Finally some fixture sense from the AFL

[Gibbke]

It's a f###ed idea if we're reading it as a division of the comp to lock them into fighting for those places. Basing the remaining rounds on ladder position and continuing as is, fine, whatever - but we don't need a nine week finals series...

It's also sending the wrong message to be advertising the bottom six as a fight for primo draft picks. Be shit and be rewarded. Everyone gets a prize...

 

[bombers21]

Keep it as it is. Silver Spoon Gil has no clue

 

[Jade's_]

Has been advocated by various people of common sense for years, make it happen please Gill



http://www.afl.com.au/news/2014-08-25/midseason-draft-in-2016

I challenge anyone to argue that the final few rounds haven't had any significant impact in the season. The last few rounds have been sensational because there has been so much riding on so many games

 

[Gibbke]

Wouldn't matter what the draw looked like, the current top five would be the five, Essendon and North would be where they are, and 8-12 would have been fighting this same battle. Same deal last year. The 2012 Adelaide soft draw uproar is easily countered by looking at the winning record they built up against top sides...

 

[shintemaster]

Call me crazy but there should be two key aims to any fixturing changes in the short to medium term. Transparency & fairness.



I fundamentally do not understand how 17 rounds before then breaking up into any division system can possibly achieve these aims without massive amounts of fine print to ensure this is the case. Playing each team once does not make the fixture any fairer. Leaving aside the extra game (I’ve assumed a 9 / 8 home away split for simplicity here is one “hypothetical” fixture for North.

Home / Away
NM v Adl
NM v Bris
Carl v NM
Coll v NM
Ess v NM
NM v Fre
Geel v NM
NM v Suns
NM v GWS
Hawks v NM
Mel v NM
NM v Port
Rich v NM
St K v NM
NM v Syd
NM v WC
WB v NM

Now flip each game and tell me which one is more advantageous. Both are possible under this system. Under the first fixture I would suggest a North Melbourne team has a massively increased chance to finish top 4 and vice versa. The whole prospect makes no sense IMHO. Why do people insist on dancing around the obvious. ALL clubs need to get on the front foot and demand a rolling fixture. In particular the onus needs to be on all of the non-Victorian clubs to do so, it is only when they are demanding the same as the smaller Victorian clubs that there can be forced change. The biggest clubs in Melbourne are extremely powerful and entrenched, they are also easy money for the competition without ever having to risk anything.

 

[Bunk Moreland]

Lol

TV networks will say no

 

[mottrain]

Doesn't fixturing this way encourage non taking to happen? Somehow now a team takes up 13 spot who was miles better than that and as a result rips the other teams big time in the playing for picks games. Great thing is that they don't have to lose deliberately to benefit.

 

[Giants FC]

The flaw with that system is that it's impossible to guarantee every club 11 home games. Some could end up with 12, others with only 10.
That affects the value of memberships, corporate packages, ground signage etc.

 

[clogged]

Abolish the doubling up of derbies and blockbuster matches. Institute a rolling draw over 3-4 years.

This solution is nothing but adjusting the draw to have more top of the table clashes at the end of the year, ergo aiming for more attendances and higher ratings. Nothing to do with 'fairness'.

 

[Footy Smarts]

Seems like a much fairer and better way to do it to me.

The TV networks would definitely go for it. They'd much prefer to be guaranteed games between teams in similar positions on the ladder in the last 5 weeks of the year. This week channel 7 in Melbourne had 2 bore fests (Port Carlton and WB Sydney), a game that had virtually no impact on the finals race (Haw Geel) and 1 cracker (Adel North). By having 3 groups of 6 then basically every game will be competitive going into it and most games will have some importance for something.

It would be particularly good for the lower teams being able to play for something in games they're competitive in. That should drag some extra bums through the gates.

 

[KnaveyBlue]

The bottom six "play off" for draft picks?

I assume that means you compete for the highest pick, in which case #1 is going to go to the 13th/14th placed team every year. It's generally only the bottom three or four that are truly uncompetitive.

Turn the draft into a lottery and play off for extra balls perhaps?

 

[telsor]

Wont happen.

2 core issues.

1) The AFL needs to book grounds a fair way ahead. They can't realistically book all grounds for the last 5 rounds 'just in case'.

2) They would miss out on a lot of their desired return bouts. Only having 1 Derby/showdown/etc each year would affect both the bottom line and the happiness of the clubs/supporters (especially true of non-vic clubs, but applies elsewhere).

 

[THE EQUALIZER]

It looks like the AFL are on the right track playing everyone once in the first 17 rounds before the double up games.

The plan falls away by splitting the competition into thirds for the remaining 5 rounds, by playing everyone in your own group for a second time.

There are massive fixturing issues if you have played every team in your 6 at home already in the first 17 rounds. If you are a struggling Victorian team, and still have 3 more home games to fulfil, can you imagine having two home games for the season against the Suns and the Giants.

Keeping derbies and marquee fixtures underpin the equalisation process and need to be largely maintained. Playing everyone in your own third of the table for a second time is too rigid.

3 games against your own group and 1 game against teams in the other two groups builds in the flexibility for maintaining derbies and blockbusters.

