Review Dogs choke the life out of The Eagles

[Ted's Robot]

Was the free against Baker for taking the player's legs out at the end of 3rd quarter fair? Seemed like he got to the ball ok and the opponent came in and tripped over him

I thought I saw Bont trip over an Eagles player on the ground earlier in the game and the ump paid a free against Bont for High contact?

 

[geoffjennings79]

Thank goodness I don't have Fox, but to join the Brereton pile on, the commentary on this clip featured him identifying 'Liam' Hemsworth, followed by Kellie Underwood confirming its Chris Hemsworth.

Brereton then reminisces about his battles with the Hemsworths at WO in the 80s and 90s, and his coach who moved into Qantas management...

 

[Drunken Bum]

It was about the commentators.
People criticising commentators for criticism of players, while going full numpty themselves.
Who cares about the commentators, let alone obsess about them.

And I clearly said people are jealous of the commentators, not the players.

I'd suggest that people are complaining about the commentary because it inhibits their enjoyment of the game. I wish i could mute them but i feel i miss more from not having the atmosphere of the crowd and the games noises than the commentary pains me, but it is a very VERY close call. Week after week we get commentators highlight and replay over and over every free we got away with or that we got that were dodgy, while we dont even get a replay of a saft free kick going the other way or one we missed out on even if a commentator mentions it.
The vast majority of them are insufferable oh how i long for that one glorious season when Optus vision gave you the choice to mute the commentators and still hear the game sound. That was the absolute peak of AFL broadcasting and it has gotten progressively worse since that joyous time.
Yes people exaggerate a little when posting on the matter but they're trying to enjoy the game and follow it and you have stupid ******* morons like brereton talking nonsense non stop while you just want to watch the ******* game, good on you if you can tune out the dribble they speak to concentrate solely on the game for others it can be quite difficult to concentrate on the actual game while they're babbling inanely, i'm honestly quite surprised there isn't more frustration shown on this forum about the commentators i suspect most are more like me who don't comment about it in spite of having the urge to quite often. I certainly don't judge anyone criticising commentators because i don't, in fact i quite often log in to check if anyone actually commented on some nonsense that a commentator spouted specifically.
Most of us feel sorry for the commentators or contempt more acurately, hardly jealousy lol

 

[doggy_dog]

I reckon the worst thing to happen for English’s footy career was growing to ruck height. If he was 195cm he’d be a tall mid-forward hybrid and would be one of the best players in the league.

Half back flanker who grew a foot too tall

 

[BrisDog]

It was about the commentators.
People criticising commentators for criticism of players, while going full numpty themselves.
Who cares about the commentators, let alone obsess about them.

And I clearly said people are jealous of the commentators, not the players.

Nice to have you on the forum, Gil

 

[House_of_Dahl]

I reckon the worst thing to happen for English’s footy career was growing to ruck height. If he was 195cm he’d be a tall mid-forward hybrid and would be one of the best players in the league.

English is one of the best 208ish cm footy players.

But don't think that'd be the case at 195 (eg Bont level).

 

[TiAn_]

I'd suggest that people are complaining about the commentary because it inhibits their enjoyment of the game. I wish i could mute them but i feel i miss more from not having the atmosphere of the crowd and the games noises than the commentary pains me, but it is a very VERY close call. Week after week we get commentators highlight and replay over and over every free we got away with or that we got that were dodgy, while we dont even get a replay of a saft free kick going the other way or one we missed out on even if a commentator mentions it.
The vast majority of them are insufferable oh how i long for that one glorious season when Optus vision gave you the choice to mute the commentators and still hear the game sound. That was the absolute peak of AFL broadcasting and it has gotten progressively worse since that joyous time.
Yes people exaggerate a little when posting on the matter but they're trying to enjoy the game and follow it and you have stupid ******* morons like brereton talking nonsense non stop while you just want to watch the ******* game, good on you if you can tune out the dribble they speak to concentrate solely on the game for others it can be quite difficult to concentrate on the actual game while they're babbling inanely, i'm honestly quite surprised there isn't more frustration shown on this forum about the commentators i suspect most are more like me who don't comment about it in spite of having the urge to quite often. I certainly don't judge anyone criticising commentators because i don't, in fact i quite often log in to check if anyone actually commented on some nonsense that a commentator spouted specifically.
Most of us feel sorry for the commentators or contempt more acurately, hardly jealousy lol

I often watch with the volume down. I find avoiding the mostly inane commentary helps with forming your own view about what’s going on. But perhaps my appreciation of quiet observation is merely a symptom of raging, unchecked jealousy? Who can say?

