Opinion Matthew Nicks: Adelaide's Coach (Part 3) - The Biggest Loser

[skam85]

This would theoretically be the week it happens if this sub 10 win clause thing was true.
Which I doubt

 

[GreyCrow]

I dont think this year was disastrous enough to sack the coach, he's earnt another year.

Firstly thats a lot of spin in the 1st paragraph but I will comment on this

We finished 15th in a year we were meant to ''linealry progress'' - we lost games due to poor decsion making either on game day or selection night

At best you can say you have some point but he isnt being judged on his 2024 output anymore - its the combined overall record and '' disasters'' that have led many to the feeling he needs/ed to go

If he wasnt signed in April would you still give him an extension now?

99% of Members would say no and history suggests he would have been sacked after the Showdown this week without his parachute

 

[FR0GGY]

I wouldnt be judging Nicks based on ladder position, which is a low quality metric. It’s susceptible to wild fluctuations. It also doesn’t take into account unequal fixtures, with some teams having a lot of hard double ups.

Percentage is the better metric. If you have a percentage over 100% you’re usually not a bottom 4 team. While disappointing, it's not a major regression on last year when you compare the harder fixture this year to last. It should be a reality check, however.

What? % can be influenced as much as anything by the fixture.

 

[kirky]

Last year we had a much easier fixture and that percentage was inflated by a few big wins and an AA Walker who was one of the best players in the league. This covered over some of the cracks that were always there and probably inflated expectations too high for this year. When you consider the fixture difference as well as the Walker decline (both of which are out of the coaches control), it's stagnation rather than a regression.

I dont think this year was disastrous enough to sack the coach, he's earnt another year.

Did we have an easier fixture last year? So we ended up playing Collingwood, Brisbane and GWS twice - all Preliminary Finalists plus Port (who ended top 4 by seasons end). So 4 of the 6 made the eight - 3 in the top 4. We also played West Coast and Gold Coast twice.

So we come to this year - double ups against Brisbane, Essendon, Hawthorn, Swans, Geelong plus Port. A similar result with 2 in the top 4 and 5 have made the 8.

We have regressed on every measure and that is on the coach and coaching staff. He didn’t deserve any extension and certainly not after a Round 1 loss.

Again, as I’ve stated, if we were going to re-sign him why wait to after R1?

My belief, the extension had actually been done in the preseason and they were waiting for the right time to announce. They didn’t think they would go 0-4.

 

[Brett Cummings]

Nicks is going to be the first coach ever to coach half a century without making finals and go on to be a premiership coach. You're one f'ing delusional campaigner silvers.

 

[rabidcrow]

Firstly thats a lot of spin in the 1st paragraph but I will comment on this

We finished 15th in a year we were meant to ''linealry progress'' - we lost games due to poor decsion making either on game day or selection night

At best you can say you have some point but he isnt being judged on his 2024 output anymore - its the combined overall record and '' disasters'' that have led many to the feeling he needs/ed to go

If he wasnt signed in April would you still give him an extension now?

99% of Members would say no and history suggests he would have been sacked after the Showdown this week without his parachute

I don’t think the Showdown result would have resulted in a sacking at all. If he didn’t have the extension and we were sacking him on results it would have been after Hawks/Richmond losses

Looking back over his tenure. God himself couldnt have made us competitive in his first couple of years. 2023 was the first year he had a list with genuine developing talent. And that’s what got him the extension and has saved his bacon

Remember in 2020 the bright shiny toys to be the core group of the rebuild were

Milera - missed all of 2020/2021
Doedee - injured for most of 2020
Fog - has come along nicely but really hadn’t shown much until half way through 2022
Gallucci - bust
Jones - ?
McHenry - bust
McAsey - bust

That’s all the top 20 picks from 2015 to 2019 before he started. Add on the loss of McGovern, Lever and Cameron arguably our most talented guys coming into the sweet spot of their careers

He had no foundation talent to work with and as you can see with West Coast and North - talent doesn’t make you a good side in one year, it takes a few years which we have done from 2020 onwards in our drafting

This year - our lack of recruiting last year - as well as losing Doedee, McAdam and no Schoenberg, Murray or Thilthorpe to start the year. Our depth was wafer thin

I agree there are big question marks over Nicks but we have been sabotaging his (or any coaches) chances of success for the last 10 years. Get 3-4 best 20 recruits in, have a good pre season and it gives him a crack to see if he can do it. A poor start though and would expect him to be in all sorts of trouble by the quarter mark of the season


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[Brett Cummings]

I don’t think the Showdown result would have resulted in a sacking at all. If he didn’t have the extension and we were sacking him on results it would have been after Hawks/Richmond losses

