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Great post. Some reflections on it: How a midfield is defined is a semantic exercise to a degree. But i think its a stretch to include the wingers given it is such a specialist position and don't really get involved at center clearances and around the ground stoppages - other than being an outlet distributor option. For example in your list above Sidebottom, Hunter and Langdon didn't attend any centre bounces all season (Sidebottom might have attended 2 or 3). Josh Daicos was also a winger (an AA winger at that) and only attended centre bounces when his brother went out of the team. You'll get no argument from me that Sidebottom and Josh Daicos are better kicks than Hunter and Langdon and were more impactful this year. You left out arguably their best mid, Taylor Adams, who attended 40% of all the Pies centre bounces over the season. Adams only averaged 52% by foot, which is in part a function of being an extractor and often kicking under pressure (something that makes Mitchell's 60% by foot super impressive given he is also an extractor). If you take out Sidebottom and Josh Daicos and add Adams the pies KE average goes down. I would add that of the Pies players you list Nick Daicos played more than half the season at half back flank and Pendlebury also spent large periods behind the ball, as did Crisp, which is a big factor in why their DE is so good (more time and space). And you included Max Gawn and Darcy Cameron's as mids. Rucks are not usually considered midfielders, but of course are part of the midfield, so for the sake of this exercise lets include them So, if you don't include Sidebottom, Josh Daicos, Hunter and Langdon, but DO include Cameron and Gawn, using your metric of including rucks and utilities who roll through the middle as midfielders: The Pies seven mids are: Cameron, Daicos, DeGoey, Pendles, Mitchell, Adams and Crisp (7 AA selections, with pendles having 6 of them) The equivalent seven mids for the dees are: Gawn, Petracca, Oliver, Viney, Brayshaw, Sparrow, and for the sake of argument James Jordon (12 AA selections) I 100% agree the Pies seven are better kicks over all than our seven mids. And i also 100% agree we need to bring in a quality distributor with elite kicking skills and one or two utilities of Bailey and Mcluggage's ilk who can kick goals and reliably hit targets by foot. I have said as much in several posts of late, including this post in the What's needed in 2024 thread. In fact I've been banging on about this ever since i started posting on DL 10 plus years ago. For example, i was strongly in favor of taking Kelly rather than trading pick 3 out and ending up with Salem, Hunt and Tyson instead. And for the same reason i was against trading Watts out. But kicking efficiency is of course only one metric to determine the relative strength of midfields. And arguably not a particularly useful one. From the 14 players listed above the top four for average: center clearances per game are (in order): Oliver, Viney, Petraca and Pendles stoppage clearances per game: Oliver, Petracca, Mitchell and Gawn contested possessions per game: Oliver, Petracca, Viney and Gawn metres gained per game: Tracc, Daicos, Oliver and Crisp (nb: Daicos' numbers are inflated by the fact he takes most of their kick outs) score involvements per game: Tracc, Daicos, Oliver and Adams goal assists per game: Adams, Tracc, Pendles, Viney goals per game are: Tracc, Daicos, Adams, Sparrow Perhaps of most value in terms of determining who has the better midfield is the AFL player ratings, a metric that the industry apparently values very highly. The top 4 rated players from the 14 listed above are (in order): Tracc, Oliver, Daicos and Gawn. The upshot of all that is i don't think the numbers support the assertion Collingwood’s midfield is/was better than ours this year.

"We're better than them" "Play out brand, we've got them covered" "We know we're a better side" is the exact sort of messaging that would be used internally in every single game they go out to play. In the week leading up to it, pre game, during quarter breaks, the works. Calling it immature, arrogant or spoilt shows an enormous lack of understanding about the psychology required to will yourself to contest after contest, and how important trusting your teammates to best their opponents is. Without that mindset, you're on a hiding to nothing, and every contest becomes about luck because you're not there utterly convinced that you can beat your man. He never once made an excuse in saying what he said. It was almost the exact opposite - that it was hard and he hating watching the Pies go on and win the flag because he knows we're better. That's an admission of failure that's now burning, not an excuse.

