Rival Clubs Opinions: Our Best 22

[Takahashi Tank]

For fun I asked a few mates (who know enough) who hate Collingwood to rank our top 27 list as harshly as possible...

For simplicity assume Ablett and Judd are 10 and only whole numbers to be used:

Average results were:

1.Swan 9
2.Pendlebury 9

3.Jolly 8
4.Didak 8
5.Maxwell 8
6.O'Brien 8
7.Ball 8
8.Thomas 8
9.Wellingham 8

10.Cloke 7
11.Shaw 7
12.Tarrant 7
13.Reid 7
14.Sidebottom 7
15.L.Brown 7
16.Goldsack 7

17.Beams 6
18.Macaffer 6
19.Toovey 6
20.Johnson 6
21.Blair 6

22.N.Brown 5
23.Dawes 5

24. Krakouer 4

25. Dick 2
26. Davis 2
27. Wood 2

So going by the numbers Dawes or N.Brown misses out!

Thoughts/surprises?

 

[Soul_Pie]

Interesting results.

Very surprised by Dawes' rating considering the signs he showed this year, as well as Brown who showed in the two grand finals that he what it takes to be a great defender.

I also think Shaw is our best defender but it seems like in most opposition fans eyes he has been overtaken by O'Brien and Maxwell. Personally I think Shaw has been better for longer.

In any case, though numbers rating don't really take into account team balance and such so Dawes would probably get a gig anyway even if he wasn't rated best 22 or even best 20 simply because he is the best we have for that particular role.

Dick is a better than 2 player as well, but I guess opposition supporters haven't seen a lot of him.

 

[lozza63]

Rather surprised by Goldsack's 7 and 2 for Dick and Neon appear rather harsh.

Dawes - is structurally vital - although 5 may be right ATM so it is an irrelevant rating.

Not sure how they rated Krak 4, as we havent seen him in B&W yet.

 

[vjknight]

a couple of variations to how id see them, but overall pretty accurate......

BUT

do the same for every clubs best 27 - as we all know watch how fast those numbers drop away compared to ours.

i dont think any other club could rate player 16 as a 7 - or player 21 as a 6. numbers 10 to 21 are the reason we are premiers in 2010 - and again 2011.

good times.

 

[mattys123]

The Dawes and Brown ratings aren't surprising, most opposition supporters don't rate them as highly as we do, and that's simply because they haven't seen them either as much, or as close up as us.

No way either players misses our final 22 if fit though, not for the next 7-8 years IMO.

Apart from that though, about what I would expect from decent minded opposition supporters.

 

[Ed D]

I'm probably surprised most by their ranking of Maxwell. To me a lot of opposition supporters don't rate him as a player at all. But I guess apart from that, the rankings are about what I expected from people who don't follow the club week to week.

 

[Thommo 42]

Heath Shaw is an 8 minimum, it is criminal how underrated he is.

I will also assume L.Brown's score was a typo, and he scored 17 out of 10, which is probably about right.

 

[Pissi123]

Heath Shaw is underrated a fair bit. No way is he a 7! Goldsack and Beams I'd switch. Pretty good scoring though. .5s would help a bit I reckon.

 

[Rioli magic]

I posted this in another thread a few months ago. It's in a different format, A+, A, A-, B+, B, B- etc, but you get the drift.

Getting somewhat back on topic, here is my assessment of the playing list individually, ignoring the outstanding job Malthouse did and what that adds to the 'team' - the synergy effect.

Luke Ball - B Limited player with poor disposal, good inside player who plays to his strengths well.

Dayne Beams - B- Developing well, great start to his career, likely A grader longer term.

Jarryd Blair - C Limited somewhat by genetics, a good role player.

Leigh Brown - B- Not great in any role but good enough in a few, adds versatility and is a good back up option to Jolly.

Nathan Brown - C Currently only really capable of being a stopper. Important to the team structually going forward and potential B grader with more experience.

Simon Buckley -

Travis Cloke - B+ Huge workrate and great mark. Terrible kick lets him down but plays the toughest position on the ground and is still young.

Leon Davis - B Dropped off badly last year possibly through injuries but still has talent, poor record in big games. Make or break for Leon at his age next season IMO, I'd play Dick if fit.

Chris Dawes - C+ Looks a likely forward, enormous man and good mark. Ok kick of the footy probably B grade next year if his development continues.

Brad Dick - C+ Looks good when fit and has alot of talent. Injuries have held him back but with/if continuity will become a very good player.

