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The Enforcer - do they help win NRL games? Is an enforcer what the warriors need?
With the Warriors Soft bellied reaction to the Roosters manhandling and giving Shaun our star play maker a chicken wing leading him to be out for 2 matches plenty of discussion that we need an enforcer.
This analysis looks at the impact of having Enforcers in the team vs standings in the ladder.
Please read these Caveats first
This is an entertainment oriented analysis and not designed for an academic journal. The results are preliminary and based on only ten games this season. Any analysis should be taken tentatively until repeatability is established by variations of the study being repeated over multiple years with different parameters and assumptions.
Methodology
Firstly my credentials for this analysis is that I have been a numerical analyst for large companies. So I will try to present these findings with some appropriate cautions.
I had to define what an enforcer was. In the National Hockey League they use penalty minutes so I went with something similar here for this NRL analysis.
Table 1.0 Shows a list of players with greater than 5 penalties who are forwards (excluding hookers) who have been assessed more than 0.6 penalties per 80 minutes of game time.
Without surprise JWH is near the top of this list. There are faults with using this system in that some players who are just ill disciplined like Jackson Ford make the list but for the most part I was comfortable with this method as it was objective rather than me just naming enforcers by memory or impressions of watching them. I only used Forwards as backs aren’t ever enforcers in my history of watching. There were a lot of hookers on the list that I deleted. They must all be agitators but I don’t think they are big enough to be enforcers. There were some notable missing names of this list such as Haumole Olakau'atu bur overall I was happy with it and it was more comprehensive than using sin bin data which was my other option.
Here is Table 1.0 for you to peruse. Results from the 2024 season first 10 games
FINDINGS & ANALYSIS
Please review table 2.0 below
The following are hypotheses that the data suggests that need further testing to be valid, but as discussed earlier I will present them as tentative findings for entertainment purposes.
Please note small sample sizes
Well it presents data that is pretty sketchy given small sample sizes and lack of repeatability at this stage. But it seems to fly in the face of quotes that Jazz has made about how important an enforcer is to stop the team getting pillaged in the ruck. Instead the top 8 teams are no more likely to have enforcers than bottom 9 teams and in some threshold scenarios the top 8 teams appeared less likely to have enforcers.
I think it all means, if it is all true, which it may not be, due the vast number of noted limitations with this study, that getting tougher and getting an enforcer into the side isn’t going to help the Warriors. In fact, improving discipline and getting discipline might be more helpful.
Or given three of the top 8 teams took a team toughness approach with slightly lower penalties per minutes but multiple guys appearing on the list for that team, if the Warriors do want to be a tough team then team toughness seems to be more popular rather than putting into the hands of one enforcer.
Thoughts??? Comments??? Go easy on the study as there are admittedly plenty of problems with it !!!
With the Warriors Soft bellied reaction to the Roosters manhandling and giving Shaun our star play maker a chicken wing leading him to be out for 2 matches plenty of discussion that we need an enforcer.
This analysis looks at the impact of having Enforcers in the team vs standings in the ladder.
Please read these Caveats first
This is an entertainment oriented analysis and not designed for an academic journal. The results are preliminary and based on only ten games this season. Any analysis should be taken tentatively until repeatability is established by variations of the study being repeated over multiple years with different parameters and assumptions.
Methodology
Firstly my credentials for this analysis is that I have been a numerical analyst for large companies. So I will try to present these findings with some appropriate cautions.
I had to define what an enforcer was. In the National Hockey League they use penalty minutes so I went with something similar here for this NRL analysis.
Table 1.0 Shows a list of players with greater than 5 penalties who are forwards (excluding hookers) who have been assessed more than 0.6 penalties per 80 minutes of game time.
Without surprise JWH is near the top of this list. There are faults with using this system in that some players who are just ill disciplined like Jackson Ford make the list but for the most part I was comfortable with this method as it was objective rather than me just naming enforcers by memory or impressions of watching them. I only used Forwards as backs aren’t ever enforcers in my history of watching. There were a lot of hookers on the list that I deleted. They must all be agitators but I don’t think they are big enough to be enforcers. There were some notable missing names of this list such as Haumole Olakau'atu bur overall I was happy with it and it was more comprehensive than using sin bin data which was my other option.
