Ryan Buckland: Mr Rose, we’ve made it through the dreaded bye rounds, and we’re getting ready for the 10 week run home.

I’ve sifted through the draw earlier this week, and have got a pretty good idea of where I think the top eight is going to settle.

What I thought would be an interesting exercise is to rate how each team has performed to this point in the season, relative to expectations.

To keep it simple – I love simple after all – three ratings can apply: overachiever (OA), underachiever (UA) or meeting expectations (ME).

As a frame of reference, here’s what we picked as our respective ladders heading into the season. Brace yourself, it doesn’t look pretty…

Where do you want to kick it off?

Cam Rose: Why don’t we start with two clear OA’s – West Coast and Collingwood. We had each of them in 12th and 14th, and they currently sit second and fifth, all but assured of finals, and in the Eagles case, a top four spot. Given I wrote about West Coast last week, I probably don’t need to go into more detail here, but their defensive system and all-ground coverage has really caught my eye.

Similarly, the Pies have also been extremely well coached, and several of their wins have had a clearly identifiable Buckley imprint. Do you think the rise of these two sides has been coach driven, which is so hard to factor in pre-season?

Ryan: Yeah we were a little bearish on the old Eagles, weren’t we? For West Coast, it’s most certainly to do with coaching and tactics. Adam Simpson – a Clarkson disciple – has got them playing Hawks footy after just 12 months in the job.

Positional moves have been important, too. For instance, Sharrod Wellingham looks a completely different player as a half back flanker, where he only has to worry about picking up the opposition’s fourth or fifth best forward option. Eliot Yeo’s move into the midfield is inspired. Mark LeCras playing more forward of the ball looked risky, but has come off magically. And a certain dreadlocked ruckman is back to his 2011 best.

As you say, the question is whether top four is in play – I think it is, but North Melbourne are firmly in that frame, too.

Collingwood get an OA from me as well, but I’m a little less convinced on their top eight chops as I discussed on Wednesday. Coach Buckley has built a system that allows for his players to play within their limitations, and it’s worked well in the face of the easiest draw in the league. But it gets a bit tougher on the way home. They’re on ninth watch, for mine.

I think their spot is at risk from another overachiever, the Western Bulldogs. Is that another coach-induced improvement? Or are their players just better than we thought?

Rose: I can count 10-12 players having career best seasons for the Dogs, a lot of whom were under-exposed coming into this season, and on top of that you can add into that guys like experienced hands Rob Murphy and Matthew Boyd who are both in All-Australian contention. Beveridge has obviously injected more run into the side, using a combination of personnel and game style. He strikes me as a coach who can get the absolute best out of individuals, and thus making his team greater than the sum of its parts.

Do St Kilda qualify for OA status? 14th on the ladder isn’t bad for a side we both had pegged for last.

Ryan: A four win team?

You know, they probably do. The whole world was down on the Saints heading into this season – some analysts said they may not win a single game – but they’ve shown enough spark and run to suggest they’re improving.

They still make mistakes, and they’ve been blown off the park a couple of times, but unlike other bottom dwellers they are at least trying to play an exciting style of footy. St Kilda have a very young list, chock full of high draft picks and with another couple to come this season, they’re setting themselves up for a rise up the ladder from next season onwards, by my reckoning. Its almost a similar situation to the Bulldogs of last year – although you’d think Alan Richardson is in no danger of losing his job.

Speaking of four win teams… should we get it over with now? The most underachieving team of the year, as far as I’m concerned, is Essendon. What do you think has gone wrong?

Rose: They’ve obviously lacking confidence, similar to the Tigers in the first half of last year, and I think the basis of it is they lack run. Run is such an overlooked quality in a good football side. When you’ve got a forward line like the Bombers do, which can be dysfunctional at times, they need to be running the ball in and hitting up their mobile targets like Goddard, Chapman and Cooney. If they do go long, and Daniher and Carlisle don’t mark it, they don’t have a natural crumbing forwards, to either gain possession, or apply pressure to stop the opposition from running it out. I know the Dons are a pet subject of yours, what do you put their poor season down to?

Ryan: I put all my chips in the middle of the table earlier in the season…and its not quite come off as I expected.

