Re: Andrew johns on Cameron Smith : Sun Jul 05, 2020 1:11 pm  

True but those players are rare.

There are a lot of players who won't deliver value on the final contract of their career because they can negotiate a good wage off their reputation but are in decline. The decline kicks in at different times with different players and isn't always just to do with their professionalism: some great pros like Mike Gregory, Iestyn Harris, were in decline in their late 20s. Injuries, miles on the clock from playing lots of games early, also has to be factored in.

The decline curve is part of the "moneyball" data analysis which started off in baseball. In a stats-rich sport like baseball where they have so much data over so many years they've been able to model peak and decline curves and found that most players fit into a few general curves: early peakers, late bloomers, rapid decliners, evergreen stars. The moneyballers started to work out which path players were on and that kind of analysis can be great if you get it right. I remember one concept that came up when I was reading about this was that at the end of players' careers many have the 'cliff edge' which is where they have a rapid fall off from their season before and realise that physically they are past it. You don't want to be stuck with a player with a couple of years left on a contract when he's hit the cliff edge. With us, we saw the signs in Morley's last season, but then when he went to Salford he just wasn't the same, we timed that perfectly. Souths timed getting rid of Asotasi perfectly because he hit the cliff edge in his first year with us and we were stuck with a big contract.

That kind of analysis is getting big in football now but I'm not sure how much it is used in RL yet. Sam Allardyce at Bolton used it and picked up a lot of guys (notably Gary Speed) who other clubs assumed were past it but were at or close to their peak well in to their 30s. Also Liverpool getting rid of Torres to Chelsea was driven by data metrics as they'd picked up something like "percentage of runs of 8 yards or more where a player reaches speed X" which they saw was an early indicator of a striker losing effectiveness and saw Torres had plummeted in his last half season when Dalglish was there, so they looked to offload him at maximum value before his decline became apparent. They blew the money on Andy Carroll though who was never fit after that, which shows the analytics won't always get it right...

Re: Andrew johns on Cameron Smith : Sun Jul 05, 2020 1:43 pm  

sally cinnamon wrote: This comment is just a bit of harmless mickey-taking, Johns is also projecting about himself here though as I very much doubt Cameron Smith has ever smoked cigs...if he came to SL he'd be the model pro, a role model to his team mates and would be fantastic for the image of the sport as he's intelligent and humble with the media. You can see why the idea of tearing up the Poms with a cig in his mouth appeals to Johns though as he is more that kind of personality. I wouldn't hold this comment against Johns but over the years I've grown used to being disappointed by him. He was a fantastic player but he's a flawed person. The Inglis thing was what really put me off him. I can still respect him as a player and I'm glad Warrington signed him and we got to see him on the field in our jersey but sometimes you get a window in to what your heroes are really like and the sheen comes off. https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2010/ ... reg-inglis Aus is a bit like the US in some respects. It is relatively isolated geographically in terms of borders, and isn't close enough to other nations to get a bit of a culture mix like we are used to in Europe. Within the country itself there are lots of races / ethnicities etc but from my time there I don't recall seeing anywhere near as much inter-racial relationships or even social mixing when compared to Europe. I think the current generation of people Johns' age have probably grown up with casual racism, whereas for forty-somethings in the UK we've been reflecting on the issues a lot longer. Hopefully it will get stamped out, although the far-right does seem to be getting a bit of a hold again.

sally cinnamon wrote: This comment is just a bit of harmless mickey-taking, Johns is also projecting about himself here though as I very much doubt Cameron Smith has ever smoked cigs...if he came to SL he'd be the model pro, a role model to his team mates and would be fantastic for the image of the sport as he's intelligent and humble with the media. You can see why the idea of tearing up the Poms with a cig in his mouth appeals to Johns though as he is more that kind of personality. I wouldn't hold this comment against Johns but over the years I've grown used to being disappointed by him. He was a fantastic player but he's a flawed person. The Inglis thing was what really put me off him. I can still respect him as a player and I'm glad Warrington signed him and we got to see him on the field in our jersey but sometimes you get a window in to what your heroes are really like and the sheen comes off. https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2010/ ... reg-inglis Aus is a bit like the US in some respects. It is relatively isolated geographically in terms of borders, and isn't close enough to other nations to get a bit of a culture mix like we are used to in Europe. Within the country itself there are lots of races / ethnicities etc but from my time there I don't recall seeing anywhere near as much inter-racial relationships or even social mixing when compared to Europe. I think the current generation of people Johns' age have probably grown up with casual racism, whereas for forty-somethings in the UK we've been reflecting on the issues a lot longer. Hopefully it will get stamped out, although the far-right does seem to be getting a bit of a hold again.

