La Dee-vina Comedia

That is a pathetically contrived, tortuous headline, though.

Bump George Christensen channelling former Melbourne President, Joe Gutnick

You've asked a reasonable question. The best answer I can give is that what I really want is consistent starting times. If it's always on the quarter hour, there are only four times to remember, on the 10 minutes only six. The five minute option has 12. (I did say it was a minor gripe.)

I suspect it has a lot to do with it. A 2.35pm start in Perth makes it a more premium time than it might seem here in Victoria. Interesting that people are referring to the 4.35pm Saturday timeslot as "graveyard". On a Sunday I can understand, but why do (some) people think it is that on a Saturday? My gripe is a tiny one in the overall scheme of things...why 4.35pm and not 4.30pm or 4.40pm? To my way of thinking, either all games should start on the quarter hour (ie, xx00, xx15, xx30 or xx45) or all games should start on the 10 minute mark (xx10, xx20, xx30 etc). And every night game should start at the same time whether it's 7.15 or 7.30 or whatever.

Many, many years ago teams played at least two nominal ruckmen, sometimes more. This was in part because it meant there was always a player somewhere nearby to attend a ball up or boundary throw in immediately. Of course, in those days there was only one field umpire and two boundary umpires, so there was often a bit more time while the umpires got into position. The idea that a team could play with just one full-time ruckman is a relatively modern phenomenon.

Brett Ratten's turn to miss this week due to Covid protocols. Not sure if he has Covid or is a close contact. Shows the importance of having a smooth running coaching team and not just relying on a singular, autocratic coach.

There's some stiff competition. What about the ruck nomination rule? The "insufficient intent" rule? The kicking out from a behind from outside the goal square rule?

Jobs he has previously been linked with (meaning there's been unsubstantiated speculation) include CEO of the 2032 Brisbane Olympic Games organising committee and CEO of Crown. Given today's announcement of the Commonwealth Games being held in Victoria in 2026 I think it's inevitable that he'll be linked to the job of CEO of that organisation, too.

I don't know Watson-Wheeler and what she's done, but it would be no surprise to me if the next CEO was someone with experience in the entertainment industry generally, not just from within the AFL or sports administration.

Is it better treatment? Or does Luke Beveridge and his team understand the rules, and therefore how to exploit them, better than everyone else? I'd suggest it's the latter.

I should add, though, I agree with your point that free kicks not being paid is as relevant as those that are. It's not dissimilar an argument to comparing the performance of forwards with defenders. We have goals kicked to help us determine if a forward played well, but we don't have a proper metric for goals prevented to help us understand whether a defender played well.

As hard as it is to do, we should avoid blaming a single incident (or mistake) whether it's made by a player or umpire for the result of any game. There are thousands of other decisions made in any game which help determine the outcome. I agree that in this instance it should have been a free kick against Geelong, but given they won by more than a goal, I'm not even sure it was relevant to the final result anyway.

In fact, if anyone can discern a pattern from this data which shows that free kick numbers are somehow linked to winning and losing, I'd be astounded.

If the umpires have a duty of care, has the AFL empowered them by giving them a rule they can use for this purpose? For example, hasn't the AFL been saying for some time that they will be clamping down on off-the-ball incidents? I detest the off-the-ball niggle whether it's pushing and shoving or something worse. I'd rather it was stopped at the source thereby removing the need for some players to feel they have to retaliate.

I agree with that, but I just thought there were others who played better. But for the avoidance of any doubt, I absolutely concur that Viney was one of the best players on the ground.

Or just a different person as the MRO. I'm not judging the VFL MRO's decision, but the process is always going to be very subjective and different people can come to differing views on the same incident even using the same process.

Genuinely surprised that one of the coaches thought Viney was the second-best player on the ground.

It could be the second night game telecast by Fox/Kayo. Whether we like it or not, Fox will expect to be given some Melbourne games to show in prime time, even if it is scheduled against a theoretically more tantalising the free-to-air game. Who knows, by Round 11 it is conceivable that it could be teams 1 and 2 on the ladder.

Wouldn't a night game in Melbourne be a better time slot for WA viewers than anything earlier?

We're still playing Brayshaw in defence. That's one spot that can be "freed up" for a defender with Brayshaw going back to the wing. But would we now do that? Brayshaw is playing excellent football off half-back and Jordon played his best game of the year, if not his career, on the wing as Brayshaw's replacement, against Port.

Conversely, where's the list for the last loss-less teams? I like the look of "2022 - MEL"

Or, he's being very smart. Knows he can't beat Gawn and Jackson so finds a way to avoid that embarrassment.

And #69 reads to me like he's absent without leave ("AWOL"). As an aside, isn't it great that our Senior players wear their MFC jumper number when playing in the Casey side? It really annoyed me when they didn't .I assumed it symptomatic of the old arrangement which showed that integration between the MFC and Casey Scorpions wasn't smooth sailing.

dee-tox - Son of Joeboy

Jake Bowey now holds the record with 11.