As I predicted last year, the ruck contest has become a tactical flash point in today’s AFL. And every team has its own little wrinkle at the position.
The abolition of the third man up rule in the 2016 offseason was destined to have an impact on the way teams approached the ruck. I wrote about the change when it occurred, and came back to the issue after two rounds of the 2017 season proclaiming the death of rucking as we knew it.
So the phrase ‘tactical ruck concession’ (or TRC for short) didn’t catch on as one may have hoped, but the predicted revolution in the way players and coaches would approach stoppages has come to pass.
As with any innovation, it has not necessarily gone as the designer of said innovation may have planned – or hoped. Outlawing the third man up was ostensibly a response to the AFL’s concern that ‘ruckman’ was dying as a position. This was a somewhat overblown concern at the time. Through almost one and a half seasons of operation under the new rule, not a great deal has changed.
We know this because thanks to another AFL innovation, we the public have the most sound handle on the quantitative side of ruck play we’ve ever had. AFL Stats Pro, a player statistics platform, has opened up a trove of new information about the quantitative performance of every current player in the AFL (so long as you can work out how to ask the platform the right questions).
Using some information obtained from the platform, we can examine how each team in the competition is attacking the ruck position as revealed by their preferences over the first ten rounds of the AFL season. We cannot, sadly, compare this to past years due to the limitations of the platform. But for now, this proves to be a revealing activity.
There are some broad trends that seem to carry across teams, but there are plenty of difference at the team level too.
Carrying the load
So far in 2018, there has been an average of 88 ruck contests per game – 22 per quarter, or one every roughly 90 seconds. Almost every team has been within one standard deviation of that average, with three exceptions: Greater Western Sydney (94 contests), St Kilda (78 contests) and Richmond (77 contests).
Based on their respective performances this season, there is no obvious correlation between the number of ruck contests and success.
But this does give us some additional insight into the game plan of Richmond (and suggests St Kilda might be going for it too). We have long suspected the Tigers like to keep the ball in play as a way of both attacking and defending, preferring to improvise in the scramble than work within the structural bounds of stoppage football.
St Kilda have also exhibited this so far in 2018, albeit without the all-time defender that thrives in chaos and the attacking weapons to convert territory and possession to scores. The idea is fundamentally the same; the Saints want to create and quickly pounce on turnovers since Alan Richardson took over.
The Giants are an interesting outlier, having the most ruck contests (and therefore stoppages) per game in the league despite lacking a dominant ruckman. And it is perhaps one of the club’s biggest weaknesses in 2018: they are ranked 13th in stoppage scoring differential, after being one of the best stoppage scoring teams in the league in the past two years. GWS has a patchwork ruck unit this season which cannot be helping matters.
GWS is one of four teams that have not relied on a sole ruckman to do three-quarters of their team’s ruck work over the course of a season. The others are Port Adelaide, the West Coast Eagles, and the Western Bulldogs.
Gold Coast’s Jarrod Witts has carried the heaviest burden of all ruckmen in the league, contesting 91 per cent of the Suns’ ruck contests in 2018. Looking at raw ruck contests, Melbourne’s Max Gawn is the number one ruck contester in the competition on 75.7 contests, or around one more than Witts (the difference being Melbourne has been involved in 92 contests per game this year compared to 82 by Gold Coast).
Eight ruckmen have taken to 70 ruck contests or more per game, although two of them have been in and out of their respective teams (Rhys Stanley and Dawson Simpson). The workhorses of the league have been: Gawn (75.7 contests per game), Callum Sinclair (75), Witts (74.6), Sam Jacobs (74.4), Stefan Martin (70.8) and Todd Goldstein (70.4).
By contrast, the primary ruckmen at West Coast and the Western Bulldogs – Nic Naitanui and Tim English respectively – have taken just 49.1 contests and 46.6 ruck contests per game. That is a significant difference between the eight names above, and means the two teams have relied on a secondary ruckman significantly more often than other teams.
For the Eagles, it has been a sole secondary ruckmen: Scott Lycett (44.5 contests per game). They have been the only team to regularly play a two-prong ruck set up, and have only had one non-ruckman take ruck contests this year: Jack Darling, who in line with the rest of his season has won both of the ruck battles he fought.
