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The comprehensive end-of-year review: North Melbourne Kangaroos

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Roar Guru
12th November, 2018
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This is the twelfth of nineteen articles looking at the meta-results for both team and players, as collected from ELO-Following Football’s wide range of sources.

Today, the North Melbourne Kangaroos.

Back in 2017
The team finished 15th with a home-and-away record of 6-16 and a percentage of 88 per cent, a final-round victory over Brisbane preventing them from getting their first wooden spoon since 1972.

They’d released all their veteran talent (including AFL total-games leader Brent Harvey) and struck out for the future. Like most such journeys, the first steps were rather difficult, as everyone had been predicted.

The expectations for the team…
Were equally low. It seemed unlikely that the Roos would out-Brisbane Brisbane this year, but that’s what they did.

Before the season, only Gold Coast was a longer-shot at the premiership, and they were not-coincidentally tied with the Lions in most odds-makers’ minds. By the narrowest of margins in our survey of more than fifty sources, they were expected to again avoid the spoon, with the Suns very slightly outvoted for that prize.

Coming into the season, the players who were considered to be in the top 50 in the league by the AFLPA and-or The Roar – and we use the word “considered” loosely, as neither was even a unanimous top fifty choice by the two polls – were Ben Brown and Shaun Higgins. A very pessimistic view of a team that wasn’t expected to play a significant role in AFL 2018.

In 2018, the team finished…
Surprisingly well. They lost game one in a monsoon on a grassy swimming pool up in Cairns, to a Gold Coast team eager to prove something to their new coach. Had that game gone their way, they might still have been behind Geelong for eighth on percentage, but it’s fun to dream, isn’t it?

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As it was, they finished in ninth position, 12-10 for the season, with 109 per cent to edge Port, Essendon, and Adelaide for position in the twelve-win tie for 9th through 12th places.

It’s been… over two years since The Purge, and it seems that all is forgiven as the current Kangaroo Krowd is too busy celebrating Ben Brown’s near Coleman Medal to remember to be upset about the way the team treated Harvey, del Santo, et al.

It’s been three seasons since they hung on for eighth place, fading from the ladder lead mid-season to cling to a 12-10 record that got them skewered by the Crows in the 2016 EF.

It’s been 12 seasons since they’ve been where they want to be: in the double chance territory of the top four, last seen by NMK in 2007.

It’s been 20 years since their last title, in 1999. Can this roster get back to the mountain top?

Jack Ziebell

Jack Ziebell of the Kangaroos leads his team onto the field. (Photo by Quinn Rooney/Getty Images)

According to our patented “ELO-Following Football” rating system…
Needless to say, North started way south on the ELO ladder, at 37.5 and in 15th place. They reached their peak at 63.4 and sixth place at midseason, R11. They ended the season just above 50, the first of the bottom section in 11th place.

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The other rating systems…
Were all shaped exactly the same, and precisely the opposite of GWS – a mountain peaking mid-season. They ended every list at the tail end of the lead pack, either 11th or 12th with Port Adelaide.

Across the spectrum: game-by-game expectations
*Final record) 12-10.
*Betting Line expectations) 8-13-1, with a percentage just under 100%.
*ELO-Following Football forecasts) 10-11-1, with a percentage just over 100%.
*AFL.com.au game predictions) 10-12, with a percentage right at 100%.
*The Roar predictions) Our staff saw them at 9.5 – 12.5; the individual votes tallied to 55-66.
*”Pick-A-Winner” predictions) The only marker above five hundred, at 11.5 – 10.5.
*The Age forecasters) They also went 9.5 – 12.5, and their twelve pickers said 118-134.
*BetEasy “CrowdBet” percentages) …were more pessimistic, at 8-14, with a win percentage total of 935% and a loss percentage totalling 1265%.
(My own game-by-game predictions had them at 10-12.)

What was their best game of the season?
I’m going to give the reader two possibilities – choose your fave: their R4 demolition of Carlton in Tasmania (yes, it was only Carlton, but I mean, it was 116 to 30, you know?), in Ben Brown’s “coming out party”, or their hugely surprising upset over Sydney in R7 (back when we still thought visitors winning at the SCG was unusual!), 68-66, in Mason Wood’s one remarkable game of the year.