Broke out in hives, had difficulty breathing with severe nausea, vomiting and diarrhoea. Apparently an anaphylactic reaction to a Collingwood premiership.

This is the problem with statistics - they mean nothing if you don't know what you're measuring and why/if it's important. The kicking efficiency stat is practically worthless, IMHO, because of what is measures and how it assumes all situations where you kick the ball are the same. Kicking efficiency is just whether or not a kick finds a team mate or if the kick goes to a contest 40+ metres away. So James Harmes' diagonal kick from the stoppage to Fritsch inside 50 midway through the 3rd quarter of the 2021 GF is judged as being exactly the same as a 40m backwards to a contest between Spargo and Tom Lynch 10m from your own defensive goal. Both kicks = effective. Also a centering kick over your shoulder to the top of the square is only effective if you kicked the ball over 40m, even if you intended it and it is 100% the right kick to do - and a chip backwards to an open player 15m away in defence is effective. If you look at the top 10 players in disposal efficiency (minimum 10 games) all of them are defenders. Same with the top 20, and 30, and 40 and 50 ...... THE TOP 50 PLAYERS IN DISPOSAL EFFICIENCY IN 2023 ARE ALL DEFENDERS!!!! What are the chances of the top 50 kicks in the league playing in the backline? It goes further .... of the top 100 in disposal efficiency, 95 of them are defenders. The exceptions were Jackson Macrae, Jaspa Fletcher, Matt Johnson, Sam Petrevski-Seton and Eddie Ford. If you look at that, disposal efficiency is far more a function of where you play and the situation you play in than it is of your ability to kick the football. This is the only real information that you can take from the Collingwood vs Melbourne kicking efficiency statistic: that the two teams play differently and put their midfielders into different situations than each other. I'd recommend this excellent article about kicking statistics if you want more information on what good kicking is and how bad kicking/disposal efficiency is as a statistic: How defining what makes a good kick in the AFL is always up for debate - ABC News

I know nothing.

i thought it was bloody brilliant and turned me from miserable to fired up for next year. that unfiltered passion will sign up new members

Schultz wants to come home because he’s desperately home sick. He’s also demanding to play for Collingwood. So which is it? Is he home sick or does he want to play for Collingwood? (Welcome to the modern day player)

3 first round picks for pick 4 is a high price to pay. Proven guns at the start of their career or in their prime are getting 2 1st rounders and streak knive picks/players

Mods! Milhouse is smoking!

Pick 5 for 31-year-old Tommy 'Moonboot' Lynch? Crazy talk

He's an upgrade on Ginnivan, Elliot is aging. Makes complete sense.

Very disappointed to hear of a good player going to the Pies. Freo really are a hot mess. What is the go with Sean Darcy? He could be a great replacement for Gawn long term.

Not ALL duck, but some duck.

I know this is a rumour thread but sorry I have to address the midfield talk. I love the input both binman and his pa put into this forum and yes we have a very good midfield and yes you could argue that our best four our the best. But I for one don’t just look at four players as a midfield and for me when you include the wings and some rotations our midfield is not the best. Collingwood’s midfield is / was better than ours this year, their disposal efficiency in particular is much better than ours and they have a better balance and have smarter players than ours. Coll Disp Eff Kick Eff Hand B Eff ND 75.1 69.2 81.5 JDG 71.1 61.1 81.6 SP 73.6 68.5 79.3 JC 71.5 61.9 82.4 JD 71.2 64.6 79.5 DC 67.5 53.2 85.5 TM 72.9 60.8 80.5 SS 67.1 61.1 76.9 Av 71.25 62.55 80.9 Melb CP 66.8 55 78.8 CO 67.2 52.2 817 MG 61.6 50.9 78.5 JV 61 49.5 73 AB 73.4 66 81 TS 70.1 58.7 83.5 EL 72.2 63.2 83.5 LH 66.4 56.5 79.6 Av 67.34 56.51 79.95 Our midfielders kicking is miles off that of Collingwood’s, six out of eight of their core midfield group average over 60% we have two and JV didn’t even average 50% Our midfield is very good but it needs improving from both personal and coaching to maximise our strengths