The Dogs are a different beast altogether.
Tim English acted as the primary ruckman in the first six rounds of the season, but with very different structures around him in almost every game. In Round 1, the Dogs had Jordan Roughead and Jackson Trengove take 31 ruck contests each to English’s 39 contests. English took a greater share over time, as Beveridge threw Marcus Bontempelli (11 contests in Round 3), Josh Dunkley (20 contests in Round 4) and Tom Boyd (19 contests in Round 5 and 27 in Round 6) as his partner.
Boyd became the dominant ruckman in Round 7 (41 contests, compared to 31 for English and 29 for Dunkley), and English was dropped in Round 8 (with Boyd partnering with Dunkley). Then, in Round 9, Roughead returned to the team as the lone partner to Boyd.
Finally, in Round 10, Roughead was the primary ruckman as Boyd played more time in the forward line, and Trengove took a handful of contests.
What a whirlwind. And that’s just one area of the Bulldogs’ game – fans in the know have suggested Beveridge has been flippant with his team’s structures across the ground.
Ruck effectiveness
Unfortunately, the Dogs are getting little out of the position this season.
They have generated a hit-out to advantage on just 5.5 per cent of ruck contests this season, the lowest mark in the league. What’s more, they aren’t getting much out of their ruck group by way of work around the ground.
A ruckman’s primary responsibility is to generate a positive outcome from a stoppage. Under the new ruck rules, the nominated ruckman is the only player on the field who can affect a ruck contest until the ball hits the ground. So it holds that to be at their most influential in most situations a nominated ruckman should be generating hit-outs to advantage (which Champion Data defines as a hit out which goes to the intended teammate). That much of the stoppage is in the ruckman’s direct control. The average rate of hit-out to advantage this season is 12.3 per cent; for a team’s leading ruckman this rate is 14.6 per cent.
The league’s leading ruck unit this year has been Fremantle – driven by Aaron Sandilands – whose unit has generated a hit out to advantage from 23 per cent of ruck contests. This is a hair ahead of Melbourne (Gawn) on 22.9 per cent, but a full 34 per cent better than Collingwood (Brodie Grundy) in third.
At the bottom end of the table are the Dogs, Port Adelaide (9.5%), Geelong (9.5%) and Port Adelaide (9.8%). Unsurprisingly, these teams have had limited continuity at the position in 2018. For example, Paddy Ryder has a hit out to advantage rate of 13.3 per cent but he’s only taken 28 per cent of Port Adelaide’s ruck contests.
But this isn’t all a ruckman can do of course – they can be multidimensional. As a way of measuring this, I’ve taken three decidedly non-ruck statistical categories (ground ball gets, uncontested marks and defensive half pressure acts) and developed a standardised measure of how much or little of this additional work a team’s ruck unit does on average (when compared to the other ruck units). If you’d like a further explanation please advise, but trust me it’s boring as hell.
Plotting this on a matrix reveals there are some ruckmen units who excel at both primary ruck duties and in doing extra work across the ground.
We have one complete unicorn: Collingwood, driven by Brodie Grundy, who is well above average at producing hit-outs to advantage, but also generates plenty of extra work for his team in the form of ground-ball gets and defensive half-pressure acts.
Brisbane’s unit, powered by Stefan Martin, does well in both categories too but not to the same extent at the Pies.
Below, these two units on the matrix are Richmond (Toby Nankervis) and Sydney (Callum Sinclair), who are below average in generating hit-outs to advantage but who do plenty of extra work around the ground. Nankervis himself brings plenty of defensive support, where Sinclair is more useful in attack.
Fremantle (Sandilands) and Melbourne (Gawn) are the clear standouts in hit-outs to advantage but are light on in terms of extra work. Then there are the units which sit to the bottom left-hand side of the matrix, who haven’t done much on either measure.
There’s often a debate that plays out among fans as to whether a ruckman should be focussed solely on the job of powering their team through stoppages or be contributing moreso in non-ruck ways. Collingwood, Brisbane, Richmond and Sydney suggest both are possible.
