He was seriously good in 04. Never quite that good ever again though.
1 Like
Damn good player. Later in his time with us he seemed more unsure with his decision making - that may have been a function of player movement up ahead or lack of confidence in the options presented to him. Kicked a lot of goals for a guy playing off half back a lot.
McPhee at his best vs Ridley at his best would be a difficult choice.
We got bashed by the hawks in 2004, McPhee copped a fair bit of it. We never responded. Weâve been scared shitless ever since.
1 Like
Figured Iâd post a couple of charts which use Blitzâs favourite stat to tell a slightly different story of our season compared to what the ladder (and some of our memories) have done.
DISCLAIMER: Yes, I am aware that Expected Score (xScore) does not tell us who deserved to win a match of football. Good kicking is good football, etc. What it does quite however well is illustrate how well a team converted its shots at goal, as well as roughly the quality of chances that were created.
Chart 1
My interpretation of this chart is that we rode our luck a fair bit over what some remember as the âpart of the season where we were playing good footyâ. There are some caveats, such as the Bulldogs kicking some junk time goals which donât reflect the state of that game, but that also applies to our game vs Melbourne, so swings and roundabouts.
I have labelled the difference between Essendonâs xScore and the oppositionâs xScore for clarity:
Chart 2
Hereâs another chart showing the difference between Essendonâs actual score and its xScore, compared to the difference between the oppositionâs actual score and its xScore. This one gives a better indication, at a glance, of how well each team converted compared to what would be expected:
The Hawthorn game was a really good example of Essendon kicking incredibly well while Hawthorn kicked poorly in the same conditions. Carlton was the complete inverse despite Essendon kicking junktime goals late, which somehow flatters Essendonâs conversion in what was a night of missed chances while the Blues took theirs.
While we were understandably furious with the Adelaide loss a couple of weeks back, the Crows kicked incredibly well for goal. In that regard, we probably caught them at their most clinical.
Hope these are slightly interesting. I may post a few more since it took so long to manually put the data together.
1 Like
My gut feel has been that, ever since Ridley returned, our backline has been somewhat dysfunctional.
That last chart is quite extraordinary. It suggests that every opponent is outperforming on scoring accuracy since that Richmond game (when Ridley returned). Did he disturb some ancient Egyptian curse or something.
1 Like
Shut up, Hawk apologist/propagandist.
The response was 7 goals in 14 minutes and winning by 74.
That they âwonâ the suspensions 15-1 has nothing to do with the ongoing form of the two teams in the following years.
1 Like
Or the least good at counting
2 Likes
I would argue that 0.77 rotations difference between Melbourneâs first and last is far from a âmeaningfulâ difference! I donât think that this data shows much of note.
The more interesting data for mine would be what teams are doing when the scores are close - in tight games do teams rotate more or less?
The other interesting data would be which players are rotated. Is there a trend to rotate mids more than forwards/defenders? Talls more than smalls? etc. Do teams do this differently?
My uneducated guess is that games with the least rotations are those where there are blowouts, say 30+ points. The stars get taken off for as a risk mitigation etc. Otherwise teams follow the plan of around 17-18 changes a quarter.
1 Like
My interpretation of those stats was âBradâs tried nothing, and is all out of ideasâ.
1 Like
Does anyone know how long a midfielder spends on the park before being rotated? Is there an average time spent onfield per mid?
Iâm guessing around 11 minutes.
Martin gets cheap kicks, his pressure disposal is putrid in the last game cost us 2 goals
He does a lot of hard running to get those cheap kicks and usually his disposal is very good although he has the occasional clanger
Interesting variations between the 3 methods. Perkins rates much worse in Supercoach & Fantasy Points.
1 Like
My understanding is that fantasy points isnât a rating system. It simply assigns points to a given stat.
SuperCoach is a bit more advanced and accounts for what type of possessions a player gets and the outcome of that possession.
Ratings system accounts for position played and team outcomes
3 Likes
Martin is allowed to run free, which works well as a loose man, but his pressure disposal is not good
Just to add some extra details:
itâs a measurement of direct impact each player has on a game through their actions that affect either the ball or ball-carrier, expressed as scoreboard impact.
To get this measurement three factors are considered for each action:
- The location of the ball on the ground before and after the action
- The situation before and after the action
- The difference in Next Expected Score (NES) value before and after each action
Actions that increase a playerâs teamâs chances of scoring next (e.g., taking possession, moving the ball forward) give positive ratings and actions that decrease those chances (e.g., turning it over, missing shots at goal) give negative ratings. The PR each player gets at the end of a game is the sum of these ratings.
2 Likes