Dees fans, even those who think they were ill advised or plain wrong, should double down and really lean into maysie's comments. Add a dash of conspiracy - 'I've heard from a reliable source that Gill was obsessed with finishing his career as CEO with 100k plus crowd at the gf and put pressure on the tribunal to get Maynard off - the flag has a huge astrisk' Tell them the blues were a better team. Make some other merde up. Collectively troll the hell out of pies' fans. Psy ops.

Is he even aware that he's changed teams?

Bloody good get by Collingwood. Schultz is a gun. Just the sort of player we need.

Negotiation tactics. He’ll sign an extension with the cats.

Excellent point we beat ourselves up about how poor our disposal efficiency is from Trac Oliver etc but that ignores the pressure they are under

Interesting stats @ANG13. They make sense with the respective game styles. We play 1-short at the stoppage so there is less opportunity for us to find a free man when we have the ball and more opportunity for the opposition to find a free man when they have the ball. The extra time and space allowing for more efficient disposal.

Are we being harsh on him? He went from what 2 games as sub to 24 games. He was always bound to run out of gas. Much like Roo.

i'll be surprised if we do

Isn’t he the guy that when Jesse announced he was off to GWS, said: “Hooooooogaaannn!!”

Farm stuff.

Kate Roffey called on dees fans to get louder and MORE obnoxious 'like Collngwood fans'. To be honest, i'm not convinced we need more obnoxiousness at the footy, but i get what she was saying. Maysie was merely doing what the prez asked!

His speech has triggered so many pies fans wow wee. They’ve become soft… I loved it

Poor old Taylor Adams Who remembers 2017 when he said Lynden Dunn hadn't been part of a successful club? I guess Taylor has now been part of a "successful club". He just played no part in their ultimate success. Good luck at the Swans bozo

Long live Steven May, how refreshing to hear stuff like that. Absolutely loved it.

Frankly, I’m surprised that any Dees fan would have an issue with this. He admitted he’d had more to drink than he would’ve had he known he’d be interviewed. We all want honesty, right? Not the tired, worn-out clichés. We got that. It was in the presence of the faithful at our own B&F. A gag-free environment, as it should be. Maysie believes we’re better than Collingwood. That’s HIS opinion and he’s more than entitled to express it. And finally, who gives a fat rat’s what *Collingwood thinks??? *A team that harbours malicious thugs and filthy sex offenders and had a cheer squad run by a registered child sex offender on their watch. You really value their take on what Maysie said?

I have a feeling we will go hard at the draft this year and I would be comfortable with us trading a first round pick next year to give us three top 15-20 picks this year. I wonder if GC will be happy to swap pick 4 & 5 if we give them an extra pick? Will we package up a few picks to pry pick 7 from Geelong? Can we also get a hold of a pick around 15-20 using our future first? Imagine we end up with: Pick 4 (likely pick 6) - take your pick from McKercher/Duursma/Sanders Pick 7 (likely pick 9 or 10) - Connor O'Sullivan Late teens pick - Windosr/Wilson/Leake/Tholstrup 4th pick - Kynan Brown We can then go hard at trading next season, which may have better options.

May was speaking to his tribe. that was the audience. i've no problem with the comments. Don't really care what the pies make of it. winners and grinners and they have the cup so why should they care a jot. reckon the whole pin the comments/newspaper article to the wall old school motivational technique is overdone nowadays. you shouldn't be relying on emotional responses to get a team fired up. it has a place, but if you're not properly prepared and organised emotional drive ain't going to make a difference. Roll on 24

I suspect I’m in the minority here but I don’t like May’s comments. I’d rather hear him acknowledge that we’re not as good as them. That we need to find another level, or go to work on our weaknesses, etc. Yes he’d had a few and it was the B&F and I’m all for positivity and motivation, but if we were better than them we’d have won the flag. We didn’t, so we weren’t.