Odds and ends
There is not, however, a straight line to ruck dominance and scoring, at least by way of converting taps in the ruck to immediate scoring opportunities. Stats Pro has a measure called “score launches”, which indicates how many times a player’s creation of a possession chain (a hit out, intercept or kick in) results in a score.
This isn’t 100 per cent attributable to ruck work, because players who have played in the ruck will have also generated intercepts or been responsible for kick in duties, but it’s a useful proxy. Melbourne’s unit again leads the way, with 3.3 score launches from their ruck unit per game. Brisbane isn’t far behind, on 3.2, but as a share of their total scores that is significantly more than league average (15.9%, versus 7.8%).
At the bottom – again – are the Dogs, on 2.6 per cent. Other notable teams are Richmond (1.9 launches per game, or 6.6% of their total) and West Coast (2.2 launches per game, or 8.5% of their total) – the Tigers because it again reinforces their chaos preference, and the Eagles because it is a little counterintuitive.
Finally, a word on the best non-ruck ruckmen in the competition. As far as midfielders go (players averaging 20 possessions or more per game), there is only one, and it’s not premiership ruckman Shaun Grigg. No, it’s two time Brownlow medallist Nat Fyfe.
The Fremantle captain has participated in 38 ruck contests so far in 2018, winning 42 per cent of them with a hit out, and generating a hit-out to advantage 15.8 per cent of the time. Those are full-time ruckman levels, albeit with a small sample size as far as more regular ruckmen go.
The rest of the midfield-ruckman class? They’ve won 15.2 per cent of their contests, and generated a hit out to advantage just 2.6 per cent of the time. Indeed, Fyfe’s number of hit outs to advantage (six) is the same as the rest of the midfield-ruckman class (six). This isn’t opponent adjusted of course, but anecdotally, Fyfe has done a decent share of his work against opposition full-time ruckmen. Is there anything he can’t do?
As for forwards who provide regular assistance to their full-time ruckman counterparts, there is another clear standout: North Melbourne’s Ben Brown.
The Coleman medal leader has won 48 per cent of the ruck contests he’s partaken in, about the rate of a full time ruckman, although his advantage rate is much lower (6.9%). The king of generating hit outs to advantage in this group is Levi Casboult: 10.2 per cent of his hitouts put a teammate in a quality position to create a clearance. Port Adelaide’s Charlie Dixon isn’t too far behind, on 9.9 per cent.
| Contests | Win % | HTA % | |
| Levi Casboult | 177 | 38.4% | 10.2% |
| Charlie Dixon | 222 | 41.0% | 9.9% |
| Jarrad Waite | 33 | 30.3% | 9.1% |
| Sam Day | 89 | 37.1% | 9.0% |
| Josh Jenkins | 136 | 31.6% | 8.8% |
| Tom Hawkins | 64 | 29.7% | 7.8% |
| Harry McKay | 39 | 25.6% | 7.7% |
| James Stewart | 66 | 24.2% | 7.6% |
| Jarryd Roughead | 82 | 34.1% | 7.3% |
| Ben Brown | 58 | 48.3% | 6.9% |
| Matthew Taberner | 84 | 34.5% | 6.0% |
| Joe Daniher | 50 | 18.0% | 4.0% |
| Jonathon Patton | 222 | 20.3% | 2.7% |
| Jack Riewoldt | 38 | 7.9% | 2.6% |
| Josh Caddy | 32 | 15.6% | 0.0% |
| Total | 1392 | 31.4% | 7.2% |
What’s clear from this analysis is there is no one way to play the ruck position in today’s AFL. Some teams are loading up a workhorse, with varying degrees of success. Others have a unicorn who can provide both superior ruck play and contribute across the ground. Others still are doing whatever it is the Western Bulldogs are doing.
What is also clear is the AFL’s move to abolish the third man up has delivered the league a renewed tactical battleground. And for that, they should be congratulated.
Doctor Rotcod
Guest
But Ryan,when you suggest that the number of forwards is way below two , isn't that a little like saying that the average number of legs possessed by male humans is below two? Nomination at contests means that the ruckmen or substitute therewith have to be mobile or clever. Is there any data on how far a ruck runs in a game? Grundy would be way ahead. Ryder when fit was a running machine. Naitanui,Gawn and Sandilands have to hone their anticipatory skills because they are more the burst athlete type. It's no wonder that Fyfe is so good, because he's coming to the contest without having lost his leap or breath.
