Even though the top-8 is incredibly close this year, it feels like there’s a big divide between the real contenders and the teams that have made the finals but are probably making up the numbers.
There are five teams that can do it: Collingwood, Adelaide, Brisbane, Geelong, and GWS.
But then there are another four teams that are still in the hunt to make the finals and are realistically probably hoping to jag a premiership in a year where each of those top five teams have shown legitimate frailty: Hawthorn, Fremantle, Gold Coast, the Bulldogs.
So, who do the top-five teams not want to see?
I’ve created a “You Don’t Want to Play These Blokes” ranking system where the following measures go into the pot, you add a bone and a potato and baby we got an upset stew going:
- Star-power /20
- Aggressive game-style /10
- Chaos inducement /10
Western Bulldogs
You’ll note that none of these rankings take anything defensive into account, that’s by design.
All the best teams will no doubt think they can score against anyone because their system and talent is so good. The worry for them will be that they lose in a firefight like Tony Montana.
To underline the point, the best five teams are four of the five highest scoring teams in footy.
Who’s fifth? The Dogs.
Based on that, I’ll grant you that having the Dogs here are like Wee Bey taking murders in The Wire to improve the BPD’s clearance rate.
They do everything in the measure well and all of their weaknesses aren’t in the measure.
They’re dotted with stars through the midfield and forward line, potentially adding the newly in-form Aaron Naughton back into the star discussion.
They are aggressive from the back half, sitting second in the league for back half scoring over the last five weeks and third at taking the ball from D50 to a score.
They are chaotic in the front half scoring 51.2 ppg from the front half, which would be the second-best mark by any team since 2021 if they keep it up.
There’s every chance the Dogs don’t make it, and if they do, all the chat will be about how they’ve only won one game against the current top-9.
But they’ve not lost by more than four goals in any of their losses to the top-9.
Running into the Dogs in the first week of the finals is like ocean swimming and running into a great white.
- Star-power: 18
- Aggressiveness: 9
- Chaos: 10
Total: 35
Gold Coast
The Suns are a bully football team and those top five teams are prefects, which makes them naturally opposed to one another.
With Rowell and Anderson, as well as Touk Miller if he’s back and apparently Alex Davies if he’s not, the Suns have the best inside/out midfield in football, sitting second in getting first possession and first in percentage of first possessions turning into clearances.
The Suns professionally stuff teams into wheelie bins.
Other than those guys, they have the chaos factor of Ben Long, Ben King as a genuine key forward, Sam Collins in the back half returning, potentially Dan Rioli if he can get back.
There are stars there, but the stars don’t make the car go.
In classic Hardwick fashion, and the Davies masterclass is the latest example of it, he’s the classic do your job coach.
There’s a role that needs to be filled, and outside of a special few, the role can almost always be filled by someone else.
Alex Davies is just the next Derek Eggmolesse-Smith, who’s the next Jake Aarts etc.
Hardwick is footy’s pre-eminent infrastructure coach, non-Chris Scott edition.
Their aggressiveness is marked down too because, even though with Rioli and Noble they have added a lot of bounce off half back, they struggled to turn that transition into scores sitting 17th in D50 to scoring.
However, it feels better than that.
Chaos-wise, they aren’t as good as those elite Hardwick teams because they have the talls and mid-sizers but not the genuine smalls like Castagna and Butler that bring the ruckus.
They’re only this high because Ben Long is footy’s Joker, whose plan doesn’t go much further than kick goals and hurt people.
I could see Gold Coast bringing the hurt across the board to one of those top teams.
- Star-power: 15
- Aggressiveness: 7
- Chaos: 9
Total: 31
Fremantle
God, damn I hate that they’re here. I should love this team.
They’re like American Gangster. I remember going to that film thinking it should be incredible.
Denzel, Russell Crowe, organised crime, Ridley Scott.
That’s four of my five favourite things.
Then I saw it and it was fine. Nothing wrong with it. Didn’t titillate me though.
Freo has just about as much star power as that film with Serong, Brayshaw, Bolton, Treacy, Jackson, now the returning Young and I could go on.
This is, frankly, a more top heavy list than the Dogs and so much of that talent is forward of the ball.
So why are they so boring right up until they have to be?
It’s like the ghost of Ross Lyon, fresh off a turn it on when you have to masterpiece, never left.
Adam Simpson, who I would never hire again based on his TV commentary where he only compliments defensive teams, loves it but I don’t.
Justin Longmuir has somewhat changed up his risk appetite over the last two months, but you just want it to be more given the talent he has on offer.
With the kind of transition mids he has, and rebound being launched by Luke Ryan, you have to be better at going from D50 to F50 than 11th.
You just do.
Chaos wise it’s also lacking. Even with guys like Murphy Reid who has to be the rising star for what he’s doing in a good team, Sam Switkowski, and Michael Fredrick, Freo just don’t force enough chaos anywhere.
That’s how, even in a last five games where you’re 4-1 and playing better than you have all season, you can still be 13th in front half scoring and 12th in F50 ground ball get.
- Star-power: 19
- Aggressiveness: 5
- Chaos: 4
Total: 29
Hawthorn
The Liberal party donor base will be unhappy with this.
You’d love to see Hawthorn in a final this year I reckon, they’re kind of the inverse Freo.
Maybe Sam Mitchell can come up with a bespoke game plan to beat you from the box, but that’s their best bet.
He’s done it before, particularly Adelaide in Round 14 was a real masterpiece, but at a certain point the rubber hits the road.
Who is their best player? I’d say it’s Will Day.
If it’s not him, it’s Josh Weddle who is injured or Jai Newcombe and I have a soft spot for Dylan Moore.
Are any of them top 60 players in the AFL? Probably not.
No team is more aggressive with their ball movement, with Hawthorn leading the league in threat rating by foot, and not many are better at scoring from the front half and off turnover than the Hawks.
None of it matters.
Stars win finals and Hawthorn don’t have enough of them.
- Star-power: 10
- Aggressiveness: 8
- Chaos: 9
Total: 27