11 home games against 11 different teams is surely something we want to preserve, now and into the future.

 

[loki04]

What if 7th place is percentage out of the top 6 after round 17, does that mean the highest they can finish is 7th?

Yeah that would need revising imo what happens if they were 2 games out of top spot and ended up on more wins by the end of season then the top side..

 

[hcd199]

It was a flawed proposal every time posters proposed it on here, and it remains a flawed proposal now. "Playing for draft picks", in particular, is a ludicrous idea that misses the entire purpose of the reverse-ladder-order draft process - namely, to give the earliest choice to the team most in need of assistance. Giving it to the best team in the bottom 6 just doesn't make any sense. There's no way to ensure an equitable number of home games for each team, either... is it that hard for the AFL to consider a rolling draw over three seasons?

 

[MickyG]

This has been discussed before. Biggest problems are booking venues at short notice and effects on memberships.

18 teams means 9 play home on week 1 then 9 on week 2. 17 rounds means nine teams get 9 home games in the first 17 weeks and the other 9 teams only get 8. You get to the end of round of 17 and the top 6 have all played home that week, how do you book the following week?

11 game memberships are no more? Will people sign up for 11 rounds when they will not know until after round 17 when and where the final 2 or 3 home games are going to get played? People book at short notice for finals so maybe they will for rounds 18 to 22 but how much interest will there be in rounds 18 to 22?

The idea of this system is great but the practicalities are probably too hard.

 

[piesnz]

The bottom six "play off" for draft picks?

I assume that means you compete for the highest pick, in which case #1 is going to go to the 13th/14th placed team every year. It's generally only the bottom three or four that are truly uncompetitive.

Turn the draft into a lottery and play off for extra balls perhaps?

This is a good way perhaps of having a bit each way in keeping it interesting as well as avoiding propping up better team.

Say award larger number of balls at end of 17 rounds from bottom side up. Then the rest of the balls are awarded after round 22 from 13th down to 18th.

 

[KnaveyBlue]

Say award larger number of balls at end of 17 rounds from bottom side up. Then the rest of the balls are awarded after round 22 from 13th down to 18th.

Round 17:

18th: 6 balls
17th: 5 balls
16th: 4 balls
15th: 3 balls
14th: 2 balls
13th: 1 ball

post-playoff:

Winner: 4 balls
2nd: 3 balls
3rd: 2 balls
4th: 1 ball
5th/6th: Nothin'

The 13th team theoretically can't get a better shot at the #1 pick than the team who finished last, even if they win the playoff.

 

[Here2tellyouwhy]

This is all GC and GWS fault.

If they were'nt around we could just drop half the Victorian teams, add the Tazzie team and then play everyone twice.
One game at home, next one away.

18 teams into 22 rounds has never worked and never will.

 

[loki04]

The point of playing for draft picks has never made sense to me. We want the worst team to get the best pick.

They would still be getting access to elite talent, top 6 pick.

Also the bottom 4 teams are usually as poor as each other and capable of knocking off each other and even mid ranked sides.

Carlton - Dogs, WC, Saintsx2, Crows, Nth Melb, GC
Dogs - Rich, GWS, Melbx2, Coll, GC, Saints
Lions - Saints, Carlton, Dogs, Nth Melb, GC, Melb, Collingwood
GWS - Swans, Melbx2, Lions, Carlton,
Melb - Carlton, Richmond, Essendon, Crows
Saints - Melb, GWS, Essendon, Freo

Would be the 6 fighting it out and next to them the teams they have beaten.

All have shown that they are capable of knocking each other off, the top teams have shown you don't need a team full of top 10 picks to win a flag. It comes back to more development, talent ID, injury profile, a smidge of luck and also having a winning culture which this system would promote.


I don't like the idea of locking in the rest of the ladder though.

 

[UpForGrabs]

Great idea but won't happen (or at least not properly) because you can't possibly have only one Derby, one Showdown, one Coll v Carl, etc etc etc in a season. The world wouldn't survive it.

We should have only one of those matches a year.

It's ridiculous that the sport rigs its fixture so they appear twice each season.

 

[Final Siren]

Yikes. So Carlton would collect the #1 draft pick this year, while Melbourne, who battled hard but couldn't hold it together for the whole season, would get pick #4 - #6.

 

[master bate]

Freaking disastrous idea.

It condemns the bottom 6 to tank it out against each other. The middle six end up in a useless battle for spots that they can't win the flag for anyway and the top 6 play the finals before the finals start.

Let's work on getting a legitimate system of who plays who twice each year. Then continue to work on equalisation measures so we can see a bottom 6 team upset a top 6 team more often and some variation in the top 4 between the teams who are there early in the year and middle-end of the year change a bit.

Creating these fixturing brackets will just result in even bigger gaps between teams.

 

[PrideOf]

Call me crazy but there should be two key aims to any fixturing changes in the short to medium term. Transparency & fairness.

Lulza. The AFL would never go for transparency - Vlad even had his office windows painted so no-one could see in.

And fairness would only be fair if the TV networks or Collingwood thought it was fair.

 

[BC9_]

The top 6 playing for spots week after week would have to be exhausting for the players wouldn't it?