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Topic: The Great Ruck Debate. (Read 30379 times) previous topic - next topic
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Re: The Great Ruck Debate.

Reply #120 –
Just went through my email and found the spreadsheet again.

A couple of quick snippets keeping in mind this was from June last year. (averages)
Player (team) - HO - HTA - HOS - +/-
Witts (G.C.) - 41 - 12.9 - 8 - +4.9
Darcy (fre) - 39 - 11 - 9.2 - +1.8
Nankervis (ric) - 31 - 9 - 6.6 - +2.4
Pittonet (car) - 29 - 10.6 - 4.9 - +5.6
Williams (wc) - 26 - 6.5 - 6.0 - +0.5
Lycett (PA) - 21 - 6.5 - 5.6 - +0.9
Grundy (col) - 21 - 7.5 - 3.8 - +3.7
Gawn (mel) - 20 - 6.1 - 4.7 - +1.4
Ladhams (syd) - 20 - 4.7 - 4.3 - +0.4
Lynch (haw) - 19 - 1.0 - 3.0 - -2.0 **
DeKoning (car) - 17 - 5.3 - 3.3 - +2.0


** this was from his one and only game, but 3x more likely to hit it to the opposition than his own team. Is this someone you want to get more hitouts from?? You'd rather him lose!

Now what this doesn't show because i CBF going through it all again is how likely a player is to get the hitout at all based on the ruck contests attended.
You might get every 2nd hitout. Or you might only get 1 in 10. Obviously that changes the effectiveness of that ruck as well.

The last number in all of that is key though.
If you ruck gets his hand on the ball, what is the likleyhood it will benefit your team compared to the opposition. Hitouts to advantage minus hitouts sharked = comparitive skill of a ruck in the ruck contest

Re: The Great Ruck Debate.

Reply #121 –
Quote from: PaulP – on
I tend to agree Baggers. If we had 2 Tom De Konings, would this discussion be occurring? Perhaps the issue is a slow, more lumbering type ruckman as you suggest, rather than 2 ruckmen per se ? It's hard to know from the outside. I'd like to see Pittonet played as a ruck plus marking target around the ground and De Koning as a big bodied mid plus extra forward target, just to see how it goes. Against North would be as good a time as any IMO.

The problem with that scenario is Pitto’s inability to take marks.  If he was a marking ruckman, we wouldn’t be having this debate and Pitto and Tom would be dominating opposition rucks.

It's still the Gulf of Mexico, Don Old!

Re: The Great Ruck Debate.

Reply #122 –
Quote from: DJC – on
The problem with that scenario is Pitto’s inability to take marks.  If he was a marking ruckman, we wouldn’t be having this debate and Pitto and Tom would be dominating opposition rucks.
Inability is a bit harsh.

Keeping in mind TDK has played games as a key forward and been targetted a lot more than Pitto as a result. Other 'sole ruck types'

Average marks 2024
Pitto - 1.38
TDK - 3.44

Contested marks average 2024
Pitto - 0.63
TDK - 0.88

As a comparison some other rucks averages 2024...
Player - avg Ms - avg CMs)
Darcy - 1.33 -  0.33
Grundy - 2.41 - 0.59
Gawn - 5.25 - 1.81
Witts - 2.18 - 0.55
Nankervis - 3.06 - 0.94
Goldstein - 1.92 - 0.46

Re: The Great Ruck Debate.

Reply #123 –
Quote from: DJC – on
The problem with that scenario is Pitto’s inability to take marks.  If he was a marking ruckman, we wouldn’t be having this debate and Pitto and Tom would be dominating opposition rucks.

It will be interesting to see what the future holds for Pittonet. Will he simply be a back up for De Koning, in which case will he want to stay, or go elsewhere ? The ideal of course would be for the two of them to develop into a winning combination, but at this moment that still looks like a work in progress.

Re: The Great Ruck Debate.

Reply #124 –
Quote from: DJC – on
The problem with that scenario is Pitto’s inability to take marks.  If he was a marking ruckman, we wouldn’t be having this debate and Pitto and Tom would be dominating opposition rucks.
We don't use them the same, Pitto tends to play a kick behind play, TDK tends to push forward to become a target, I'd rate Pitto with higher D50 marking reliability than TDK. Pitto isn't going to take the lead-up marks on the wing or HBF like TDK and Harry, not just because he isn't as mobile, but also because he isn't in that part of the ground.