Which game would they most like to erase from memory?
R1’s debacle in Cairns, frankly, should never have been played in those conditions, and with a win there they might have had a better chance to sneak into finals. But the game probably did Gold Coast’s fragile egos more good than it harmed the Kangaroos, who had more than their share of good experiences this winter, so let it be.

Instead, let’s go with their R21 upset loss to the Bulldogs, the one that for all intents and purposes ended their quixotic quest for a finals berth by knocking them both a full game and percentage out of the eight with just two games to go; the next week’s loss at Adelaide Oval sealed it. As a runner-up, having their seventeen-game winning streak over the Demons snapped so definitively in R3 (by 37 points) can’t have felt good.

Ben Brown

Ben Brown of the Kangaroos celebrates kicking a goal. (Photo by Quinn Rooney/Getty Images)

If we were to speak of the club in as many words as they had wins in 2018: “If they still had Boomer, would that have gotten them into finals?”

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Meta-Player Of The Year Results
Over the course of the season, we gathered game-by-game naming of the outstanding players of the game or the week from fourteen different sources. These range from “Team of the Week” listings to more Brownlow-like top player of the game scenarios. Our tallies are from external sources, while the team’s “Best and Fairest” was selected by the team’s coaches, so they never quite match up. But it’s still an interesting comparison.

Regarding “Dominant”, “Prominent”, and “Notable” performances, those terms indicate games where 90%, 80%, or 70% of those fourteen sources recognised the player as outstanding in that week’s game. (This is the most “Brownlow-ish” we can get during the year!)

1. Shaun Higgins – 326 points (13th overall)
Best and Fairest finish: Shaun won his second Arden Street Best and Fairest this season, as well as copping 15 Brownlow votes to lead that tally for the Kangaroos this season.

Last year’s meta-PotY finish: Third place (59th overall).

Dom/Prom/Notable games: Two dominant games (R11 and R14), three prominent games (R4, R7, and R12), and one notable game (R23).

All-Australian interchange midfielder.

2. Ben Cunnington – 258 points (30th overall)
Best and Fairest finish: Second here too, and also second in Brownlow votes with eleven.

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Last year’s meta-PotY finish: Second (39th overall); in 2016 he was 7th on the team.

Dom/Prom/Notable games: Two dominant games (R5 and R8), two prominent games (R14 and R19), and two notable games (R11 and R23)! Had enough “twos” yet, Ben? (How did he NOT get recognized in R2? Or R22?)

3. Ben Brown – 252 points (33rd overall)
Best and Fairest finish: Fourth. He received six Brownlow votes, equal fifth on the team.

Last year’s meta-PotY finish: First on the team, but only 34th overall…so, did he improve this year or not? (He was 13th on the team in 2016.)

Dom/Prom/Notable games: One dominant game (R4) and three prominent games (in R2, R9, and R14). He also led the Coleman Medal race for much of the season, before running out of goals towards the last few games.

All-Australian 40-man roster.

4. Jack Ziebell – 146 points (76th overall)
Best and Fairest finish: Equal fifth. He was also equal third on the club in Brownlow votes with seven.

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Jack Ziebell North Melbourne Kangaroos AFL 2017 tall

Jack Ziebell of the Kangaroos celebrates on the final siren. (Photo by Adam Trafford/AFL Media/Getty Images)

Last year’s meta-PotY finish: Fifth (107th overall).

Dom/Prom/Notable games: One dominant game (in R17) and one prominent game (in R20).

5. Jarrad Waite – 142 points (78th overall)
Best and Fairest finish: The retiring Waite was named Clubman of the year.

Last year’s meta-PotY finish: Sixth (128th overall), and fourth in 2016.

Dom/Prom/Notable games: Two dominant games (in R2 and R9) – when he still had it, he really had it!

6. Todd Goldstein – 120 points (92nd overall)
Best and Fairest finish: Seventh. Goldy was also equal fifth in Brownlow votes, with six.

