Given the raft of injuries across first grade I thought it best to collate it all together to see where we currently sit. Have sorted it into positions.
1. Iongi
2. Twidle
3. Russell (maybe back this week)
4. Samrani
5. Simonsson
6. Pezet
7. (Moses groin but still playing)
8. (Paulo carrying an injury but still playing)
9. (Smith carrying an injury but still playing)
10. Hopgood
11. Kautoga
12. Tuilagi
13. Doorey
14. Tuivaiti
15. (JAC ribs but still playing)
16. Ryan Matterson
17. Jake Tago
18. Richie Penisini
Replies
See it's why I've beaten the drum for how long about where they look for talent if you can't land it in your own backyard why as a club recruitment strategy aren't we looking wider.We've had bugger all outside back depth for at least I don't no 2,3,4 seasons yet here we are.
We recruit the Kelly's Opacic's Harpers of the world.
The 2 best centres in the club are Penisini and Russell but since we don't develop outside backs they get a free ride and aren't dropped even if they aren't developing and to be fair Russell has improved but the kick in the nuts here is he's off to Perth so what else do we have another journeyman in Kelly to replace him with seemingly nothing coming through the pipeline worth a damn.
The club loses Lomax let's him walk hey fair enough but what are you replacing him with Simonsson a middle of the road player replacing a SoO and international yet we are expected to improve an area of weakness with lesser talent.See someone has to explain it to me the thought process behind this move.
Melbourne lose Coates and Warbrick is off to the warriors sweet they are in for Lomax spend millions in court costs lose but don't muck around they end up lining an equivalent talent in Issako with goal kicking to boot see that's a strategy.
Penrith lose Critta Tago replaces him as they have Maclean stashed then proceed to drop Tago recruit Alamoti and Maclean at 19 looks like the second coming of GI.
To very different strategies from the best in class where we are god knows but I know for a fact we are far from best in anything.We need a coherent executed strategy right now it feels like we are the kid sitting in the corner with the dunce hat on.It's all there to see now it's upto whoever is responsible to come up with a better plan because this BS clown show they've got going on now is joke central and is only going to get exposed further with this injury predicament we are in.
I'm going to throw some data into the mix here.
Below are the most games lost and least games lost for each season (MGL = man games lost by injury) by NRL teams and their ending ladder position (for the last 8 years to give a good sample size):
So apart from the Tigers who were able to suck with no injuries, and the Roosters who were able to do well with a massive injury toll, conventional wisdom does say that a high injury toll will absolutely derail your season.
Interestingly, the Panthers have the least injury toll for half of those years showing that having low injuries isn't luck. You don't get lucky that often. The Storm, Broncos and Roosters are all up there in terms of regularly having very few injuries to deal with.
First Point: Injuries DO absolutely impact your sitting on the table (surprise surprise...)
Second Point: Inuries are not just "bad luck" - they appear to be also bad management. Otherwise we'd see an even spread of teams dealing with injuries over time. But we don't. This is NOT an even distribution...so a high injury count over time is not bad luck.
Here is the data JUST for the Eels (position on table and our Man Games Lost per season:
As you can see - we had a blip in 2018 where we were ravaged but otherwise we stayed well conditioned up to the grand final...and then it's been a massive upward trend since then. Bad results and high injuries.
Let's compare this with the Panthers:
Sustained success means keeping players on the park.
Does this Panthers chart look like luck to you?? So the next time you think that this season is happening TO us and we're out of control of our injuries...have a look at the data. Well managed teams have less injuries over time (we all have the odd bad season, that is bad luck, but not regularly over time).
If it happens regularly over time, that's more bad management than bad luck.
We have been trending up for 4 years now and it looks like the trend continues...
Injuries play apart but we can't exonerate the inadequate roster management of the head if football
Nice stats there on injuries and ladder positions, HOE. But I have some doubts about your claim regarding injuries, bad luck and management.
We all agree injuries will harm competitiveness. No argument.
But assuming injuries must be due to bad mgmt not luck is a correlation vs cause issue and an assumption about an even spread is not enough to establish bad mgmt over bad luck. Why? Well, first, we admit that ogically it makes sense to posit that bad management (by which I assume it is meant flaws in training & conditioning?) leads to injuries. Why? Because doing so satisfies the temporality condition of separating correlation from cause because bad mgmt (cause) precedes effect (injuries). So bad mgmt is a potential mechanism breeding an effevt. But bad luck also satisfies the temporality condition because bad luck (cause) precedes the effect (injuries) and is thus also a candidate mechanism. Assumptions about even spreads is unargued for in such a context.
My point here is to say that IF bad mgmt is the cause of this rash of injuries, I've yet to hear a good argument that elevates bad mgmt over bad luck.
