Simon Buckley

[absy]

Buckley is currently running at 75% DE over the course of the season, which one might think doesn't sound too bad, but maybe we should compare him to some other players who you wouldn't call either good decision makers or particularly good disposers of the ball (they do however all play in the same area of the ground).

Raphael Clarke 89%
Dylan Grimes 85%
Zac Dawson 85%
Tom Lonergan 85%
Luke McGuane 82%
Nathan Grima 82%
Daniel Merrett 81%
Matthew Warnock 81%
and the big one Karmichael Hunt 79%.

I'd argue that Buckley has ten times the skill of all of those players (he can be a beautiful long kick at times, his goals against Port and Essendon in the NAB cup are examples) yet he has a worse DE than all of them.

Yes he's improved in quite a number of areas but can we just hold off the love in until after we've seen 8 weeks of good footy from him rather than 3. After that time if he's still playing the type of footy he is atm then no-one would have a reason not to jump on board!!

Terrible selection of players. Did you take into account that Buckley kicks twice as often as most those players? They are such bad kicks they handball to somebody else while Buckley has a crack and takes more risks.

Nobody 'loves' him but he has done better then most people expected so he definitely deserves some praise

 

[Brad Goodman]

There are a number of good players to come back into the side. The most important in this case is Ben Johnson. I still think Buckley is playing good enough football to hold his spot. I also think it's in our best interest to let him grow in confidence while he is playing good footy. If Johnno is fit maybe we rest Toovs for another week.

Decent suggestion but West Coast's versatile forward line might necessitate Toovey's inclusion.

 

[Scodog10]

Terrible selection of players. Did you take into account that Buckley kicks twice as often as most those players? They are such bad kicks they handball to somebody else while Buckley has a crack and takes more risks.

Nobody 'loves' him but he has done better then most people expected so he definitely deserves some praise

Of course I took that into account, I was merely pointing out why DE is not the best statistic to use because it throws up all sorts of anomalies.

For instance Trent Mckenzie is the best kick to enter the league since Nathan Buckley yet he only has a DE of 62% atm.

 

[Old Spice]

Buckley kicks the ball 60% of the time which is far riskier than handballing to get out of jail. On that basis his figures are even better.

He can also kick the ball in and land on the edge of the centre square which is no small thing in a year dominated by the spectre of fwd 50 pressure. His penetration is far superior to the list you mention.

He has also managed to snag a few goals from outside 50 already, can't say I've seen that type of thing from Dawson, Lonergan, Grima etc.

Finally, on the question of holding off the love in, I'll reverse it and say why not hold fire until it's warranted and give credit where it's due.

 

[mdc]

Played a good game against Geelong, which was a big positive, but otherwise has been pretty mediocre. Decision-making has slightly improved c.f. NAB Cup though, which is good to see.

Still nowhere near best 22, but has put his hand up to be a decent back-up for Johnson/Davis.

Slice-n-Spice: 75% for a mid defender is below average - Johnson, Harry O and Maxwell are well over 80% long-term.

 

[Scodog10]

Buckley kicks the ball 60% of the time which is far riskier than handballing to get out of jail. On that basis his figures are even better.

He can also kick the ball in and land on the edge of the centre square which is no small thing in a year dominated by the spectre of fwd 50 pressure. His penetration is far superior to the list you mention.

He has also managed to snag a few goals from outside 50 already, can't say I've seen that type of thing from Dawson, Lonergan, Grima etc.

Finally, on the question of holding off the love in, I'll reverse it and say why not hold fire until it's warranted and give credit where it's due.

Trent Mckenzie and Hamish Hartlett both kick the ball maybe 70% of the time and are far superior kicks than Buckley yet their DE is still relatively poor. I just feel that DE is a fairly useless statistic because many defenders are highly efficient yet they wouldn't hold a candle to Beams efficiency going into the forward 50 as an example.

I admitted in that post that Buckley is a much better kick than those 9 players and even sighted two of the high quality long range goals he's kicked this year as proof of his abilities, he just sometimes makes poor decisions!

Are you just nitpicking when you say give credit where its due? Because I've also said in a previous post that he's improved in a number of areas and has found a niche in the team because he's big enough to beat the oppositions small-medium forwards in the air and fast enough to cover them on the ground.

I even went as far as saying that IMO he's gone from our worst player with AFL experience at the start of the year (which would've been exceptionally difficult to argue against at the beginning of 2011), to just outside best 22. Which is a huge leap off the back of just 5 games considering I still have some doubts on him.

 

[jerry springer]

I no longer have my heart in my mouth when he brings it out of defence so he defiantly has improved

Still think he would be better on a HFF

 

[Old Spice]

Played a good game against Geelong, which was a big positive, but otherwise has been pretty mediocre. Decision-making has slightly improved c.f. NAB Cup though, which is good to see.

Still nowhere near best 22, but has put his hand up to be a decent back-up for Johnson/Davis.

Slice-n-Spice: 75% for a mid defender is below average - Johnson, Harry O and Maxwell are well over 80% long-term.

Reid's has been consistently pretty low this year: 67, 67, 77, 54, 80, 61, 88, 88 for an average of 73. Buckley had a nervous and abysmal DE in his first game of 36%, then 89, 77, 81 and 94. So 3/5 over 80% for Buckley, 3/8 for Reid.

Doesn't mean though that Reid is crap. He's actually very handy for us because of his raking left foot.

I will admit however that I think Leon is working very nicely down back so wouldn't be shoe-horning him out for Buckley. Johnson provides very good evasive and lateral movement which makes him valuable for breaking the lines. Buckley relies on a big kick to break a zone.

If Buckley could increase his defensive pressure then he certainly puts pressure on Johnson for my money.

 

[FIGJAM]

Or Corrie / Cook like from last year.

I'd wager Buckley is closer to Corrie than Tooves. Tooves at least has a strength, which is extremely good pace, resulting in a human blanket effect. We can put up with his OOF's and turnovers if he's stopping goal scorers from doing their job.

Buckley has no redeeming features. Just genuinely uncomfortable when he has the ball in his hands and he plays very loose at the best of times.

Egg on face repost.

Still think he is flawed to the point where I rate him as depth only in an ideal world.

 

[BEEG]

The good old whipping boy the blokes been great doesn't really make mistakes is strong quick and has done very well people are a rave for Leon in the back half his been good but his kicking has been no where near as good as Buckleys it's actually been very poor so give the bloke some credit