 

[cherrypie]

We've had a recent history of drafting/trading in vfl standard battlers and giving them a good run at it, I was expecting rhe same with bramble, but wow have i been pleasantly surprised, he's been absolutely brilliant in every game. Kudos to the trade team, hope he can continue the amazing form, hasn't set 1 foot wrong.

Bramble and O’Donnell could be in our backline for the next decade and we’ve plucked them out for free when nobody else wanted them

 

[glenashley]

Was the free against Baker for taking the player's legs out at the end of 3rd quarter fair? Seemed like he got to the ball ok and the opponent came in and tripped over him

In real time I thought it was a harsh call but I replayed it a few times and yeh, the free kick was there.

 

[scooter600x]

In real time I thought it was a harsh call but I replayed it a few times and yeh, the free kick was there.

That’s how the rule has evolved, certainly, but not why the rule was brought in originally.

The rule came about when Lindsay Thomas went in feet first.

The htb against Bont was absolutely there. He played on for sure.

 

[dogwatch]

English is one of the best 208ish cm footy players.

But don't think that'd be the case at 195 (eg Bont level).

He acts and thinks like a midfielder. Whether he'd be good enough to play AFL if he was still a 194cm midfielder is hard to know.

The more significant point I think is that most of his junior years were spent in that role and only toward the end did he grow so tall that he had to be turned into a ruckman. So nearly all his junior instruction and experience would have been as a midfielder. Hence he arrived with very little natural feel for the game as a tap ruckman. He has had to learn that very late in his junior career and at the Western Bulldogs. It still shows.

This late growth spurt might also be partly the cause of him being a gentle giant rather than a crash-through type. In his developing years and even his early years at the Dogs he did not have the imposing physique that he has now so he's not used to the fact that he can throw his 107kg weight around and opponents have to get out of the way or get hurt.

We need to feed him raw meat and angry pills.

 

[perro_loco]

What makes me happy is the output of Baker, Buku, Gallagher, Bramble. The lower ranked players are an improvement on last year and making good contributions. Vanders also but needs to improve. Good signs.

 

[threenewpadlocks]

He acts and thinks like a midfielder. Whether he'd be good enough to play AFL if he was still a 194cm midfielder is hard to know.

The more significant point I think is that most of his junior years were spent in that role and only toward the end did he grow so tall that he had to be turned into a ruckman. So nearly all his junior instruction and experience would have been as a midfielder. Hence he arrived with very little natural feel for the game as a tap ruckman. He has had to learn that very late in his junior career and at the Western Bulldogs. It still shows.

This late growth spurt might also be partly the cause of him being a gentle giant rather than a crash-through type. In his developing years and even his early years at the Dogs he did not have the imposing physique that he has now so he's not used to the fact that he can throw his 107kg weight around and opponents have to get out of the way or get hurt.

We need to feed him raw meat and angry pills.

I'm not exactly sure it really matters though.

We have several years of data of English's head to head tapwork measuring his and his opponents hitout win rate, to advantage and sharked, and is overall relationship to clearance and effective clearances can be well known.

English is below average but not near worst in the league in terms of hitout win percentage, of which is higher ranked players are correlated with age. He hitouts are to advantage/sharked are at levels near the league average. And while it's hard to seperate the rucks from the mids, there is basically no league wide correlation to winning hitouts and clearances.

All of this is to say the very discussions of "does the ruck position even matter" we were having when Dunkley was contesting 20 ruck contests a game (or indeed Cordy was) are still very much relevant to English, aside from the fact that he does win the hitout instead of his opponent 40% of the time rather than 5% of the time.

