Make the 8 and anything can happen

[John Who]

Last year, you could make the 8 with 11 wins and a good percentage (Sydney). So 11.5 wins might still be able to make it this year. Likely it will need around the 12 minimum, with us needing 12.5 if we were to make it.

It’s looking unlikely currently, but another month of footy might change a few perspectives.

 

[Kane McGoodwin]

I reckon we can make the 8... wins, but only just.

 

[crowholder]

I reckon we can make the 8... wins, but only just.

We can. but only just. I think if we lose this week, we won't make it. Even if we win 13 and a half games this year, we may not make it. NM, WC and Richmond all stink this year, giving more wins to teams. It may be that it is a close call between the 4 teams that were involved in a draw, providing we win this Saturday. My expectations have gone down though with the team selections.

 

[skam85]

I reckon we can make the 8... wins, but only just.

If Nicks keeps coaching for KPIs, anything can happen

 

[Slippery Pete]

We can. but only just. I think if we lose this week, we won't make it. Even if we win 13 and a half games this year, we may not make it. NM, WC and Richmond all stink this year, giving more wins to teams. It may be that it is a close call between the 4 teams that were involved in a draw, providing we win this Saturday. My expectations have gone down though with the team selections.

I think he meant eight wins total

 

[CrowBloke]

I'm not sure how serious you're being with the "Make the 8 ... etc", but

Is this little good patch just a big tease?

Probably, because Nicks is our Coach. It's a false dawn. 2023, that loss to Sydney, convinced most that the Crows were Finals-bound. Nicks certainly assumed that and decided the Crows needed to have a Top 4 defence, forgetting that it's Minor Round wins PLUS strong defence that gets you there. That emphasis on defence drained the mids amd forwards of their scoring flair ==> 0-4.

Nicks might be good at bringing people together in a warm-fuzzy, kumbaya way but Nicks has no tactical nous, no imagination, no flair, no I-just-wanna-win toughness.
Worse, his player-favoritism is obvious and counter-productively polarising within the group, I'd suspect.

Is our 0-3 start plus ongoing selection missteps and midfield A Grader shortage going to prevent us from reaching the 8?

0-4, but yes, probably.
Nicks' tendency to play rookies in positions that do not suit their abilities (as well as the abovementioned favoritism) hinders their development, crushes their confidence and would be creating a lot of resentment. I can't imagine how, say, Curtin feels watching super-experienced, 250-game Leader Smith and others spud it up.
It could be argued then that young players would not be re-signing/extending their contracts if they were disenchanted.
I think the feel-good atmosphere is responsible for that, rather than any real or hard awareness of what it takes to win a Flag.

Or are we back in business baby?

I wanna say NO, but Hardwick reinvented himself so I suppose there's a slight chance Nicks might do the same.
Very slight. I think Nicks lacks the introspective self-awareness and imagination required to do that .
Blaming the players is the ultimate in not taking responsibility for his selections, player positioning and gameday actions (or inactions, in his case). As long as Nicks blames the players for not executing, he has an excuse not to change anything he does. In his mind, they have to change/improve, not him.
In actual fact, they all have to.

"Make the 8 and anything could happen"?
I think that's a Myth of Hope created by Adelaide (1997/fourth and 1998/fifth at end of minor rounds) and the Bulldogs who pulled it off amazingly from 7th in 2016. I only went back as far as 1995, so 2 only in 30 years from 5th to 8th, but since then all the other Premiers have come from Top 4.

A better way to put it is probably "Make the Top 4 and anything could happen".
It's depressing when I think about how far from Top 4 the Crows under Nicks are.

 

[Bevoman]

I'm not sure how serious you're being with the "Make the 8 ... etc", but

Probably, because Nicks is our Coach. It's a false dawn. 2023, that loss to Sydney, convinced most that the Crows were Finals-bound. Nicks certainly assumed that and decided the Crows needed to have a Top 4 defence, forgetting that it's Minor Round wins PLUS strong defence that gets you there. That emphasis on defence drained the mids amd forwards of their scoring flair ==> 0-4.

Nicks might be good at bringing people together in a warm-fuzzy, kumbaya way but Nicks has no tactical nous, no imagination, no flair, no I-just-wanna-win toughness.
Worse, his player-favoritism is obvious and counter-productively polarising within the group, I'd suspect.

