Player Watch Shai Bolton - The Next Best Player In The Game

[Back One Out]

Bolton is one of the best attacking players in the game, but there are more well-rounded, more complete two-way players.

2.05 tackles per game (305th in the AFL) and 13.6 pressure acts per game (198th)

Even if you just compared him to other small forwards and half forwards, he ranks towards the bottom in these defensive stats.

I'd say this is largely by design. Shai has no shortage of teammates willing to do the 'dirty work' and with Dusty absent this year, his teammates need him to focus on scoring & creating goals.

He is off-the-charts this season for score involvements... 4th in the AFL behind Tomahawk, Trac and Tex with 7.8 per game.

This tempered by the fact that he has scored 39 goals, 39 behinds.

Remove those missed opportunities from his score involvements tally and he drops down to 25th in the AFL with 5.85 per game

 

[Ancient Tiger]

Bolton is one of the best attacking players in the game, but there are more well-rounded, more complete two-way players.

2.05 tackles per game (305th in the AFL) and 13.6 pressure acts per game (198th)

Even if you just compared him to other small forwards and half forwards, he ranks towards the bottom in these defensive stats.


However, he is off-the-charts this season for score involvements... 4th in the AFL behind Tomahawk, Trac and Tex with 7.8 per game.

This tempered by the fact that he has scored 39 goals, 39 behinds.
Remove those 39 behinds from his score involvements tally and he drops down to 25th in the AFL with 5.85 per game

Why would you remove 39 behinds? Many of them should have been goals and they also indicate he is beating his opponents to score.

 

[Back One Out]

Why would you remove 39 behinds? Many of them should have been goals and they also indicate he is beating his opponents to score.

Because I don't consider it to be good play if you kick a point. (Unless there are fewer than 2 minutes remaining and it puts your team 1 point or 7 points in front)

It's a wasted opportunity. He should've kicked it straight, or found a teammate in better position instead of blazing away and wasting the scoring chance and giving possession back to the opposition. So who cares about that particular "score involvement" ? It's a meaningless aspect of that statistic. Padding.

He can't help it if one of his teammates is inaccurate. So I give him credit for helping set up scoring chances for his teammates (goals or behinds) and I give him credit for kicking goals.

 

[blaisee]

Because I don't consider it to be good play if you kick a point. (Unless there are fewer than 2 minutes remaining and it puts your team 1 point or 7 points in front)

It's a wasted opportunity. He should've kicked it straight, or found a teammate in better position instead of blazing away and wasting the scoring chance and giving possession back to the opposition. So who cares about that particular "score involvement" ? It's a meaningless aspect of that statistic. Padding.

He can't help it if one of his teammates is inaccurate. So I give him credit for helping set up scoring chances for his teammates (goals or behinds) and I give him credit for kicking goals.

You forgot something

He has also had 15 shots at goal that haven’t scored

By your reckoning he should be dropped , and buddy should have been dropped and Gary Ablett senior as well . Jason dunstall kicked heaps of points too
.

I Am assuming that the above post is either a joke or a troll , because if it neither you need to take a Valium and have a nap or better still just rub one out instead of eating too much and backing one out

 

[Back One Out]

You forgot something. He has also had 15 shots at goal that haven’t scored

By your reckoning he should be dropped , and buddy should have been dropped and Gary Ablett senior as well . Jason dunstall kicked heaps of points too

What are you blathering on about?

Ancient Tiger and I were discussing the "score involvements" stat and why I modified it to subtract the 39 behinds he'd kicked.

I Am assuming that the above post is either a joke or a troll , because if it neither you need to take a Valium and have a nap or better still just rub one out instead of eating too much and backing one out

Maybe you should take your own advice and have a lie down.

Take your teddy bear with you and leave your night light on.

 

[Sky]

Maybe not yet the best player in the comp but there is nobody close to being more watchable.

With the exception of about 3 to 5 key forwards under the age of 26 there is nobody in the league I would rather have than Shai Bolton

29

Shai Bolton

Age

25

Ht

176cm

Wt

77kg

Pos.