In terms of effective midfield clearances, Pitto and TDK are almost inseparable, Pitto has taken his stoppage and clearance work to another level this year but fans do not give him credit for a variety of reasons. He deserves some, he is better than they credit him.
"Extremists on either side will always meet in the Middle!"

Re: The Great Ruck Debate.

Reply #125 –
Quote from: PaulP – on
...The ideal of course would be for the two of them to develop into a winning combination, but at this moment that still looks like a work in progress.

They won't develop into a winning combination if we only play one at a time.
TDK seems to go to another level when he's the solo ruck.
He tends to go missing to some extent when he plays with Pittonet.

I'm not sure why that is, or what's the solution.
They tend to play 'wide' of each other,taking the rucks at different times.
Perhaps something that (silly as it sounds) could be tried is to have them play closer together.
Talking to one another
Tom has the follow up ability to virtually be another midfielder at the contest.

Imagine a ruck contest where the opposition has Tom on one side and Marc on the other and he has no idea which one is going to nominate :D  :D

Re: The Great Ruck Debate.

Reply #126 –
Quote from: Lods – on

Tom has the follow up ability to virtually be another midfielder at the contest.
Prior to their ruck crisis the Handbaggers were already doing this with SDK, it's the very same they were doing with Blicavs when Stanley was rucking. I can't specifically recall, but it might have even been the case that back in Rnd 13 Blicavs and SDK reversed roles at various times against us, with Blicavs taking the ruck and SDK standing Cripps.

I'd love to see TDK on a wing at times as well, he's more than capable of run downs, and yet he'd be an A-grade option to exit D50 allowing BigH and Charlie to stay fresh.

Of course, you still need a Plan B, this isn't an "All In" scenario that opponents of the 2 rucks like to paint it as, ironically the scenario closest to "All In" is the solo ruck option.
"Extremists on either side will always meet in the Middle!"

Re: The Great Ruck Debate.

Reply #127 –
Quote from: kruddler – on
Inability is a bit harsh.

Keeping in mind TDK has played games as a key forward and been targetted a lot more than Pitto as a result. Other 'sole ruck types'

Average marks 2024
Pitto - 1.38
TDK - 3.44

Contested marks average 2024
Pitto - 0.63
TDK - 0.88

As a comparison some other rucks averages 2024...
Player - avg Ms - avg CMs)
Darcy - 1.33 -  0.33
Grundy - 2.41 - 0.59
Gawn - 5.25 - 1.81
Witts - 2.18 - 0.55
Nankervis - 3.06 - 0.94
Goldstein - 1.92 - 0.46

A good example of how averages can be misleading. The median (midpoint of the data set) and mode (most frequent result) are more informative:

Median: Pitto = 1.5, Tom = 4

Mode: Pitto = 2, Tom = 5

The raw data is:

 Pitto: 0 marks per game X 2, 1 mark X 2, 2 marks X 3 and 3 marks X 1

Tom: 0 marks per game X 0, 1 mark per game X 3, 2 marks X 3, 3 marks X 1, 4 marks X 3, 5 marks X 5 and 6 marks X 1

When we have played Pitto and Tom, the latter has played limited minutes as a key forward and he isn't targeted anywhere near as often as Charlie, Harry and Owies.  Tom also rarely gets involved in transferring play and doesn't rack up meaningless uncontested marks. 
It's still the Gulf of Mexico, Don Old!

Re: The Great Ruck Debate.

Reply #128 –
Quote from: DJC – on
A good example of how averages can be misleading. The median (midpoint of the data set) and mode (most frequent result) are more informative:

Median: Pitto = 1.5, Tom = 4

Mode: Pitto = 2, Tom = 5

The raw data is:

 Pitto: 0 marks per game X 2, 1 mark X 2, 2 marks X 3 and 3 marks X 1

Tom: 0 marks per game X 0, 1 mark per game X 3, 2 marks X 3, 3 marks X 1, 4 marks X 3, 5 marks X 5 and 6 marks X 1

When we have played Pitto and Tom, the latter has played limited minutes as a key forward and he isn't targeted anywhere near as often as Charlie, Harry and Owies.  Tom also rarely gets involved in transferring play and doesn't rack up meaningless uncontested marks.

When we play both TOMs minutes has suffered?
Go back and check your data on that one.
If you want to go head to head, its hard for the reasons we've both outlined.
So thats why i included some other of the best 'solo' rucks for comparison.
For someone with an inability to take a mark, he stacks up pretty well with some of the best.
I suggest if you normalise that out, you'll find that he is even better than those averages suggest.

