Each week of the 2024 AFL season, ESPN.com.au's Jake Michaels looks at six talking points.
This week's Six Points feature the premiership hungover Magpies (or so everyone will say), the finals-bound Suns, the unheralded Giant who will be All-Australian, and how the AFL has let its players down ... again.
1. Spare me this Collingwood premiership hangover nonsense
One game. That's all it's taken for many parts of football media to declare Collingwood is in the midst of a premiership hangover. I'm not buying it for a second.
Two things can be true. One, the Giants, who fell to these very Magpies by a solitary point in last year's preliminary final, are a seriously good side. In fact, ESPN's Jarryd Barca ranked their list as the best in the league heading into 2024, while Adam Kingsley is already on a shortlist for best coach in the sport.
It can also be true that Collingwood remains the rightful premiership favourite and team to beat. The list no worse than last year and they now not only have invaluable finals experience, but finals success.
This Opening Round game was always going to mean more for GWS. Primetime games, at home, don't come around too often for the Giants. There was the revenge factor (yes, it most certainly is real), while Mason Cox's comments and pre-game antics only added fuel to the fire.
I say all of that to say this: the 32-point win to the Giants wasn't totally surprising. What is surprising is the amount of concern and negativity centered around the Magpies in the aftermath. You'd think they lost the game by triple figures! The sentiment should be quite the opposite, really, given Champion Data's expected scores tell us Collingwood should have actually won the game 92-77.
That 47.5-point differential between actual and expected score is the sixth-largest on record and was made possible by GWS scoring an unheard of 29% better than expected, while the Magpies fared 7% worse than expected. This is a totally out-of-the-box game. Don't get carried away.
2. Gold Coast will play finals in 2024. Book it!
Yes, yes, we've heard this type of claim year after year, but this time -- I promise -- there's a lot more substance behind it.
This current Suns squad is, quite comfortably, the best the club has ever had, and under the guidance of perhaps the sport's top current coach in Damien Hardwick, there's real reason to believe 2024 will mark a maiden finals appearance.
"It does feel different. I feel like we're building something good. We've got a good environment and a good system with Dimma," Matt Rowell told ESPN, after starring in Opening Round against Richmond. "He's been really strong on the game plan he wants to implement. He's brought a really good energy. He loves to have fun but at the same time work hard. All of the boys have gotten around it."
It's still very much early in Gold Coast's season and there's not enough of a sample size to decipher what it is Hardwick is trying to do. With that said, it's evident he's not trying to replicate the style of play that made his Richmond teams so successful. Instead, he's leaning on the strength of the midfield.
Significant strides have been made all over the field but it's that young, talented midfield unit which can carry the club to success. Jarrod Witts, Rowell, Noah Anderson, and Touk Miller are all well established, but last year the emergence of Sam Flanders gave them some much needed depth. This year, the move to switch Brayden Fiorini to a wing looks to be paying early dividends.
"As a midfield, I'm not sure where we rank, but we've got some really good depth in there now," said Rowell. "Heaps of boys can go through there and we're really building something good there."
I'm calling it now. The Suns are playing finals in 2024.
3. Hey, AFL, stop pretending you care about the welfare of your players
I knew it wouldn't take long for the 'action vs. outcome' debate to pop up. I didn't expect it to take just two games!
I'm so sick of having this discussion and appalled the AFL continues to sit on its hands and refuse to make the necessary amendments we've all been crying out for.
George Hewett simply had to be suspended for striking Lachie Neale during Friday night's clash at the Gabba. Instead, Hewett's strike was classed as 'careless' (that's garbage), low impact (um, what!?) and high contact, meaning he only received a financial sanction. If that exact same action -- which is something the league has to want to stamp out -- causes a Neale concussion, Hewett is looking at a minimum of six weeks on the sidelines.
Is there anything in these moments?#AFLLionsBlues pic.twitter.com/pay6rx6pzM
— 7AFL (@7AFL) March 8, 2024
It cannot work like this. It's the action that must determine the penalty, not an outcome that can vary wildly from incident to incident, player to player.
Neale can also consider himself extremely fortunate to avoid suspension for his retaliation strike. Interestingly, his was classed as intentional contact but as it was low impact and to the body, he too received only a fine. So much for the league wanting to stamp out these non-football grubby acts.
4. Brent Daniels is every chance of making the All-Australian team
Every year there's a player who comes from the clouds and makes an unexpected yet totally legitimate case to be selected to the All-Australian team. This year, I'm tipping that player will be Brent Daniels. And while for many it will feel exactly that, unexpected, I'm here to tell you it really shouldn't be.
Since the beginning of 2022, Daniels is the fourth-highest rated general forward in the competition, behind only Dustin Martin, Toby Greene, and Dylan Moore. Among players in that position, he ranks third for score assists, fourth for score involvements, and fifth for forward half pressure acts, ticking both the offensive and defensive check boxes of an elite general forward.
FACT: Daniels is the only general forward in the competition to rank 'elite' for score assists, score involvements, forward half pressure acts, and disposals over the last two years.
Daniels' season got off to a flying start against the Magpies in Opening Round, booting four goals from his 22 disposals as well as amassing 500 metres gained. It's a stat line we saw just six times throughout the entirety of last season, and only three times by a small.
If he remains healthy, I'm tipping a 40-goal season for Daniels to go along with a per-game disposal number somewhere in the high teens. If he does that, and maintains the defensive aspect of his game, you cannot say he won't be in All-Australian discussions come season's end.
5. What on earth has happened to Tim Taranto?
At Richmond's bye round last year, Tim Taranto was the third favourite to win the Brownlow Medal and the unquestioned recruit of the season.
But since then, his production has fallen off a cliff. What's worse is that Opening Round gave no indication whatsoever he's close to turning things back around.
Taranto finished the game against the Suns with just 15 disposals, his lowest mark as a Tiger. His disposal efficiency was a lowly 53%, he gave away two free kicks and committed seven turnovers. Champion Data rated him the 35th-best player on the ground. Out of 46.
Taranto's drop off has been stark. The 26-year-old should be heading into his prime as a midfielder in the league, not going backwards at a rapid rate in just about every conceivable category. If he's unable to rediscover that early-2023 form, it could be a long season for the yellow and black army.
6. The downside to Carlton's simply stunning comeback
Carlton's come-from-behind win over Brisbane in Opening Round will take some beating for best win of the season, but it's one which doesn't bode well for this week's traditional Round 1 clash against Richmond.
Since 2019, there have been 39 instances of a team coming from at least 30 points down to win a game. Those teams are just 12-27 the following week, a win rate of just 31%. Last year, there were eight of these comebacks and none of them won the following week!
And while we're on the topic of 30-point comebacks, can we cool the jets on the 'no lead is safe' discourse. These comebacks actually don't happen as often as you might think. Over the last five years we average just one every five to six weeks, significantly down from 2013 when they were twice as frequent.