M/F

Career

Season

Last 5

D

12.3

3star

K

6.9

3star

HB

5.4

4star

M

2.8

3star

T

2.9

4star

CL

1.4

4star

D

12.7

3star

K

9.2

4star

HB

3.5

2star

M

3.0

3star

T

2.7

4star

CL

1.8

4star

D

9.2

3star

K

4.6

2star

HB

4.6

4star

M

2.0

3star

T

2.6

4star

CL

0.0

1star

 

[BF Tiger]

Bolton is one of the best attacking players in the game, but there are more well-rounded, more complete two-way players.

2.05 tackles per game (305th in the AFL) and 13.6 pressure acts per game (198th)

Even if you just compared him to other small forwards and half forwards, he ranks towards the bottom in these defensive stats.

I'd say this is largely by design. Shai has no shortage of teammates willing to do the 'dirty work' and with Dusty absent this year, his teammates need him to focus on scoring & creating goals.

He is off-the-charts this season for score involvements... 4th in the AFL behind Tomahawk, Trac and Tex with 7.8 per game.

This tempered by the fact that he has scored 39 goals, 39 behinds.

Remove those missed opportunities from his score involvements tally and he drops down to 25th in the AFL with 5.85 per game

You Backed One Out, but not all of them when you forgot to re-calculate for all the other behinds scored. For a start you should be removing Tomahawk's 33 behinds, Petracca's 27 behinds (only 16 goals btw) and Tex's 23 behinds.

 

[Back One Out]

You forgot to re-calculate for all the other behinds scored. For a start you should be removing Tomahawk's 33 behinds, Petracca's 27 behinds (only 16 goals btw) and Tex's 23 behinds.

Nope. I did that already.

I wouldn't subtract Bolton's behinds from his score involvements , but keep everyone's else's included in their modified tally.

1. 7.15... Christian Petracca.... 143 / 20
2. 6.95... Marcus Bontempelli.... 132 / 19
3. 6.94... Zach Merrett.... 118 / 17
4. 6.80... Tom Hawkins.... 136 / 20
5. 6.71... Darcy Parish.... 94 / 14
6. 6.65... Josh Dunkley.... 133 / 20
7. 6.58... Clayton Oliver.... 125 / 19
8. 6.57... Bailey Smith.... 92 / 14
9. 6.56... Taylor Walker.... 105 / 16
10. 6.56... Rory Laird.... 118 / 18
11. 6.55... Tom Liberatore.... 131 / 20
12. 6.50... Lachie Neale.... 130 / 20
13. 6.47... Patrick Cripps.... 123 / 19
14. 6.42... Chad Warner.... 122 / 19
15. 6.35... Jeremy Cameron.... 127 / 20
16. 6.33... George Hewett.... 95 / 15
17. 6.30... Jack Macrae.... 126 / 20
18. 6.26... Stephen Coniglio.... 119 / 19
19. 6.16... Mitch Duncan.... 117 / 19
20. 6.07... Tom Papley.... 85 / 14
21. 6.00... Sam Walsh.... 114 / 19
22. 5.90... Luke Parker.... 118 / 20
23. 5.90... Cameron Guthrie.... 118 / 20
24. 5.85... Shai Bolton.... 117 / 20
25. 5.78... Lance Franklin.... 104 / 18
26. 5.77... Tim English.... 75 / 13
27. 5.75... Ben Ainsworth.... 115 / 20
28. 5.75... Callum Mills.... 115 / 20
29. 5.74... Hugh McCluggage.... 109 / 19
30. 5.69... Joel Selwood.... 91 / 16
31. 5.69... Dion Prestia.... 91 / 16
32. 5.65... Isaac Heeney.... 113 / 20
33. 5.65... Patrick Lipinski.... 113 / 20
34. 5.61... Jye Caldwell.... 101 / 18
35. 5.60... Andrew Brayshaw.... 112 / 20
36. 5.58... Scott Pendlebury.... 106 / 19
37. 5.55... Charlie Curnow.... 111 / 20
38. 5.55... Tyson Stengle.... 111 / 20
39. 5.47... Adam Treloar.... 104 / 19
40. 5.45... Brad Crouch.... 109 / 20
41. 5.42... Tom Mitchell.... 103 / 19
42. 5.42... Sebastian Ross.... 103 / 19
43. 5.35... Isaac Smith.... 107 / 20
44. 5.35... Dylan Moore.... 107 / 20
45. 5.33... Toby Greene.... 80 / 15
46. 5.32... Travis Boak.... 101 / 19
47. 5.30... Errol Gulden.... 106 / 20
48. 5.27... Jordan De Goey.... 79 / 15
49. 5.26... Luke Breust.... 100 / 19
50. 5.25... Touk Miller.... 105 / 20
51. 5.21... Nic Martin.... 99 / 19
52. 5.20... Will Brodie.... 104 / 20
53. 5.11... Zac Bailey.... 97 / 19
54. 5.10... Jai Newcombe.... 102 / 20
55. 5.06... Izak Rankine.... 86 / 17
56. 5.06... Max Gawn.... 91 / 18
57. 5.05... Peter Wright.... 101 / 20
58. 5.05... Connor Rozee.... 101 / 20
59. 5.05... Ben Keays.... 101 / 20
60. 5.00... Charlie Cameron.... 100 / 20

