Opinion Bonus points

Would bonus points help open the game up?

  • Yes

    Votes: 6 18.8%
  • No

    Votes: 26 81.3%

  • Total voters
    32

Coops93

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Obviously a big topic for years is how to open the game up. Ideas often get brought up like interchange caps, starting positions and things like that. In my opinion it ultimately it comes down to the coaches wanting to play defensively and mitigate risk at all times.


An idea I have to encourage coaches to attack more is to award bonus points for teams reaching a certain benchmark. Assuming we get back to full length games for the purpose of this idea, if a team scores 120 points they get an additional 2 points. So if a team wins and reaches 120 points they receive 6 points for the game instead of the current 4. Additionally a losing team can still get something out of a loss should a game be particularly high scoring.

You could potentially do it in stages, so maybe 1 BP for 90 points and 2 BPs for 120, meaning a losing team will still hopefully try to score to get something out of the game and the winning team will ideally push for 120. So even in blowouts the game is somewhat "live" right to the end for both teams.

The score and amount of bonus points can obviously be tweaked to your liking, but as an idea do you think awarding bonus points would encourage coaches and teams attack more and mitigate risk less, ideally resulting in the game being opened up?
 
May 5, 2016
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Obviously a big topic for years is how to open the game up. Ideas often get brought up like interchange caps, starting positions and things like that. In my opinion it ultimately it comes down to the coaches wanting to play defensively and mitigate risk at all times.


An idea I have to encourage coaches to attack more is to award bonus points for teams reaching a certain benchmark. Assuming we get back to full length games for the purpose of this idea, if a team scores 120 points they get an additional 2 points. So if a team wins and reaches 120 points they receive 6 points for the game instead of the current 4. Additionally a losing team can still get something out of a loss should a game be particularly high scoring.

You could potentially do it in stages, so maybe 1 BP for 90 points and 2 BPs for 120, meaning a losing team will still hopefully try to score to get something out of the game and the winning team will ideally push for 120. So even in blowouts the game is somewhat "live" right to the end for both teams.

The score and amount of bonus points can obviously be tweaked to your liking, but as an idea do you think awarding bonus points would encourage coaches and teams attack more and mitigate risk less, ideally resulting in the game being opened up?


In an ideal world this would be reasonable but with an imperfect draw where some teams are going to play the worst teams twice, and others wont, it unofficially means there are more bonus points up for grabs for some teams than others.
 
In an ideal world this would be reasonable but with an imperfect draw where some teams are going to play the worst teams twice, and others wont, it unofficially means there are more bonus points up for grabs for some teams than others.
It's the weather that is the real issue.

Imagine two games going on simultaneously. One is 12 degrees, a strong wind and pouring rain and the other just a few kilometres away inside and undercover with no rain and no wind at Etihad.
 
May 5, 2016
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It's the weather that is the real issue.

Imagine two games going on simultaneously. One is 12 degrees, a strong wind and pouring rain and the other just a few kilometres away inside and undercover with no rain and no wind at Etihad.


Yep.

A lot of sports have entertained the idea of bonus points - rugby union have done it in various competitions to encourage scoring tries over kicking penalty goals. 5 tries gets you an extra point.
Lots of cricket competitions have done it.
generally what you will find with ANY competition that utilises bonus points is that teams will find a way to exploit it.

I know in our local first grade cricket competition, during two day matches, bonus points are awarded for second innings runs and wickets - 100 runs equals a bonus point, 5 wickets equals a bonus point.

What we found is that any time a side was looking like losing the first innings, they would decided to basically throw their wickets away or if they were bowling, bring on part timers to speed up the first innings result, concede a flogging on the first innings but then get the best part of a day to rack up bonus points. Meanwhile a team could finish 8-260 in the first innings chasing 275 to win when the game comes to an end, and get nothing.
 
If you assume 20% shorter game time so 20% reduction in the bonus points in the OP making the threshold 72 and 96 for 1 and 2 points respectively

Then look at this season and the bonus points would be

Cats
12​
Lions
10​
Saints
10​
Port
9​
Tigers
9​
Dogs
8​
Eagles
7​
Demons
7​
Suns
6​
GWS
5​
Carlton
4​
Pies
3​
Dockers
3​
Bombers
3​
North
3​
Swans
2​
Crows
2​
Hawks
1​

Which would mean the makeup of the 8 with one round to go only changes are Geelong goes up a spot as do the saints the actual teams don't change at all.


