Average Age & Games

[Demonland 73,485]

[Chook 15,023]

At least we're in the top 8. I hate being out of contention for the finals of…checks notes…games played and years of existence on planet earth.

[Wrecker46 3,067]

Geelong and West Coast look pretty old 

The two teams with the strongest home ground advantage.

Interesting to see how that plays out.

[daisycutter 29,892]

11 hours ago, Demonland said:

do you know what this is based on? looks to me like the whole list, rather than those who played senior games in 2021.

jeelong definitely looks low.

figures can be a bit misleading without proper context

[durango 2,023]

Is this 2021 or 2022 average age and games of players.

[leave it to deever 17,591]

It's more revealing with the median age.

The thread on players peaking seemed to suggest 25  to 26 was about it.

We have a lot of players at the age of 25  especially in the middle. Oliver( 24), Trac, Gus. Ed. Plus Fritra, Lever and Salem.

We have some key feds and defenders ( our big men) in late  20s which are nicely balanced out by some exciting youngers.

The stats can be misleading like Geelong where they have players around thirty and players towards twenty with not as many mid twenty players like us. 

 

[old55 23,833]

12 hours ago, Demonland said:

There's a pretty high correlation between the two measures in the top 9 which is not surprising and all but St.Kilda and Richmond played finals in 2021 - worrying for St.Kilda, the Tigers can safely reminisce about their flags.

Correlation goes a bit haywire in the bottom 9.  I think intuitively it's better to be placed higher on games accrued than age because it could indicate that you've got more experience into a younger list.  If that's correct then things look surprisingly positive for Hawthorn and Collingwood.  Less so for GWS, Carlton and Essendon, but then two of them did play finals last year so let's say: less so for Carlton.

Therefore it looks least promising for St.Kilda and Carlton to me - no real news there ...

Edited December 8, 2021 by old55

[Wrecker46 3,067]

I wouldn't read much into it. When we were hopeless we bought in players like Vince*, Lamumba and Dawes which would have increased our age profile.

* I love Vince

Players normally get to 100 games if they are good footballers. But some get there cheaply if they play for struggling clubs.

What you really want is your best footballers at around 100 games and a culture to get the younger players heading towards it.

[george_on_the_outer 7,843]

43 minutes ago, Wrecker46 said:

Players normally get to 100 games if they are good footballers. But some get there cheaply if they play for struggling clubs.

What you really want is your best footballers at around 100 games and a culture to get the younger players heading towards it.

Absolutely.

Every year this sort of thing comes out. It is just statistics trying to find a pattern, that doesn’t exist.

@Wrecker46is spot on. You don’t get to play 100 games if you are no good. An ordinary player might get there in a struggling team. And to get to 100 games you have to play for 5 years. 
Success is achieved by having a big group of talent getting to that point together. But without talent they don’t get therein the first place. 
What this does show is the dire state of affairs at Adelaide. Their average player has just over 2 years experience, and that’s with Tex, Talia and Sloane!

What is scary for others is we have just won a Premiership with 8 (9 including Jordon) players under 21.

[Little Goffy 14,750]

Similar thoughts to Wrecker here;

If you've got a 25 year-old with 100 games under their belt, you'll probably get another 5 years and 100 games out of them.

But an 18 year old is maybe a 1/3rd chance of giving you even 100 games at all.

A team that is older on average is just a team that has managed to collect more AFL-level players over recent years. Put another way - it matters that Josh Kennedy is old because he's Josh Kennedy. Nathan Ablett is also pretty old now but you wouldn't be concerned about the impact on your list if he retired!

And as always with all statistics, you've got to break it into the segments if you're going to get any real value out of it.

In this case, you really have to know about the bulges at the ends - if you've got too many kids that will cause problems even if they are talented. If you've got too many 'genuinely older' players you've got risks to endurance, injuries, and retirement suddenly blowing a hole in your team.