 

[Ancient Tiger]

Because I don't consider it to be good play if you kick a point. (Unless there are fewer than 2 minutes remaining and it puts your team 1 point or 7 points in front)

It's a wasted opportunity. He should've kicked it straight, or found a teammate in better position instead of blazing away and wasting the scoring chance and giving possession back to the opposition. So who cares about that particular "score involvement" ? It's a meaningless aspect of that statistic. Padding.

He can't help it if one of his teammates is inaccurate. So I give him credit for helping set up scoring chances for his teammates (goals or behinds) and I give him credit for kicking goals.

What if we added up his points as goals? That way he's scored a total of 45 goals and 3 behinds. I've never understood why this is never done for the Coleman. If you score 1 goal 6 in a game you win by 5 points, you have greatly contributed to the victory! It's not like the winning team is the one with the most goals. It's the one with the most total points!

 

[Back One Out]

What if we added up his points as goals? That way he's scored a total of 45 goals and 3 behinds. I've never understood why this is never done for the Coleman. If you score 1 goal 6 in a game you win by 5 points, you have greatly contributed to the victory! It's not like the winning team is the one with the most goals. It's the one with the most total points!

Because missing your shot for goal and kicking a point is generally considered a bad play
That's why most fans sigh, groan or throw their hands up in frustration when a player misses a shot for goal.

The player failed to fully capitalise on his teammates' hard work and on the opposition's defensive lapse

And they handed possession back to the other team.

What about opposition scores from the kickout which go coast to coast? Maybe we should also subtract them from the player's SI total.


Bottom line: goals win matches. Not behinds.
There have been 180 matches this season. How many were won by the team who kicked fewer goals & more behinds?

 

[Noidnadroj]

Because missing your shot for goal and kicking a point is generally considered a bad play
That's why most fans sigh, groan or throw their hands up in frustration when a player misses a shot for goal.

The player failed to fully capitalise on his teammates' hard work and on the opposition's defensive lapse

And they handed possession back to the other team.

What about opposition scores from the kickout which go coast to coast? Maybe we should also subtract them from the player's SI total.


Bottom line: goals win matches. Not behinds.
There have been 180 matches this season. How many were won by the team who kicked fewer goals & more behinds?

So let me get this straight. If you score zero goals yourself, but are involved with 10 x scores from your teammates that are all points, you get credited with 10 x score involvements. But if you kick 4.7 and set-up 3 other scores that were all goals by teammates, you’d be credited with 7 x score involvements.

I think your ‘solution’ needs a bit more work. 0.10 for the team getting credited with 10 x SI’s versus 7.7 getting credited with 7 x SI’s…hmmmm.

SI’s are a stat to gauge how likely it is that a scoring opportunity will result from that player being involved in the play.

If you want to get a better reflection on the quality of the score involvement, then ‘total’ score contribution would make more sense. Because passing 20m sideways to someone on 50m
on the boundary who kicks a point is a SI. But if that same player picks off a laser pass to a teammate 20m out directly in front, that’s a
much more valuable SI but it’s still only counted as 1.

So it rewards players like Nick Daicos who
often take play into the corridor, I am sure resulting in more SI ‘goals’ than players who are involved in scores coming around the boundary line.

So ‘scoreboard impact’ needs to be focussed on moreso than score involvements.


Sent from my iPhone using BigFooty.com

 

[Ancient Tiger]

Because missing your shot for goal and kicking a point is generally considered a bad play
That's why most fans sigh, groan or throw their hands up in frustration when a player misses a shot for goal.

The player failed to fully capitalise on his teammates' hard work and on the opposition's defensive lapse

And they handed possession back to the other team.