Alan Didak - A+ Best disposal on the list and hurts opposition. Has taken his game to a new level. Still squibs too many contests but quality everywhere else.

Tyson Goldsack - C Not a bad player, just outside the 22.

Ben Johnson - C+ Good role player.

Darren Jolly - A One of the top ruckman in the league.

Andrew Krakeour -

Brent Macaffer - C+ Great set of hands, suited to hff IMO still has loads of improvement in him.

Nick Maxwell - B Great reader of the play, great leadership.

John McCarthy - D

Harry O - B Sometimes overrated IMO. Can play tall or small and generally limits his opponents, but lacks thought with the ball in hand IMO.

Scott Pendlebury - A+ Superstar.

Ben Reid - B Quality young tall, massive future.

Heath Shaw - A- Can struggle with a tag but quality player who provides heaps of run and rebound.

Steel Sidebottom - B- Quality young'n with good footy smarts. Future A grader.

Dane Swan - A+ Superstar.

Chris Tarrant - A- One of the better KPD in the league.

Dale Thomas - A- Getting better and better and fulfilling his potential.

Alan Toovey - B- Underrated by most except Collingwood fans IMO.

Sharod Wellingham - B Natural player with alot of talent. Potentially future A grader.

Cameron Wood - D+ Stock standard back up ruckman at this stage.

Basically I think the starting team is one of the best and the depth is the best in the league, coupled with a great gameplan and the commitment from the players made them a force. To answer the OP I don't think they are so far ahead personal wise, and if opposition coaches earn their money the gameplan should be less effective going forward. Still should be favorites though.

Fire away.

 

[thecig]

I posted this in another thread a few months ago. It's in a different format, A+, A, A-, B+, B, B- etc, but you get the drift.

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Very nice work. I agree with almost all of it.
Kudos.

 

[Tannin]

An interesting poll, which says as much about opposition supporters as it does about Collingwood players. I don't say that in any disparaging sense, I simply mean that the ratings are clearly made by people who know a bit about the Collingwood players, but not all that much - about as much, for example, as I know about the Geelong list.

Some comments:

Opposition supporters readily recognise Maxwell's impact, more so than I would have expected, and they maybe rate him higher than Collingwood supporters do.

Shaw should certainly be higher, Wellingham is way too high, should be 5 or 6 (but will improve and earn that 8 rating in the future, I should think). Interesting that they rate Wellers so much - perhaps only seen him once or twice on a very good day.

A surprise to see L.Brown and Goldsack both get 7. I'd have thought Brown would get about 4 from non-Coillingwood people, who can hardly be expected to know what a role Brown has played off the ball, and Goldsack not much better.

Beams and N Brown aren't sufficiently recognised yet either. At this stage of their careers, it is probably only Collingwood people who are fully aware of their ability, though Brown served emphatic notice when he thrashed Riewoldt in both grand finals.

Extraordinary to see Davis given only 2! Wood, well, he hasn't shown enough to be worth any more than 2, so no argument there. But to give Brad Dick 2 is just plain ridiculous! Dickie is at least a 7 now, and will go higher if he ever gets on the field for 22 weeks in a row.

Most surprising of all is the absurdly low ranking given to Ben Johnson. This seems to me to provide further evidence that opposition supporters are behind the times. (Again, I don't mean to be disrespectful here - I wouldn't expect (say) a Footscray supporter to be intimately familiar with the lesser-known players at (say) Brisbane either.) BJ's rankling is a very fair indication of where he was two or three years ago, or five years ago for that matter, and just plain wrong if we are talking about the Ben Johnson of 2009 or 2010. But once you get a picture in your head about a player, it tends to stick, and if you don't see him playing every week, it probably take something completely unexpected to make you change your mind - a 38-possession game or some such.

Anyway, there is a lesson there - if you don't follow a club, your perceptions of its players are a year or so out of date, your survey seems to say.

Oh, and if we if we assume that Judd is 10, then Swan and Pendlebury are 11, and Ablett is 13 or 14!

 

[shawthing09]

Thanks a lot Riloi Magic.

That is as close to a spot on assesment from an opposition fan as you will come across IMO.

On the survey I think when talking to group of people who don't follow the club you are always going to get a result similar too that. It would be interesting to see how they would have rater our list if we had not won the flag. I am guessing some higher marks then usual based out of respect for the premiers.