[DemonDave 1,096]

Of our list, we've got 17 players with 100 games or more, of which only 3 didn't play in the Grand Final (Tomlinson, Melksham and Dunstan).  So thats 14 out of our 23 in the GF, means they've generally played a fair bit of footy together now.

With Hunt and Fritsch on the cusp they should both pass the 100 game mark next year.

No-one on our list has played 200 games, Melksham on 195 may reach that, Mcdonald on 193 will.

11 guys on our list, including recent draftees, have played 10 games or less.

To me, thats a pretty well balanced list. We would have no real need to top up with experienced players in the next couple of trade periods, unless a lack of depth in any particular area is uncovered.

Source of stats: https://www.footywire.com/afl/footy/tp-melbourne-demons?year=2022&sby=13

 

 

Edited December 9, 2021 by DemonDave

[All the Jacks 99]

On 12/9/2021 at 1:20 AM, Wrecker46 said:

Geelong and West Coast look pretty old 

The two teams with the strongest home ground advantage.

Interesting to see how that plays out.

It was there downfall during finals and round 23 

[Pates 9,674]

It’s obviously tricky to work out out of season by the other interesting one would be the same stats for “best 22”. Would have to imagine Geelong’s average age goes up then, the cliff is coming for them big time. 

I had a chat with a mate who’s a cats fan, discussing the fact of them being up there so long without the reward of a premiership. Didn’t seem to bother him much, he was quite happy just to be up there in the conversation. That home ground advantage is massive for them, I feel it’s papered over some cracks that they have. I just hope the when the cliff comes, it’s that bad that they don’t win at home and the cattery goes to half capacity of fans. (I really hate the cats!)

[—coach— 3,496]

2 hours ago, Pates said:

It’s obviously tricky to work out out of season by the other interesting one would be the same stats for “best 22”. Would have to imagine Geelong’s average age goes up then, the cliff is coming for them big time. 

I had a chat with a mate who’s a cats fan, discussing the fact of them being up there so long without the reward of a premiership. Didn’t seem to bother him much, he was quite happy just to be up there in the conversation. That home ground advantage is massive for them, I feel it’s papered over some cracks that they have. I just hope the when the cliff comes, it’s that bad that they don’t win at home and the cattery goes to half capacity of fans. (I really hate the cats!)

Absolutely it has, on two fronts I reckon: one sided crowd and a playing surface which is around 26m narrower than the MCG. Width makes it much easier for their aging bodies to defend the ground, they have no hope on the width of the G.

[leave it to deever 17,591]

7 hours ago, Pates said:

That home ground advantage is massive for them, I feel it’s papered over some cracks that they have. I just hope the

Couldn't agree more.  Its carried them for a long time. They have also relied on a handful of players ( who are getting long in the tooth)

The no crowd at kardinia I think helped nullify their home advantage but it has been a huge factor in them winning about ten games each year every year. It's a small ground with the crowd up in the umps face. Sick of playing there but round 23 was so sweet. I remember ticking that for a loss trying to ascertain our finish.😁

 

[Sydney_Demon 1,175]

On 12/9/2021 at 6:38 PM, DemonDave said:

Of our list, we've got 17 players with 100 games or more, of which only 3 didn't play in the Grand Final (Tomlinson, Melksham and Dunstan).  So thats 14 out of our 23 in the GF, means they've generally played a fair bit of footy together now.

With Hunt and Fritsch on the cusp they should both pass the 100 game mark next year.

No-one on our list has played 200 games, Melksham on 195 may reach that, Mcdonald on 193 will.

11 guys on our list, including recent draftees, have played 10 games or less.

To me, thats a pretty well balanced list. We would have no real need to top up with experienced players in the next couple of trade periods, unless a lack of depth in any particular area is uncovered.