Here is Table 1.0 for you to peruse. Results from the 2024 season first 10 games
| Name | Team | G | MIN | PEN | SB | Penatiles/80mins |
10J. Aloiai | MAN) | 9 | 379 | 7 | 1 | 1.477573 |
29S. Hughes | CBY) | 9 | 275 | 5 | 1 | 1.454545 |
2J. Hopgood | PAR) | 9 | 553 | 9 | 0 | 1.301989 |
29J. Waerea-Hargreaves | SYD) | 8 | 315 | 5 | 0 | 1.269841 |
29A. Seyfarth | WST) | 9 | 323 | 5 | 1 | 1.23839 |
18F. Molo | STI) | 9 | 394 | 6 | 1 | 1.218274 |
29B. Cartwright | PAR) | 5 | 360 | 5 | 0 | 1.111111 |
10C. McInnes | CRO) | 9 | 524 | 7 | 0 | 1.068702 |
10T. Loiero | MEL) | 9 | 525 | 7 | 0 | 1.066667 |
29G. Neame | NQL) | 10 | 384 | 5 | 0 | 1.041667 |
10J. Bateman | WST) | 8 | 559 | 7 | 0 | 1.001789 |
18A. Crichton | SYD) | 8 | 529 | 6 | 0 | 0.907372 |
7V. Kikau | CBY) | 9 | 706 | 8 | 0 | 0.906516 |
10R. Cotter | NQL) | 10 | 641 | 7 | 0 | 0.873635 |
7J. Ford | WAR) | 10 | 773 | 8 | 0 | 0.827943 |
29J. King | MEL) | 9 | 508 | 5 | 0 | 0.787402 |
29S. Blore | MEL) | 7 | 516 | 5 | 0 | 0.775194 |
29C. Murray | SOU) | 8 | 529 | 5 | 0 | 0.756144 |
29B. Nikora | CRO) | 7 | 543 | 5 | 1 | 0.736648 |
18D. Lucas | NEW) | 9 | 652 | 6 | 0 | 0.736196 |
18T. Wilton | CRO) | 9 | 710 | 6 | 0 | 0.676056 |
29V. Radley | SYD) | 8 | 598 | 5 | 1 | 0.668896 |
29J. Salmon | CBY) | 9 | 605 | 5 | 0 | 0.661157 |
29M. Barnett | WAR) | 10 | 621 | 5 | 0 | 0.644122 |
18P. Carrigan | BRI) | 10 | 750 | 6 | 0 | 0.64 |
18J. Nanai | NQL) | 10 | 769 | 6 | 0 | 0.624187 |
29N. Butcher | SYD) | 9 | 645 | 5 | 0 | 0.620155 |
29I. Papali'i | WST) | 9 | 666 | 5 | 0 | 0.600601 |
FINDINGS & ANALYSIS
Please review table 2.0 below
| NRL STANDINGS | Enforcers > 1.2 Penalties/80 mins | Enforcers >1.0 Penalties per 80 mins | Enforcers>0.6 Penalties per 80 minutes | |
1 | Sharks | 1 | 3 | |
2 | Panthers | |||
3 | Storm | 1 | 3 | |
4 | Dolphins | |||
5 | Roosters | 1 | 1 | 4 |
6 | Broncos | 1 | ||
7 | Raiders | |||
8 | Sea Eagles | 1 | 1 | 1 |
9 | Bulldogs | 1 | 1 | 3 |
10 | Knights | 1 | ||
11 | Dragons | 1 | 1 | 1 |
12 | Cowboys | 1 | 4 | |
13 | Eels | 1 | 2 | 2 |
14 | Warriors | 2 | ||
15 | Wests | 1 | 2 | 3 |
16 | Titans | |||
17 | Rabbitohs | 1 | ||
Count Top 8 teams | 2 | 4 | 5 | |
Count Bottom 9 teams | 4 | 5 | 8 |
The following are hypotheses that the data suggests that need further testing to be valid, but as discussed earlier I will present them as tentative findings for entertainment purposes.
Please note small sample sizes
- The top 8 teams did not have more enforcers than the bottom 9 teams. In fact where the threshold was >1.2 and >0.6 the top 8 teams had less enforcers.
- Of the top 8 teams the three teams with the most enforcers >0.6 threshold were the Storm, Roosters, and Sharks while the Panthers, Dolphins and Raiders appear to follow a different strategy and not have any enforcers (using the definition of enforcers I used for this study).
- The four teams who did not use any enforcers under all scenarios were, The Panthers ranked 2nd, The Dolphins ranked 4th, The Raiders ranked 7th, the Titans ranked 16th. The coaches of those teams are all arguably elite coaches: Ivan Cleary, Wayne Bennett, Ricky Stuart, Des Hasler.
- Where the threshold was set at greater than 1.2 penalties per 80 minutes only JWH Roosters and Josh Aloiai Manly showed up as enforcers for the top 8 teams. Other teams like the Storm and Sharks instead used a team approach to enforcement. Rather than having one player with a large amount of penalty minutes they had several players with a lower but still significant amount of penalty minutes. Team toughness and team enforcement rather than one guy riding shot gun.
- The Warriors had two players who made the grade as enforcers under the lightest threshold at 0.6 penalties per 80 minutes but none of our players exceeded 1.0 or 1,2 penalties per 80 minutes. The Warriors seemed to be neither really using enforcement or making a point of not using it like the four mentioned teams earlier in Point 3 above.
Well it presents data that is pretty sketchy given small sample sizes and lack of repeatability at this stage. But it seems to fly in the face of quotes that Jazz has made about how important an enforcer is to stop the team getting pillaged in the ruck. Instead the top 8 teams are no more likely to have enforcers than bottom 9 teams and in some threshold scenarios the top 8 teams appeared less likely to have enforcers.
I think it all means, if it is all true, which it may not be, due the vast number of noted limitations with this study, that getting tougher and getting an enforcer into the side isn’t going to help the Warriors. In fact, improving discipline and getting discipline might be more helpful.
Or given three of the top 8 teams took a team toughness approach with slightly lower penalties per minutes but multiple guys appearing on the list for that team, if the Warriors do want to be a tough team then team toughness seems to be more popular rather than putting into the hands of one enforcer.
Thoughts??? Comments??? Go easy on the study as there are admittedly plenty of problems with it !!!
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