(Archived) THE RUMOUR MILL - Player Movement

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BurgoShark

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Jack A Williams goooooe - Dragons
Train and trial, or did he get an NRL deal?

Him leaving is not a surprise. Another one who Bomber kept at the club but others probably didn’t rate.
 

bort

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Jack A Williams goooooe - Dragons
Well there goes me wondering if he will jump into hooker at all in preseason
Again you’re jumping to conclusions Bort. I agreed with the whole context of Gard’s post, nothing to do with Cotric at all. I know in previous times I’ve been a bit of a dick with the rumour mill page but I genuinely like to hear what’s happening and if there is any news on player signings. But I do think some posters get worked up over news about players that have been linked with us. That didn’t mean Cotric just meant players in general.

I think we just need to agree to disagree on this and just move on.
I think we probably can agree that sometimes people get a bit overly worked up I just got confused because you replied to something which mentioned Cotric which you are still sticking by your post had nothing to do with but because you quoted stuff to do with Cotric I jumped to that conclusion
Still pretty hyped on this 1 🤞
Can you believe he is currently without an NRL contract!
 

Wiz

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Does Cotric start before Sexy and Ronnie?
Absolutely before Ronnie - way too inconsistent. Also, our current back 5 lack size and Cotric brings that in spades

Sexy is one of our top 5 players week on week, no way in the world he loses his spot
 

BurgoShark

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Don't give up so easily, he might.... For the dragons
Good luck to him. Injuries have held him back but he’s a decent player at Cup level. Hope
he kicks on and gets a game or two in the NRL one day.
 
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Re Williams, his family might see some nostalgia with the dragons signing, one of my mates knows some of his family members,
I can’t remember who it is for sure but his either the great grandson of Reg Gasnier or one of the other dragon greats
 

andrew's_sharks

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Burg, I get that the game isn't statistically faster now, but it is hard not to think it is based just on the eye test. I do think my sample might have some bias in fairness... Outside of Sharks games I'd pay most attention to the top teams. Maybe it's the intensity that's lifted. Player speed? Fitness, size ... All if the above? That is different to time spent in play and the like.

Just a musing... Was interested in what you thoughts about it.


My thoughts exactly. The 6 again means that a 6 tackle set can quickly turn into a 9 or 10 plus tackle set. The tempo from the panthers and the storm is very high. I don't think it suits Cotric at all. I would prefer Tracey to have a full preseason there and prep for it properly. IMO Cotric needs to trim down a bit, but I'm note sure I see it happening
 

andrew's_sharks

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Absolutely before Ronnie - way too inconsistent. Also, our current back 5 lack size and Cotric brings that in spades

Sexy is one of our top 5 players week on week, no way in the world he loses his spot

There is absolutely no way I would give up Ronnie for Cotric even at the same price.
 

BurgoShark

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Re Williams, his family might see some nostalgia with the dragons signing, one of my mates knows some of his family members,
I can’t remember who it is for sure but his either the great grandson of Reg Gasnier or one of the other dragon greats
Yeah. Reg Gasnier is (was) his grandfather.
 
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BurgoShark

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It depends on how the refs decide to interpret the new rules. It seemed faster when the new rules were first introduced but now the refs control the pace of the game and actively slow it down.
Telling tacklers when to "release" was there before the new rules, but seems to be even more a part of the game now.
No. It wasn’t. There was slightly more ball in play when the rule first came in, but it wasn’t faster.

Commentators just say it is, and the punters believe the drivel.
Burg, I get that the game isn't statistically faster now, but it is hard not to think it is based just on the eye test. I do think my sample might have some bias in fairness... Outside of Sharks games I'd pay most attention to the top teams. Maybe it's the intensity that's lifted. Player speed? Fitness, size ... All if the above? That is different to time spent in play and the like.

Just a musing... Was interested in what you thoughts about it.
So the good teams play at an intensity level higher than the bad ones? Shocker.

Watch the 2019 GF again. It’s quick, intense, and was won by an “eyes up” play. The new rules were a solution without a problem.

What they rule changes have created is long periods of possession for one team. There were at least 3 games this year for the Sharks where they had the ball for less than 10 tackles in a 20 minute period (Eels, Roosters, Storm). A team who has momentum will get plenty of set restarts, and when they kick to a corner, stand offside, and hold down the other mob you won’t see a call - and even if you do it will be an extra set on tackle 0 or 1 a few metres out from their own line. That doesn’t help change momentum.

This creates a situation where the team who has done 20 minutes of tackling gets tired, doesn’t move up as quick or as often as they should, and the other team now has way more time and space than normal. This is why Turbo tears teams apart. It’s not faster. It’s the massive swings of possession that create more space for big, fast attacking players.
 

Sparkles

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So the good teams play at an intensity level higher than the bad ones? Shocker.
You're pointing out what I've acknowledged

Watch the 2019 GF again. It’s quick, intense, and was won by an “eyes up” play. The new rules were a solution without a problem.

