Follow along with the video below to see how to install our site as a web app on your home screen.
Note: This feature may not be available in some browsers.
AFLW 2024 - Round 6 - Chat, game threads, injury lists, team lineups and more.
The mesomorph has the best balance? Really? I would have thought the Endomorph does; solid through the core, lower centre of gravity, still strong through the shoulders. Leroy Jetta was shaped like a mesomorph and always got knocked off the ball because he was both smaller and top heavy. I reckon players like Jobe and JPK look like endomorphs.I think big bodied is bit too simplistic. I think body type is the bigger issue.
Mitchell and Neale aren’t big body’s but are still dominant in the contest partial due to body type.
Personally think we’ve drafted too many ectomorphs and not enough mesomorphs.
View attachment 746574
The mesomorph frame generally has the best balance, between physical competing, agility and aerobic capacity.
We really only have Shiel, Parish and McGrath with this body type in our midfield when that type should be the majority of the midfield. Obviously there are more variables to football ability than that but it’s a truism that you build around due to probability and then have some outliers for points of difference.
The mesomorph has the best balance? Really? I would have thought the Endomorph does; solid through the core, lower centre of gravity, still strong through the shoulders. Leroy Jetta was shaped like a mesomorph and always got knocked off the ball because he was both smaller and top heavy. I reckon players like Jobe and JPK look like endomorphs.
Wait, which ones are you saying are the outliers physically? Mesos or Endos?They are also outliers physically and if you’re aiming to only draft them you’re never going to develop a premiership standard midfield. Not to mention we had Watson and still had a s**t midfield because we didn’t have the balance. Ectomorphs obvious work well in the one aspect of the stoppage, but you’ve gotta have that balance for the majority of your side to execute a system which is far more important to team success than just stoppage execution.
Wait, which ones are you saying are the outliers physically? Mesos or Endos?
I see what you're saying. I think we need an inside mid who's an endo. At the moment Stringer is probably the only real bull who's strong through the hips and core and can break tackles. Myers was more meso but because he was aller maybe it didn't matter so much. I think we need another one.In general population it would be meso but in afl midfielders it’s endos due to lesser athletic traits and aerobic performance.
You know it doesn't matter , right?
You are spot on! I could not care less about NBA stats.Sure it does. People just don’t think about these things as being significant.
In the NBA the average length limb to height ratio has grown significantly since they’ve started testing. Why? Not because they’ve specifically been looking for it, but because those players have risen to the top. There would be similar variance nuances in the AFL but the average punter wouldn’t care. Nor are the stats generally taken for this stuff because our stats game is significantly behind the major sports in the world.
You are spot on! I could not care less about NBA stats.
Makes sense to me. Reminds me of the science behind Ivan Drago.Understandable. But teams do care about this stuff, such as Carlton whose recruiting team had some Oakland Raiders statisticians out working with them this year to help improve their scope of data collection.
someone made a point to me a while back that the game changed and we stood still - a particular focus being the tall big inside midfielder.
in times past players like Fyfe, Dangerfield, Cripps would have probably been champion centre half forwards - all those classic chf's of the days were only really 190cm but had the ability to run up and down the wings an use the tank which made them a better option at chf and not at ff.
Its pretty clear to see from junior levels these days, if any player shows any form of ability, even if they are 190cm+ they are turned into midfielders because its a midfielders game and thats where their talents are maximised. It probably signals the deathnell of the class forwards coming through the system, in the future foward lines will prbbaly consist of a beanpole or resting ruck who can bring it to ground for a fleet of smalls, who either lock it in or kick the goals.
I recdkon we are still rooted in the past, small midfielders , tall forwards - thats how its always been, and how it will stay - we are sticking by it, it won us 16 flags yaknow?
I don't agree with this.
We had a big midfield unit in 2013/2014 which was the peak of the first Dodoro list build.
Watson and Myers were huge mids. Hocking was another bull. If height is the cut off, it probably is at the point players are drafted/recruited, Heppell and Goddard are also there too (that's 4 mids >189cm in one team).
If anything by that time we were stuck in the Geelong era of the game with a midfield that was too big and too slow without the running power to work well in the transition of the game in this most recent era (which has essentially been from 2013 to now with variations).
Since then we've also drafted Laverde, Langford, Begley, Francis and Ridley with the stated aim of playing them as mids. They're all somewhere in that Fyfe, Cripps and Danger size and shape. I accept that we weren't going to turn them all into full time mids but so far we have tried it with 1 player player.
It suits the narrative about out team that I like, so make of that what you will, but almost all of the evidence (in terms of decisions made, etc) demonstrate that this fascination with a midget midfield is more recent.
It's been a miss calculation at two levels. First, by the coaching staff which clearly believed at the end of 2017 that the game style was much closer than it actually was. The second miscalculation has been from Dodoro who burned all of our high end picks on players he thought we'd at least try to turn into midfielders.
The other query I have is physical development. Not enough meat and potatoes in the gym for any of them. There was a time I supported the gradual build for our kids but I now think it's basically just stagnant.
A Sydney kid is basically AFL adult size by the end of year 3. It seems to b much the same for Adelaide too.
so it would seem, going by this narrative that we are always one step behing the prevailing footballing trends? but we are too inflexible to change with the times as they happen? once you lock onto a one paced midfield, it takes us a full cycle to change, then we changed to a lightweight outside list - the game changed to contested again...we lock onto a vision and dont waver from it (as spoken in woosh voice)
although its kind of weird, I always wanted to be the trendsetter who comes up with the next great footballing philosophy that takes the game by storm, and everybody imitates - and clearly we have gone it alone with the run and gun from the back while the rest of the comp moves it forward and locks it in. Do we admit defeat and join the flock or keep pushing on this philosophy?
I asked a mate who works in this area (he did stats for a Melbourne club last year and others before it. I'll quote him directly when I asked about Carlton's Oakland's Raiders visit..."Blind leading the blind. The blues have no serious stats department"Understandable. But teams do care about this stuff, such as Carlton whose recruiting team had some Oakland Raiders statisticians out working with them this year to help improve their scope of data collection.