It looks ugly when English gets pushed or he half-winces/failes to attack a centre bounce whatever, obviously. It just is more irrelevant to actual team success than people think - at least in the way modern, fully profession footy is played and structured. Maybe it mattered when John Nicholls and Polly Farmer and Len Thompson and Gary Dempsey were rucking, I don't know, I wasn't alive at the time, but even though the position and coaching and cultural elements of the position haven't evolved with the game itself. In the same way that we understand that a fat 6 foot 3 full forward leading to the pocket isn't how modern key forward operate, we need to treat rucks the same way.

 

[threenewpadlocks]

Among the 46 players who were rucks and attended centre bounces last year English was:

30th in hitout win rate
6th proportion of hitouts won that become to advantage
3rd in % of ruck contests attended

So yes he probably isn't "physical" enough that he doesn't do well enough to beat his opponent in getting first hands on the tap and to prevent the potential for an opponent to get a hitout to advantage. (ie rank 30 of 48 players).

An element of this is English probably being too "cute" and looking for a hitout to advantage (rank 6 once he does get the hitout) rather than prioritising mere prevention of opponent hitout, even if own hitout is not to advantage either.

Also, keep in mind that an element of his value comes from the ability to attend so many and be part of the physicality of it all game long. One would assume that the ability to approach a ruck contest "physically" increases when you know that you're only going to go to 50 stoppages all game, instead of 70 or whatever. Stamina in rucking is an element of athleticism itself that English has but gets no credit for.

And to suggest he doesn't have ruck craft is incorrect. 33.8% of his hitouts were defined as to advantage in 2023. Maybe that's having Libba and Bont). But Gawn was tapping to Petracca and Oliver and 30.1% of his hitouts were to advantage.

I agree it's below average. But I don't think it's anywhere near as poor and deficient as people are making it out to be nor does it seem to have any meaningful effect on midfielders or stoppages. More than half of all stoppages are either sort of both rucks hitting it out at the same time or neither to advantage or being sharked. The value add of the difference between the best tap rucks and a capable one in the league are perhaps a handful of first possessions at a stoppage, that don't appear to correlate with subsequent clearance success anyway.

What I do know is that once you have a bloke who can battle in the ruck and win a few hitouts to advantage, the fact that they can spread, read the play, mark, kick goals, execute skills while the Oscar McInerneyies of the world do not is incredibly valuable.

 

[dockendorf]

If Vandermeer and Williams had a kid it would look just like Gallagher

Pretty close with a new hairdo, I reckon.

 

[dogwatch]

View attachment 1946828View attachment 1946829
Pretty close with a new hairdo, I reckon.

You might be on to something.

One day some investigative journalist will lift the lid on the dark doings in the secret medical and genetic laboratories deep beneath Whitten Oval. Poor Things.

No wonder the renovations took so long, bwahahaha.

 

[Bushdid911]

You might be on to something.

One day some investigative journalist will lift the lid on the dark doings in the secret medical and genetic laboratories deep beneath Whitten Oval. Poor Things.

No wonder the renovations took so long, bwahahaha.

Would be just like Dogs to figure out genetics/cloning and then use it to get more VDM types

 

[dogwatch]

Would be just like Dogs to figure out genetics/cloning and then use it to get more VDM types

Still perfecting the technique.
Also they want to do a few like that to throw the authorities off the scent. Nobody would ever suspect, would they?

 

[Bulldogs85]

Coaches Votes

Western Bulldogs v West Coast​

10 Adam Treloar

1

Adam Treloar

Age

31

Ht

185cm

Wt

84kg

Pos.

Mid

Career

Season

Last 5

D

28.2

5star

K

12.9

5star

HB

15.3

5star

M

3.6

4star

T

4.9

5star

CL

4.6

5star

D

30.3

5star

K

16.3

5star

HB

14.0

5star

M

2.0

2star

T

3.3

4star

CL

5.8

5star

D

18.0

5star

K

11.2

4star

HB

6.8

5star

M

4.2

4star

T

2.6

4star

CL

1.6

4star

(WB)
7 Bailey Williams (WB)
4 Aaron Naughton

33

Aaron Naughton

Age

24

Ht

196cm

Wt

92kg

Pos.