The forward set up is a short-term concern. I maintain that in 50-100 games time, Daniher-Carlisle will be the best big man duo in the league. But right now? Less than one-in-five inside 50 entries for the Dons result in a mark, compared to an AFL average of 23 per cent, and well below the league leading Hawthorn that mark it almost 27 per cent of the time. Forward line efficiency is a big talking point in the league right now, and Essendon are pretty much the worst.

But more broadly, I think you’ve hit the nail on the head: they’re not quick enough. Who are the “runners” in the team? Maybe David Zaharakis and Courtney Dempsey? Adam Cooney was likely recruited to fill some of that void, but it’s become clear he’s aging more as a half forward rather than a wingman – not that this is a bad thing, but it’s a different role.

A lot has been made of the tactics, and there are certainly some legs to that critique. Essendon are playing a style that is suited to the pre-Port-inspired surge running game of, say, 2011 and 2012. Short kicks, playing keepy off, and maintaining possession. The Dons are very good at it. But the game has moved on. I think they still have a very strong list, but perhaps they need to look at bringing in a few more runners off the waiver wire in the off season, like Port Adelaide did in 2012.

One team that has got this running thing down pat is the GWS Giants, who, until a demolition derby-esque run of injuries a few weeks back, looked destined to make the top eight. Given where they’re at now – ninth place with a percentage a tick over 100 – do they get an OA or ME from you?

Rose: I think they’re an OA that will slip down to an ME by the time the season is over. But the funny part about their over-achievement was that it wasn’t that much of a surprise when you watched them play. It was easy for us all to say the Suns were tracking beautifully last year, and the Giants are doing the same a year later, but there definitely feels more substance to what GWS are building, even if they do slip back to a 10th-12th finish this year.

Speaking of the Suns, both Queensland teams get a big fat UA. We were both quite bullish about the Lions based on their midfield depth, but it hasn’t quite worked out for them has it?

Ryan: Oh yeah, we both buggered that one up. Brisbane were coming from so far back – losing most of their decent young players picked up over the early 2010s – that it was maybe a little optimistic to think they would rise as high as 9th-10th. But bottom three is quite disappointing, as would dropping from seven wins to, say, three or four which looks likely. Gold Coast are similar, although they have something of an out clause given their crazy injury toll. The Suns are down arguably their best starting five midfielders, which has flown on effects across the park. They’re one to watch out for in 2016, if they can get over these cultural issues.

Jumping states, where do you peg the two South Australian teams? Neither of us had Adelaide making the eight – and they could still drop out – while we both had Port as top four bound. The Power’s rating is pretty clear cut, but what about Adelaide? I’m tempted to say they’re just meeting, rather than exceeding, expectations.

Rose: If we look at the Crows from Round 4 on, they’ve gone 4-5 with a percentage of 95.7. The wins in that time have been over Gold Coast, St Kilda, Carlton and Brisbane. It’s not an imposing record is it, even if they have pushed Fremantle and Hawthorn in that time. My predicted ladder spread for them at the start of the season was 6th-12th, and they’re going to land somewhere in there. I’d say they’re meeting expectations, albeit perhaps at the higher end of it.

You mentioned North being in the frame for a top four finish earlier, which you’ve been vocal about on this site in the last week or two. What rating are you giving them so far?

Ryan: I think to this point in the season, I’d give them a par rating, so an ME. They’ve had the league’s toughest draw to this point in the season, and have one of the easiest in the final 10 weeks. In fact, I’ve got them pegged for two 50/50 contests, two leaning in their favour, and six pretty clear cut victories. It’ll be tight at the top end of the ladder for that fourth spot, but win both of those lean games and perhaps one of the 50/50s, and that’s likely enough to get them over the line.

Standing in their way is Richmond (and West Coast). I held on to the Tiger’s finals chances for as long as I could earlier in the season before writing them off completely. After a very strong five weeks they’re pretty much a lock for the eight and could even jag a double chance should things break their way. It’s been up and down, which is the Richmond way, so it’s probably a ME for them, too?

Rose: I think so. Even a Richmond notorious for playing Jekyll and Hyde should win their next three, against GWS, Carlton and St Kilda. That puts them at 10-5 before a tough three week stretch. The Tiges may need to beat all of Collingwood, Essendon and North in the final three rounds in order to claim fourth, but it is well within their grasp if they can consistently bring something close to their best football, rather than sporadically, but also eliminate their horrible patches.