Looking back over his tenure. God himself couldnt have made us competitive in his first couple of years. 2023 was the first year he had a list with genuine developing talent. And that’s what got him the extension and has saved his bacon

Remember in 2020 the bright shiny toys to be the core group of the rebuild were

Milera - missed all of 2020/2021
Doedee - injured for most of 2020
Fog - has come along nicely but really hadn’t shown much until half way through 2022
Gallucci - bust
Jones - ?
McHenry - bust
McAsey - bust

That’s all the top 20 picks from 2015 to 2019 before he started. Add on the loss of McGovern, Lever and Cameron arguably our most talented guys coming into the sweet spot of their careers

He had no foundation talent to work with and as you can see with West Coast and North - talent doesn’t make you a good side in one year, it takes a few years which we have done from 2020 onwards in our drafting

This year - our lack of recruiting last year - as well as losing Doedee, McAdam and no Schoenberg, Murray or Thilthorpe to start the year. Our depth was wafer thin

I agree there are big question marks over Nicks but we have been sabotaging his (or any coaches) chances of success for the last 10 years. Get 3-4 best 20 recruits in, have a good pre season and it gives him a crack to see if he can do it. A poor start though and would expect him to be in all sorts of trouble by the quarter mark of the season


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No he's just a shit coach.

Made an injured lynch sub.
Puts curtin on the field with only a few minutes to go.
Refuses to drop an underperforming murphy when there's better options like taylor.
Puts pedlar on stewart.
Took 10 years to get laird the **** out of the midfield.
Took forever to debut nankervis.
Refused to drop underperforming senior players like smith.

 

[feenix67]

Last year we had a much easier fixture and that percentage was inflated by a few big wins and an AA Walker who was one of the best players in the league. This covered over some of the cracks that were always there and probably inflated expectations too high for this year. When you consider the fixture difference as well as the Walker decline (both of which are out of the coaches control), it's stagnation rather than a regression.

I dont think this year was disastrous enough to sack the coach, he's earnt another year.

What you have actually said here is that last year was unusually soft - I agree with this. By extension, if this year is more "normal" then what we do have is regression, considering how much further down the track we are in this rebuild. Personally, I think this seasons draw has been slightly on the tough end (especially pre bye) and Walker has predictably declined. So if Im being charitable, I would call it stagnation. Of course, if you stand still in this comp you're effectively going backwards... and I think the coach has reaped this year what he sowed in previous years by not prioritising and trusting youth.

The biggest issue I have with Nicks is that his tactical fingerprints have been exposed this year, and as predicted, he has been found to have considerable shortcomings in this area. Selection has been confusing, player development has been disjointed, on field tactics have been, at times, horrific. So, more than our actual position on the ladder, his performance this year in key areas has shown that he is not, as the club states, our next premiership coach.

Statistically, it would be a monumental achievement for Nicks to become a premiership coach. No other coach in the AFL era has recovered from such a pathetic win ratio and the list still seems to be 3-5 years off, with much hinging on the success of the next couple of draft/trade periods. Given that timeframe and Nicks' exposed shortcomings, it makes no logical sense to continue with him. Far better for a better coach with solid development and matchday skills to take over and re-set the playing group for a window which will hopefully open around 27-29.

And if it doesn't open by then, at least the members will be able to take over the club and get rid of all these pretenders

 

[119others]

Has the club actually examined his coaching ability and even bothered to ask him his philosophys because goddam, I think he has made more mistakes from any coach in the history of coaching. His selection philosophies are the worst kind of rubbish, his game plan is incredibly flawed and over thought. He is over reliant on just 3 to 4 star players to get the job done and make him look good.

All this says to the football industry is we are a club sticking with Nicks for PR and blindly hoping he can take us to another level, he sure has not provided any evidence he can do it in 5 years.

Some good questions and you’d bloody well hope so!

Funnily enough when Nicks was given the job weren’t 2 of the other prime candidates Yze and Burns? I remember some here rejoicing when Burns was made Snr Assistant as we effectively “got 2 head coaches in the one go”. Yze, is having a Nicks like year from 2020 so will see how he fares over the next 3-4 years. Quite a few similarities with Crows when Nicks joined and think Tiges will gut their list very very hard and go all in the next 2-3 drafts, just beating Tassies entry. No finals for them for at least 4-5 years..

 

[GreyCrow]

I don’t think the Showdown result would have resulted in a sacking at all. If he didn’t have the extension and we were sacking him on results it would have been after Hawks/Richmond losses

Likely right

Looking back over his tenure. God himself couldnt have made us competitive in his first couple of years.