0-4, but yes, probably.
Nicks' tendency to play rookies in positions that do not suit their abilities (as well as the abovementioned favoritism) hinders their development, crushes their confidence and would be creating a lot of resentment. I can't imagine how, say, Curtin feels watching super-experienced, 250-game Leader Smith and others spud it up.
It could be argued then that young players would not be re-signing/extending their contracts if they were disenchanted.
I think the feel-good atmosphere is responsible for that, rather than any real or hard awareness of what it takes to win a Flag.

I wanna say NO, but Hardwick reinvented himself so I suppose there's a slight chance Nicks might do the same.
Very slight. I think Nicks lacks the introspective self-awareness and imagination required to do that .
Blaming the players is the ultimate in not taking responsibility for his selections, player positioning and gameday actions (or inactions, in his case). As long as Nicks blames the players for not executing, he has an excuse not to change anything he does. In his mind, they have to change/improve, not him.
In actual fact, they all have to.

"Make the 8 and anything could happen"?
I think that's a Myth of Hope created by Adelaide (1997/fourth and 1998/fifth at end of minor rounds) and the Bulldogs who pulled it off amazingly from 7th in 2016. I only went back as far as 1995, so 2 only in 30 years from 5th to 8th, but since then all the other Premiers have come from Top 4.

A better way to put it is probably "Make the Top 4 and anything could happen".
It's depressing when I think about how far from Top 4 the Crows under Nicks are.

Win some away games and then anything can happen

 

[dogs105]

Win some away games and then anything can happen

Cheers Nicksy

 

[cmndstab]

I voted "no" a little while back. Don't think we'll make it.

However, I wonder if we've been a little unfortunate in who we've played so far? So far we've been beaten by Geelong, Essendon and Melbourne who are all top four on the ladder at the moment, and Gold Coast who just belted Geelong. The only really unforgivable loss is the one to Fremantle.

Meanwhile we've knocked off Carlton and Port who are both in the top 8 and at the moment.

Is it possible we're a bit better than we all think? I think I read that we have the 2nd hardest run home in the season, not sure how that happened after we've played so many top 8 sides so far.

 

[jackster83]

I voted "no" a little while back. Don't think we'll make it.

However, I wonder if we've been a little unfortunate in who we've played so far? So far we've been beaten by Geelong, Essendon and Melbourne who are all top four on the ladder at the moment, and Gold Coast who just belted Geelong. The only really unforgivable loss is the one to Fremantle.

Meanwhile we've knocked off Carlton and Port who are both in the top 8 and at the moment.

Is it possible we're a bit better than we all think? I think I read that we have the 2nd hardest run home in the season, not sure how that happened after we've played so many top 8 sides so far.

Nope.

We're good enough to be in most games but not good enough to win them. There's been absolutely no improvement from last year in that regard. We've also been very lucky with opposition teams either being depleted or suffering injuries during games.

 

[woofsson]

I reckon we can make the 8... wins, but only just.

5 more wins for the season then?

 

[George Kramer]

Nope.

We're good enough to be in most games but not good enough to win them. There's been absolutely no improvement from last year in that regard. We've also been very lucky with opposition teams either being depleted or suffering injuries during games.

And we have Nicks

 

[NSolis]

I voted "no" a little while back. Don't think we'll make it.

However, I wonder if we've been a little unfortunate in who we've played so far? So far we've been beaten by Geelong, Essendon and Melbourne who are all top four on the ladder at the moment, and Gold Coast who just belted Geelong. The only really unforgivable loss is the one to Fremantle.

Meanwhile we've knocked off Carlton and Port who are both in the top 8 and at the moment.

Is it possible we're a bit better than we all think? I think I read that we have the 2nd hardest run home in the season, not sure how that happened after we've played so many top 8 sides so far.

It's been a tough draw. Certainly playing GC, Freo and Carlton away plus Geelong and Melbourne at home was an extremely tough first 5 weeks. After playing Collingwood tomorrow we have three easier games. If we win all of those after losing to Collingwood we'll be 6-1-6 which I think is probably a fair representation of where we are at as a club and the difficulty of our draw will have evened out. And I guess if we don't win them then we don't have much to complain about anyway.

So yes, a bit unfortunate in terms of the draw, but even when it rebounds I think we'll be mid table.

One striking feature of this season just like last season is we never really lose heavily, but don't close out many tight games. Last year only 2 of our 12 losses were by more than 5 goals, and only 2 of our 11 wins were by under 5 goals. So 2-10 in games with margins 30 or less. This year it's 1-4, so the trend continues. Plus the draw.