What about opposition scores from the kickout which go coast to coast? Maybe we should also subtract them from the player's SI total.


Bottom line: goals win matches. Not behinds.
There have been 180 matches this season. How many were won by the team who kicked fewer goals & more behinds?

What if you kick a goal and the ball goes back to the centre and the oppo wins the clearance kicks a goal themselves and gets on a roll? You cannot say what if. The bottom line is a behind contributes to your score and we groan because our team doesn't get the maximum value but still gets one-sixth of it. There have been many times at games I have thought to myself that that might be an important point. It may mean you now lead by 7 points and the oppo has to kick 2 goals to win the game. If behinds didn't contribute to the score then I would completely agree with you, but they do and so I don't.

 

[Rioli2Rioli]

I love how he plays
I love watching him play

I love the fact he plays for Richmond even more

 

[blaisee]

Nope. I did that already.

I wouldn't subtract Bolton's behinds from his score involvements , but keep everyone's else's included in their modified tally.

1. 7.15... Christian Petracca.... 143 / 20
2. 6.95... Marcus Bontempelli.... 132 / 19
3. 6.94... Zach Merrett.... 118 / 17
4. 6.80... Tom Hawkins.... 136 / 20
5. 6.71... Darcy Parish.... 94 / 14
6. 6.65... Josh Dunkley.... 133 / 20
7. 6.58... Clayton Oliver.... 125 / 19
8. 6.57... Bailey Smith.... 92 / 14
9. 6.56... Taylor Walker.... 105 / 16
10. 6.56... Rory Laird.... 118 / 18
11. 6.55... Tom Liberatore.... 131 / 20
12. 6.50... Lachie Neale.... 130 / 20
13. 6.47... Patrick Cripps.... 123 / 19
14. 6.42... Chad Warner.... 122 / 19
15. 6.35... Jeremy Cameron.... 127 / 20
16. 6.33... George Hewett.... 95 / 15
17. 6.30... Jack Macrae.... 126 / 20
18. 6.26... Stephen Coniglio.... 119 / 19
19. 6.16... Mitch Duncan.... 117 / 19
20. 6.07... Tom Papley.... 85 / 14
21. 6.00... Sam Walsh.... 114 / 19
22. 5.90... Luke Parker.... 118 / 20
23. 5.90... Cameron Guthrie.... 118 / 20
24. 5.85... Shai Bolton.... 117 / 20
25. 5.78... Lance Franklin.... 104 / 18
26. 5.77... Tim English.... 75 / 13
27. 5.75... Ben Ainsworth.... 115 / 20
28. 5.75... Callum Mills.... 115 / 20
29. 5.74... Hugh McCluggage.... 109 / 19
30. 5.69... Joel Selwood.... 91 / 16
31. 5.69... Dion Prestia.... 91 / 16
32. 5.65... Isaac Heeney.... 113 / 20
33. 5.65... Patrick Lipinski.... 113 / 20
34. 5.61... Jye Caldwell.... 101 / 18
35. 5.60... Andrew Brayshaw.... 112 / 20
36. 5.58... Scott Pendlebury.... 106 / 19
37. 5.55... Charlie Curnow.... 111 / 20
38. 5.55... Tyson Stengle.... 111 / 20
39. 5.47... Adam Treloar.... 104 / 19
40. 5.45... Brad Crouch.... 109 / 20
41. 5.42... Tom Mitchell.... 103 / 19
42. 5.42... Sebastian Ross.... 103 / 19
43. 5.35... Isaac Smith.... 107 / 20
44. 5.35... Dylan Moore.... 107 / 20
45. 5.33... Toby Greene.... 80 / 15
46. 5.32... Travis Boak.... 101 / 19
47. 5.30... Errol Gulden.... 106 / 20
48. 5.27... Jordan De Goey.... 79 / 15
49. 5.26... Luke Breust.... 100 / 19
50. 5.25... Touk Miller.... 105 / 20
51. 5.21... Nic Martin.... 99 / 19
52. 5.20... Will Brodie.... 104 / 20
53. 5.11... Zac Bailey.... 97 / 19
54. 5.10... Jai Newcombe.... 102 / 20
55. 5.06... Izak Rankine.... 86 / 17
56. 5.06... Max Gawn.... 91 / 18
57. 5.05... Peter Wright.... 101 / 20
58. 5.05... Connor Rozee.... 101 / 20
59. 5.05... Ben Keays.... 101 / 20
60. 5.00... Charlie Cameron.... 100 / 20

After your analysis, when you saw that Cam Guthrie was more impactful on scores than Shai Bolton, did that raise any alarm bells as to the fact that your reasoning was flawed, or was that a proof of concept moment?

