Special Interest

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…

Watching the whimper with which Port went down in The Showdown on Saturday night, I thought of Ken Hinkley and the rod that the club which he has faithfully (and mostly successfully) formed for his back. That rod, in my eyes, took away the Ken Hinkley superpower that has made his teams so special to watch. I remember that 2014 Port team that took the league by storm because they ran. They were like Coach Carter’s Richmond High School team and the rest of the league couldn’t keep up. They overwhelmed teams with their running power, and had enough skill…

*Windhorst fingers* what is going on in Footscray? They’re having a very strange season. Very strange season. By the premiership metrics, there is not a single better with the footy/territory team in the AFL. By the ladder that just looks at your games against the top-9 teams, they’re 1-8 and ahead of only North Melbourne,…