The Race for the Flag in Squiggly Lines

Animated!

An interesting week even though almost every game turned out as expected! The only surprises were:

Bulldogs v Collingwood was lower-scoring (although the expected margin was right)
Carlton activated beast mode on Geelong

Since teams only move on the chart when their results deviate from prediction, there isn’t much squiggling today.

But it’s a good example of why the squiggle takes a while to be convinced that a team has radically changed form: because that doesn’t usually happen. More commonly, teams get better or worse slowly. Fremantle started delivering poor results a year ago; West Coast started delivering good ones in late 2014; when Port came within 3pts of the 2014 GF, that was the peak of a steady climb that started in 2012.

Geelong and GWS have only started performing this year. They may well kick on: That does happen, like the Bulldogs suddenly turning into a good team in 2015, or Brisbane going from pathetic to powerhouse in 1999. This year, an open field makes the flag especially achievable for a new challenger. And it’s easy to think why the Cats and Giants might be exceptions to the general rule. But the general rule exists for a reason.

Meanwhile, West Coast completed another one of those thrashings that people say doesn’t count, just like they did in 2014 and 2015, before making the GF. But anyway, it was a great week for the Eagles, with the Cats’ loss making Top 2 more achievable. In fact, it was good for about 7 teams, for the same reason.

Pretty good for Port, too, who are keeping close enough to the 8 to challenge if any of the current locks suddenly contracts ebola. It’s rare to be able to tip the finalists this far out, so there is probably a good chance of someone entering a death spiral over the next few months. If that happens, Port will be ready to help them out the door.

Still extraordinarily bunched up on the Ladder Predictor: