Senior 30. Tom Atkins (2019 - )

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BORIS332 said:
The game has changed since those blokes were in their prime. Not many successful slow MIDs getting around now.
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Mitchell was in the game until recently, and I'd add Pendlebury to that list.

I think the "slow" tag is a misnomer, often they aren't slow, just not super quick. But the blokes on that list just create their own time and space.

I just hate seeing blokes like Atkins and Brownless copping this mantle before they've played a senior game. I'd rather see what they can bring to the team. We've had fast players who've brought nothing of value.
 
BORIS332 said:
The game has changed since those blokes were in their prime. Not many successful slow MIDs getting around now.
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Sam Mitchell only retired at the end of the 2017 season.
Bartel, Ling and Kelly were also not recognised for speed.

Being quick means jack if you cannot play the game.

A good mid can do two things very well.

A) He can win the ball
B) He can dispose the ball to advantage.

These are the two fundamental skills of footy.
 

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The rabbi said:
Sam Mitchell only retired at the end of the 2017 season.
Bartel, Ling and Kelly were also not recognised for speed.

Being quick means jack if you cannot play the game.

A good mid can do two things very well.

A) He can win the ball
B) He can dispose the ball to advantage.

These are the two fundamental skills of footy.
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What about his opponent? Does this slow MID have to be accountable too or is he absolved of that responsibility?
 
BORIS332 said:
What about his opponent? Does this slow MID have to be accountable too or is he absolved of that responsibility?
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I think that you will find that the people listed in the rabbi's post were well managed by those slow mids.
 
RegHickeyStand said:
It was a messy game to follow. I wasn't really looking out for him. I just noticed his high number 64. Mainly around half forward. The way he beat his opponent a couple of times, a very strong mark, and his moves in heavy traffic a couple of times. Wasn't taking stats or looking out for him.
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Fair enough ..just thought you may have seen enough to have an opinion on where he may fit in ... but we will see if he can push in. One would think at 23 he has not been added to the list to develop for a couple of years.. he should be ready or close to it.
 
BORIS332 said:
What about his opponent? Does this slow MID have to be accountable too or is he absolved of that responsibility?
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If you're as good as Paul Couch, Sam Mitchel and Greg Williams most of the times you get tagged and most taggers won't hurt you on the rebound, only time they hurt you is if they can actually shut the player down.
 
BORIS332 said:
What about his opponent? Does this slow MID have to be accountable too or is he absolved of that responsibility?
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They can often overcome a quicker player by superior reading of the game.
The same way that Ling and Bartel had a strange ability to get distance on quicker opponents or shut them down. The same way Sam Mitchell was able to be accountable and rack up near 40 possessions on a regular basis.
 
candiehappy said:
Mitchell was in the game until recently, and I'd add Pendlebury to that list.

I think the "slow" tag is a misnomer, often they aren't slow, just not super quick. But the blokes on that list just create their own time and space.

I just hate seeing blokes like Atkins and Brownless copping this mantle before they've played a senior game. I'd rather see what they can bring to the team. We've had fast players who've brought nothing of value.
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Nearly all commentary on speed is meaningless... I wouldn't worry about it.

The troglodytes don't actually know how fast players are, they just guess based on the way a player makes them feel. It can be completely shaped by angle, opponent, situation, etc.
 
On the topic of slow mids, if you look at Matt Crouch from the Crows, he is very much of the old-school midfielders and a Diesel Williams type. He still has the hurt factor and the ability to accumulate in the modern game.
 
Landgraft said:
Nearly all commentary on speed is meaningless... I wouldn't worry about it.

The troglodytes don't actually know how fast players are, they just guess based on the way a player makes them feel. It can be completely shaped by angle, opponent, situation, etc.
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Menzel was slow and was arguably delisted for it.
 
Landgraft said:
Nearly all commentary on speed is meaningless... I wouldn't worry about it.

The troglodytes don't actually know how fast players are, they just guess based on the way a player makes them feel. It can be completely shaped by angle, opponent, situation, etc.
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So when GHS ran at the ball, it was all an optical illusion that he looked slow due to angle, opponent, situation, etc?

Do we really have to know how fast a player can run to come to the conclusion that they are slow in comparison to the great bulk of AFL players?
 