 

[NSolis]

Into the softer part of the draw now. 8 of our remaining 13 games are at the Adelaide oval, including 4 of the next 5. The opposition in the run home is mostly good, but the next block of games is 3 of the bottom 4 followed by Sydney and GWS either side of the bye, with the only away game being the Hawks at the MCG.

If we win 4 of those 5 I think it's season alive at 7-1-7, and you can expect a bit of media positivity if we put a few wins together given that the overall body of work since the Melbourne game is pretty good. If we lose more than 1 of them, or any of the next 3, I think we're looking at 'prepare for 2025' time.

 

[Kane McGoodwin]

So we probably need at least 12.5 wins to make the finals.

So that's another 9 wins from our remaining 13 games... ie. Maximum of 4 more losses.

So we have Cats at the Cattery, Sydney at the SCG, Brisbane at Gabba, Dons at Docklands.

We may as well be developing the team for 2025.

 

[Vladdy Daddy]

So we probably need at least 12.5 wins to make the finals.

So that's another 9 wins from our remaining 13 games... ie. Maximum of 4 more losses.

So we have Cats at the Cattery, Sydney at the SCG, Brisbane at Gabba, Dons at Docklands.

We may as well be developing the team for 2025.

Clubs put forward a 22 looking to the future and not the immediate sugar rush of a meaningless win. We lack the nous to be one of these clubs…..

 

[crowholder]

So we probably need at least 12.5 wins to make the finals.

So that's another 9 wins from our remaining 13 games... ie. Maximum of 4 more losses.

So we have Cats at the Cattery, Sydney at the SCG, Brisbane at Gabba, Dons at Docklands.

We may as well be developing the team for 2025.

and with the teams going so bad at the bottom, 13.5 wins may not be enough....we have little if any chance. So I agree, developing the team is the goal now...but will they develop younger players or players that already have xp. I suspect it will be a balance.

 

[PCORF]

So we probably need at least 12.5 wins to make the finals.

So that's another 9 wins from our remaining 13 games... ie. Maximum of 4 more losses.

So we have Cats at the Cattery, Sydney at the SCG, Brisbane at Gabba, Dons at Docklands.

We may as well be developing the team for 2025.

How I think the rest of the season pans out. We'll be inconsistent. Will probably have at least 1 upset victory and lose a game (I say Hawthorn) we are expected to win. Will take care of struggling West Coast and Richmond sides in the next 2 home games.

11 = vs West Coast at AO = Win by 40
12 = @ Hawthorn at MCG = Loss by 12
13 = vs Richmond at AO = Win by 60
14 = vs Swans at AO = Win by 5
Inspiring upset win vs the Swans has the team on a high going into the bye but then ....

16 = vs Giants at AO = Loss by 21
17 = @ Lions at G = Loss by 8
18 = vs St Kilda at AO = Win by 13
19 = @ Essendon at MS = Loss by 4
20 = vs Hawthorn at AO = Win by 27
21 = @ Geelong at KP = Loss by 29
22 = vs Bulldogs at AO = Win by 25
23 = @ Port at AO = Win by 8
24 = @ Swans at SCG = Loss by 10

Final record = 10-12-1

 

[skam85]

So we probably need at least 12.5 wins to make the finals.

So that's another 9 wins from our remaining 13 games... ie. Maximum of 4 more losses.

So we have Cats at the Cattery, Sydney at the SCG, Brisbane at Gabba, Dons at Docklands.

We may as well be developing the team for 2025.

Last two are winnable but we have always saved our worst performances for Essendon at Marvel.

 

[glengowan]

Need to win the next 4. Should win 3 of the next 4. Will most likely win 2 of the next 4. A loss before the bye and they should be 100% planning for 2025.

 

[Kane McGoodwin]

Last two are winnable but we have always saved our worst performances for Essendon at Marvel.

We haven't beaten Essendon in years!

 

[SugarShane]

We haven't beaten Essendon in years!

We've played in a Grand Final more recently than we've beaten Essendon.

 

[GreyCrow]

Should change the poll to how many of the next 3 games do we win?

 

[Drugs Are Bad Mackay?]

Should change the poll to how many of the next 3 games do we win?

Done

And for posterity:

 

[kirky]

If we are 3-9-1 after the next 3 weeks, Nicks won’t make it to the bye.