The luck ladder: AFL teams that’ll rise in 2022... because they were robbed last yearMax Laughton
Fox Sports
February 5th, 2022The fact is, the ladder is never a perfect reflection of team ability, because wins and losses can lie to you - especially when a team plays a lot of close games.
Close games can be decided by one moment, one whistle or one accident. It’s been proven time and again, across multiple sports, that there’s no rhyme or reason to teams performing well in them. Great teams don’t “know how to win the close ones” - that’s a myth.
In reality if a team does well in close games one year, it’s almost certain to regress to the mean and perform worse the next - and vice versa for those that struggle and then improve.
We'll give you one example: Geelong in 2014, who finished 17-5 with a percentage of just 113.8%. That was driven by a ridiculous 7-0 record in games decided by two goals or less.
What happened the next year? The Cats couldn’t rely on being ‘clutch’ - they instead missed the finals, because winning so many close games oversold how good they were in 2014.
So to determine who was lucky and unlucky in 2021, we’ve analysed all games decided by 12 points or less, to see what it can tell us about season 2022.
THE LUCK LADDERRecords in games decided by 2 goals or fewer, 2021 home and away seasonPort Adelaide: 5-0
North Melbourne: 3-0
Carlton: 2-0
Fremantle: 4-1
Melbourne: 4-2
Sydney Swans: 4-2
Hawthorn: 3-2
Geelong Cats: 4-3
GWS Giants: 3-3
St Kilda: 3-3
Western Bulldogs: 2-2
Adelaide Crows: 4-5
West Coast Eagles: 2-3
Brisbane Lions: 1-2
Gold Coast Suns: 2-5
Richmond: 1-4
Collingwood: 1-5
Essendon: 1-5
WHO WAS UNLUCKY?Finally Richmond had plenty of bad luck, especially outside of Victoria, where they lost away to Port Adelaide (2 pts), West Coast (4 pts) and Fremantle (4 pts). Flip just two of those losses into wins and the Tigers would’ve played finals.
They split close games against the most recent expansion sides at another distant away venue, Marvel Stadium, beating GWS (4 pts) while falling to Gold Coast (10 pts).
WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN?Just because a team has a poor record in close games one year doesn’t mean they’ll have a great record the next year - that’s the gambler’s fallacy, that because black has showed up a bunch of times, red has to be next.
But a majority of the time teams at the extremes - the luckiest and unluckiest - will revert to average the next year.
That means if Port Adelaide plays five close games in 2022, we would expect them to go 3-2 or 2-3 instead of 5-0; that’s a few extra losses on their record.
And it means if Collingwood plays six close games in 2022, we would expect them to go 3-3 instead of 1-5; that’s two extra wins right there.
These teams’ luck should change. So if the Power and Dockers slip a bit, while the Tigers, Magpies and Bombers rise, don’t be surprised if results in close games are partially behind it.
https://www.foxsports.com.au/afl/afl-2022-preview-analysis-luckiest-and-unluckiest-teams-in-2021-close-game-results-risers-and-fallers-in-2022-news/news-story/b481381f9ad39b9f6cdb6f7ee14cff05
