The interesting thing about Ratts v Richo

[B.M]

Did AR recruit Paddy?

Look I thought Richo had a reasonable list in 2016-17 (best players a bit old though) and we won 23 out of 44

Not sure we were ever contending in his reign

6 years?
His bottom out occurred in compromised drafts and our recruiting staff made a huge error which set us back 5 years.

Was he a good coach?

Maybe not, I don’t know?

Is Ratten a good coach?

Not sure either?

We have a much superior list now I can tell you that much

[Yorkeys]

Any coach who fields such an unmotivated team as we saw last week, is not much good

Is this the first time Ratts has actually been under tenure pressure?
Be interesting how he and the Board react and how the players perform knowing coach is under pressure (if he is, the extension may already be a done deal). Luck is not being kind to him/us and if there was some mutual commitment between team and coach this time last year it seems to have expired.

As Saints TV guys say, the vibe is unsettling after early promise.

I'll be watching to see how we play without Hill and if Howard can recover form. I know Max will nearly take a lot of marks.

Jones is a worry, and the commitment to certain out of form players has shades of Richo about it.

[samoht]

You can't compare the 2 coaches ...I agree with BM, we have a much stronger list now, with much better depth.
We were ravaged by injuries in one year under AR, and we didn't have anywhere near the depth that we do now.

AR's 23/44 W/L was probably a good return considering all this.

It's our recruiters that are the real culprits - missing out on draft picks - if we are looking for who to blame.

[meher baba]

You can't compare the 2 coaches ...I agree with BM, we have a much stronger list now, with much better depth.
We were ravaged by injuries in one year under AR, and we didn't have anywhere near the depth that we do now.

AR's 23/44 W/L was probably a good return considering all this.

It's our recruiters that are the real culprits - missing out on draft picks - if we are looking for who to blame.

Totally. Richo was a perfectly competent coach as far as I can see: it's not like he had a uniquely bad game plan or consistently selected players in the wrong position. He was never given the quality of players he needed to produce results. Coaches can make players work better together but they can't make individual players more skilled.

[shanegrambeau]

You can't compare the 2 coaches ...I agree with BM, we have a much stronger list now, with much better depth.
We were ravaged by injuries in one year under AR, and we didn't have anywhere near the depth that we do now.

AR's 23/44 W/L was probably a good return considering all this.

It's our recruiters that are the real culprits - missing out on draft picks - if we are looking for who to blame.

Totally. Richo was a perfectly competent coach as far as I can see: it's not like he had a uniquely bad game plan or consistently selected players in the wrong position. He was never given the quality of players he needed to produce results. Coaches can make players work better together but they can't make individual players more skilled.

I’ve said history will be kinder to Richo…

2014 4 wins
2015 6.5 wins
2016 12 wins
2017 11 wins
2018 4 wins
2019 sacked, but Saints were 4-1 after Round 5


You would say that the 2014 was better than the ‘15, ‘16 and ‘17 teams? And yet the Saints did better. (And at Seaford) So that is evidence of Ricoh’s effectiveness, no?

Mid 2017 was the apex, half time vs Richmond.
Then the wheels surely fell off.
Damn, I would like to know what happened there.

But I’d add, did Hawthorn, ever under Clarko, show up like last Friday?

[Saintmike65]

Ratten still has time to turn his tenure into something - if he throws away his match day plans and and starts coaching with a feel for the game.

It seems apart from a couple of player's our team player magnets are super glued to the board and deemed never to change? No matter what phase of the game things are in, he refuses to mix things up.

Agree 100%…if Ratts is to continue, we must shake up the assistant coaching set up.
Ratten is a terrific people manager but seems weak tactically, so we need to fill that void..retaining Enright and bring in new midfield coach & forwards coach.

[skeptic]

Did AR recruit Paddy?

Look I thought Richo had a reasonable list in 2016-17 (best players a bit old though) and we won 23 out of 44

Not sure we were ever contending in his reign

6 years?
His bottom out occurred in compromised drafts and our recruiting staff made a huge error which set us back 5 years.

Was he a good coach?

Maybe not, I don’t know?

Is Ratten a good coach?

Not sure either?

We have a much superior list now I can tell you that much

You can make an argument that he didn’t have the list… I can accept that but he also had 6 to get it and didn’t. That’s on him.
Compromised drafts, he should have traded smart. Can’t attract players… that’s on him.

Regardless of the list…
The indicator that he was bad coach lies in a number of his consistently flawed principles, persevering with players that were performing at a subpar level and just all round atrocious strategy/approach to game play.

Quality of the list doesn’t the fact that he persevered with a strategy of Longer as the primary ruck, Bruce relieving and midfielders pinch hitting around the ground. Completely messed Hickey about who blossomed in Sydney.
Failed to get the best out of him though he was clearly a player.

On McCartin… I believe with a high degree of certainty that Richo wasn’t involved in that decision. Am more than happy to sink the boots into AR who IMO is our worst coach of the modern era but he gets a pass on that one

[realdeal]

Ratts has a once in a generation forward and cannot get a good return from that.

Ratts has a better, not good, but better, mid field. Ratts has a better defence.

Ratts is a better coach but is struggling to get us into the finals and in the end what does some marginal difference between failed coaches mean.

I thought Richo did his coaching by rote and had no imagination or instinct or innate understanding of how best to deploy his players. I am starting to wonder about Ratts. Wondering if his commitment to the current first choice 22 as a group is stopping him from making needed changes and not acknowledging the blindingly obvious. Also possibly too many cooks involved in the "coaching".
The effort against Sydney will be defining. As will the team performance in the coming month.
I desperately want Ratts to succeed, hope he can pull the right levers, press the right buttons for Saturday.