All i'm saying is you are selling Pittonet short.

Re: The Great Ruck Debate.

Reply #129 –
360 discussed this.
2012 HAPPENED!!!!!!!

Re: The Great Ruck Debate.

Reply #130 –
Pittonet is the best ruck in the comp pre clearance.
TDK is 4th.

Neither are top 5 post clearance.

Gawn was 5th pre clearance and number 1 post clearance.

Jackson was the only other ruck top 5 in both, his team mate Darcy was top 5 pre clearance.
2012 HAPPENED!!!!!!!

Re: The Great Ruck Debate.

Reply #131 –
Seems that we have a perplexing issue with Pitto and TDK - they're both number 1 ruckmen, and really good, albeit in different ways. However neither is overly effective as a 2nd banana - seems unfair not to run either of them as the number 1 ruckman. Ideally you'd run the pair of them on and off the interchange... but that aint practical. Another conundrum.
Only our ruthless best, from Board to bootstudders will get us no. 17

Re: The Great Ruck Debate.

Reply #132 –
So here's where we are at in my opinion.
We can debate this until the cows come home.
We have two AFL standard ruckman.
Both with different skill sets.
Both high up in certain  aspects of ruck work.
Some say two rucks can't work.
But rather than saying two rucks can't work...
I think a really good coaching group should be able to find a way to 'make it work'.

Re: The Great Ruck Debate.

Reply #133 –
Quote from: Baggers – on
Ideally you'd run the pair of them on and off the interchange... but that aint practical. Another conundrum.
That's not how it works now, that claim is used by the anti-ruck duo brigade to cast doubt.

The reality is TDK is generally in a complex rotation with Charlie and Harry, but it's no more complex than the D50 or Midfield rotations. Pitto shares bench time mostly from Harry, Charlie, TDK bench time. Technically it won't matter who we have as the 3rd tall in that rotation, the impact on the bench is the same, whether it's a ruck or another KPP like SoJ, Young or Durdin. What changes from the choice of who is in the squad is how they can be used on the field and who they can substitute for in a crisis!

It quite foolish to think you can have an "All In" approach and leave one significant segment of the zones without a viable back plan. For me it's not viable for Harry to be our ruck backup plan, in fact it's disastrous to withdraw Harry from F50 if our solo ruck goes down, the flow on impact to Charlie and the F50 as well as the diminished ruck / midfield presence is almost impossible to overcome against a well organised opponent. Our F50 strength is the Twin Towers, when we go solo ruck, even without unexpected injuries, we actively degrade one of our key strengths.

Then you have the absurdity of the claim that when we solo ruck a Mid like Cripps get extra bench time, it's both worthless and meaningless claim. In reality when we solo ruck it's Cripps who ends up doing some of the part-time ruck role, if anything his load goes up when we solo ruck, he's not fresher at all!
"Extremists on either side will always meet in the Middle!"

Re: The Great Ruck Debate.

Reply #134 –
Quote from: kruddler – on
When we play both TOMs minutes has suffered?
Go back and check your data on that one.
If you want to go head to head, its hard for the reasons we've both outlined.
So thats why i included some other of the best 'solo' rucks for comparison.
For someone with an inability to take a mark, he stacks up pretty well with some of the best.
I suggest if you normalise that out, you'll find that he is even better than those averages suggest.

All i'm saying is you are selling Pittonet short.

Tom's time on the ground doesn't fluctuate that much, regardless of whether he's rucking solo or in tandem with Pitto, and it generally hovers between 78-80%.  His lowest was 68% against the Swans when Pitto had 78%.  He had 80% TOG against the Giants in round 6 and Pitto had 68%.  Pitto's time on the ground is less and fluctuates quite a bit; 50-78%.

It's not so much time on the ground that matters when playing two ruckmen, it's the impact they have when "resting".  When Tom is is playing as a tall forward, he gets up the ground like Harry does, impacts contests and takes some ruck contests, leaving Pitto behind the ball.  When Pitto is "resting", he's more likely to be on the pine because he isn't able to impact contests to the same extent as Tom.

The crux of the two rucks scenario is having two ruckmen who are complementary and can have an impact when not rucking.  We've had a couple of games this season where our two rucks worked very well and a couple where one or the other didn't do much.  Melbourne couldn't get it to work when they had arguably the two best ruckmen in the competition in their 22 but they weren't all that complementary.  Our two are very much a work in progress and it's getting more impact from Pitto when he's not in ruck contests that needs more work.
It's still the Gulf of Mexico, Don Old!