At face value, Geelong has been another inconsistent team, with some wild fluctuations in winning and losing margins. We both had them barely hanging in the eight, but I doubt they’ll make it now. UA or ME for them?

Ryan: Cats fans will disagree with me, but I think a just-outside-the-eight finish is meeting expectations for Geelong this season.

I wrote before the season proper that of all of last season’s top eight sides, they were the most likely to drop out, simply because their win total was significantly above what their offensive and defensive output would suggest. That, plus their reliance on an aging core was always risky, and the loss of a number of those veterans throughout the year has hurt. I bet the front office are seriously regretting turning down a rumored first round pick for Steve Johnson trade.

A loss to Melbourne before the bye was somewhat poetic. Geelong had made the Dees their whipping boy throughout their dynastic years, and here they are, losing to them quite comfortably in the first year they’ll likely miss the finals in a decade.

Where do you have the Cats? And seeing as we’re talking about them, the Dees?

Rose: I’ll give the Cats an ME too, and the same with the Dees for mine. I thought 6-8 wins was a realistic goal for them, and they’re on four after 12 rounds. The most positive aspect for them is that they’ve beaten three teams in the 6th-10th range on the ladder, so it shows they’re closer to bridging that gap to the middle tier than they’ve been in years.

Melbourne meets Carlton in Rd 21, which is the sort of game at the end of the season where the result can determine a positive or negative mindset for a supporter base going into the next season. Where do you rate the Blues? I have them as meeting expectations.

Ryan: Yeah I’d cop that. Talk of the Blues contending for the finals from some outlets was madness, particularly given the prospects of teams like Gold Coast and Adelaide heading into the season.

Carlton are a very interesting proposition headed into next season and beyond, if only because they’re looking likely to be the only team in a genuine tear-it-down rebuild for 2016. Matthew Lloyd is not the holder of opinions I find myself agreeing with often, but his call that a strong end to the year from Carlton would be perhaps the worst thing that could happen is pretty spot on.

As for Melbourne; early in the season it was looking like the Roos Regime was teetering on the brink of collapse. But they seem to have pulled it together, and the future is looking brighter.

So by my count that leaves us with what I think are the clear three best sides in the competition: Fremantle, Hawthorn and Sydney. How have they gone to date?

Rose: Freo, two games clear on top of the ladder after 12 rounds? That’s a clear OA for me. And while they’ve slowed down a little in recent times with Pav struggling for impact (they’ve only kicked 38 goals in their last four matches; Hawthorn have 67), every team is going to have lulls at various times in a long season. They really need to get Ballantyne up and going.

The Hawks are at the bottom end of meeting expectations, but are still meeting them all the same. So many experienced players, with so much success, it’s no surprise they weren’t mentally sharp over the first half of the year. September is when they do their real business.

Sydney get an ME too, pretty much doing exactly what we all thought they would. They’ve lost three games by an average of two goals, but have had a few matches where they’ve been unable to stem the flow of opposition goals in a short time. The Swans backline can look vulnerable when their midfield drops away, so the onus really is on the likes of Hannebery, Kennedy, Parker, Jack, McVeigh and Mitchell to maintain a consistent effort across four quarters, given we know they have the toughness and class.

Your take on the big three?

Ryan: I had the Dockers as a sneaky premiership chance (and certainly in the top two) so from my perspective they’ve largely met expectations. But for the AFL community at large, they get an overachiever tag for sure. I think we’re in for either a 2013 or 2014 Grand Final rematch come the first Saturday in October (that’ll never catch on…)

Hawthorn’s record isn’t an accurate reflection of where they’re at as a side, as I discussed on Wednesday. But it’s Hawthorn, and we’ve come to expect nothing less than total dominance, so it’s a meets expectations for them.

Sydney are an interesting one. The Franklin-Tippett experiment is working, but it’s seen their midfielders lose some of their scoring potency, which puts them in stark contrast to the other two rivals. They have a very easy defensive slate of games in their last ten, so look to them to get back on the scorers sheet.

I think that about covers it! So we have four underachievers, six sides overachieving, and eight meeting expectations. Maybe we weren’t so far off after all?

Rose: Big misses on West Coast, Collingwood, Gold Coast, Brisbane and Port, but many would have been in the same basket. Pretty solid on the rest I think.