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BORIS332 said:
Menzel was slow and was arguably delisted for it.
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I don't think his problem was speed as much as his reluctance, or inability to tackle.
 
The rabbi said:
So when GHS ran at the ball, it was all an optical illusion that he looked slow due to angle, opponent, situation, etc?

Do we really have to know how fast a player can run to come to the conclusion that they are slow in comparison to the great bulk of AFL players?
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Honestly, you should have to. At least if you wanted to make statements that had any relevance to seriously discussing footy instead of just barracking.

Of course there can be standouts where their speed becomes apparent, but even then I would say with an extremely high degree of confidence that even with GHS it was overstated, because discussions about speed are such a nothing. If you want them to become even slightly interesting then make them measurable or move on*.

* Obviously this is out of the capabilities of we mere mortals in any realistic sense. I'm sure Champion Data are sitting on some interesting analysis that will never be revealed so they can instead just show the top five for 'sprint efforts' and then call it a day.
 
Landgraft said:
Honestly, you should have to. At least if you wanted to make statements that had any relevance to seriously discussing footy instead of just barracking.
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That is a nonsense statement. And you can dispense with the barracking slur. What exactly are I barracking for? Anyone with a pair of eyes could see that George was very slow as a professional footballer. It became obvious when comparing him to the other 35 players on the field. I had seen plenty of him at AFL and VFL level.


Landgraft said:
Of course there can be standouts where their speed becomes apparent, but even then I would say with an extremely high degree of confidence that even with GHS it was overstated, because discussions about speed are such a nothing. If you want them to become even slightly interesting then make them measurable or move on*.
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I do not agree that discussions about speed are nothing. Nor do I think that they have to be particularly interesting. I would agree that they are overrated as I have expressed earlier. I think footy skills are more important.

* Obviously this is out of the capabilities of we mere mortals in any realistic sense. I'm sure Champion Data are sitting on some interesting analysis that will never be revealed so they can instead just show the top five for 'sprint efforts' and then call it a day.
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If you can show me any evidence that GHS is not one of the slowest players in a sprint I will happily concede. Although I would not be too surprised if he performed well in a long distance trial. i.e 10 klms
 
Turbocat said:
Fair enough ..just thought you may have seen enough to have an opinion on where he may fit in ... but we will see if he can push in. One would think at 23 he has not been added to the list to develop for a couple of years.. he should be ready or close to it.
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"Where he fits in?" thats a horse of a different colour. If he gets an opportunity, I think he'd do ok.
 
The rabbi said:
That is a nonsense statement. And you can dispense with the barracking slur. What exactly are I barracking for? Anyone with a pair of eyes could see that George was very slow as a professional footballer. It became obvious when comparing him to the other 35 players on the field. I had seen plenty of him at AFL and VFL level.
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Subjective viewing is meaningless, though. You can form opinion out of it but that's all - and not enough to go on for more serious discussions. If barracking doesn't work for you then I'm happy for you to provide a different term.

I do not agree that discussions about speed are nothing. Nor do I think that they have to be particularly interesting. I would agree that they are overrated as I have expressed earlier. I think footy skills are more important.
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They're generally based on nothing with no substance behind them. Might as well be discussing players haircuts, or whether they wear their socks up.

If you can show me any evidence that GHS is not one of the slowest players in a sprint I will happily concede. Although I would not be too surprised if he performed well in a long distance trial. i.e 10 klms
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Burden of proof on the negative? Lets not get into flying spaghetti monster territory.

I also don't think that a sprint is necessarily that important... playing AFL would involve repeat sprints and changing directions in unexpected ways. Intuition, agility, turning circle all have nothing to do with sprinting in a straight line but would heavily change the rate at which a player could impact contests or the ball carrier or get separation from an opponent.

Just on that last point those are the kind of stats I'd be interested in - how often a player successfully completes a chase down tackle, how often they get separation from a defender, how often they impact a distant contest, etc. Those would be much more interesting to me than a discussion on is GHS slow which, probably, but also doesn't tell us anything.
 
Subjective viewing is meaningless, though. You can form opinion out of it but that's all - and not enough to go on for more serious discussions. If barracking doesn't work for you then I'm happy for you to provide a different term.
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This whole forum consists of subjective opinions. There would be very little discussion without it.