Cant argue with this. I like Ratt's however there are certainly some growing concerns... fwd structure, our inability to play attacking free flowing footy for longer than 15mins a game and team selections being the most glaring.

Win tonight and we're right back in the season, play anything like last week and we have big issues.

[Sanctorum]

On McCartin… I believe with a high degree of certainty that Richo wasn’t involved in that decision. Am more than happy to sink the boots into AR who IMO is our worst coach of the modern era but he gets a pass on that one

McCartin at pick 1 was very much a collective decision by the coaches and management (Ameet Bains was COO) at the time and was based on the belief that the club needed to select a replacement for Nick Riewoldt when he retired as there was no one else on the list.

On the perennial question whether or not Brett Ratten is a better coach than Alan Richardson that is an unfinished story because the team is still in contention to make finals this year. Lose the 8 point game v Sydney tonight and the pressure will be very much on Ratten gaining an extension for 2023 and beyond because it will be nigh impossible to win another 5 games from the last 8 matches, especially on current form.

My view on Ratten's performance in the past two years is that I am not sure if he has been much of an improvement on Richo. The feeble loss to the Bombers last week and being clearly outclassed against the Lions before that suggest to me that the players are no longer a well-drilled cohesive unit, which in my mind rests on the shoulders of Ratten and his assistants. Likewise, Ratten has to answer for the mystifying team selections since the bye especially going against the accepted trend to play a third tall forward, failing to give the support needed for Max King - maybe with Sharman playing tonight it will be a different story....

If it's true that competitive sport is 90% above the shoulders, how come the coaches failed to remedy the highly emotional reaction in many of the players' heads prior to the Spud game - even Blind Freddy should have known that this would be a major distraction.

As I pointed out in another post, the failure to get Bradley Hill back to somewhere near his best, the timid performance of Max King who should be making a much harder effort to lead at times when the ball is heading into St Kilda's attack - surely he is more than capable of doing exactly that!

like others I don't dislike Brett Ratten, I certainly hope the team rewards his efforts and win for him tonight. But he needs a lot more runs on the board if he is going to be senior coach for the Saints beyond 2022 and surpass Richo in the annals of the clubs failed coaches.

[realdeal]

Richo's first couple of years were, dare i say, positive.

He had a solid if unspectacular list and he was going ok. I recall that bad goal kicking cost us a few games and wasn't there a year where our highest losing margin was only 25 odd points?

Then our lack of quality talent coming through really hurt, it was Steven or bust.

High draft picks not working, GOP got worked out and then it dropped away. Writing was on the wall 12 months before he got the sack. It was the right decision.

Some similarities are starting to arise between the two, lets hope Ratten identifies this and changes before its too late.

[seano1]

As 42 said, I'm more worried about the list than I am the coach. As always the list makes or breaks a coach and my view about this list is it is similar to the list Brad Scott had with Notth, an eternal middling list that peaked as high as the preliminary final stage when lady luck was around and bottomed out when she left building.

We could have a coach that is a genetic mutation of Clarko, Sheeedy, Malthouse, Mathews and Norm Smith and we would still be a middle of the road club.

A critical mass of AFL grade players is what wins flags, the coaches biggest contribution is speaking in cliche's at press conferences.

We are about 6 to 8 AFL grade players short of a flag.

Spot on …….this current team will not win a gf no matter who the coach is , we are short sighted in recruitment for quite a few years. Too focused on King being the saviour when we can’t deliver the ball to him and probably look to him too often and other forwards don’t spread out . I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he doesn’t get seriously injured soon with all in sundry jumping into him .

[SydneySainter]

You can't compare the 2 coaches ...I agree with BM, we have a much stronger list now, with much better depth.
We were ravaged by injuries in one year under AR, and we didn't have anywhere near the depth that we do now.

AR's 23/44 W/L was probably a good return considering all this.

It's our recruiters that are the real culprits - missing out on draft picks - if we are looking for who to blame.

Totally. Richo was a perfectly competent coach as far as I can see: it's not like he had a uniquely bad game plan or consistently selected players in the wrong position. He was never given the quality of players he needed to produce results. Coaches can make players work better together but they can't make individual players more skilled.

I’ve said history will be kinder to Richo…

2014 4 wins
2015 6.5 wins
2016 12 wins
2017 11 wins
2018 4 wins
2019 sacked, but Saints were 4-1 after Round 5


You would say that the 2014 was better than the ‘15, ‘16 and ‘17 teams? And yet the Saints did better. (And at Seaford) So that is evidence of Ricoh’s effectiveness, no?

Mid 2017 was the apex, half time vs Richmond.
Then the wheels surely fell off.
Damn, I would like to know what happened there.

But I’d add, did Hawthorn, ever under Clarko, show up like last Friday?

Richo still had Carlisle & Steven in their prime.

As for the development of the list (which was supposed to be his jam), we had Dunstan, Ross, Billings, Acres, Sinclair, Goddard and Hickey.

All promising talent that wasn’t developing. Was it his fault? Maybe, partly, not at all, I guess we’ll never know.

As for Paddy, I’ve heard that even Richo was suss on taking him with pick no. 1. Ultimately wasn’t his call, but could he have influenced the outcome? It’s beggars belief that he had no say in the decision.

[CQ SAINT]

No. There's nothing interesting here.