Michael44
Guest
Oh, one thing I want to add:- I can't remember whether Terry had said that the premier may have already moved on to another style, or whether he had said that the game may have already evolved to counter the premier's original style. It probably makes more sense to say that the game may have moved on by the time another team has tried to play catch-up, being as there have been so few premiers who have had the ability to go back-to-back.
Michael44
Guest
I agree Sammy. Even though ruck hit-outs may be overrated, what team's on-ballers wouldn't want a ruck man that really can tap to a real advantage on a regular basis. I know Ryan's been focusing on the ruck men in this article, but I just wanted to comment on the "small-ball" game plan for a bit :- The Tiges really did seem to want a 2nd tall on the forward line in 2017, but, it just didn't work out that way. They tried Griffiths, and he had shown that he clearly had abillity, but, he just couldn't get it together nearly often enough, and, in the end, injury ended any chance of him ever fulfilling that ability. The Tiges also tried Elton, but he just had never shown enough over a period of years, and so the Tiges seemed to decide to go full-throttle on a forward-half game plan that maximised what they did have on their list,and that was - lots of forward players who were able to run fast for repeat efforts, along with a natural willingness to go hard and pressure and tackle and corral their opponents. I know that some people say that anybody can tackle and that it is just a matter of having the will to do so, but, I remember Justin Leppitch talking about Buttler, Castagna, and Rioli a few months ago and he said something to the effect that no one had to tell them or teach these guys to pressure and tackle, but that they just did these things instinctively. From what I remember reading in Konrad Marshall's book on Richmond's 2017 season, basically the Tiges went "small-ball" due to a mixture of circumstances forcing them to, along with performing an assessment of their list and deciding that they had players on their list who may be able to pull the 'small-ball' game-plan off.. As a Tiges fan, I would love them to have that 2nd key forward (God, who wouldn't want Darling at the moment!), but, the fact is unfortunately for us Tiges fans (or, for me at least anyway), that they simply did not (and still do not) have one good enough. Therefore, the Tiges have decided to play a game style that probably most suits their list at the moment. The lesson for me is that I think that clubs should base their game-style around the cattle that they do have, and not try to mold their players to play a pre-concieved game-style. Also, I heard Terry Wallace say yesterday on SEN Melbourne radio that clubs that try to copy the premier risk never catching up, as, by the time they may become proficient at playing the premiers style, the premier may already have moved on to another and possibly more successfull game plan.
sammy
Guest
I can say one thing for certain..Sam Jacobs looks like he is done. Last year he could easily have been the AA ruck such was his season and dominance over Paddy Ryder - the AA ruckman but almost overnight he has lost any jump and he is being pushed around. This is a big area of concern for the crows going forward as guys like Naitanui, Grundy and Gawn are now the benchmarks as not only do they do really well at the stoppage..they link up so well around the ground. Richmond have shown that you can win a flag with a workman like ruck, but it makes life so much easier to have a guy that can feed your mids rather than your mids having to try read an opposing ruck
Lroy
Guest
Interesting article, it probably confirms whatever your previous bias is. For me, I think 2 ruck-men are essential, its a specialist position and is not something that can be performed effectively by part timers. But teams like Richmond did ok only having one, so obviously they felt the benefit they gained elsewhere outweighed any potential loss in not playing the second tall. I also like the idea (old school I know) of the resting ruck-man playing out of the forward pocket rather than sitting on the bench... it used to bring the crowd to its feet when the full forward on a lead was ignored, player went long to the square and the resting ruck-man took a great mark in the square just standing his ground. Simon Madden was a master at it. ;-)
Macca
Guest
Thanks Ryan, it may not change the results that much but it does make them more robust IMO
Ryan Buckland
Expert
Good thinking Macca. It doesn't change too much believe it or not. https://1drv.ms/u/s!AlVXsvff-VNow3fGLrF2NnCgNlmj
Col in paradise
Guest
As a economist myself don't mind stats, but to be honest picked Brody as the unicorn on twitter before reading the article, no stats required Grundy has been a standout in the ruck by a mile all year!.Observation can sure beat hours of statistics for analysis!!
