The AFL: Nine doesn't go into eight evenly

            The two longest finals participation streaks in the Australian Football League belong to the Hawthorn Hawks and the Sydney Swans, who have each competed in the eight-team finals bracket for seven consecutive years, from 2010-2016.

            Presumably, sitting at a combined 3-11, those streaks will likely end this year.

            The next longest streak belongs to North Melbourne, with three straight finals appearances in 2014-16.

            Those Kangaroos are 14^th at 2-5 and presumably making other plans for September.

            The upshot of this is that the closest thing to a ”veteran” club in the 2017 finals might very well be Adelaide, or Western, or West Coast, with two consecutive berths under their belts. Geelong and GWS will make their second straight this year, and three “new” teams will probably join them, very possibly Port Adelaide and Richmond being two of them. Neither team is a stranger to September action, although September winning might be more foreign to these players. The two pre-season darlings, Melbourne and Saint Kilda, are still very much in the hunt, and while finals would be a novel experience in either club’s recent history, they each carry players on their roster who can share their background with premiership teams.

            Round seven, when finalists often solidify, is a good time to glance at some meta-numbers for each of these clubs. As it has for several years now, my “Spreadsheet of Death” is tracking basic stats, our own “ELO-Following Football” rating system, and trends of both reality and perception. Watching the tipping change gradually as the punters and the casual fan gradually realize that Hawthorn 2017 is not the same as the three-time premiers, that Richmond and Adelaide really are that good; and that Sydney really does have some issues to deal with.

            In addition, the spreadsheet tracks what I call the “meta-Brownlow”, the Player of the Year as determined by accumulation of as many other “PotY” and “team of the week” and “3-2-1” rating systems as I can track: the AFL itself, best & fairest, the game coverage, The Age, the AFLCA and AFLPA, SuperCoach and other fantasy ratings, and yes, The Roar. Besides following individual point totals, it’s interesting to see how the team totals of these votes compare to the ratings and ladder positions: often, they’ve shown a possible future trend that hasn’t manifested yet in the win-loss columns.

            Adelaide: In six weeks, the Crows moved from an ELO-FF rating of 73.5 (50 is average) to 90.0, the highest since Sydney before the 2016 GF – and then dropped 12 of those rating points on Saturday, most of them during that surreal 64-0 first quarter. Their cumulative player vote total is also first place, as is their point differential in reality and predicted through ratings, so they should maintain a solid grasp on the ladder’s top rung. Rory Sloane sits first overall with 255 points in our meta-Brownlow race, and Rory Laird is ninth, with Taylor Walker, Eddie Betts, and Sam Jacobs all in our top 25.

Geelong: Why are we still surprised when the Cats win? Perhaps because we’ve long expected them to do what the Hawks and Swans did this year. Their rating was third two weeks ago; now, though, they’ve dropped 16 points in two weeks, sit just seventh, and lie 12 points below where they ended 2016. But their record still has them holding a double chance right now, and their player vote totals sit third overall. How do they do this? <strong> Mirrors?</strong> Well, yes, if Paddy Dangerfield and Joel Selwood are mirror-images of each other. At 4^th and 5^th overall, they’ve carried this club for a year and seven games: only Mitch Duncan joins them in the top seventy in our meta-Brownlow at 38^th.

            GWS: I love Ryan Buckland’s “the team who shall not be named” moniker for the Giants: not even in the Hawks’ recent heyday, or the early 2000s when you just knew the Lions would find a way, did we ever have that feeling of inevitability that the Giants give you in 2017, even after the hiccup in week one, and the injury-pressed loss. Most punters have them winning every game, and nine players in our meta-Brownlow top 80 explains why a real Brownlow winner won’t come from western Sydney: too many players split their votes too many ways. (Toby Greene, Jeremy Cameron, and Josh Kelly all sit within a few points of each other in our top 30.)

            Melbourne: They started the season with a rating of 43.8; currently, it’s 43.9. All of their prediction numbers are spot on their actual record. But they’re only 2-5 against-the-spread, and Clayton Oliver is the highest-ranked player in our meta-Brownlow, barely top 20, with nobody else top 70. With their overall player vote total at 8^th, and currently sitting on the deadly ninth rung, losing winnable games against Geelong, Freo, and Hawthorn means that while they’re close to being 6-1, their margin for error is (ahem) Gawn.

            Port Adelaide: Before Saturday, their two losses were to the two best teams in the comp, which is why they’re still a clear third on our rating table. Last week’s 76.0 was their highest rating in three years. Bettors haven’t figured out how strong this team is, or just don’t believe it yet. But all the signs are there, and Ollie Wines is holding the largest sign, currently in 6^th place at 146 points. With Robbie Gray back in the top ten again, and about a dozen in the top 125, they’ve got a strong team that could earn a double chance this spring.

