Opinion 2020: Super Early Player Discussions

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So R1 has been released early...

...Hawks play Lions. Get the feeling they will be one of the teams Hawthorn have to play twice - again. This year out of the 5 teams the Hawks faced twice, 4 of them finished in the top 6. Was hoping for a bit easier draw in 2020 seeing they missed finals, but can nearly guarantee the Cats will be at least one of the other teams they play twice. Guess we find out on Thursday.

Rd 1 fixture:

Thursday, March 19
Richmond v Carlton at the MCG, 7.25pm AEDT

Friday, March 20
Western Bulldogs v Collingwood at Marvel Stadium, 7.50pm AEDT

Saturday, March 21
Essendon v Fremantle at Marvel Stadium, 1.45pm AEDT
Adelaide v Sydney at Adelaide Oval, 4.05pm ACDT
Greater Western Sydney v Geelong at Giants Stadium, 7.25pm AEDT
Gold Coast v Port Adelaide at Metricon Stadium, 6.25pm AEST

Sunday, March 22
North Melbourne v St Kilda at Marvel Stadium, 1.10pm AEDT
Hawthorn v Brisbane at the MCG, 3.20pm AEDT
West Coast v Melbourne at Optus Stadium, 3.20pm AWST
Called it. Hawks play 2 games against Brisbane and Geelong as expected. The other 3 are Port, North and Sydney which is probably a bit better than this year.

Grawndy both having the bye in the same round does make things harder. Hopefully there's a third option this year scoring similarly by then.
 
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Now the draw has been released, I thought I would look at which teams are the best to choose for loophole options. See below table where the pink shading means a team plays in the first 3 games of a round, green shading means that team plays in the last three games of a round.

2020 Draw.png

From the above table, St Kilda, Fremantle and Carlton appear to be the best options for a bench donut this year. Ideally one of these clubs will draft a rookie Ruck/Fwd, but that's probably asking for too much.

Collingwood, Richmond and Essendon appear to be the best choices for vice captain scores on a regular basis, playing the most early games.
 
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Now the draw has been released, I thought I would look at which teams are the best to choose for loophole options. See below table where the pink shading means a team plays in the first 3 games of a round, green shading means that team plays in the last three games of a round.

View attachment 12381

From the above table, St Kilda, Fremantle and Carlton appear to be the best options for a bench donut this year. Ideally one of these clubs will draft a rookie Ruck/Fwd, but that's probably asking for too much.

Collingwood, Richmond and Essendon appear to be the best choices for vice captain scores on a regular basis, playing the most early games.
Is it really that much of a stretch to see the Aints picking up a rookie R/F is it?
Yeah they just unearthed a gem in Marshall and traded in Ryder, but they also delisted Longer, Pierce and Rowe who was rucking a fair bit in the VFL.

I don't know a heap about their list, but it looks like the only other ruck in waiting is a cat B rookie named Alabaskis.
 
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I do not see much benefit in doing this. Right now some teams play the same team twice. Lots of logistical factors go into how these fixtures turns out. The new idea means that some teams play the same team twice. I don't see enough difference in new proposal. The only thing I can see is that the AFL will think they can make more money out of it.
 
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I do not see much benefit in doing this. Right now some teams play the same team twice. Lots of logistical factors go into how these fixtures turns out. The new idea means that some teams play the same team twice. I don't see enough difference in new proposal. The only thing I can see is that the AFL will think they can make more money out of it.
I think it means the conferences will be

1 - 6
7 - 12
13 - 18 (also might be completely wrong, maybe they have a week off after Round 17 to work it out)

and just play each other, not sure how they can do that though all in a week after the completion of Round 17, would be a logistical nightmare organising grounds, transport, accommodation, catering, security all in a week

hopefully each team will play each other before the double up games, crazy how they can play someone twice before they play other teams

Victorian teams won't like it as they want the "double up " guaranteed marquee games, Interstate teams won't like it as they want 2 guaranteed showdowns , derby's , battle of the bridge, Q clash etc

either go to a 17 game season (or even fairer a 34 game season) or conferences of 6 from the get go, play each team in your conference twice (= 10) plus the other 12 teams once (= 12)
 
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I do not see much benefit in doing this. Right now some teams play the same team twice. Lots of logistical factors go into how these fixtures turns out. The new idea means that some teams play the same team twice. I don't see enough difference in new proposal. The only thing I can see is that the AFL will think they can make more money out of it.
We probably need to see some more detail, but if in fact they decide to reduce the season to 17 games, then revenue would be reduced I'd say. Broadcasters won't pay any higher than what they are currently unless there was some other benefit to cover the shortfall. Either way, the afl need to do something about it, whilst also considering a Tasmanian team which would enter the market in 4 or 5 years.
 