But he would have set us up better

2023 was the first year he had a list with genuine developing talent. And that’s what got him the extension and has saved his bacon

Remember in 2020 the bright shiny toys to be the core group of the rebuild were

Milera - missed all of 2020/2021
Doedee - injured for most of 2020
Fog - has come along nicely but really hadn’t shown much until half way through 2022
Gallucci - bust
Jones - ?
McHenry - bust
McAsey - bust

That’s all the top 20 picks from 2015 to 2019 before he started. Add on the loss of McGovern, Lever and Cameron arguably our most talented guys coming into the sweet spot of their careers

He had no foundation talent to work with

Im not sure what you mean by foundation talent unless you mean missing draft picks who could have been.

But just to look at your list. McHenry you say is a bust but he played 49 games from 2020-2022 8 last year and 10 this year

Played a lot of games for a bust. But that goes to my point in another thread. We dont make assessments quick enough .

Doedee injured in 2020 but played 41 games over 21-22 - ironically we did the right thing this time by moving him on at the exact right time

Milera - what could have been . Still 34 games between injuries meant we didnt ignore him

and as you can see with West Coast and North - talent doesn’t make you a good side in one year, it takes a few years which we have done from 2020 onwards in our drafting

This year - our lack of recruiting last year - as well as losing Doedee, McAdam and no Schoenberg, Murray or Thilthorpe to start the year. Our depth was wafer thin

Again it highlights our overall decision making . I'm not a fan of Kelly but this is woeful even from him. There were promises made last year - like this year - '' we will go hard in the trade period'' and we get Burgess. Nice depth but not wow And we knew Doods and McAdam were gone long before so we had prep time

I agree there are big question marks over Nicks but we have been sabotaging his (or any coaches) chances of success for the last 10 years. Get 3-4 best 20 recruits in, have a good pre season and it gives him a crack to see if he can do it. A poor start though and would expect him to be in all sorts of trouble by the quarter mark of the season

'' just wait until next year! ''

 

[cedric]

If the decision was made at the start of the year (which it should have been) to delay contract talks until the season is over there is no way he’d be getting an extension. Hell, even if we scraped into the eight and went out first week I would’ve resigned him for another two years cause there would’ve been improvement on last season. Bottom four is a long way off that.

 

[119others]

This would theoretically be the week it happens if this sub 10 win clause thing was true.
Which I doubt

Are there any obvious candidates to replace Nicks? Perhaps that’s part of the issue.

Buckleys name again was brought up on Fox in recent days re Weagles and the same “kids in Melbourne” issue came up so just don’t think he will leave Melbourne currently.

Not sure who the next batch of coaches are besides the normal names linked with Weagles job. Experienced sacked coaches like Ratten, Rutten, Dew etc hardly jump out either.

For every success story in a new coach like McRae there also lots more that don’t make it - Neeld, plethora of Blues / Suns / Roos coaches in the last decade, Richardson, Mc Cartney and it’s looking like our own Matty N unfortunately.

 

[GreyCrow]

Hopefully Montgomery turns up and showcases some things to look at

 

[1990crow]

Hopefully Montgomery turns up and showcases some things to look at

If West Coast don't just make him their coach

 

[119others]

Also worth reiterating we made fixture demands that were granted in the wake of the Sydney debacle and still bottom four.

Just on this…from the Horses Mouth we successfully lobbied for a very strong commercial focus for our games including big games in PRIME time TV spots. Big games in prime time ain’t playing Weagles, Kangas, Tigers, GC etc so we effectively backed ourself to be better than last year and play in marquee spots which the AFL granted. At the start of the year the initial fixture (up to round 15 or whatever it is) had the Crows an unprecedented THIRD for Thu and Fri night games (after Pies and Blues IIRC) despite not making finals last year. That was the payback for KeaysGate - robbing Matty N of being a finals coach - and very unlikely to be repeated next year

At least let’s hope being bottom 6 we finally get an easy draw compared to the hardest 1-2 teams in the last couple of years which clearly does make a difference to W/L - not enough to make finals - but an extra few wins for a “par” fixture

 

[Brett Cummings]

Hopefully Montgomery turns up and showcases some things to look at

Hopefully he gets the job at west coast. This inept board don't deaerve to get what they want.

They need to learn that horrible decisions have consequences.

 

[crows dude]

Nicks is going to be the first coach ever to coach half a century without making finals and go on to be a premiership coach. You're one f'ing delusional campaigner silvers.

He hasnt coached for 50 years. Only 5. Half a decade. Not half a century

 

[Brett Cummings]

He hasnt coached for 50 years. Only 5. Half a decade. Not half a century

Sorry meant decade lmao.

 

[kirky]

He hasnt coached for 50 years. Only 5. Half a decade. Not half a century

Bloody feels like 50 years!