TeamBonus PtsActual PtsTotal
Lions
10​
52​
62​
Port
9​
52​
61​
Cats
12​
44​
56​
Tigers
9​
46​
55​
Eagles
7​
44​
51​
Saints
10​
36​
46​
Dogs
8​
36​
44​
Pies
3​
38​
41​
Demons
7​
32​
39​
GWS
5​
32​
37​
Carlton
4​
28​
32​
Dockers
3​
28​
31​
Bombers
3​
26​
29​
Suns
6​
22​
28​
Swans
2​
20​
22​
Hawks
1​
16​
17​
North
3​
12​
15​
Crows
2​
12​
14​
 
I looked into this a while back, it didnt make a big difference to the table, just a few minor changes here and there, however, I only awarded 1 point. So all it was really doing was splitting those up who were tied on points.

2 points would be enough to make changes up and down the ladder, allowing teams who attack to jump others, actually encouraging an attacking game rather than prioritising it.

So this is last years ladder based off of 2 points when a team scores 100 with differences in the ladder

1. Geelong (-)
2. Brisbane (-)
3. Collingwood (+1)
4. Richmond (-1)
5. West Coast (-)
6. Greater Western Sydney (-)
7. Western Bulldogs (-)
8. Essendon (-)

9. Port Adelaide (+1)
10. Hawthorn (-1)
11. North Melbourne (+1)
12. Adelaide (-1)
13. Fremantle (-)
14. St Kilda (-)
15. Sydney (-)
16. Carlton (-)
17. Melbourne (-)
18. Gold Coast (-)

This is last years ladder based off of 2 points when a team scores 120 with differences in the ladder

1. Geelong (-)
2. Brisbane (-)
3. Richmond (-)
4. West Coast (+1)
5. Collingwood (-1)
6. Greater Western Sydney (-)
7. Western Bulldogs (-)
8. Essendon (-)

9. Port Adelaide (+1)
10. Hawthorn (-1)
11. North Melbourne (+1)
12. Adelaide (-1)
13. Fremantle (-)
14. St Kilda (-)
15. Sydney (-)
16. Carlton (-)
17. Melbourne (-)
18. Gold Coast (-)

And here's another one where you get 2 points at 100 and 120 (I think Super Rugby has done this in the past, once at 5 tries the other at 7??????)

1. Geelong (-)
2. Brisbane (-)
3. Greater Western Sydney (+3)
4. Collingwood (-)
5. West Coast (-)
6. Richmond (-3)
7. Western Bulldogs (-)
8. Port Adelaide (+2)

9. Essendon (-1)
10. North Melbourne (+2)
11. Hawthorn (-2)
12. Adelaide (-1)
13. Fremantle (-)
14. St Kilda (-)
15. Sydney (-)
16. Carlton (-)
17. Melbourne (-)
18. Gold Coast (-)

Im all for it tbh.

I hate how the league makes rule changes which create unintended consequences.

eg. Ruckman concedes prior opportunity if they take the ball out of the ruck - Causes taps into a maul, congestion, and repeat ball ups.

Why not just reward teams for doing what you want, then coaches might open up the game and higher scores occur more frequently
 
In an ideal world this would be reasonable but with an imperfect draw where some teams are going to play the worst teams twice, and others wont, it unofficially means there are more bonus points up for grabs for some teams than others.

Let alone the variable weather conditions - although it might once again make the awful a dome a great place to have home games.

But wouldn't it just make coaches defend to ensure the oppo doesn't get a bonus point?
 
May 5, 2016
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Let alone the variable weather conditions - although it might once again make the awful a dome a great place to have home games.

But wouldn't it just make coaches defend to ensure the oppo doesn't get a bonus point?

That would depend on the team's relationship to the other side.

If a team is trying to get into 8th and their opponent is trying to get into fourth, they would both take the handbrake off and turn it into a free for all.

Some sports do have losing bonus points too, ie. if you keep the margin within a certain bracket you get a point
 
Jun 7, 2007
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Let alone the variable weather conditions - although it might once again make the awful a dome a great place to have home games.

But wouldn't it just make coaches defend to ensure the oppo doesn't get a bonus point?
Maybe, but in most cases you're looking after yourself rather than worrying about your opponent.
 

PAFC_1870

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You can't do this. Simply because they play under different conditions and different grounds

I love the concept, but it'd be a huge advantage to Marvel tenants and a huge disadvantage if other teams experienced many wet games.
 
Jun 11, 2007
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You can't do this. Simply because they play under different conditions and different grounds

I love the concept, but it'd be a huge advantage to Marvel tenants and a huge disadvantage if other teams experienced many wet games.
Raised this a couple of years back and this is the argument against.
You can't even adjust for wet weather or dewy conditions because they vary so much as well.

Only other thing i can think of for getting scoring up is to introduce bench subs only or rotations between goals & quarters only.
Might find coaches are less keen on the rolling mauls if they can't freshen the legs up every 2-3m
 

Ok Boomer

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I was a yes until a poster above mentioned the potential inequity with the draw with some clubs potentially playing poor clubs twice.