Macca
Guest
Ryan - just further on this I assume a clearance the ruckman gets himself isn't counted as a hit out to advantage - therefore is it possible to add the clearances to the hit outs to advantage and show that combined figure as a percentage of total ruck contests?
dontknowmuchaboutfootball
Guest
Paul, I expect that you're pretty familiar with the idea of "meaning" being always contextual. The same has to be said for the "meaning" of hit outs. If a team's game plan, structures and set plays are built around scoring from a stoppage, and if the players are capable of successfully performing the roles designated by those structures, etc., then hit outs are incredibly meaningful. By contrast, if a team's gameplay, etc. is built around scoring from F50 turnovers, or rebounding from half-back, etc., and if they don't have the personnel to create an advantage in a stoppage, then hit outs aren't very meaningful. That's not to suggest that a team can play only one way or can focus only on one source of scoring, but different players have different strengths and, as a consequence, different teams have different aggregates and combinations of strengths, and so teams are going to be more or less successful at different kinds of play and in different types of scenario. (As an aside: a coach making effective use of their team's aggregate strengths is more or less the thing that people refer to as a "game plan"). The perfect illustration of this is Fremantle 2015. Freo's game plan was built around stoppages to exploit Sandi's dominance in the ruck and Fyfe/Neale/Barlow/Mundy's contest-and-clearance power. Have a look at Freo's first nine games for that season and try again to say that hit outs are meaningless. Then came Round 10, when Richmond showed the rest of the competition how to counter Freo's dominance at the stoppage (and especially at the centre bounce). FWIW, I think you can trace much of Richmond's current gameplay and playing style to that game (or at least to the 2015 season). Freo's current problem is not that their ruck does well in ("meaningless") hit outs but performs poorly in other ("meaningful") measures. Their problem is that once they've won the ball from the stoppage, they are unable to maintain possession and convert that possession into shots on goal. Their problem is a disconnect between the midfield and the forward line. Whether that disconnect is owed to a lack of quality forwards or to terrible, terrible delivery inside-50 is a matter for debate. But if we're going to point fingers of blame at personnel, tell me: do you blame the player who can be relied upon to get the ball and get it to their teammate's advantage, or do you blame the player who can't be relied on to do so? By precisely the same token, I would suspect that Sandi's current lack of scoring is also owed to gameplay, etc. Firstly, Freo have (along with most of the rest of the competition) moved to a one-ruck set up, meaning that Sandi is spending more time in the ruck and less time resting forward, ergo fewer opportunities to score goals. Second, Freo have shifted emphasis from creating a stoppage to rebounding off half-back, meaning faster ball movement, providing little time for the ruck to position forward to be on the end of an inside-50. If all that sound like I'm being defensive on behalf of Freo, it's not meant to be. I'm trying to illustrate a general point through an example. It happens to be the example of Freo/Sandi, because I only really watch/analyse Freo games. (Nevertheless, the findings of the analysis lead me to be skeptical of all those would-be pundits who cast judgement on the basis of stats sheets, or who comment on performance outside of any consideration of role.)
Jorge from Bvegas
Guest
Ryan, great work. I understand why you chose ‘ non ruck’ statistics . I would like to think that Stef Martin is a uniciorn and Brodie Grundy is a horned Pegasus .... but I digress. The most useful part of your article is not highlighting the best ruckman, although this was a nice, statistically proven , result. It shows quite demonstratively how the ruck contest is a major asset or major weakness to some teams. A case in point, Geelong and Giants are suffering demonstratively from having so much inconsistency and it all being poor. Especially since the Giants scoring from stoppages was such a big part of their scoring previously. Where as Collingwood’s season is quite strong, riding on the back of their horned Pegasus ( see earlier comment) . Where one wonders where the Lions season would be without their unicorn . I think now, more than ever the ruck role is pivotal to a teams success, the teams which were best at third man up until intro of new rule Doggies and Cats, seem to be now struggling the most. Doggies are comfortably a bottom six side where as Cat’s strong ruckman from last year Smith has lost firm badly and even the ‘holy trinity’ can’t get them on the front foot enough to score heavily. It St Kilda could go back and change one thing about their rebuild, would they have let go of Ben McEvoy ? I think if you ask Richo now he may give a different answer.
