Why will Buckley be a better coach than an experienced assistant?

[TheBuzz]

Just trying to understand this as everyone seems to think so, but I have not heard it sufficiently justified yet.

 

[year of the roo]

When it comes down to it, it is almost impossible to predict whether X will or won't be a successful coach. All you can do is look at what X brings to the table in comparison to Y, Z, etc and make a decision from there.

The amount of talk and hype that Buckley has generated already, the campaigns to have him as coach, at the very least indicate he should at least be seriously looked at. Publicity is something this club has never really had, at least in a positive sense. And whether you like it or not, it is important to have that for many reasons, and as we have seen - simply winning Premierships isn't enough.

 

[Zvim]

While he had no official assistant role, in his last playing year he was mostly injured and helping out in an assistant coach capacity, it was the year they almost knocked Geelong out in the PF.

Will he step-up and be a great coach? Who knows. Half the battle is having the cattle and our recruiters and developers will play a large role in if he will have success or not.

 

[TheBuzz]

Agree, there are so many factors external to the coach themself that will lead to success/failure.

However, would it be fair to say something like this?:

Canditate / Probability of On-Field Success

a) Coach with No experience / 40%
b) Assistant with 1-3 years experience / 50%
c) Assistant with 4+ years experience / 60%
d) Premiership assistant with 4+ years experience / 70%

If so, why does the marketing dream of Buckley make this 30% gap irrellevant.

 

[Jisse W Smuth]

Agree, there are so many factors external to the coach themself that will lead to success/failure.

However, would it be fair to say something like this?:

Canditate / Probability of On-Field Success

a) Coach with No experience / 40%
b) Assistant with 1-3 years experience / 50%
c) Assistant with 4+ years experience / 60%
d) Premiership assistant with 4+ years experience / 70%

If so, why does the marketing dream of Buckley make this 30% gap irrellevant.

The fect that you made thet shut up uz what makes ut urriluvant, not the marketung dream.

 

[Chadwiko]

However, would it be fair to say something like this?:

No. It wouldn't be fair to say that.

Some of the most successful coaches have been pretty green and inexperienced. Some of the least successful have been the ones with huge amounts of experience.

Really, it's a crapshoot.

Buckley will no doubt be at the very least a competitive and professional on-field coach who will also have the added bonus of lifting the clubs profile immensely off-field. That's highly attractive to me.

 

[tw0kbydesign]

The sole reason IMHO is purely because he was a champion midfielder. That is where the game is won and lost these days and our midfield just disappears for extended periods of time. I actually see a lot of potential in our midfield (if it all clicks obviously) but I do not think the players on our current list have ever had it drilled into them to attack attack attack and go for the kill. I think Bucks would certainly go a long way to helping that cause.

The only other reason I could think of (clutching at straws here) is that of all the other candidates out there, he is the most recently retired. The game has changed so much even from 3 years ago (the good old days where flooding was frowned upon) that it has to hold some form of relevance. It has obviously changed again since he has retired but I still get the impression he is well aware of what is going on out there.

 

[TheBuzz]

My #1 criteria for the incoming coach is their coaching ability.

I struggle to come to terms with the concept that someone with years of experience is not as good as someone with none.

This is why I can't accept that its all a lottery and that all that experience counts for nothing once you're in the top job.

 

[Chadwiko]

In my opinion, Buckley does have that experience. He was effectively their assistant coach in 2007, has done good work developing kids at the AIS, and has spent some time in the media where he is paid to analyse the game.

His experience is broad and encouraging for someone of such a relatively young age. And that's a huge upside for my money. Surround him with some great assistants, and he'll do fine.

 

[chubbspeterson]

Just trying to understand this as everyone seems to think so, but I have not heard it sufficiently justified yet.

He probably won't be as experienced, but I'd think he'd have learnt a fair bit at collingwood from Mick. I'm still 50/50 on him, not convinced of his people skills. He may want to be just an assistant somewhere.

 

[Manbearpig]

Totally overrated concept.

You can either coach people or you can't.

Tim Watson didn't fail cause he didn't have experience, it was because he was shouse at coaching.

Mark Harvey is a bubbling mess cause he aint great at coaching.

Everything you see in Nathan Buckley suggests he has the tools. Intelligence, decisiveness, communication skills, inspiring and probably most of all, leadership.

 

[Event Horizon]

You can either coach people or you can't.

Totally agree with that.
What type of experience are we referring to when it comes to assistant coaches? Do we look at purely learning from a senior coach you're working under, or do we look at coaching the area of the ground that you've been intrusted with (eg. midfield)?

The learning part is surely not an issue. Buckley would have learned enough from playing under Malthouse and often seating in the box in his latter years - but only if he is smart enough to take it all in, which I believe he is.

And working with midfielders or defenders is overrated IMO. It doesn't make you a better senior coach down the track.

Laidley has spent 2 years IIRC under Malthouse. Didn't hep us win the flag or get near it in his years as a coach. Or is anyone suggesting that had Laidley spent 7 years under Malthouse, he would have coached us better?