I doubt it - he was half drunk at a BnF. It’ll be forgotten in 8 months time when we play them. The Brayshaw hit will be what is front of mind for every Melbourne player.

I had said in another thread that there is just no way this guy plays anywhere else but the fact he happily told Josh Jenkins - who he knew would share it on radio - there was issues/deadlock in negotiations suggests to me he is either trying to force Geelong’s hand or soften the impact for Cats supporters if he were to leave. I hope the latter - we would be a better side with him in it next year.

Really loved hearing Lamby's response to the question posed during a trade week interview about Grundy. Sydney clearly low balling us and Lamby has played a classic straight bat drive through the V for four. "He's a contracted player if a deal can't get done he can continue on with us" Or words to that affect. In the words of Dennis Denuto F'n Brilliant from Lamby Absolutely loved it to bits, so Sydney come to the party or Grundy is held to his contract, simples.

We should try to recruit Angus' brother, once he sees the wheels falling off at Freo 😏😏

Congratulations Axis of Bob, a pleasure to read a well thought out and logical post. The current vogue for reams of often dubious data accompanied by near meaningless psycho-footy babble, needs some serious backwash. James Harmes’s diagonal foot pass to Bayley Fritisch in the 2021 GF. Rightly deserves legendary status as one quality kick to premiership glory. Efficacy with efficiency seamlessly.

Pick 19 compo for a guy with 2 x knee recos. Wowza

On a serious note, May's comments are indicative of what is wrong with the MFC at the moment. Stop complaining, whinging and behaving like spoilt brats. We are looking like the 2004 Port Adelaide side who should have had a dynasty, but didn't, because they were sooky arrogant frogs.

Same for me. [censored] Collingwood and their snowflake supporters.

It's about the focus on contested football vs uncontested football. Collingwood is a less contested team through the midfield than we are, so it obviously leads to better kicking efficiency. Of those midfielders that were included in ANG13's stats, Melbourne's players averages 16% more contested disposals per game (10.0 vs 8.6) and their contested/uncontested possession % was +5 (ie, 44% of disposals were contested vs Collingwood's 39%). The top 3 contested players (by total and ratio) were Melbourne players (Oliver, Petracca and Viney). The efficiency stat doesn't tell you how good a kick a player is because the bar for an 'effective' kick is incredibly low in certain circumstances and is therefore almost entirely reliant on the situation in which you are being asked to kick. Contested midfielders and forwards are under the most pressure with the ball so they have the lowest efficiency. That's the story. Using kicking efficiency as the measure of kicking ability is wrong. Either that or someone's going to have to convince me why Dougal Howard is the 4th best kick in the league.

He wont be getting any "get well soon" cards from the Pies. Good. I'm glad May stuck it up Collingwood regardless of whether he was right or not. Tired of people who insist on being civil and polite all the time. We're talking about Collingwood who chanted while Brayshaw lay unconcious. Get under their skin at every opportunity. The Filth will boo Brayshaw in the KB game mext year. I hope May keeps annoying them .

Gives the Suns time to strike a deal for the other two picks

Dumb comments to make, but he was obviously pretty [censored] and had the red wine lips going! Honestly, if the Pies and their supporters get triggered by this it actually shows how insecure they are. You won, who gives a toss.

Why did you have to show this on demonland?! Begone with this information! Our mids are untouchable, the best in the league by a mile and we don't need any of that to show otherwise thanks!

This is definitely not the right thing to put out there. But it’s also 100% correct.

I'm glad he didn't cop an injury like that oyster who went to a nightclub and pulled a mussel. Sorry.

Posted publicly by May’s partner