 

[JollyBallsUp]

I agree with Rioli Magic's assessment of our list.
I have just a couple of queries and those are with Sidebottom is better than a B- IMO.
I would rate him as a B to B+ even at this stage of his carrier. He nearly won the Norm Smith medal in the Grand Final replay. The other one is Didak, although I agree with his assessment on his player rating I feel I need to defend him as a player. I agree that from an opposition perspective it could appear that he is avoiding a contest but in playing his role for the team they need him with the ball when it comes out in open space.
His Grand Final performance was below par for mine but playing with an significant injury can affect the way he played although he was closely watched by StKilda.
Other than that I think it's a great and honest assessment. A job well done.

 

[daics_35]

That was a great assessment by Rioli Magic, the only thing I would disagree with is I would give Ben Johnson a B, I think a C+ is not enough for his work throughout his career and especially 2010. But overall great assessment and isnt it great when an oposition suporter actually asseses our list fairly.

 

[shawthing09]

I agree with Rioli Magic's assessment of our list.
I have just a couple of queries and those are with Sidebottom is better than a B- IMO.
I would rate him as a B to B+ even at this stage of his carrier. He nearly won the Norm Smith medal in the Grand Final replay. The other one is Didak, although I agree with his assessment on his player rating I feel I need to defend him as a player. I agree that from an opposition perspective it could appear that he is avoiding a contest but in playing his role for the team they need him with the ball when it comes out in open space.
His Grand Final performance was below par for mine but playing with an significant injury can affect the way he played although he was closely watched by StKilda.
Other than that I think it's a great and honest assessment. A job well done.

No doubt we are all going to be different with our individual ratings of players.

I personally feel Maccaffer is better then a C+ I think he was probably our most important foward in the second half of the season and was a stand out in the first half of the grand final replay when the game was there to be won.

On the Didak issue I don't think it's a matter of people wanting him to get more contested ball, in fact he is pretty under rated in his ability to win constests. It's the "squibbing" or the pulling out of contests. It's not a matter of him wanting to get into a better position it's a matter of him occasionally giving up a ball to easily by being worried out of it due to fear of physical contest. There are the odd occasions where there is a loss ball that either has his name all over it, or he is the only pie around and needs to make a contest and he has at times given these balls up too easily, taken his eye of the ball to check for contact, short stepped and took his body out of the line of the ball etc. He has gotten better at it but still does it occasional. Those things aren't a matter of inside or outside player the fact of the matter is when it's your turn to go you need to go.

 

[Cousin of Daicos]

I like that Brad Dick is number 2 lol.

Can't wait for this guy to have an injury free season and become a '9' on that list.

 

[Ed D]

With a player like Didak he makes up for the occasional pulling out of a contest, and to be honest I'd rather him do that than get injured and possibly cut his career short. I don't think he does it all that often either like some people tend to think.

 

[shawthing09]

With a player like Didak he makes up for the occasional pulling out of a contest, and to be honest I'd rather him do that than get injured and possibly cut his career short. I don't think he does it all that often either like some people tend to think.

In some ways I don't agree with much of that at all. I certainly think he is a good enough player to make up for it. A guy like Luke Ball makes up for his poor disposal with his ability to win hard ball, a guy like Lovett used to make up for being a pure reciever with his ability to break the lines. A guy like Didak makes up for this with his hurt factor, the fact that he is still good in contests is another redeeming factor.

That said you would rather all your players where committed to the contest 100% of the time, it's not a good look when a guy short steps a contest and doesn't give it his all, you'd hate to have that happen in a tight situation because the results of that on morale can be horrible. He certainly doesn't short step the contests as much anymore and not as much as can be made out but it's also not something that is gone from his game either. I guess the main thing and the thing you hope, is that in a big situation he'd recognise it and go despite his natural instinct.

 

[Ed D]

In some ways I don't agree with much of that at all. I certainly think he is a good enough player to make up for it. A guy like Luke Ball makes up for his poor disposal with his ability to win hard ball, a guy like Lovett used to make up for being a pure reciever with his ability to break the lines. A guy like Didak makes up for this with his hurt factor, the fact that he is still good in contests is another redeeming factor.

That said you would rather all your players where committed to the contest 100% of the time, it's not a good look when a guy short steps a contest and doesn't give it his all, you'd hate to have that happen in a tight situation because the results of that on morale can be horrible. He certainly doesn't short step the contests as much anymore and not as much as can be made out but it's also not something that is gone from his game either. I guess the main thing and the thing you hope, is that in a big situation he'd recognise it and go despite his natural instinct.

