Headlines....Girth just as important to the NRL as to women.

19/04/09 - From Trevor Gillmeister of the CourierMail - THERE's not many things in rugby league that give me a bee in my bonnet but one is the amount of kicking. That's why it's time for the NRL to consider reducing the points for tries scored from a bomb or a grubber kick….To me, if a team scores a try off a kick it should get three points, not four. The last resort for teams these days is to kick and hope. It's like a lottery. The ball goes up, the players go up for it and if you're a taller bloke, like an Israel Folau, then chances are your number will come up.

It seems like the annual resurfacing of this issue is as sure a thing as a special guest appearance from Andrew Johns on The Footy Show.

The fact is: kicking offenses retain parity throughout the league. They are a competitive stable and a reduction in their value would be detrimental to the league. Just think about this, both in a business sense and a cultural sense.

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From a business sense:

Gillmeister carves out the atypical purist argument—kick oriented offensive systems are diluting the game of fundamental skill.

In a broad sense that argument has some truth to it, however, it’s too simplistic. The traditional skill set – passing, catching, kicking, tackling, running – hasn’t deteriorated; it’s merely been re-defined and redistributed throughout the league.

A rise in kicking isn’t the reason complete skill sets are deteriorating, it’s the result of the deterioration; it’s an inevitable product of the game turning professional.

When the rugby league went professional, it turned into a business. And when businesses develop and grow they compartmentalize and specialize roles and operations within the organisation. That’s exactly what’s happened to the NRL.

Teams evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of their player personnel, and tailor a system to emphasizes those strengths and minimize any weaknesses. The more objectively a coaching staff can self-evaluate, the better understanding they will have of themselves and the better they will be able to accentuate their strengths. It’s the reason why Jamie Soward was on his way out of the league in 2008, and in 2009 he is having a career year.

Where once coaches and managers simply tried to put as many talented players on the field as possible, teams are now made up of 17 specifically skilled players who fill certain roles within a offensive and defensive system.

These strengths are matched weekly against the weaknesses of a team’s opposition. Whoever can execute the game-plan more efficiently (successfully exploit the other teams weaknesses) will win. Simply: it’s a scientific approach to the game.

It’s hard for every team to develop a Darren Lockyer or Andrew Johns but it’s not hard to sign a winger who is tall. Sure, there is a “lottery” element to a kick but ultimately there is a science to the process and result.

There is a lottery element to picking up women too, but if you can accentuate certain strengths to exploit a girl’s weaknesses (like Stifler’s pseudo cultured attitude he adopts in American Pie 3 when he is trying to sleep with Cadence), chance is wholly taken out of the equation.

Folau’s true value in the game is his size; the Broncos believe that his defensive liabilities (he is secretly a terrible defensive decision maker) are outweighed by his offensive advantages, especially in the air. This strength is accentuated by the kicking offense.

So, as professionalism has brought about this ideological evolution in the leagues approach to the game, teams who haven’t been able to sign or develop star players (especially when it comes to halves) have been forced to look for other ways to compete.

And this is where the recent prevalence of kicking has come from.

Look at the Raiders. They don’t have a lot of talent, they aren’t athletic, and they don’t have a lot of experience to lean on. When they played the Sharks in round 5 they were outmatched athletically.
But they could compete because they have a competent game manager in Campese, and they were more efficient in their execution of their game plan—exploit Cronulla’s size disadvantage on the fringes with kicks to their taller wingers in the corners.

In business success comes from a focus on your core competent advantage.

Similarly, the Sharks were outmatched against the Cowboys in round 6, but were able to compete more so then against the Raiders, because the Cowboys didn’t have the same size advantage. The Sharks focused on attacking the questionable outside defense of the Cowboys while the Cowboys exploited the inside channels the Sharks left open.

Kicking is just one of many matchup issues a team can create. It’s just going to be more prevalent because there are more teams without star halves then not.

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From a cultural sense:

It’s harder to go through and around teams anymore. The field hasn’t grown, but the players have.

As conditioning has become a more integral part of the game, player girth has become an issue. A premium is being put on stocky players because they can literally plug defensive holes across the field.

The same way the NBA values length in player evaluation, girth is important in the NRL. It’s the reason why players like Anthony Tupou, Feleti Mateo, Anthony Watmoug, Adam Blair, and Bronson Harrison have become highly sought after commodities with a premium being put on offloading. Teams are too wide and they drift too well.

Teams are forced to create second phase play or kick. In some cases it’s the only way through. There are only so many 2nd man plays a team can run.

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So as great as Gillmeister was, his argument is as outdated as Mark Geyer’s suits on the Sunday Roast. The rise of the kicking offense is a positive thing for rugby league. It allows more teams to compete, incorporates more athletes into the game, and provides a better spectacle for the fan. Skill will still be in the game, it’s just been redefined.