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We probably need to see some more detail, but if in fact they decide to reduce the season to 17 games, then revenue would be reduced I'd say. Broadcasters won't pay any higher than what they are currently unless there was some other benefit to cover the shortfall. Either way, the afl need to do something about it, whilst also considering a Tasmanian team which would enter the market in 4 or 5 years.
Tassie Suns?
 
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We probably need to see some more detail, but if in fact they decide to reduce the season to 17 games, then revenue would be reduced I'd say. Broadcasters won't pay any higher than what they are currently unless there was some other benefit to cover the shortfall. Either way, the afl need to do something about it, whilst also considering a Tasmanian team which would enter the market in 4 or 5 years.
I don't think the idea was to ever drop to a 17 game season. It would be play 17 games then the last 5 games are against the other teams in your "bracket". A 17 game season would cost the AFL mega dollars and they are all about making money not reducing income.

IMO the GC are a failure and the AFL should stop living in denial about it. I know why they went there but put your hand up guys and acknowledge you were wrong. Tassie should have had a team a long time ago and the number of teams can stay as is.

And I am not a fan of having three conferences of 6 teams from the start either. Nor can I see the AFL being happy about not having Richmond v Collingwood at the G twice a year if they were in different conferences. They want to manipulate the drew to get as many big 90k crowd games as possible. That is one of the reasons why the draw will never be "fair" or a "level playing field"
 
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I do see the benefits that would come from the 17-5 setup... the final 5 rounds being played with other teams in the same bracket on the ladder will mean they all have relevance.

Points get carried forward from the first 17 rounds.

13-18 these teams play for pick position in the draft with the best performers getting better picks... stops team tanking or simply playing kids to ensure they don’t win
7-12 these 6 teams are all fighting for the last two spots on the ladder so every game is an 8 point game
1-6 as above every game becomes an 8 point game - lots to play for with home finals up for grabs

Downside to the above is no guarantees of doubled up blockbuster games.. also ticketing given the disturbing is up in the air... and it really doesn’t even it the whole draw anyway as teams don’t get the chance to play each other at home AND away in the same season
 
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I do see the benefits that would come from the 17-5 setup... the final 5 rounds being played with other teams in the same bracket on the ladder will mean they all have relevance.

Points get carried forward from the first 17 rounds.

13-18 these teams play for pick position in the draft with the best performers getting better picks... stops team tanking or simply playing kids to ensure they don’t win
7-12 these 6 teams are all fighting for the last two spots on the ladder so every game is an 8 point game
1-6 as above every game becomes an 8 point game - lots to play for with home finals up for grabs

Downside to the above is no guarantees of doubled up blockbuster games.. also ticketing given the disturbing is up in the air... and it really doesn’t even it the whole draw anyway as teams don’t get the chance to play each other at home AND away in the same season
Thinking about it further, you might not get the 'traditional' blockbusters but 5 weeks of the top 6 teams going at it round robin would create blockbusters based on actual form... who wouldn't want that!
 

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Thinking about it further, you might not get the 'traditional' blockbusters but 5 weeks of the top 6 teams going at it round robin would create blockbusters based on actual form... who wouldn't want that!
This is a good point ... I can’t recall the last time the Collingwood-Carlton blockbuster was a good lineup going in, and lived up to expectation.
 
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I really like the idea of the 17-5 setup and reckon it is worth a try however I think the one big flaw in what has been proposed to date is what to do with the bottom six. I don’t think it makes sense to have them play for the higher draft picks because the point of the draft order is to assist the weaker teams who inherently will lose the majority of those final 5 games. However you obviously can’t set it up that way because it creates a disincentive for those bottom 6 teams to win those games.

To address that I would propose a slight variation. I would suggest the top 6 stay the same, however the remaining 12 teams get broken into 2 division of 6 based on ladder positions; 7,10,11,14,15,18 & 8,9,12,13,16,17. Those two sections then play all the teams in their section with the top team from each making the finals. This is not too dissimilar than what effectively happens now but is fairer because all teams competing for the finals berths are playing against the same set of teams.

Having said all that I think there is next to no chance anything like this will happen because of the howls of protest from teams who feel they’re have been wronged by any move away from the status quo. Furthermore you can’t guarantee a full set of perceived blockbusters and derby’s each year.
 
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