Well the reason I said that was because I rarely see Didak doing it these days, and if he's doing it to avoid a heavy collision then I don't have a problem with it as long as that contest isn't in a dangerous position where it's going to cost us an important goal like you said. It's not like Didak is avoiding tackling people or not going for marks, it's the rare one on ones where sometimes he looks stupid for not putting his body on the line.

Someone like Luke Ball puts his head over the ball and his body on the line every contest he's in which is great for the player he is and it's important to the side, but the huge downside to that is it's less likely Ball will be playing past the age of 30.

Anyway, we don't need a talented outside player like Didak being hard at the ball, he more than makes up for it, and he's much more useful to the team playing the way he does which is all I was getting at. I think he wins way more games for us then he could theoretically lose. The ability to kick 3 goals out of nowhere vs the possibility of losing a contest doesn't match up.

 

[StillWaiting5689]

Please don't make excuses for Didak when he avoids contact. He isn't doing it to extend his career he does it because he is scared. Doesn't do it any where near as much as he used to which I commend him for but when it happens it is very embarrassing to watch.

2010 saw him improve winning contests, getting hard ball and tacking, before last year I think you could have put together a very solid argument for him being the softest player in the AFL.

 

[Ed D]

Please don't make excuses for Didak when he avoids contact. He isn't doing it to extend his career he does it because he is scared. Doesn't do it any where near as much as he used to which I commend him for but when it happens it is very embarrassing to watch.

2010 saw him improve winning contests, getting hard ball and tacking, before last year I think you could have put together a very solid argument for him being the softest player in the AFL.

I'm not making excuses for him, I'm saying him avoiding certain contests (not all contact and it's happening less and less) has it's good points and he more than makes up for it the way he damages teams when he has the ball.

And like it or not, even if he is scared of heavy contact, it is extending his career. It might not be the sole reason but who cares? And who really cares if he is labelled soft when he plays like he does?

 

[StillWaiting5689]

I'm not making excuses for him, I'm saying him avoiding certain contests (not all contact and it's happening less and less) has it's good points and he more than makes up for it the way he damages teams when he has the ball.

You know he can still damage the opposition when he has the ball even if he puts his head over the ball when it is his turn to go, wouldn't you prefer he do both? I have never understood fans trying to justify players squibbing it, the fact it seems like he has made an effort to get it out of his game would lead me to believe he doesn't like this aspect of his game so don't understand why fans accept it.

And like it or not, even if he is scared of heavy contact, it is extending his career. It might not be the sole reason but who cares? And who really cares if he is labelled soft when he plays like he does?

His team mates, the coaches? Every player puts in when it is their turn, no exceptions.
How would you feel if our top 6 or so players all played to extend their careers? Would it be okay because they are our best players?

 

[Ed D]

1. Didak doesn't pull out of contests enough for it to be a problem. It sounds like you're the one with the problem of being embarrassed when/if he does it and can't accept that other fans don't mind him doing it.

2. Didak is an extrememly good and damaging outside player and we don't need him to go in hard to get the ball. Certain contest, sure, but he competes in most of them anyway. The good far far far outweighs the bad.

3. I never said Didak should avoid contact or he's doing it to extend his career, I'm only pointing out that it is extending his career so why not look at the positives?

4. He's almost 28, he's not going to rdically change the way he plays so just enjoy what he does and all the damaging plays he's involved in. Feel lucky that he's in the Collingwood side and playing well, don't get angry at him for being a 'squib'.

5. Not only do the football club think Didak plays well, he's also 2 time AA and was unlucky not to get in the side in 2009. The club don't have a problem with the way he plays, you've just got it in your head that he's one of the softest players in the league. He's not, he doesn't cost us games, that's why I say who cares if he plays like he does (not a squib, I said plays like he does)?

I'm going to leave it at that. I don't need to repeat my comments anymore on Didak. He's a gun player and a matchwinner and would make every sides 22.

 

[StillWaiting5689]

Your reading me wrong, I don't think he is one of the softest in the league anymore and have stated that I'm happy he has improved in this area. And I have never disputed that he is a match winning gun who would make all sides 22. I just don't think our players our outside getting criticism in areas that they aren't strong in.

 

[Boris the Contradiction]

I want to meet the man who had Didak outside our best 22. Wacky much?