Opinion Questions For Rowsus

[Rowsus]

Hey Rowsus, thanks for all your answers. Just reading your post above, do you think the new venue will effect Sloane or for that matter any of the other players? I doubt you can use stats to prove anything, so opinion is fine. Cheers

Hey TJ,
30 years ago I worked for a guy that played for North Melbourne in the late 1950's. He told me, every ground is different, and has it's own unique differences and characteristics. Some grounds, sometimes for unexplainable reasons, were harder for some players to play on than others. For him, it was Windy Hill. He said there was just something about the wind, and the way it seemed harder to judge on one side of the ground compared to the other. For other players it was different grounds, and different reasons. The shape of the pockets, the alignment of the goalposts (yes, that can be different!) or nearly anything from length or width of the ground, or distance from the boundary line to the fence!
So the bottom line is, yes it will definitely affect probably 2 or 3 players. Of course, we have no way of knowing who that will be, and because they may never return to AAMI, it will be impossible to factually analyse even in hindsight, 5 or 10 years from now.

 

[Krieks]

One of the things I like to see from a potential breakout/score jump player, is the ability to post good scores across a number of different scenarios. Winning teams, losing teams, home, interstate, moderate teams and harder teams. If their good scores are too concentrated in one area, it worries me that they are not diverse enough to make the jump we are looking for.
Sloanes good scores are very concentrated. Let's have a look at a few different ways to break his scores up. (As usual, my analysis only looks at the last 2 years)

I have used "In South Australia" rather than "home", as Adelaide are playing their home games at a new venue now.
In the top table:
The red scores contain his 178 in round 12, 2012 against Fremantle at Paterson
The blue scores contain his 180 in round 20, 2013 against North at AAMI
The purple scores contain both of the above scores.
I'm generally not too big of a fan, of the "If you take these scores out, his average looks like this" type of analysis. Having said that, if you remove Sloane's 2 monsters, you end up with the figures we have in the 2nd table. All of a sudden, the only area that looks good for him now, is games in South Australia, where Adelaide win by 31+. Even the 31+ wins interstate don't look that impressive. I know some/many of you will say any players figures will suffer, if you take out their 2 best scores, but even with those 2 games in, the other areas don't look tremendous
Looking at the bottom table, that breaks his scores up just in simple score groups, it doesn't look too bad. A third of his games are in the 116+ area. But pulling apart further 50% are below 100, and 20% below 86. Of his 14 games at 116+, 7 of them came in home wins, where the margin was 41+ (more than the 31+ in the other tables). If you want him to be a 115/game player, he needs around 12 - 15 games in this 116+ area. As historically 50% of these have come for him when Adelaide play in South Australia, and win by 41+, you might need that to happen in 6 to 8 of their 12 games in South Australia this season. The 12 games are against, in order: Port, Sydney, GWS, Melbourne, Collingwood, Gold Coast, North, Port, Hawthorn, West Coast, Richmond, St. Kilda. I can only see 3 games there I'd be happy to back them to win 41+, and maybe another one or two where they are an outside chance to do it.
Even looking at possibly improved opportunities from Van Berlo or Vince being gone doesn't help him. The only player being out, that really boosts his score is Douglas. In 6 games Sloane played without Douglas in the last 2 seasons he averaged 129.5 (the 178 is in there, but not the 180), all 6 scores were 112 or higher. When Douglas plays, Sloanes average drops to 102.7.
All in all, too many of his good scores seem to be coming from one scenario. big wins in South Australia.
He's a no for me on the breakout possibilty, as I think he is only a 15-20% chance to go 110+, and about 5-8% to 115+. Add his round 8 bye into the equation, and while I think there is only a little downside possibility to him (any player you take at that price should hopefully be a top 10 player) I think his risk outweighs his potential reward.

Great write up Rowsus, got my thinking now!

For interests sake I was wondering if you could write up a comparison against pendles at a similar stage to his career?

I noticed over his first 4 seasons pendles played:

2006 - 9 games (56.8 average)
2007 - 20 games (88.6)
2008 - 21 games (103.5)
2009 - 20- games (106.4)

While Sloane went

2010 - 14 games (75.2)
2011 - 18 games (88.3)
2012 - 21 games (106.1)
2013 21 games (107.0)

(I ignored Sloanes first official year being 2009 with 1 game as not relevant)


So both players had a fairly similar progression year to year (and games played), but as we know Pendles went on to be a gun averaging 110.5, 129.2, 124.7 and 126.6 since that point. I'd be really interested in knowing if Pendles had similar issues in his pre breakout years as those you highlighted in Sloane - of course there is no indicator to success just because 1 player did it but could certainly weigh on the decision whether to punt on Sloane or not!