Total rubbish. If you have it in you, you'll succeed. And one can argue that given how much the game has evolved over the last 5 years, it would be more beneficial to be a recent player than to have been out of the game for 7 years while assisting, say, Thompson at Geelong, where the list is hardly comparable to ours.

 

[Groggyk]

Give anybody the rudimentary tools to do a job and most can, at least, make a go of it.

Wether or not they are actually any good at it is someting entirely different.

I work with some guys who have been at their job for 15yrs yet still make unbelievably basic errors.

The whole argument of "Yeah, but this blokes got experience" doesn't mean he'll be any better than a rookie.

Like MBP says you either can or you can't.

All indicators point to Buckley being in the "can" bracket.

 

[speedy]

Experience is irrelevant when selecting a rookie coach.

You just get a slightly better idea of whether the person will make a good coach if he's been coaching in some shape or form. Its still a crap shoot though.

In my eyes Buckleys is as good a bet as Crocker, Hardwick, Hinkley or any other assistant coach. The only one that you can argue is a safer bet than Buckley is Longmire, because the horse already seems to be earmarked as the next sydney coach.

 

[TheBuzz]

OK, so the general consensus is that its all a crapshoot & you either simply can coach, or you can't. And there's no way to tell until you try.

But if experience is needed, Buckley will have what is needed by having played at AFL level recently. Oh and he must have learned so much from Mick, just like Laids did.

I'm Sold, lets offer him a 5 year contract at top dollar!

 

[Zvim]

OK, so the general consensus is that its all a crapshoot & you either simply can coach, or you can't. And there's no way to tell until you try.

But if experience is needed, Buckley will have what is needed by having played at AFL level recently. Oh and he must have learned so much from Mick, just like Laids did.

I'm Sold, lets offer him a 5 year contract at top dollar!

I am guessing your glass is half-full.

 

[TheBuzz]

I am guessing your glass is half-full.

Half full of disappointment. Just waiting for Buckley to either fill it up or tip it out.

 

[fairdinkum]

Don't worry. If (heaven forbid) we do not end up 'getting Bucks', this board will be full of people telling you how 'happy' they are that we did not go with an 'untried', 'unproven', 'selfish' coach.

 

[DarwinRoo]

My #1 criteria for the incoming coach is their coaching ability.

I struggle to come to terms with the concept that someone with years of experience is not as good as someone with none.

This is why I can't accept that its all a lottery and that all that experience counts for nothing once you're in the top job.

That can be the case for some but the reverse can also be true.

 

[conwaynmfc]

The fect that you made thet shut up uz what makes ut urriluvant, not the marketung dream.

wow that's annoying and not funny.

 

[Woodson]

I can't see why any new coach North takes on wouldn't seem to be the bad choice in the initial stages as the message will be different, the players will (hopefully) respond and play a smarter brand (that includes Skills being the Key factor). It's how often the same message doesn't register with players after a season and how the players react to getting 'dropped' that is more the concern with me. One of the last articles I read about Laidley was how gut-wrenching he felt about ending young players careers when he felt they didn't measure up and trying to respond to the parents who wrote to him to express their dissappointment.. (being North fans) the parents probably are still pondering whether having a different guy in charge could of saved their sons career. it's no doubt that JYD was full of contradictions and he STILL had TWO YEARS as an assistant to a team who fell 9pts short of a flag so having a non-experieced guy like Buckley shouldn't be such an issue. As long as Buckley or whoever North choose, (Brad Scott!! ) can be an inspiration to his players for longer than the honeymoon period, that's where it all clicks a whole lot better..

Don't believe me.. >> Mike Tomlin.

 

[Jisse W Smuth]

wow that's annoying and not funny.

Thenks for the feedbeck Jules. Win wool your cookbook be riddy?

 

[conwaynmfc]

Thenks for the feedbeck Jules. Win wool your cookbook be riddy?

lol seems your South African mind can't read either.

Chief ≠ Chef

 

[FrangaRoo]

Don't worry. If (heaven forbid) we do not end up 'getting Bucks', this board will be full of people telling you how 'happy' they are that we did not go with an 'untried', 'unproven', 'selfish' coach.

I can see the threads now.

I actually reckon there are half a dozen assistant coaches out there that will be able to as good a job as bucks in getting the most out of our list and rebuilding without having to throw long term contracts and money at.
Im confident that the board will choose the right guy, and I dont get caught up in the 10 articles a day followed by the 10 threads on here a day about the subject. Life is great.

 

[windsock]

I actually reckon there are half a dozen assistant coaches out there that will be able to as good a job as bucks in getting the most out of our list and rebuilding without having to throw long term contracts and money at.

This is how I feel. is I really don't know why there are so many people on here who will be devastated if we don't land Buckley. I'll be pleased if we do but will comforted by the knowledge that if we don't there are a stack of candidates out there who are very well qualified to do the job.