 

[King Elvis]

What you have actually said here is that last year was unusually soft - I agree with this. By extension, if this year is more "normal" then what we do have is regression, considering how much further down the track we are in this rebuild. Personally, I think this seasons draw has been slightly on the tough end (especially pre bye) and Walker has predictably declined. So if Im being charitable, I would call it stagnation. Of course, if you stand still in this comp you're effectively going backwards... and I think the coach has reaped this year what he sowed in previous years by not prioritising and trusting youth.

The biggest issue I have with Nicks is that his tactical fingerprints have been exposed this year, and as predicted, he has been found to have considerable shortcomings in this area. Selection has been confusing, player development has been disjointed, on field tactics have been, at times, horrific. So, more than our actual position on the ladder, his performance this year in key areas has shown that he is not, as the club states, our next premiership coach.

Statistically, it would be a monumental achievement for Nicks to become a premiership coach. No other coach in the AFL era has recovered from such a pathetic win ratio and the list still seems to be 3-5 years off, with much hinging on the success of the next couple of draft/trade periods. Given that timeframe and Nicks' exposed shortcomings, it makes no logical sense to continue with him. Far better for a better coach with solid development and matchday skills to take over and re-set the playing group for a window which will hopefully open around 27-29.

And if it doesn't open by then, at least the members will be able to take over the club and get rid of all these pretenders

Spot on Feen.

There is no cohesive, clear plan for our development and improvement.

Its doing the same - but try harder - until it becomes obvious to even a complete moron that it isn't working; then it's knee jerk reactions to try and correct course.

But we don't even stick with that, we just flip flop every other week.

 

[WAG]

Last year we had a much easier fixture and that percentage was inflated by a few big wins and an AA Walker who was one of the best players in the league. This covered over some of the cracks that were always there and probably inflated expectations too high for this year. When you consider the fixture difference as well as the Walker decline (both of which are out of the coaches control), it's stagnation rather than a regression.

I dont think this year was disastrous enough to sack the coach, he's earnt another year.

Ok... c'mon. Which board member are you!

 

[rabidcrow]

Likely right

But he would have set us up better

Im not sure what you mean by foundation talent unless you mean missing draft picks who could have been.

But just to look at your list. McHenry you say is a bust but he played 49 games from 2020-2022 8 last year and 10 this year

Played a lot of games for a bust. But that goes to my point in another thread. We dont make assessments quick enough .

Doedee injured in 2020 but played 41 games over 21-22 - ironically we did the right thing this time by moving him on at the exact right time

Milera - what could have been . Still 34 games between injuries meant we didnt ignore him

Again it highlights our overall decision making . I'm not a fan of Kelly but this is woeful even from him. There were promises made last year - like this year - '' we will go hard in the trade period'' and we get Burgess. Nice depth but not wow And we knew Doods and McAdam were gone long before so we had prep time

'' just wait until next year! ''

Just on Doedee and Milera injuries - players rarely come straight back from major injuries like they were pre injury. Doedee took a year to get back to near his best and Milera was half the player in 2022, coming back after 2 years off - compared to where he was last year

And by foundation talent - I meant the core group of first rounders you build a team around. The record for the years prior to Nicks appointment were terrible, and the ones that did hit were generally having significant injury issues through those early Nick s years

And finally - yes McHenry played (and Jones) a lot of games through Nicks first few years because they were the high end talent on the list! The last two years McHenry, when played has generally been sub - as soon as Pedlar got fit he was in front of him straight away


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[Doctor B]

And watching Curtin in centre bounces he look Jonesed, totally defensive

At half time in the Gold Coast game they crossed to their rooms.
They had a few large positive affirmation signs on the walls.
One said "play to YOUR strengths"
Do we encourage that?

 

[Doctor B]

Mitchell cut hard and backed in his kids

 

[nerRADIAN]

Firstly thats a lot of spin in the 1st paragraph but I will comment on this

We finished 15th in a year we were meant to ''linealry progress'' - we lost games due to poor decsion making either on game day or selection night

At best you can say you have some point but he isnt being judged on his 2024 output anymore - its the combined overall record and '' disasters'' that have led many to the feeling he needs/ed to go

If he wasnt signed in April would you still give him an extension now?

99% of Members would say no and history suggests he would have been sacked after the Showdown this week without his parachute

I wouldn’t have gone early on the extension, but I would be ok with a 1 year contract with a success based trigger.

Since you can’t change that, I don’t think the season he had was a mid contract coach killing season. I know the ladder says 15th, but a few weeks ago there was 1 game separating 2nd and 8th.

Regarding the fixture being harder, I think we had the most games against top 8 teams this year (if not equal most).

Edit - assuming the top 8 stays the same

Games vs top 8

Adel - 13/24
Port - 8/24
Syd - 9/24