quarters. 

Get Gawn and Hogan back, and in time good form, and if Petracca can really start stepping up then I have no doubt that on our day we'll be capable of beating anybody. 

You wouldn't think we would be 4th for most quarters won as it feels like we are so inconsistent, but I suppose it's really only 1 quarter that's been killing us 

Improved without a doubt (but some of that I think is taking off the hand-break - i.e - switching from learning-mode to something closer to full-flight). But that we're in the same position as last year suggests our depth isn't quite there yet. I've been critical of some aspects of list management, but there's only so many contingencies you can cover. We're in fantastic stead, but bad luck (not just injuries to key personnel, but the timing and location of those injuries) has been compounded by inexperience - otherwise I imagine we'd be the best traveling team in the league (bar GWS who can lodge their own complaints), and that equals a massive improvement. There is only the slight question over game-plan, because we haven't had much of a chance to see it in action with a full list and better luck/greater experience.

  On 31/05/2017 at 23:35, brendan said:

You wouldn't think we would be 4th for most quarters won as it feels like we are so inconsistent, but I suppose it's really only 1 quarter that's been killing us 

Someone showed me a stat a few days ago. If you take our best 2 quarters and worst 2 quarters from each game and compare the scores as if they were the whole game. You get a side that is 10-0 with 200%+ and a side that is 0-10 with 51%. I'd say that suggest we are as capable of anyone, contender at both a premiership and the top draft pick. It is a frustrating year because it's no longer us being incapable of matching it with the best, its us being incapable to produce more than 1 week in a row...

  On 01/06/2017 at 22:41, ArtificialWisdom said:

Someone showed me a stat a few days ago. If you take our best 2 quarters and worst 2 quarters from each game and compare the scores as if they were the whole game. You get a side that is 10-0 with 200%+ and a side that is 0-10 with 51%. I'd say that suggest we are as capable of anyone, contender at both a premiership and the top draft pick. It is a frustrating year because it's no longer us being incapable of matching it with the best, its us being incapable to produce more than 1 week in a row...

But conversely we also could be the worst side with no wins and 51%.Most of the damage is being done in the first quarters

We must find a way of fixing that fast or will finish worse than last year

We've definitely improved. With a few tweaks of luck this year we would be top 3. The same could not be said of the same time last year, despite the same win-loss. Which makes the year to this point enormously frustrating. All things staying on our side of the luck ledger for the second half, and the results will start to match our true abilities. 

By this stage last year we lost to a VFL side, St Kilda wiped us off the floor at Etihad and we were never in the contest against the Dogs (as opposed to this year where we've lead or been even in almost every last qtr). Our percentage flattered us as we had a cheap win over a depleted Gold Coast (75 points) and a hopeless Brisbane (60 points). Our crowning achievement was beating GWS in round 1.

The only significant negative this year are our MCG losses to Freo, Hawthorn and North.

We have improved to this stage, but we need to better our 5-7 run home of last year.

Having said that I think we actually played some solid 4 quarter games in the first half of 2016 against teams such as Collingwood and Richmond. We can't say the same about this year.

 

  On 01/06/2017 at 22:52, jackaub said:

But conversely we also could be the worst side with no wins and 51% .most of the damage is beomg done in thr first quarters

We must find a way of fixing that fast or will finish worse than last year

Compared to top of the table Adelaide:
Good 2 quarters: 10-0   234.35%
Bad 2 quarters:    5-5    86.9% (fun fact: that is better than freos actual percentage)

While their best is slightly better than ours, as you would expect for the side sitting on top, its their worst makes up all the difference. We need to drag our worst way up. Our best is pretty damn close now.

Our dilemma  reminds me of a person on a treadmill.. Its moving at X and person atop is running at X... result...standing still ( effectively ).. 

Person gets better and starts upping to Y....only to have the treadmill similarly increase demands to Y...net result.... no change

Which metric do we go by to describe our situation ?  we are better...yet no further advanced !! 

Average losing margin in 5 losses = 12.2 points. Average winning margin in wins = 33.8 points. Definitely better.

Whilst we haven't put 4 qtrs together regularly enough (and I discount the Geelong, Richmond games where key injuries early killed us late in those games), my take is we've had 1 horrendous qtr vs Freo, 1st qtr v. North not turned on (plus TMac fwd not a good move early) and similar story with Hawthorn. But these poor starts + 3Q Freo haven't diminished our belief we can come back, and the fact we score heavily (who'd have thought this in 2013) adds fuel to the belief. 

I'd like to revisit this thread after the 3x 6 day breaks, this will tell us a bit about our selection strategies (I felt we didnt make enough changes last year in a similar situation) and depth.

  On 01/06/2017 at 23:59, small but forward said:

Average losing margin in 5 losses = 12.2 points. Average winning margin in wins = 33.8 points. Definitely better.

Whilst we haven't put 4 qtrs together regularly enough (and I discount the Geelong, Richmond games where key injuries early killed us late in those games), my take is we've had 1 horrendous qtr vs Freo, 1st qtr v. North not turned on (plus TMac fwd not a good move early) and similar story with Hawthorn. But these poor starts + 3Q Freo haven't diminished our belief we can come back, and the fact we score heavily (who'd have thought this in 2013) adds fuel to the belief. 

I'd like to revisit this thread after the 3x 6 day breaks, this will tell us a bit about our selection strategies (I felt we didnt make enough changes last year in a similar situation) and depth.

In reality...and I agree with your points , we'll only know at the end of the h/a

IMO it isn't even an argument we have improved greatly. The gap between our best and worst is significantly less. Our kids are standing up as leaders. We have been in every game and whilst lapses in those losses have cost us dearly we have continued to fight which in past years we hadn't.

Contested possession has improved 

Ball movement has improved but still needs work 

Forward pressure greatly improved 

Our clearance work has improved even without Max for most of the season

I think the lessons learned and development in the first half of this year will be seen in 2018 and beyond 

  On 31/05/2017 at 22:56, brendan said:

Noticed we are sitting in a similar position to same time last year after 10 rounds 

5-5 with similar percentage 

have we improved? You would have to say yes seeing as our biggest loss before round 10 last year was 45 and this year it was 29, we also have had to go about it with our 2 best players missing, so I think with a little luck get hogan and gawn back we can make a run at September, we have a tough month coming up I would say we will know if we are finals bound after that, pies is a must win game and then see what happens after that.

i would hate to finish the year in 9th and ponder the what ifs over the off season 

im hoping we do a western bulldogs of 2015 after round 10 they were 5-5 then went on a run to make finals, they did lose that final but just want to make it, last final I went to was 1998 when we smashed Adelaide only for them to win the flag 

Absolutely, if we were without a ruckman last season our kids would have struggled big time. We are now a good side that shows periods of brilliance. Last year we were workmanlike and prone to periods of inconsistency. Improvement from here is really about consistency and overcoming adversity to be able to close out games when the odds are against us.