We really need to do something to incentivise scoring though.
 
You can't do this. Simply because they play under different conditions and different grounds

I love the concept, but it'd be a huge advantage to Marvel tenants and a huge disadvantage if other teams experienced many wet games.
2019 100 scores
8 - Geelong, Brisbane, Greater Western Sydney
7 - Collingwood
6 - Western Bulldogs
5 - West Coast, Port Adelaide
4 - Richmond, Essendon, North Melbourne
3 - Adelaide, Fremantle, Carlton, Melbourne
2 - Hawthorn, St Kilda, Sydney
1 - Nil
0 - Gold Coast

Marvel tennants - 3.8 each
Non-Marvel tenants - 4.5 each
 

Bungeye

Club Legend
Aug 19, 2017
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If people are arguing that weather is the determining factor for them being against having bonus points, than the same applies for statistics. A few seasons ago the Sydney swans played half their games in wet weather footy, which diminished their overall efficiency effectiveness stats, but their tackle count and pressure rating went through the roof!
Do we than abolish fantasy footy and pressure ratings because it is a flawed system?
If we agree that both are flawed, than I advocate for every stadium to have a roof, which eliminates the doubt. But that won't be happening anytime soon!
 
Last edited:
Feb 23, 2009
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Obviously a big topic for years is how to open the game up. Ideas often get brought up like interchange caps, starting positions and things like that. In my opinion it ultimately it comes down to the coaches wanting to play defensively and mitigate risk at all times.


An idea I have to encourage coaches to attack more is to award bonus points for teams reaching a certain benchmark. Assuming we get back to full length games for the purpose of this idea, if a team scores 120 points they get an additional 2 points. So if a team wins and reaches 120 points they receive 6 points for the game instead of the current 4. Additionally a losing team can still get something out of a loss should a game be particularly high scoring.

You could potentially do it in stages, so maybe 1 BP for 90 points and 2 BPs for 120, meaning a losing team will still hopefully try to score to get something out of the game and the winning team will ideally push for 120. So even in blowouts the game is somewhat "live" right to the end for both teams.

The score and amount of bonus points can obviously be tweaked to your liking, but as an idea do you think awarding bonus points would encourage coaches and teams attack more and mitigate risk less, ideally resulting in the game being opened up?
There's a number of limitations.
The reward for offensive gameplans and scoring is percentage. Coaches shouldn't be forced to attack and tweak their list strengths just to get bonus points. A win is a win and should be rewarded as such.

Secondly, teams that play at different grounds and different conditions have far different scoring potentials. Marvel Stadium is a high scoring fast deck under perfect conditions every week. Tasmania or Geelong at the same time might be windy and wet. Queensland might be hot, humid, torrentially wet or slippery.

Finally, if there is a fixturing issue with getting stronger or weaker teams, then bonus points just compound this issue. Instead of getting the bottom side once and smashing them, you get them twice. Based on 2 bonus points each time, that's a total of 12 points or 3 wins equivalent for 2 wins in practice. Far too big a reward for scoring a few more points.
 

Topkent

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It's the weather that is the real issue.

Imagine two games going on simultaneously. One is 12 degrees, a strong wind and pouring rain and the other just a few kilometres away inside and undercover with no rain and no wind at Etihad.
This has always been true as the argument against but I think * it who cares, games dog s**t anyway with advantages all over the place.
If it means that to make finals a team has to try win and score 120 or whatever the bench mark is then * it.
 

dean33

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Oct 10, 2007
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Obviously a big topic for years is how to open the game up. Ideas often get brought up like interchange caps, starting positions and things like that. In my opinion it ultimately it comes down to the coaches wanting to play defensively and mitigate risk at all times.


An idea I have to encourage coaches to attack more is to award bonus points for teams reaching a certain benchmark. Assuming we get back to full length games for the purpose of this idea, if a team scores 120 points they get an additional 2 points. So if a team wins and reaches 120 points they receive 6 points for the game instead of the current 4. Additionally a losing team can still get something out of a loss should a game be particularly high scoring.

You could potentially do it in stages, so maybe 1 BP for 90 points and 2 BPs for 120, meaning a losing team will still hopefully try to score to get something out of the game and the winning team will ideally push for 120. So even in blowouts the game is somewhat "live" right to the end for both teams.

The score and amount of bonus points can obviously be tweaked to your liking, but as an idea do you think awarding bonus points would encourage coaches and teams attack more and mitigate risk less, ideally resulting in the game being opened up?
No. Just no.
 

coldlunch

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Mar 19, 2013
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aside from the obvious issues with the weather, am I the only person who thinks a high scoring blowout (as a neutral fan) is much more boring than a low scoring slog?
 
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