Re: Andrew johns on Cameron Smith : Sun Jul 05, 2020 5:36 pm  

sally cinnamon wrote:

True but those players are rare.

There are a lot of players who won't deliver value on the final contract of their career because they can negotiate a good wage off their reputation but are in decline. The decline kicks in at different times with different players and isn't always just to do with their professionalism: some great pros like Mike Gregory, Iestyn Harris, were in decline in their late 20s. Injuries, miles on the clock from playing lots of games early, also has to be factored in.

The decline curve is part of the "moneyball" data analysis which started off in baseball. In a stats-rich sport like baseball where they have so much data over so many years they've been able to model peak and decline curves and found that most players fit into a few general curves: early peakers, late bloomers, rapid decliners, evergreen stars. The moneyballers started to work out which path players were on and that kind of analysis can be great if you get it right. I remember one concept that came up when I was reading about this was that at the end of players' careers many have the 'cliff edge' which is where they have a rapid fall off from their season before and realise that physically they are past it. You don't want to be stuck with a player with a couple of years left on a contract when he's hit the cliff edge. With us, we saw the signs in Morley's last season, but then when he went to Salford he just wasn't the same, we timed that perfectly. Souths timed getting rid of Asotasi perfectly because he hit the cliff edge in his first year with us and we were stuck with a big contract.

That kind of analysis is getting big in football now but I'm not sure how much it is used in RL yet. Sam Allardyce at Bolton used it and picked up a lot of guys (notably Gary Speed) who other clubs assumed were past it but were at or close to their peak well in to their 30s. Also Liverpool getting rid of Torres to Chelsea was driven by data metrics as they'd picked up something like "percentage of runs of 8 yards or more where a player reaches speed X" which they saw was an early indicator of a striker losing effectiveness and saw Torres had plummeted in his last half season when Dalglish was there, so they looked to offload him at maximum value before his decline became apparent. They blew the money on Andy Carroll though who was never fit after that, which shows the analytics won't always get it right...

That’s very good stuff. The data doesn’t lie

Re: Andrew johns on Cameron Smith : Sun Jul 05, 2020 11:03 pm  

easyWire wrote:

Aus is a bit like the US in some respects. It is relatively isolated geographically in terms of borders, and isn't close enough to other nations to get a bit of a culture mix like we are used to in Europe. Within the country itself there are lots of races / ethnicities etc but from my time there I don't recall seeing anywhere near as much inter-racial relationships or even social mixing when compared to Europe.

I think the current generation of people Johns' age have probably grown up with casual racism, whereas for forty-somethings in the UK we've been reflecting on the issues a lot longer.

Hopefully it will get stamped out, although the far-right does seem to be getting a bit of a hold again.

They’ve called us Poms and Limies for decades if not longer.

Re: Andrew johns on Cameron Smith : Mon Jul 06, 2020 1:09 pm  

I didn't know Andrew Johns was a racist. There must be something we can burn/take down to protest about that?

Re: Andrew johns on Cameron Smith : Mon Jul 06, 2020 1:58 pm  

The few times we've been to Perth ,there doesn't seem to be any ethnic barriers to socialising & the work ethic for immigrants seems to make them highly desired by the Government. It seems to be still a place of great opportunity for people with the right ideas & the nouse to get started & make money. A relative of ours lives & works over in Perth & although his actual job has changed over his 10 years there he manages to chase what work there is on a self employed basis. The main ethnicity issues seem to be to do with Aboriginals & where they fit into the attitudes of some dyed in the wool non-Abo Aussies.

Re: Andrew johns on Cameron Smith : Mon Jul 06, 2020 9:45 pm  

Johns is absolutely right. What’s the problem?

Re: Andrew johns on Cameron Smith : Mon Jul 06, 2020 9:47 pm  

Lord Tony Smith wrote:

Johns is absolutely right regarding Cam Smith. What’s the problem?