Can the 'bad mgtm' explanation thus be improved? Importantly, IF that explanation can be improved, we have more movement toward prevention.
An example: what about Iongi, Hopgood, Simmonson or Apa injuries points to bad mgmt? They are bad luck. The likes of Russell, Tuilagi and Tuivati are also bad luck (Cat 2 HIA's). JAC and Matto are contact and concussion issues. Penisini, Samrani and Pezet are all lower limb injuries that are candidate conditioning issues? Moses and Kautoga are in same boat of potential conditioning issues?
Anyway, bad luck & bad mgmt are EACH potential mechanisms in a causal chain to injuries (formally equivalent). And the supposition about "even spread" separating the two out is not intuitively obvious, so if you have some other assumptions to add to that supposition can you add them so we can assess the two candidate mechanisms a bit more?
PS: note that lack of bad luck can easily be causally related to sustained higher ladder position!
Correlation vs causation, valid point.
So here's what the data says - it is not bad luck.
The assumption I made was that it is bad management. That's pure assumption, very valid point. That was all my leap.
But all of the data suggests that injuries over time (very important factor) are not happenstance and luck. If they were luck it would be statistically close to impossible to do what Penrith have done.
When you map all of the teams overtime you do see the data points of bad luck (Souths last year, the Bulldogs a few seasons ago). They stick out like sore thumbs. But none of them hold true over time - they are anomalies (one year and then back to the norm).
But over time there is something that teams like the Panthers, Storm, Broncos, Roosters do that we don't that gives them statistically less injuries over time.
The Eels, Tigers and a few other teams are on the other end. Consistently bad over time.
Is it purely bad management? I can't say with evidence, that's a guess.
But I can say for certain it's something and not luck. So we can control it and we are choosing not to. Heck maybe it's something in the water or some extra peptide juice...who knows.
The whole point of my argument is to say that we should not put this season down to bad luck because it fits a trend for us - this isn't happening to us, we are making this happen. The data is clear.
Captain, am I correct to assume that teams like Penrith, Storms, Broncos and Roosters seems to be not really much affected by their injuries since they have player replacements that can perform at almost the same level of their injured players?
That may be true too TolElts, but what the data shows is that they actually have less injuries. Their depth is absolutely better, but they also get injured less overall.
Hi Captain, first, my apologies for thinking HOE posted the stats and graphs. I literally blame my ageing eyes. Very sorry.
Second, as I am sure you know but worth saying anyway, my queries are aimed squarely at improving the argument about bad mgmt and not intended to mindlessly criticize.
Third, "statistically close to impossible" to do what Penrith have done (4 titles, 5 GFs)? If it WERE statistically impossible the probability would be zero, like rolling 7 on a dice of 6 sides numbered 1-6. But we should be really careful with inferences that deploy as premise that Panthers would be a very low probability outlier if their success hinged on miraculously avoiding bad luck. Why? Because lurking in that argument is the fallacy of false dichotomy. Basically, "it can't be luck (in avoiding injuries), so it must be great management". I suspect all the potential alternative explanations especially combinations of factors will kill "The Panthers Gambit" every time?
Fourth, "the data" don't speak, we speak for it. Every single time. For instance, let's assume that if we take 2000-2025 as data set, log ladder position each year and correlate it with "games lost per injury", we do in fact see a trend of more successful the team the less the injuries. At raw face value we have a correlation. We can then speak FOR the data and say good mgmt. But as noted, it could also be good luck.
Fifth, I do wonder about that data, say 2000-2025. We both know it would take quite a bit to tabulate, because of reporting of injuries etc. But let's take one of the outliers you identified. The Roosters 2021 coming 5th despite an injury profile teams before and after got spoons with that injury profile. That immediately suggests confounding factors, such as coverage for the injured or quality of those remaining etc.
Sixth, I agree with you it's unlikely to be JUST bad luck. But I can't see how it could ONLY be good management either. You all say that assuming good management is a "pure assumption", but I disagree there too because you're probably being unkind to yourself at that moment! As if "pure assumption" means guess uniformed by data. That's obviously not the case. Your graphs Eels vs Panthers show an obvious correlation between low injury rate and high ladder position. It's entirely reasonable to conclude "keeping players on the park" is positively associated with in-season success. But if we then wanted to disentangle management from luck, would we not then need to do things like a) try to separate injuries into contact/foul vs fatigue/athletic injuries, and b) map any changes in management and maybe track record of mgmt? With injuries we might end up with two lines, for instance, and with mgmt we may end up low vs high churn and good vs bad track record?
-
1
-
2
-
3
-
4
-
5
of 5 Next