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 rampant Hawks and why they are the best team in the competition, the obstacle facing the Lions, and a farcical Isaac Heeney robbery.
1. My eyes (and the numbers) say Hawthorn is clearly the best team in the AFL
Hawthorn has confused the footy world. Because the Hawks began the year with five straight losses, and up until last weekend hadn't won a final in nine years, their rise up the ladder in the back half of the year has been viewed as more a feel-good story than the improvement arc of a legitimate premiership hope.
But Sam Mitchell's side is every bit a serious flag threat. Not only that but there's very real arguments to be made it's the best team in the competition.
Since Round 5 this year, a sample size of almost six months, Hawthorn boasts a competition-best record of 15-4. Nine of those wins were by at least 37 points, one of those losses by a single point, and another by two points.
In that time, they rank No. 1 in the league for both points for and points against. Their scoring has come from all sources, too, with the Hawks the best team at generating points from clearance, third-best from turnover, third-best from defensive half, and fourth-best from kick-ins. No other side ranks top six in all of these categories. This might be what 'Hok Ball' truly is.
The Hawks also lead the way in the now much publicised post-clearance groundball differential. This metric, which was first noted on the ESPN Footy Podcast in May, is one that has always led to success. Nineteen of the 20 best performing teams in this area wound up playing finals that year, seven of them reached the Grand Final.
Hawthorn also has the best kicking efficiency in the league and the fewest turnovers of any finalist. They're getting contributions across the board with both the known quantities and budding youngsters delivering consistently. And, maybe most crucially, they don't appear to have a weakness.
If the Hawks justify their favouritism tag on Friday night against Port Adelaide, then it's a date with Sydney at the SCG for a spot in the Grand Final. And with all due respect to the other side of the draw, that potential preliminary final might just decide the 2024 premier.
2. Why the Lions are almost drawing dead to win this year's flag
You've got to give Brisbane's playing group and coaching staff credit. At 0-3, the season was quickly slipping away. At 2-5, many were asking how much more rope Chris Fagan had at his disposal. But since the beginning of May, the Lions have lost just three games, rocketing up the ladder to loom as one of the more dangerous teams in September. Or so it seems.
Unfortunately, there's one major problem for this Brisbane side; in order to make amends for last year's Grand Final heartbreak they would need to win three consecutive finals away from their Gabba fortress. It's an extremely tall order and something that just doesn't happen in footy.
Outside the two COVID interrupted years of 2020 and 2021, where hubs were used for finals and the majority of sides contesting them were from interstate, no team has won three finals away from home since the Crows in 1998, much less three of them in succession.
Under Fagan, the Lions are 1-3 in finals not played at the Gabba. In those games, they've been outscored by 95 points. Over the past six seasons, Brisbane is 60-12 (83.33%) in home games and 37-32-1 (53%) on the road. I'm happy to be proven wrong, but I just don't see a flag on the cards in 2024.
The reality is the Lions' premiership aspirations were flushed down the toilet after a one-point loss to Collingwood in Round 23, a game they led by 31 in the first quarter and by 18 at the 21-minute mark of the final term. That loss cost them top four and a potential home qualifying-preliminary final double to reach the Grand Final, the path they took 12 months earlier.
3. Isaac Heeney has been robbed of $50,000
On Saturday afternoon at the SCG, Sydney star Isaac Heeney took the best mark of 2024. He leapt onto the shoulders of Giants defender Jack Buckley and propelled himself high into the air, clunking the ball in both hands before crashing back down to the turf.
ISAAC HEENEY OH MY WORD 😱😱#AFLFinals #AFLSwansGiants pic.twitter.com/F4N2WLGUaz
— AFL (@AFL) September 7, 2024
Unfortunately, due to one of the AFL's more farcical award stipulations, Heeney's stunning effort is ineligible to actually win the mark of the year award. As presently constituted, the official mark and goal of the year can only come from a game during the home and away season. It's as ridiculous as it is contradictory to the name of the award.
Disqualifying finals -- the games we place more importance on and the ones that live on in our memories -- from both the goal and mark of the year honors is an inexplicable gaffe by the AFL. By nature of it being the goal and mark of the YEAR, it has to include the entire year of competition. There's absolutely no logical reason why it shouldn't and don't try and tell me it's because we'd need another awards night post the AFL Grand Final.
Aside from the mark of the year honour, Heeney has also been robbed of the $50,000 prize and two million Velocity frequent flyer points. This must be rectified immediately.
4. The year ended in disaster, but don't be so down on Carlton
60-0. SIXTY TO ZIP! That horrific start to Saturday evening's elimination final against Brisbane will haunt Carlton's players and the club's fans all off-season. It was dire. It was embarrassing. It was one of the worst halves of finals footy ever played.
And while the timing of my next statement may seem a tad odd, I urge you to bear with me. Don't sell your stock in the Blues for 2025.
Why am I remaining so bullish on Carlton's long-term prospects? We have proof of concept with this team that when healthy they are unequivocally one of the top four sides in the competition.
From Round 14 last year to Round 16 this year, the Blues were 22-6 and checking almost all of Champion Data's premiership standards. They ranked top two in the league for points, stoppage points scored, contested possession differential, and pressure. They were fifth-best for points against and clearance differential.
Injuries aren't an excuse, but they're a legitimate reason for a significant drop off in performance, and no side suffered more injury setbacks this year than the Blues. It inevitably catches up with you.
Is this side perfect? Far from it. Carlton has several glaring holes on its list that need to be addressed this off-season, one that will likely define the Michael Voss era. But with a few shrewd acquisitions, and a healthy list, you'd be crazy to not have them, at the very least, in the mix for the 2025 premiership.
5. Stop solely blaming coaches for their teams' finals failures
If the extent of your sports research and analysis ended on social media, you'd close your device believing Ken Hinkley, Luke Beveridge, and Michael Voss are all incapable of coaching AFL teams. Each of them took their turn copping a gigantic whack online after their side's finals stinker last weekend, and while they should, and do, accept some responsibility for the horror performances, it's the players who we need to shift the spotlight on for the majority of that blame.
I've argued for years coaches receive too much credit in successful periods and the reverse is also true, they're blamed too much when things aren't clicking. Like most things in life, the reality falls somewhere in the middle.
At the end of the day, it's the 23 players that run out on the day who have the ability to win or lose a final. To that end, the squads representing Port Adelaide, the Western Bulldogs, and Carlton each failed their task monumentally.
Is it really Hinkley's fault his side turned the ball over at a higher rate than in any other game this season? Was Luke Beveridge to blame for Marcus Bontempelli, someone widely viewed as the best player in the sport, tallying just nine touches to three-quarter time? And while Voss made some questionable selection calls, should he really be held totally responsible for his side's dismal lack of effort in the first half? No. No. And no.
If we're going to point figures, turn the attention to the players.
6. Stop obsessing over every Jack Ginnivan move
I'm going to keep this last one short and sweet. Footy media and the footy public need to take a deep breath and let Hawks forward Jack Ginnivan live his life.
The overreaction to this innocent Instagram message sent to former teammate Brodie Grundy is utterly insane.
Ginnivan has a presence on social media. Deal with it. It isn't manicured and curated. Instead, he's genuine, raw, and, if we're being honest, just a normal 21-year-old speaking freely. Do we really need to over-analyse and even criticize his every move?