If barracking doesn't work for you then I'm happy for you to provide a different term.
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I don't like "barracking" because it is just a rhetorical tool to dismiss or diminish someone's opinion.
I think that you can do better. I actually consider you among the best commenters on this forum.


My comment:
If you can show me any evidence that GHS is not one of the slowest players in a sprint I will happily concede. Although I would not be too surprised if he performed well in a long distance trial. i.e 10 klms
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I made that comment as I personally searched for information on time trials and sprints and could find nothing. I thought in the event that you could find some info on sprint times etc, and that this may be a possibility, I would gladly concede. It was not some attempt a trickery.

I also don't think that a sprint is necessarily that important... playing AFL would involve repeat sprints and changing directions in unexpected ways. Intuition, agility, turning circle all have nothing to do with sprinting in a straight line but would heavily change the rate at which a player could impact contests or the ball carrier or get separation from an opponent.
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And I am inclined to agree with you. Which is why I think that many mids do not have to be a quick outside runner like say David Wojcinski or Steve Motlop, to be very good midfielders like Greg Williams, Sam Mitchell, James Kelly, Bartel proved to be. I am sure others could provide better examples from mids from the AFL than my use of Motlop and Wojcinski.

Those characteristics above in your quote are what I would describe as "football" skills. And without them a quick runner over a sprint would probably just be a sprinter.
 
BORIS332 said:
What about his opponent? Does this slow MID have to be accountable too or is he absolved of that responsibility?
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Go ye and watch the 2011 Grand final and behold the accountability of Cameron Ling.
 
The rabbi said:
This whole forum consists of subjective opinions. There would be very little discussion without it.
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There's a big difference between having something measurable to interpret vs just "I think this".

I don't like "barracking" because it is just a rhetorical tool to dismiss or diminish someone's opinion.
I think that you can do better. I actually consider you among the best commenters on this forum.
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Kind as that is of you to say, I still think it was a fair enough assertion. It was simply meant to compare the reasons for following/looking closely - for many it will not be as analytical as others. And I do think that buzzwords like speed or x-factor that are more subjective tend to be linked to that kind of fan.

My comment:

I made that comment as I personally searched for information on time trials and sprints and could find nothing. I thought in the event that you could find some info on sprint times etc, and that this may be a possibility, I would gladly concede. It was not some attempt a trickery.
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There is for whatever reason (basically to protect those at the bottom) a tendency across the AFL industry to only release the top 5 or 10 results from things like sprints. It does occasionally get hilarious - I think there was a game in 2017 where the highest speed recorded against a player on GPS tracker was for Luke Hodge. So I suppose its also possible that we don't get much information because the tracking information is poor.

And I am inclined to agree with you. Which is why I think that many mids do not have to be a quick outside runner like say David Wojcinski or Steve Motlop, to be very good midfielders like Greg Williams, Sam Mitchell, James Kelly, Bartel proved to be. I am sure others could provide better examples from mids from the AFL than my use of Motlop and Wojcinski.

Those characteristics above in your quote are what I would describe as "football" skills. And without them a quick runner over a sprint would probably just be a sprinter.
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Right, but it all comes down to what are we actually wanting to track with 'speed'. I remember at least one person thinking we should only be looking at 20m sprint times, because of how important that distance is within game. For me I'm only interested in the way it impacts on play, whereas here you're asking about their straight line sprinting. And the sheer difference in how we could be looking at or measuring it is why I tend to be very skeptical about any discussion of how fast a player is.
 
Landgraft said:
I think there was a game in 2017 where the highest speed recorded against a player on GPS tracker was for Luke Hodge.
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someone was taking the piss !!
 
With 36 players on the ground and 8 interchange players speed is fairly irrelevant
More importantly 2nd and 3rd efforts for lose ball gets around the drop, and endurance running to position eg. rucks and on ballers.

Speed is really more about kicking delivery to the open player, that's when a side looks fast.
 
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Ratcat said:
More importantly 2nd and 3rd efforts for lose ball gets around the drop, and endurance running to position
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certainly that wasn't Menzel's strength
 
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