I had a brief look myself but found it difficult given Collingwood play a large % of games in melb, whether home or away. One thing that did stand out is in the win/margin groups with the 9 games Collingwood won by 30+ points Pendles avg 97.1 (8 at the G, 1 away) compared to the 10 games in the other brackets being an avg of 120 (broken down as 4 x 1-30point wins, 3 x 1-30 losses and 3 x 30+ losses).

Anyway would love your take on this if you get a chance.

Thanks

Krieks

 

[Bobbie]

Cheers for the Sloane report, Rowsus. Much appreciated.

 

[Erich1036]

Hey Rowsus, sorry to bother you again! I just put this in the defenders discussion and remembered that you had put Hurn down as one of your early locks. I was wondering if you had considered his poor record against taggers and whether that concerns you or you think that he'll be able to beat them in the future. Thanks again!

Can anyone tell me why Shannon Hurn is starting to appear in so many teams? Yes I get the fact he's 'underpriced' due to being priced at around 88 when he averaged close to 95 in 2013 without the game where he got injured. I understand they've got a very good early draw and I understand it's handy that he kicks long a lot as it's counted as an effective kick. But has everyone forgotten this man can't handle a tag? Let me go further:

Jarryd Blair tagged him - 14 disposals, 52 SC (SF, 2012)
Jonathan Simpkin tagged him - 16 disposals, 70 SC (R20, 2012)
Matt de Boer tagged him - 5 disposals, 44 SC (R19, 2012)
Jared Petrenko tagged him - 14 disposals, 56 SC (R17, 2012)
Daniel Jackson tagged him - 12 disposals, 69 SC (R5, 2012)
Cameron Bruce tagged him - 7 disposals, 56 SC (R4, 2012)
James Polkinghorne tagged him - 15 disposals, 55 SC (R23, 2011)
Ryan Houlihan tagged him - 10 disposals, 47 SC (R14, 2011)

And that's without going back to his breakout year of 2009. Really want to here from people that have Hurn in their team in regards to this. I absolutely love him as a player and would love to have him in my team, but after enduring a similar rollercoaster ride with Hamish Hartlett last year, I don't think I'm up for it.

 

[Rowsus]

Hey Rowsus, sorry to bother you again! I just put this in the defenders discussion and remembered that you had put Hurn down as one of your early locks. I was wondering if you had considered his poor record against taggers and whether that concerns you or you think that he'll be able to beat them in the future. Thanks again!

Hey Erich, It's never a bother.
I'm not too concerned about it (tagging). Every player has down games, and defenders even more so. There are only so many lock down forwards, and he won't cop them every week. I like his draw, his bye group, and the way he played before injury last season.

 

[Erich1036]

Hey Erich, It's never a bother.
I'm not too concerned about it (tagging). Every player has down games, and defenders even more so. There are only so many lock down forwards, and he won't cop them every week. I like his draw, his bye group, and the way he played before injury last season.

I can definitely see where you are coming from there, thanks for clearing that up. He was playing very well before he went down.. I guess I'll never say never and monitor his NAB Challenge

 

[Rowsus]

Great write up Rowsus, got my thinking now!

For interests sake I was wondering if you could write up a comparison against pendles at a similar stage to his career?

I noticed over his first 4 seasons pendles played:

2006 - 9 games (56.8 average)
2007 - 20 games (88.6)
2008 - 21 games (103.5)
2009 - 20- games (106.4)

While Sloane went

2010 - 14 games (75.2)
2011 - 18 games (88.3)
2012 - 21 games (106.1)
2013 21 games (107.0)

(I ignored Sloanes first official year being 2009 with 1 game as not relevant)


So both players had a fairly similar progression year to year (and games played), but as we know Pendles went on to be a gun averaging 110.5, 129.2, 124.7 and 126.6 since that point. I'd be really interested in knowing if Pendles had similar issues in his pre breakout years as those you highlighted in Sloane - of course there is no indicator to success just because 1 player did it but could certainly weigh on the decision whether to punt on Sloane or not!

