Collingwood going back-to-back? It’s not going to happen.

Collingwood going back-to-back? It’s not going to happen.

GuyWhoLikesSport

Footy is built on momentum.

Teams so often win games based on runs of goals and the best skill a team can have in the modern era is the ability to pile on when you have the running. Conversely, if you have the momentum of a game and kick behinds instead of goals, you’re shooting yourself in the foot.

It’s the same for club success.

Since 2000 we have had a Brisbane three-peat, Geelong winning three in five years, and then another one, a Hawthorn three-peat, and a Richmond run of three in four years.

Sydney and West Coast also won twice each in that time. However, Sydney’s premierships were seven years apart, but they separately lost four other grand finals so they’re not random.

West Coast, on the other hand, won flags 12 years apart and never made a Grand Final other than the one they won in 2018.

Therefore, we have only got four premiers that I would consider lightning in a bottle premiership: Port Adelaide in 2004, Western Bulldogs in 2016, West Coast in 2018, and Melbourne in 2021.

Those flags are like good sequels: rare.

It’s why Melbourne’s failure to take advantage of what has been one of the handful of the best lists in football since 2021 has been such a major issue.

Which bucket will the Pies of 2024 fall into?

They’ll be Jaws 2 instead of The Godfather 2.

The rule rather than the exception.

Why?

Let’s start with the simple stuff.

Collingwood finished on top of the ladder last year with 127%, which was the best percentage in the AFL. Since Gold Coast entered the competition in 2009, that is the second worst percentage to ever top the ladder, only to Fremantle in 2015.

However, Fremantle won 17 games in 2015 but only had a percentage of 118.7%, and the teams that finished second and third, West Coast and Hawthorn, had percentages of 148.2% and 158.4%, respectively.

The Pies were a good team in an even year last season. They were not a dominant outfit.

If you look at the premiership metrics for 2023, the picture is the same.

In a forest of great teams, the Pies were just good.

The premiership metrics are metrics where at least nine of the last eleven premiers finished in the top 6 of that stat in home and away matches of their premiership year. Collingwood’s mean ranking across all of the premiership metrics was 4.9, just sneaking into that top 6. But if you look across the rankings compared to other premiers, the only other premiers under 4.9 for the mean were the Bulldogs in 2016 and West Coast in 2018.

In short, the exceptions.

The only other team who finished with a mean even in the 4s was Richmond in 2017, which is widely acknowledged to be the weakest of Richmond’s three premiership sides.

I hear something in the distance. Is that aggrieved Pies fans wailing in the distance that the stats don’t tell the full story because this is a club with heart and guts and ticker? I think it is.

They’re also asking why can’t Collingwood pull a Richmond and use the first one as a launch point. Craig McRae is an ex-Richmond disciple, after all.

Well, now let’s look at the list.

Back in 2017, Richmond was the 7th most experienced list and the 6th oldest list in football. They were smack dab in that sweet spot where your athleticism is still all there, but the footy intellect has also caught up. Heading into 2018, Richmond shed age and experience ranking 10th in experience and 13th in age.

In short, all the good players were in their prime or just entering their post-prime, and they stayed committed to trying to rebuild while contending and it largely worked because, again, their good players were still young enough.

For 2023, the Pies were a touch older and more experienced than the Tigers ranking 4th and 5th respectively. And, also similarly, their good players were largely in their primes except Scott Pendlebury who appears to be on a Brady-esque path to having the longest prime in the history of football.

However, what Collingwood hasn’t done is get younger after the premiership. Heading into 2024 they are the oldest and most experienced list in the AFL, with almost none of their key players (except Nick Daicos) under 25 years of age.

The Pies might crow on about Lachie Schultz, who is an excellent pressure player no doubt, but you’ll forgive me if I don’t consider him to be a Napoleon Bonaparte-type figure who can bend the forces of history to his will.

He’s good, but not good enough to transcend a statistical avalanche.

There’s also something of a difference in the key forward the two clubs went out and got after acknowledging they needed an extra pair of hands up there. Richmond went and grabbed Tom Lynch, one of the handful of best key forwards in the AFL and without whom they almost certainly would not have won their 2019 and 2020 premierships.  

 Collingwood went out and got Dan McStay who, incidentally, will miss 2024 after doing his ACL in training after also having missed the Grand Final.

McStay is a fine structural player but his best return for goal kicking in a season is 28 total, which would be the 9th best return of Lynch’s career, including his injury-shortened season. McStay’s career average for goals per game is 0.9. We’re not talking Tony Lockett here. 

 Like Pussy Buonponsero said, “There’s differences Christopher, from the Richmond situation and this”. 

Granted that may not be the exact quote, but the point stands.  

 If Collingwood does go back-to-back I’ll eat my words, but heading into the season it feels about as likely as a ship called the Titanic II also crossing the Atlantic in winter only to hit an iceberg again.