Overall we finished . . .

[SwallowdaFonz]

I know this trivial inquiry may seem out of place among the blood-letting and post mortems, but:

Can someone clarify how journos (and the AFL?) work out the "overall position" that a team finishes if it made the finals? This year we came 5th I think - 6th on H&A but we jump past Melbourne because we lasted an extra week of finals? But still above Essendon because of our superior H&A?

Last year we came "4th overall" but not 3rd because Port were above us after the end of the H&A. Is that right?

Is this question relevant to allocation of draft picks or is that purely based on H&A position (like the Coleman medal)?

[liz]

Draft picks are based on positions after finals, so in that respect it does matter.

You're correct in your assessment that we finished 5th this year, with our ranking over the Bombers being based on a higher H&A finish.

But last year I believe we were officially third. We jumped over Port after the first round of the finals because we were a winning QFinalist. At that point we were ranked second (behind Collingwood because they finished ahead of us in the H&A). However, when we lost to Brisbane in the PF they jumped above us.

At least, I think that's how it works...

[Bart]

Re: Overall we finished . . .

Originally posted by SwallowdaFonz
I know this trivial inquiry may seem out of place among the blood-letting and post mortems, but:

Can someone clarify how journos (and the AFL?) work out the "overall position" that a team finishes if it made the finals? This year we came 5th I think - 6th on H&A but we jump past Melbourne because we lasted an extra week of finals? But still above Essendon because of our superior H&A?

Last year we came "4th overall" but not 3rd because Port were above us after the end of the H&A. Is that right?

Is this question relevant to allocation of draft picks or is that purely based on H&A position (like the Coleman medal)?

Final ladder placings for the top 8 are based on the finals series, with the winner of the GF ranked 1 regardless of H&A finish. The two teams that exit in week one are ranked 7 and 8, with the highest ranked of those two after the H&A finishing 7th

Likewise in week 2, hence we finish 5th and Essendon 6th.

However the prelims is a bit different. Based on the week 1 matches of 1 v 4 and 2 v 3, the winners advance to the Prelim and are ranked 1 and 2 for the prelim (based on H&A season) so lat year Pies were ranked 1 and us 2 in the prelims. Therefore after losing in the prelim we finished higher than Port as we were ranked higher going into the prelim based on week 1.

This also affected our draft picks, as Port got to pick before us

[SwallowdaFonz]

Thanks Bart and Liz. So where does the AFL hide nuggets of information like this?

[Mike_B]

Originally posted by SwallowdaFonz
Thanks Bart and Liz. So where does the AFL hide nuggets of information like this?

Most sporting bodies with decent websites would have this information on their website. But seeing as afl.com.au is an extraordinarily crap resource as far as sporting websites go, I'd be betting against finding this info on there...

[SwallowdaFonz]

You're not wrong. I was away for 2 days last week so on Wednesday I went looking for the All-Australian team announcement. Couldn't find it anywhere on the AFL web site but eventually found it through the Age archives.