So the GF teams play at a higher intensity? Shocker ;)

What they rule changes have created is long periods of possession for one team. There were at least 3 games this year for the Sharks where they had the ball for less than 10 tackles in a 20 minute period (Eels, Roosters, Storm). A team who has momentum will get plenty of set restarts, and when they kick to a corner, stand offside, and hold down the other mob you won’t see a call - and even if you do it will be an extra set on tackle 0 or 1 a few metres out from their own line. That doesn’t help change momentum.

This creates a situation where the team who has done 20 minutes of tackling gets tired, doesn’t move up as quick or as often as they should, and the other team now has way more time and space than normal. This is why Turbo tears teams apart. It’s not faster. It’s the massive swings of possession that create more space for big, fast attacking players.

I don't think we disagree. One team fatiguing more makes the other team grind less and play fast, free flowing attack more. And that happens way more often nowadays. Agreed. We haven't had the incredibly innovative and statistically critical 'VB Hard Earned Index' or 'Telstra Tracker' in the game for long, but you'd say (I'm not sure if there's stats to support it that we have access to) that players are hitting higher speeds more often these days, in good and poor teams. It doesn't really matter if it's due to fitness, rule changes or higher refresh rates on our TV's. Like you said, more of the ball is with the faster players, the ball gets spread from side to side more, and teams are parked in the red zone for longer now, which is all higher speed, higher intensity play than a middle eating metres for four hit ups for a big chunk of the game. And that's what I'm talking about. That looks like the pace has picked up. Not the amount of time the balls in play, which is where I'd say people are getting confused.
 

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No. It wasn’t. There was slightly more ball in play when the rule first came in, but it wasn’t faster.

Commentators just say it is, and the punters believe the drivel.

So the good teams play at an intensity level higher than the bad ones? Shocker.

Watch the 2019 GF again. It’s quick, intense, and was won by an “eyes up” play. The new rules were a solution without a problem.

What they rule changes have created is long periods of possession for one team. There were at least 3 games this year for the Sharks where they had the ball for less than 10 tackles in a 20 minute period (Eels, Roosters, Storm). A team who has momentum will get plenty of set restarts, and when they kick to a corner, stand offside, and hold down the other mob you won’t see a call - and even if you do it will be an extra set on tackle 0 or 1 a few metres out from their own line. That doesn’t help change momentum.

This creates a situation where the team who has done 20 minutes of tackling gets tired, doesn’t move up as quick or as often as they should, and the other team now has way more time and space than normal. This is why Turbo tears teams apart. It’s not faster. It’s the massive swings of possession that create more space for big, fast attacking players.
I said seemed faster
 

BurgoShark

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You're pointing out what I've acknowledged



So the GF teams play at a higher intensity? Shocker ;)



I don't think we disagree. One team fatiguing more makes the other team grind less and play fast, free flowing attack more. And that happens way more often nowadays. Agreed. We haven't had the incredibly innovative and statistically critical 'VB Hard Earned Index' or 'Telstra Tracker' in the game for long, but you'd say (I'm not sure if there's stats to support it that we have access to) that players are hitting higher speeds more often these days, in good and poor teams. It doesn't really matter if it's due to fitness, rule changes or higher refresh rates on our TV's. Like you said, more of the ball is with the faster players, the ball gets spread from side to side more, and teams are parked in the red zone for longer now, which is all higher speed, higher intensity play than a middle eating metres for four hit ups for a big chunk of the game. And that's what I'm talking about. That looks like the pace has picked up. Not the amount of time the balls in play, which is where I'd say people are getting confused.
I didn’t say the faster players get more ball.

The data actually says the opposite to what you are saying here. The last two seasons have produced more middle play, more one out plays, less red zone play, and less passing than we have had in the last 15 years - but we get periods within individual games where one team is rooted so the other team can do more damage in a shorter period of time.

This creates the illusion that the game is “faster”, but it’s not. Players aren’t running faster, hitting harder, or covering more ground than they were in 2005. The data shows this too. The only thing that is going faster is scoreboards.

Back to the reason why I objected to this statement: for someone to say that a player is not suited to the “faster game” is complete and utter bullshit.

What you can say is that certain forwards aren’t suited to playing the same minutes that they could before, since there are now situations that exist in the game that didn’t 3 years ago (having to defend for 20 minutes straight) but that doesn’t mean those players aren’t still every bit as effective as they always were when there is an even share of possession.

For Cotric (and probably a lot of outside backs) what you can say is that he has never been great defensively, and that playing on a bad team made this more obvious because he was defending more often against players who were given more time and space. Swap him on to a team where he gets to move up rather than backpedal and you have a different player.

Saying the game "seems" faster is fine, and anyone is fine to believe it. Using that as a foundation to justify other statements is just wrong, because someone thinking it is faster is not the same as it actually being faster. There is not a single way to demonstrate that the 2020 and 2021 seasons were any faster or more expansive than previous seasons in any way, and there is a shitload of data that says that they were not.
 
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