Source of stats: https://www.footywire.com/afl/footy/tp-melbourne-demons?year=2022&sby=13

 

 

I hope Daniel Turner's listed age of 1 yr 10 months didn't go into the average. Otherwise, our average age is under-reported by about 5 months  

[Jibroni 5,035]

I can see Geelong falling quicker than an avalanche in 2023 and beyond.

[Sydney_Demon 1,175]

1 hour ago, Sydney_Demon said:

I hope Daniel Turner's listed age of 1 yr 10 months didn't go into the average. Otherwise, our average age is under-reported by about 5 months  

Having a look at Geelong's players, they also have one player listed with an age of 1 yr 9 months and 2 players listed with no age whatsoever so maybe their average age is even more understated!

More importantly, we have the same number of players roughly as Geelong with 100+ games experience but their players in that category are nearly all over 30 whereas ours are more typically 25+. Geelong have 11 players over 30 and they're all in their best 23 (maybe with the exception of Shaun Higgins), we have 4 players over 30 but only Michael Hibberd is in our best 23, the others are all back-ups in case of injury.       

[Sydney_Demon 1,175]

On 12/9/2021 at 6:38 PM, DemonDave said:

Of our list, we've got 17 players with 100 games or more, of which only 3 didn't play in the Grand Final (Tomlinson, Melksham and Dunstan).  So thats 14 out of our 23 in the GF, means they've generally played a fair bit of footy together now.

With Hunt and Fritsch on the cusp they should both pass the 100 game mark next year.

No-one on our list has played 200 games, Melksham on 195 may reach that, Mcdonald on 193 will.

11 guys on our list, including recent draftees, have played 10 games or less.

To me, thats a pretty well balanced list. We would have no real need to top up with experienced players in the next couple of trade periods, unless a lack of depth in any particular area is uncovered.

Source of stats: https://www.footywire.com/afl/footy/tp-melbourne-demons?year=2022&sby=13

 

 

Sorry DemonDave. In my earlier response,  I misread your post and assumed that the averages supplied at the start of this topic came from the same source you included as a link. My apologies, you weren't saying that at all. The link you've provided though is far more useful as it gives a distribution of ages/games rather than averages. Thanks for your great analysis. I agree our list is well-balanced.  

[Sydney_Demon 1,175]

On 12/9/2021 at 10:42 AM, old55 said:

There's a pretty high correlation between the two measures in the top 9 which is not surprising and all but St.Kilda and Richmond played finals in 2021 - worrying for St.Kilda, the Tigers can safely reminisce about their flags.

Correlation goes a bit haywire in the bottom 9.  I think intuitively it's better to be placed higher on games accrued than age because it could indicate that you've got more experience into a younger list.  If that's correct then things look surprisingly positive for Hawthorn and Collingwood.  Less so for GWS, Carlton and Essendon, but then two of them did play finals last year so let's say: less so for Carlton.

Therefore it looks least promising for St.Kilda and Carlton to me - no real news there ...

Hello old55. As others have posted, averages tell a fairly limited story, but, rather than look at rankings as an indication of correlation I think we need to look at the actual numbers. I'm surprised at how close the average ages are compared to the average games played. Only 2.4 years difference in ages from top to bottom but a huge difference in average games played of 50. Given the list size of say 46, then each player should play an average of 11 games a year which equates to a difference of 26 games over 2.4 years.

You mention Collingwood. The reality is if their average age was 0.3 higher it would perfectly correlate with their average games played, if Hawthorn's average age was 0.4 higher it would be perfectly correlated, if GWS's average age was 0.3 lower it would be perfectly correlated. I think the differences are so small in ages that the fact they don't correlate perfectly doesn't really indicate anything.

I think a much more important factor is the quality of the list, especially the younger players coming through, having a number of players playing at their peak (25-26yo/100+ games), and a fairly even age distribution with not too many old players past their prime.     

[buck_nekkid 6,068]

We have a good spread of players in our best 22 that have a premiership medallion, too.  Would think it might be the best in the comp come round 1, 2022!