            Richmond: The Tigers are for real. They are NOT going to win it all – the Crows showed us why – but Dustin Martin (2^nd in our meta-Brownlow), Alex Rance, Trent Cotchin, and Jack Riewoldt are all top 40 players; Dion Prestia, Toby Nankervis, and Shaun Grigg lead a crew of the second tier all playing top 100 footy, and the team is still 15 rating points up from the start of 2017. Except for a trip to Spotless in Round 9, they should be favored in every game until July. This might be the year they win a final, especially if they can finish top six.

            St. Kilda: Their rating had dropped from an average 49.2 to a below-average 45.5 until the Trampling in Tassie; now, they’re fourth. No player was in the top 40 of our meta-Brownlow count, not even Sir Nick Riewoldt, until Hawthorn; now Riewoldt, Jack Steven, and the surging Dylan Roberton all are. While the writers kept picking the Saints, the punters had jumped off the band wagon. Whether they return depends on the next month: will they beat the teams they should beat (Carlton and the Kangas the next two weeks), and split the next two with Western and the Crows? Or go 1-3 and fall out of a tight pack in finals contention?

West Coast: Elliot Yeo leads the way and sits 3^rd on our meta-Brownlow ladder with 157 points, but he, Luke Shuey, and Josh Kennedy can’t do it all. (Sometimes, Jeremy McGovern has to help.) They’re 15-4 in their last nineteen: three losses at the MCG and one where they stepped in front of a rampaging September legend about to be written. Their only road games before July are Essendon and Gold Coast, by which time they might be 11-2. Even nine or ten wins sets them up for finals. (And then?)

            Western Bulldogs: We all had them top three this season (alongside the Swans – whoops – and the Giants). Are they a top three team? They’re currently in a pack at 5-2, but their rating is 6^th at 61.2 with the Eagles, Saints, Power, Giants and Crows above them. In player voting, they wallow in 9^th. Marcus Bontempelli is doing his part, in 11^th place in the meta-Brownlow, but it may be a bad sign that next comes a defenseman (Jason Johannisen). If they come through trips to West Coast, Geelong, and essentially a neutral game with the Saints with three wins and reach the bye at 8-2, they’re golden. Go 2-1, and they’ll make finals. Lose two, and it’s uphill.

            Quickly looking at the other nine, Brisbane started a distant last in our ratings at 9.5, and is back down to a 9.1, still last. Carlton, on the other hand, is up five to 34.2, and might top last year’s seven wins. Collingwood’s numbers drives home the theme of the Magpie season: “if only they could kick straight!” They’ve kicked 75.96; had they flipped goals and behinds in rounds 4-5, they’d have a winning record.

I expected Essendon’s ELO-FF rating to continue to drift upwards towards 40, but they’re back down to 25, barely above their start value of 22. Fremantle may drift up towards average but won’t surpass 50. Nat Fyfe and David Mundy sit top 20, but no one else is top 50. Gold Coast’s rating is higher than both, their player vote totals exceed both and sit them in 10^th overall. They’ve been consistently undervalued by punters this season, but if they can avoid another plague of injuries, anything’s possible.

At one point, Hawthorn had NO projected Brownlow votes through four rounds for ANY player, an unheard-of “achievement”. They still have no players in our meta-Brownlow top 40, with Tom Mitchell the closest at 71 points. Their rating fell by half to below 30 after round four, and still sits at 29.9. At least the Kangaroos were expected to lose this year but they’re back in the ELO-FF top 8 at 57.5, above Richmond and Melbourne. Sydney’s Big Four last year (Franklin, Hannebury, Kennedy and Parker) were all top 20 in the meta-Brownlow last season; right now, none are even top 35. They’ve lost 36 rating points since 2016.

            The Wanderings expects to see Adelaide and GWS on September 30th, with Geelong and Port reaching Prelim Finals. Richmond, West Coast, and Western also seem likely finalists, and if the Saints bring the bettors to their side, they’ll play in September as well. 

           Last weekend was the first in AFL history where all nine games were won by the team with the worse record.

           St. Kilda upset GWS on Friday night by 23; Carlton upset Collingwood's 125th anniversary celebration with its own 23-point victory. Port Adelaide was upset at home by West Coast, 85-75. Gold Coast upset Geelong 104-79, and Western came from five goals down to beat Richmond 80-75. Sydney routed Brisbane 122-68, Fremantle wore out Essendon, running out to a 37-point victory, and Hawthorn held on for a three-point win against Melbourne. In the most surreal moment of the weekend, 6-0 Adelaide were blown out of Tasmania by 1-5 North Melbourne by 59...after the Kangaroos somehow won the first quarter by the insane score of 64 to zero. The Crows went inside the 50-meter line four times; the Roos went in 28 times. It was a bizarre moment in a bizarre weekend.