Fwd

Career

Season

Last 5

D

10.7

3star

K

7.0

3star

HB

3.7

3star

M

4.9

5star

T

1.8

4star

G

0.8

4star

D

6.3

1star

K

4.0

1star

HB

2.3

2star

M

2.5

3star

T

0.8

1star

G

0.5

4star

D

12.8

4star

K

8.8

4star

HB

4.0

3star

M

4.8

5star

T

1.2

3star

G

0.0

1star

(WB)
3 Lachie Bramble (WB)
2 Jeremy McGovern

20

Jeremy Mcgovern

Age

32

Ht

197cm

Wt

97kg

Pos.

Def

Career

Season

Last 5

D

14.7

4star

K

10.1

4star

HB

4.6

3star

M

6.8

5star

T

1.5

3star

MG

238.7

4star

D

12.4

3star

K

8.6

3star

HB

3.8

3star

M

6.4

5star

T

2.0

3star

MG

183.4

3star

D

11.0

3star

K

8.8

4star

HB

2.2

2star

M

7.2

5star

T

1.4

4star

(WCE)
2 Tim English (WB)
2 Laitham Vandermeer

23

Laitham Vandermeer

Age

25

Ht

182cm

Wt

78kg

Pos.

D/F

Career

Season

Last 5

D

10.1

3star

K

6.5

3star

HB

3.6

3star

M

2.8

3star

T

2.8

4star

MG

226.3

3star

D

10.1

3star

K

6.5

3star

HB

3.6

2star

M

2.8

3star

T

2.8

4star

MG

226.3

3star

D

10.8

3star

K

7.0

3star

HB

3.8

3star

M

3.4

4star

T

2.6

4star

MG

242.2

4star

(WB)

 

[GetDimmaBack]

Coaches Votes

Western Bulldogs v West Coast​

10 Adam Treloar (WB)
7 Bailey Williams (WB)
4 Aaron Naughton (WB)
3 Lachie Bramble (WB)
2 Jeremy McGovern (WCE)
2 Tim English (WB)
2 Laitham Vandermeer (WB)

Lachie Bramble, clubhouse leader for recruit of the year.

...as Scrag City declared early on

 

[Golden_6]

Coaches Votes

Western Bulldogs v West Coast​

10 Adam Treloar (WB)
7 Bailey Williams (WB)
4 Aaron Naughton (WB)
3 Lachie Bramble (WB)
2 Jeremy McGovern (WCE)
2 Tim English (WB)
2 Laitham Vandermeer (WB)

Anyone want to give Bevo’s votes a crack? Purely based of random comments he makes/my thoughts on what Bevo thinks.

5. Treloar
4. B Williams
3. Bramble
2. Vandermeer
1. English

 

[Fossie 32]

Coaches Votes

Western Bulldogs v West Coast​

10 Adam Treloar (WB)
7 Bailey Williams (WB)
4 Aaron Naughton (WB)
3 Lachie Bramble (WB)
2 Jeremy McGovern (WCE)
2 Tim English (WB)
2 Laitham Vandermeer (WB)

This is taking Bonti's name in vain

 

[Mantis Toboggan]

funnily enough, he was a bloody good bloke. Actually stayed and had lunch with us, very humble guy

He’s an utter arse-hole.

 

[stefoid]

Yep, all the whingeing and blaming Macrae back in the centre ignores his CBA cohort featured limited Bont, no Liber after subbed, and Sanders, Gallagher, etc getting CBA exposure.

Well, that IS the point - hes the 191cm battle hardened senior player, so without libba and bont to carry the load, it comes to him. result 4 contested possies and 0 clearances in a full game of footy? Just scratching our heads as to what role he was being asked to play

 

[stefoid]

View attachment 1946828View attachment 1946829
Pretty close with a new hairdo, I reckon.

Not even Williams perfect teeth can fix those tombstones!