You would be a fool not to believe that the wins against GEEL, GWS, WC and near miss against WB were not excellent performances - it's progress as I have said continually against TOP teams that can't be ignored. GWS result was excpetional considering how both Longmire and Clarkson were embarrased up there.
You forget that when we were 8-3 last year all the anti-bucks brigade were saying " we haven't beaten anyone".
Bucks is damned if he does and damned if he doesn't.
We got within a kick or two against Freo, Hawthorn and Sydney last year. It was a fairly good effort. You seem to think there are only 3 good teams this year and we have beaten them all. Can you explain our absolute drubbing against Sydney and WCE in Perth? What about north, Adelaide teaching us a lesson? We haven't played the Hawks as yet. To say we have improved based on beating Geelong, GWS and WCE once only is not a great measure.
Surprisingly you just completely dismiss losing against teams we should be expected to win against. You don't get to play finals footy beating only 2 or 3 top eight teams each year and losing against those in a similar ladder position to you. The way Melbourne beat us both times was terrible. They had the game won after 10mins. St Kilda ran rings around us. Port was just plain embarrassing at the G. Not to mention the blues, Tigers etc. you know most of the worst games of footy this year featured the Pies - whether we won or lost. An improvement in my eyes would have see us put up more competitive performances in the second half of the year against middle of the ring teams. I would have expected the guys to be a lot more fluid in their ball movement. Hit targets by foot and hand. A forward line which maybe worked a lot better. A defence that wasn't leaking the most ridiculous goals.
It's not just the win/loss, it's the terrible football we continue to dish up this late in the season. Maybe it's not Buckley's fault. But it sure is someone's because others clubs we are fighting for a top 8 spot have a lot more excitement ahead of them. The saints, Melbourne, port look infinitely better than us and will only continue to get better. Gold Coast are having a far better few weeks and will likely get better.
We are the next rung down with Richmond and Carlton. Not sure what to make of Essendon next year, but they could well leap ahead of us.
Personally, I don't think it's good enough. And I can't say because we have had wins against a couple of top 8 teams that I'm satisfied the year has been a success and we are heading in the right direction.