I had a brief look myself but found it difficult given Collingwood play a large % of games in melb, whether home or away. One thing that did stand out is in the win/margin groups with the 9 games Collingwood won by 30+ points Pendles avg 97.1 (8 at the G, 1 away) compared to the 10 games in the other brackets being an avg of 120 (broken down as 4 x 1-30point wins, 3 x 1-30 losses and 3 x 30+ losses).

Anyway would love your take on this if you get a chance.

Thanks

Krieks

Thanks Krieks,
at first glance you might think there is a big similarity between where Sloane is now, and where Pendlebury was after 4 seasons, and 70 home and away games. Unfortunately, when you look at the table below, you will see that is not the case at all!

When you look at Pendlebury's figures, it's like someone threw a switch in round 6, 2008, and turned him into a superstar! That was his 35th game, and why I say comparing him and Soane after around 70 games just isn't going to work. Pendlebury averaged 109 from round 6 that year. The next season in 2009, his average shows as 20/106.4, but you have to allow for the fact, that that season contains a 2 minute no possession game. It really is like he didn't play at all that week, due to injury of course. When you take that game out, his numbers look like this 19/112.0! Premium! When you look at Pendlebury's points per 100% Time Of Game (5th column in table) from round 6 2008 and forward it is pretty much 140+ the whole way! That's from 35 games into his career, so you can see why I didn't want to compare Pendlebury and Sloane at around the 70 game mark. Pendlebury had already "arrived" nearly 2 seasons prior to his 70th game! The other 2 interesting things to look at are how Pendleburys average disposals per 100% TOG (last column in table) has been within a damn, the same since 2009. The only source to the variance in his points seems to be his ave goals per game. Where he peaked at 129/game and 160/100%TOG in 2011, it coincided with him kicking an extra 0.5 goals per game. Given goals work out to be around 10 - 12 points each (in general), you can see this is why he hit a peak of around 5/game higher than his other seasons. I love the consistency in his figures: 35-36 disposal/100% TOG for the last 5 seasons, 140 - 160 SC pts/100% TOG for the last 6 seasons, and the only variance appears to be his goal kicking! (Yes, I know there are dozens of things that make up a SC score, but surely even the fussiest reader can concede me the correlation!). It appears he found his output level in 2009, and has maintained it. More importantly, for the comparison to Sloane, we can see in 2008, 2009 and 2010 he had room for improvement in his TOG%. As his TOG% went up, his scores went up, and allowing for the goal difference, we can see it is nearly directly proportional!
Sloane, unfortunately, doesn't have room to improve his TOG%, so he loses out to Pendlebury straight away there. He also seems to have plateaued on his disposal per 100% TOG. Three years in a row at 25 - 26. Yes, there is room for improvement, but I worry about players shifting upwards off a three year plateau, most shifts after a plateau like that are down, if there is a shift at all. His goals per game are reasonable, and while he might lift his SC average by 5 or 6, if he can lift his goal count into the low 20's, I'm not backing him to do that. I'm not saying it's impossible for him to go 110+, I'm just saying he needs to kick an extra 10 goals per season, or lift his plateaued dis/100%TOG by around 10%. I'm not going to back him to do either.


As Collingwood only played 8 games in 2007/2008 at Telstra Dome, and Adelaide played 7 in thos years, lets do a game break up for Pendlebury for MCG and non MCG, wins losses and margins like I did in my first analysis. I chose 2007/2008 as I believe Pendlebury was at a Premium level by 2009.
Keep in mind, when comparing this table to the same one for Sloane, that Pendlebury averaged 96.3 across the 2 years we are looking at, and Sloane averaged 106.6, nearly 10% higher.

The blue numbers in the first table contain Pendlebury's 4 minute, 1 possession game. In the 2nd table that game has been removed.
Keeping in mind that Pendlebury scored 10% lower than Sloane in the games/years we are comparing, I think it shows that Pendlebury had a bit more consistency than Sloane, and was able to score well, even when the side lost by decent margins. Comparing to their base averages:
Sloane: 31+ wins +10.6% on his base average, wins 1-30 +2.5%, loses 1-30 -7.4%, loses 31+ -14.6%
Pendlebury: 31+ wins +27.6%, wins 1-30 -5.0%, loses 1-30 -2.9%, loses 31+ -7.9%
or Pendlebury without his 4 minute 1 possession game:
Pendlebury: 31+ wins +24.6%, wins 1-30 -7.1%, loses 1-30 -5.1%, loses 31+ +6.8%

 

[GrainFedBeef]

Nice work Rowsus. You are elite for analysis!