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Last year’s meta-PotY finish: Seventh (161st overall), but first in 2016 (and 27th overall).

Dom/Prom/Notable games: Sadly, none. The undisputed top ruckman in the world a few years back has been surpassed by several young ruck-bucks, most notably Gawn and Grundy. His improved placement from last season is a promising sign, however.

7. Trent Dumont – 107 points (106th overall)
Best and Fairest finish: Equal fifth.

Last year’s meta-PotY finish: 11th.

Dom/Prom/Notable games: One dominant (R23) and one notable game (R19).

8. Scott Thompson – 102 points (114th overall)
Best and Fairest finish: 9th.

Last year’s meta-PotY finish: Eighth (192nd overall).

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Dom/Prom/Notable games: One dominant game (R16).

9. Majak Daw – 98 points (118th overall)
Best and Fairest finish: Not in top ten. But he’s long been one of our personal favourites at Following Football, and he added to his allure with his unselfish switch to defense, where he’s started to dominate occasionally.

Last year’s meta-PotY finish: 27th.

Dom/Prom/Notable games: One prominent game (R19), one notable game (R20), and one “we think this is cool but we’re trying really hard not to sound racist about it” game covering Sydney’s Aliir Aliir in R17. (Seriously, the coverage of that matchup was ultra-awkward…)

10. Ben Jacobs – 88 points (142nd overall)
Best and Fairest finish: not in top ten

Last year’s meta-PotY finish: 35th.

Dom/Prom/Notable games: One prominent game (R10).

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[The Kangaroos had six top 100 players and 11 top 200 players in the 2018 ELO-FF meta-rankings. Averages would be 5½ and 11, respectively.]

Honorable mentions
Paul Ahern – 14th place (55 points) – One prominent game (R19); was named club rookie of the year.

Jamie McMillan – equal 12th place (62 points) – Tenth in Best & Fairest voting.

Luke McDonald – 16th place (53 points) – One notable game, in R11.

Robbie Tarrant – 11th place (84 points) – Third place in Best and Fairest voting; had one prominent game (in R5) and one notable game (in R16).

Mason Wood – equal 12th place (62 points) – One (very) dominant game, in R7.

Cameron Zurhaar – 28th place (7 points) – the only man besides Dayne Zorko that could keep Jack Ziebell from being the last alphabetical player on the roster of an AFL team this year.

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Player movement during the trade period
IN) Aaron Hall (from GC), Jasper Pittard (from PA), Jared Polec (from PA), Dom Tyson (from ME).
GONE) Ryan Clarke and Braydon Preuss.

Current list of draft picks) #42, 47, 48, 49 (three picks in a row!), 55, 58, 86. “The third round is sponsored by the Tasmanian Kangaroos…”

2019 Roster Highlights
Defencemen: Majak Daw, Aaron Hall, Luke McDonald, Ben McKay, Jamie McMillan, Jaspar Pittard, Robbie Tarrant, Scott Thompson, Ed Vickers-Willis, Marley Williams, Sam Wright.
Midfielders: Paul Ahern, Ben Cunnington, Luke Davies-Uniacke, Trent Dumont, Shaun Higgins, Ben Jacobs, Jared Polec, Dom Tyson, Will Walker.
In the Ruck: Todd Goldstein.
Forwards: Jed Anderson, Shaun Atley, Ben Brown, Taylor Garner, Jy Simpkin, Kayne Turner, Mason Wood, Jack Ziebell, Cameron Zurhaar.

Forecast for the 2019 North Melbourne Kangaroos
Historically, when a team makes an unexpected leap like the ‘Roos did this season, with a young team, the next season is one of consolidating that position: not only does their schedule get harder, and they’re no longer sneaking up on the field, but internally, they tend to suffer from a case of “are we really as good as we showed last year?”

And the target becomes one of maintaining position, rather than moving farther up the ladder. But North Melbourne is for real.

We see the Kangaroos staying in this bracket, the 9th – 12th place range, and then moving into finals in 2020. We have them ending up in 10th place next season, atop a tight pack with GWS, Fremantle, and Geelong just out of range of finals.

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