This has not been a good year for gameplay in the AFL.
Last year, I felt like we hit a happy medium between attack and defence in the game and it was probably the best year of footy I can ever remember.
This year, it’s been different. Even though scoring numbers are basically the same, there’s been a profound difference between the haves and the have nots.
The league-wide scoring numbers are mostly propped up by good teams demolishing bad teams.
This year we have had 20 games decided by 0-5 points, about 10% of all games.
Last year we had 41, or around 19%.
This year we’ve had 21 games decided by 72-95 points compared to 12 last year.
Deciding 20 games by 0-5 points is the worst result for that stat since 2015. 41
games decided by less than five points last year, on the other hand, is the best in the history of AFL tables.
The next closest is 36, which was in 2023, similarly, 21 games 72-95 points are the most since 2016.
After years of balanced footy, this season has been poor in both parity and style.
In the end, Fagan won in large part because his Lions still took a lot of marks and controlled games, but they cranked up their risk appetite moving the ball from the back half.
It seems like the ledger is moving back to control and flood now.
In the Adelaide v Collingwood game, we saw the AFL’s most fearsome attack decide to blunt itself.
They completely flooded their backline for the entire game and tried to play on the rebound in what was the biggest game of their season, even despite having three key forwards against a short Collingwood defence.
I could almost see Paul Roos on Matthew Nicks’ shoulder.
They won the game with 59 points.
Do we want that?
Do we want to go back to a world where the accepted wisdom is it’s better to stop a goal than to kick one?
Which brings me to the game on Sunday afternoon between the Dogs and Fremantle, which is effectively an elimination final.
Do we want the Dogs, who, by Luke Beveridge’s own admission, have looked at the rules and said the league is trying to make us attack so let’s lean in?
Or do we want the Dockers, who seem to attack the corridor only by accident or when they are desperate, in which case they look pretty good?
Both teams have exciting players especially forward of the ball, including star key forwards, elite inside and outside mids, and genuine small forward talent.
It’s not a game about talent, it’s a game about posture.
It’s Jimmy McGill pleading his way down to seven years and mint choc chip ice cream, and then deciding whether to do the time he’s earned or let his darkest impulses win.
It’s a battle for the soul of the season.
If there is a footy god, let the team that prefers to kick goals rather than just stop them prevail.
The Dogs run relentlessly, both attacking and defending with a view to ultimately kicking a goal.
The big sticks are their north star, watching them is the best of footy.
After the Adelaide v Collingwood snoozefest they now clearly lead the league in the scoring, they’re number two in front half scoring and number three in back half scoring.
They do it all.
More than that, they know that scoring is their best form of defence, which is why it’s virtually impossible for anyone to leave defence against them.
But, whenever anyone does, they score.
For the season, the Dogs lead the league in time in forward half and are fourth best at stopping teams moving the ball from their defensive half to the forward 50.
However, the Dogs are sixth worst at stopping teams going from their defensive half to a score.
The Dogs are John Wick, it’s kill or be killed.
Then there’s Freo, who would simply rather not die.
If the Dogs are John Wick, Fremantle are Bowery King: the homeless guy in John Wick who is a killer when he has to be.
When the Dockers really turn it on, they are an electrifying watch.
But that only happens when it’s necessary, or when they get the ball in such an advantageous position that they have no choice but to go.
They don’t manufacture attacking situations, they only seem to fall into them accidentally.
They’d rather defend both with and without the ball.
Their initial posture is “don’t cop a goal”, rather than “kick one”.
If I had to tip the game, I’d pick the Dogs. I think they will do essentially what Brisbane did and camp in their front half. Freo won’t try to take them on in the corridor and the Dogs will just be better.
If you aren’t prepared to attack the Dogs’ weaknesses, you’ll lose.
I also mostly believe in justice.
But I question my beliefs.
I worry about what we want to reward as we head into the finals.
I worry about the soul of the season.