 

[evo]

Neale has 65 centre clearances, Libba has 54, Cripps has 58, Oliver has 55 and Bolton has 49.

Here are their percentages of centre clearances they get based on CBA’s:

Neale: 12.8%
Bolton: 15.7%
Libba: 15.7%
Oliver: 12.9%
Cripps: 13.8%

I’ve not analysed any other players, but those guys are considered clearance specialists as pure midfielders. And Bolton is equal to Libba and well clear of the others in CC rates.

Then in % of possessions that result in scores, he
leads the league at around 45%. Next best is
Bont on 36%.

So he can take speccies, break tackles, kick on both feet, get midfield clearances, is lightning quick and is headed for about a 45-goal season with 100+ shots for goal. I definitely think he’s got the tools to be the next best player in the game… if he isn’t there already.

A freakishly gifted player where it’s hard to think of anyone else playing today who closely matches his skillset?

At 23yo if he adds accuracy and a little more consistency, which most players do around his age, then he could go up another couple of notches as a player.


Sent from my iPhone using BigFooty.com

Interesting stats. It confirms my long held view that he should be attending a lot more centre bounces.

Particularly now that Cumberland is turning out to be a very promising scoring small forward.

 

[HavUEvaSeenTheRain]

Did Hawthorn have someone do a job on him on the weekend?

 

[lordbob]

Did Hawthorn have someone do a job on him on the weekend?

yes, finn maginness

kept touk miller pretty quiet the week before

 

[Ricketz]

Because I don't consider it to be good play if you kick a point. (Unless there are fewer than 2 minutes remaining and it puts your team 1 point or 7 points in front)

It's a wasted opportunity. He should've kicked it straight, or found a teammate in better position instead of blazing away and wasting the scoring chance and giving possession back to the opposition. So who cares about that particular "score involvement" ? It's a meaningless aspect of that statistic. Padding.

He can't help it if one of his teammates is inaccurate. So I give him credit for helping set up scoring chances for his teammates (goals or behinds) and I give him credit for kicking goals.

Yep, better include all the ones that never crossed the line either...

 

[endure]

Interesting stats. It confirms my long held view that he should be attending a lot more centre bounces.

Agree. He reads the game so well his centre clearances would get better and better over time.

Maybe he's not at the centre bounces as much at the moment as he works better without the uniform structure.

 

[HairyO]

Did Hawthorn have someone do a job on him on the weekend?

Yep. Scored a goal in the first couple of minutes then barely sighted. Maginness did another excellent job. Sadly not a lot of other Hawks players did excellent jobs.

 

[darcytiger]

Bolton is one of the best attacking players in the game, but there are more well-rounded, more complete two-way players.

2.05 tackles per game (305th in the AFL) and 13.6 pressure acts per game (198th)

Even if you just compared him to other small forwards and half forwards, he ranks towards the bottom in these defensive stats.

I'd say this is largely by design. Shai has no shortage of teammates willing to do the 'dirty work' and with Dusty absent this year, his teammates need him to focus on scoring & creating goals.

He is off-the-charts this season for score involvements... 4th in the AFL behind Tomahawk, Trac and Tex with 7.8 per game.

This tempered by the fact that he has scored 39 goals, 39 behinds.

Remove those missed opportunities from his score involvements tally and he drops down to 25th in the AFL with 5.85 per game

Did you remove the behinds of all the other players too? Or just the single bloke you wanted to change the stats against?

 

[theyellowsash]

Bolton nowhere near the best in the game, and never will be. He is a Richmond player after all.

 

[Back One Out]

Did you remove the behinds of all the other players too? Or just the single bloke you wanted to change the stats against?

Read the thread.

 

[tiger_tough]

Should get a fair bit more midfield time when Dusty comes back for finals.

 

[Black Legion]

Honestly, he's a player you happily pay to watch, seeing him do things no one else can do, seeing things no one else can see, real things!

He's Awesome!