JamesH
Roar Guru
Even with six possessions straight out of the ruck that's still only 37 ruck wins - 18 less. 55 hit outs is immense for any ruckman. Sandi hasn't even topped that this season. The stoppage clearances were even but the Blues comfortably won the centre clearances. There are probably two reasons for this. Firstly, ruckmen can't engage prior to the bounce in the centre. That gave Kreuzer the chance to run and jump at the ball, which he is better at than Belly is. Secondly, the Bombers lack big bodied inside mids. They can nullify this to a point at the stoppages by getting numbers to the contest, but it doesn't work at centre bounces.
Jonboy
Guest
Mason Cox is going to get a lot better only played just over 20 games late starter still learning. Awareness in ruckwork is a big thing this is where Nic Nat and Ryder stand alone, Martin and Gawn are also pretty good .Gundry does heaps around the ground a workhorse. Sandi. does nothing around the ground, overrated if he was a few centimeters shorter would never played AFL No offense just my opinion.
Macca
Guest
James - those hit out numbers are a bit misleading because Kreuzer took a lot (relatively) of possession straight out of the ruck contest. He had 9 clearances for the game and I would suggest that at least 6 of them were from taking possession. Interestingly the blues won the clearances 45-40 despite the hit outs.
Paul D
Roar Guru
I agree totally jon! If hitouts actually meant anything Freo would have done better than they had. Sandi is a colossus in the ruck, but he averages 0.33 goals a game. One goal every 3 games from a guy who stands over 2.1 m tall. Contrast that to Mason Cox who is averaging 1.1 goals a game. I think tap ruckmen are a bit of a luxury personally. Leunberger did that role for years at Brisbane and was about as influential as the Labor left at the party conference. hitouts - highly overrated, in my view.
Jonboy
Guest
Good article, proves ruckman have little impact on the result of most games as quoted Martin winning hit outs 47-4 yet Lion's still got beaten by more than 30 points. This is a regular ocurrence at Freo with Sandilands there are no better readers of the Tap than Fyfe ,Mundy and Neale winning the ball but Freo have lingered at the bottom for years. Most teams concede the tap to Freo for that reason . Hit outs are not important to winning games, far from it.
Tom M
Guest
I disagree with your comment that Collingwood have gone small. Our best performing 22 for the year has included Grundy, Cox & Reid.
WCE
Roar Rookie
good article Ryan. I think what also has to be mentioned is the secondary work from a ruckman after the ruck knock. I will use big Nic as an example. Nic's ruck work has been supreme (on most occasions) and even to the point where he has a secondary tap of the ball to a clearance or the secondary tap is to himself and he either kicks the ball to advantage or grabs the ball and runs from the square himself. Being a mobile big ruckman like Nic or North Melbourne's Goldstein is very advantageous to your team.
dontknowmuchaboutfootball
Guest
Nah, I generally agree with you Ryan (just riffing on Rick's reference to "someone" talking about small ball). Having said that, saying that Freo has "gone small" is a bit of a misreading in that (1) Freo haven't really been "tall" since before 2013; (2) Freo had already moved (along with the rest of the competition) to a one-man ruck in 2017; and (3) the lack of a tall key forward this year is owing to injury (Taberner) and a general lack of KPFs on the list (see point 1). Freo were doing small ball well before Richmond, albeit with a focus on scoring from stoppages rather than the chaotic perpetual "in play" approach that Richmond have developed.
JamesH
Roar Guru
It's just the lack of mobility. Bellchambers smashed Kreuzer in the actual ruck contests (55 hitouts to 31); he just couldn't keep up with him. He's good against the bigger-bodied guys who also aren't particularly agile at ground level (e.g. Sam Jacobs, Ben McEvoy) but will struggle to match the likes of Kreuzer and Grundy around the ground. I'd actually like to see him slim down a bit, although I'm not sure how possible that is with his frame.