Pocock and Hooper in line for top player gong

Hahaha. The stuff.co.nz posted an article that Julian Savea won an hour ago. Guess they were a bit premature. Dan Carter won it

Bit of a shock here. Julian Savea actually won the player of the year

The three biggest games of the year for the All Blacks, the quarters, semi and final he has been a star in. He also stood up in the Bledisloe cup decider. He was the man that guided us through the semi and final and for that alone, he will score big points in this award.

I would be surprised if Carter does not get the award. He has been the standout player for the finals, having great games in the quarters, semis and final.

Hooper? How did he get on that list?

Still harping on about McCaw? He's had 8 nominations, 3 wins at this thing. He has nothing to prove in that respect. He'll go to retirement as the greatest player of all time, any position, any country, any time. Pocock is a limited one hit wonder who has built his career on a very narrow skilset. McCaw has done it all as a loosie and will leave Pocock in his dust, as he always has.

If McCaw had been superb in every game he would have been nominated, there were quite a few he was only reasonable. Overall no better than Hooper. Pocock has been the most consistent in having very good performances this year. I notice your other player you expound as better than Pocock in performance B Smith was not nominated either.

Nonu should definitely be there.

I'm actually quite impressed NB. That's a very reasonable post from you! :-) So you can be impartial at times ;-) Although I'd have Aaron Smith at 9. Fourie DP has been good too.

You forget leadership mate...no one has the leadership qualities of McCaw and I disagree Pocock has been better throughout the year...McCaw has been superb in just about every game he plays ..the guys defense is the best in the world of any back rower and don't serve me up you usual plethora of stats Peterk - No back rower reads the game in defense better than McCaw and his lineout work and balls carrying throughout the year have been brilliant and he has made plenty of steals But Mccaw plays the no7 differently now because the AB's hunt at the breakdown as pack in the true sense of the word and ALL their backs and tight five are very capable of making steals which has freed McCaw up to do more leg and tackle work and NZ has a significantly higher steal count as a team than Australia Making steals is not McCaw's primary function anymore but it most certainly is Pocock's- note I said primary not " only" What's the bet McCaw outplays Pocock tonight across the park just as he did in semi-final in 2011

That's it then. Won't be be taking notice of this award in the future.

NB - Pocock is a traditional fetcher which is a traditional 7 role. Sure some teams did not have fetchers in their team. Tipuric and Warburton play that role for wales. Louw for the Boks. Note the Boks traditionally use the no 6 for the opensider but since you fixate on the no on the back you would not recgonise that. McCaw plays a similar role for NZ. As I noted Hooper plays the 8's role in general play, but once again you are fixated on the number on the back. I am sure people picking world teams would have Read, Vermulen, Parisse at 8 and Pocock at 7, he would not be considered at 8 despite being a the best player this year.

Number 8s Vunipola Vermuelen Read Poey Parrise Heaslip Not the same. Number 6s Kaino Fardy Alberts Matera Wood O'Mahony Not the same. Locks Skelton Rettalick Lawes de Jager POC Not the same. Hookers Coles Biz Creevy Moore Youngs Not the same. Number 7s Hooper O'Brien Lobbe Dusautoir Robshaw Louw Not the same Telling everybody how a position plays is wrong because they dont and NEVER have.

Ahhh no. Lobbe, Dusautoir, Hooper, Robshaw. All played 7 for their countries and NOBODY including Australia played a player like Poey at 7, NOBODY. So perhaps your idea of what a 7 is, that you are trying to impose on everybody, just isnt quite right.

I'm a big AB fan, but even I feel that no All Black deserved to be nominated this year, mainly because of lack of consistency. McCaw and maybe Ben Smith would be the pick of the AB's for consistency, by a pretty long way, everyone else has had one or two bad games. Even Retallick hasn't been playing up to his normally very high standard consistently. From the games I've seen, and I don't watch much NH rugby, I would say Pocock was leading by a country mile.

No Pocock has had no 8 on his back and he scrums at the no 8 position, that is the start and end of him playing as a 8. His role elsewhere is as a breakdown monkey, pilferer extraordinaire, tackling machine, with high wrok rate. He is playing as a 7. Hooper outside the scrum is in fact playing the role of a 8 for the wallabies.

Nonu has not been consistent. In the RC SBW played half the games. In the WC SBW has played half the games. Nonu was ordinary in 1 game SA in the RC and has been really good in about 3 games for NZ all year. Making Nonus year good but NOWHERE near world poty worthy.

His "and nothing else" comment makes it pretty clear that he should not be the one to ask when it comes to assessing Hoopers game.

Poey has played number 8. Perhaps comparing him to other 8s makes sense but comparing him to McCaw makes as much sense as comparing him to Kaino. And no, opponent quality should not matter.

Nor should the points be weighted by the opponent. NMS was the best player in the ABs against the 'minows' and that means he was better than all the opponents AND all of his team. The ABs are a pretty good team and to be the best means something. Whereas SA might play NZ and nobody plays very well or anywhere near as good as NMS did and you think it should be worth more? All teams play high and low level opponents and all games should be scored the same.