 

[Krieks]

Amazing stuff Rowsus, appreciate the time you took to have a proper look at that. When I noticed the similarities in averages I thought it was passing strange when you break it down like that it just goes to show how deceiving stats can be sometimes. More and more its looking like Sloane is out.. I still think there is a chance it could be his year but there are too many ifs, buts and maybes now to justify his price in a congested midfield market.

Thanks again!

 

[KLo30]

Simply exceptional analysis Rowsus.

 

[freowho]

Who is this Rowsus? What are the lotto numbers going to be this week?
Anyway back to Supercoach. Going by the above information could we be looking at someone like Ziebell? Low TOG %, dropped 6kg over summer, playing in an emerging team, less interchange rotations, entering the prime years for a midfielder. If it wasn't for his poor history with injury and suspensions I think he would be a good pick.

 

[Rowsus]

Nice work Rowsus. You are elite for analysis!

Thanks GFB, you make me blush

Amazing stuff Rowsus, appreciate the time you took to have a proper look at that. When I noticed the similarities in averages I thought it was passing strange when you break it down like that it just goes to show how deceiving stats can be sometimes. More and more its looking like Sloane is out.. I still think there is a chance it could be his year but there are too many ifs, buts and maybes now to justify his price in a congested midfield market.

Thanks again!

No problem. As I said, he is still a chance to breakout, but he just needs to buck a trend to do it. That happens now and then, but I will add, it is hard enough to pick a break out player, without picking one that needs to buck a trend. I still think the only downside to picking him, which is enough to stop me picking him, is he will probably not be a top 10 Mid so will need upgrading at some stage, and he's a round 8 bye. He will probably be a useful performer this year, but if you have him sitting at M8 in the last 7 or 8 rounds, you might be giving up 5 or 10 points per week to the stronger teams. It sounds nit-picking, when put in those terms, it just comes down to your goal for the season.

Simply exceptional analysis Rowsus.

Thanks KLo

 

[Rowsus]

Who is this Rowsus?

A bored maths nerd who has lived in Hillerød, Denmark about 40km North of Copenhagen, the last 4 years. I used to live in Mentone, Victoria. I am unemployed, so looking at SC stats gives me something to do.

What are the lotto numbers going to be this week?

6, 8, 13, 28, 32, 37 - and remember, I want half when you win!

Anyway back to Supercoach. Going by the above information could we be looking at someone like Ziebell? Low TOG %, dropped 6kg over summer, playing in an emerging team, less interchange rotations, entering the prime years for a midfielder. If it wasn't for his poor history with injury and suspensions I think he would be a good pick.

I'll do a similar comparison between Ziebell, and my pick for a breakout Cunnington for you, look for it here in the next day or so.

 

[broges]

Think Ziebell has missed his fair share of games thanks to the Tribunal. Plenty of other under-priced players available that don't visit the Tribunal so often!

 

[broges]

Who is this Rowsus? What are the lotto numbers going to be this week?

This made me laugh! Reminds me of Neo before he went to meet the Oracle! So many questions, so little time (before the 2014 season starts)! LOL

 

[Manikato1]

When I noticed the similarities in averages I thought it was passing strange when you break it down like that it just goes to show how deceiving stats can be sometimes.

As some one on one of the SC websites I have visited recently (can't remember which-visited too many!)put it nicely.

Statistics are like a woman wearing a bikini. What they show is revealing. What they hide is critical.

 

[PC]

I have a question for Guru Rowsus -

Is Cox overpriced at $579k?

Cheers in advance

 

[Rowsus]

I have a question for Guru Rowsus -

Is Cox overpriced at $579k?

Cheers in advance

I don't think so. It seems about right.
Keep in mind he is the only Ruck to appear in the top 3 Rucks on a regular basis.
Sometimes we can shy away from the obvious, just because it is obvious!
He's still a good pick in my mind.

 

[PC]

I don't think so. It seems about right.
Keep in mind he is the only Ruck to appear in the top 3 Rucks on a regular basis.
Sometimes we can shy away from the obvious, just because it is obvious!
He's still a good pick in my mind.

Thanks for the thoughts!

 

[Krieks]

Hey Rowsus what's your take on Franklin? I'm not sold on him in the swans line up but would love to hear your thoughts on how you expect him to score pre/post byes and overall!