Despite losing to Adelaide, GWS retained top spot on both MoS Rating Systems, though Collingwood closed the gap to GWS to just 2.2 Scoring Shots on MoSSBODS, while a newly-installed-in-2nd-place Geelong finds itself just 7.3 points behind GWS on MoSHBODS.

There were some hefty re-rankings this week, especially on MoSSBODS, where North Melbourne and Adelaide both climbed three spots, and the Brisbane Lions fell four. On MoSHBODS, the big movers were North Melbourne (up three spots) and Richmond (down three spots).

In total, eight teams moved places on MoSSBODS, and 13 moved places on MoSHBODS.

Those moves left the Systems now differing in their rankings of four teams by more than two spots:

• Melbourne, ranked 7th by MoSSBODS and 12th by MoSHBODS

• Adelaide, ranked 9th and 6th

• Western Bulldogs, ranked 10th and 13th

• West Coast, ranked 14th and 9th

Eight teams - MoSSBODS’ Top 6 and the teams it ranks 8th and 9th - now have a positive Combined Rating, while

• Melbourne has a positive Combined Rating on MoSSBODS but not on MoSHBODS

• Fremantle and West Coast have a positive Combined Rating on MoSHBODS but not on MoSSBODS

The gap between 1st and 8th on MoSSBODS now stands at 4.7 Scoring Shots (down 1.0), and between 1st and 8th on MoSHBODS at 19.3 points (down 2.7).

On the component ratings, GWS has retained 1st spot on offence and defence under both Systems. Geelong now sits 2nd on defence and 3rd on offence on both Systems, while Collingwood sits 2nd on offence, and 3rd on defence on both Systems.

On MoSSBODS, only 4 teams are now rated positively on offence and defence (down 1), 4 are rated negatively on both (no change), 3 are rated positively on offence but negatively on defence (unchanged), and 7 are rated negatively on offence but positively on defence (up 1).

Three teams are in different quadrants under the two Systems:

• Adelaide (positive offence and defence on MoSHBODS, negative offence and positive defence on MoSSBODS)

• West Coast (negative offence and defence on MoSSBODS, negative offence and positive defence on MoSHBODS)

• St Kilda (negative offence and defence on MoSHBODS, negative offence and positive defence on MoSSBODS)

Looking across all 18 teams we find that:

• on offence, no teams are now ranked more than 2 spots differently by the two Systems

• on defence, four teams are ranked more than 2 spots differently by the two Systems (Port Adelaide, Melbourne, Fremantle, and Sydney).

Next, let’s compare each team’s current ratings with those of teams from the past at the same point in their respective seasons (ie after 12 rounds of the home-and-away season).

Teams shown as red points are teams that eventually finished premiers, and those shown in orange finished as runners up.

GWS remains the only team with a Combined Rating above the median for all previous Grand Finalists at this point in the season, and Collingwood, Port Adelaide, and Richmond the only other teams with Combined Ratings above the lowest decile for all previous Grand Finalists. St Kilda, Carlton and Gold Coast both still have Combined Ratings lower than that of any previous Grand Finalist at this point in the season.

If we focus purely on those seasons from 2000 on, we obtain a similar picture except that GWS falls slightly below the median.

The following animation shows the path that each team has followed, at the end of each round, to get to its current rating, and shows how the gap between GWS and the other teams closed a little this week.

ChiPS and MARS both left Geelong in 1st place this week and switched Collingwood into 2nd, ahead of GWS.

Seven teams moved spots on ChiPS, most notably Sydney (up 5 spots to 5th) and West Coast (down 3 spots to 8th), while nine teams moved spots on MARS, most notably Sydney (up 3 spots to 10th).

That’s left the two of them disagreeing about the ranking of Richmond, Sydney, Hawthorn, Adelaide, West Coast, and Port Adelaide by more than two places. Both now have their Top 9 teams rated as better-than-average teams (ie rated over 1,000), while ChiPS also has its 10th-placed team, Port Adelaide, in that same category.

Looking across the rankings of all four Systems and ordering the teams based on the current competition ladder, we find that:

• Sydney now has the widest range of rankings (from 5th on ChiPS to 16th on MoSSBODS)

• West Coast has the next-widest range (from 5th on MARS to 14th on MoSSBODS)

• Hawthorn and Melbourne have the next-widest range of rankings (Hawthorn is 6th on ChiPS and 13th on MoSSBODS, Melbourne is 7th on MoSSBODS and 14th on ChiPS and MARS)

• Port Adelaide is next (from 4th on MoSSBODS to 10th on ChiPS)

• Then come Adelaide, Essendon, and the Western Bulldogs (Adelaide is 4th on MARS and 9th on MoSSBODS, Essendon is 4th on MoSHBODS and 9th on ChiPS, and the Western Bulldogs are 10th on MoSSBODS and 15th on ChiPS and MARS)

• No other team is ranked more than three places differently across the four Systems.

• Gold Coast and Carlton are still the only teams ranked identically by all four Systems, but five other teams’ rankings cover only two or three values.

We now see fairly large positive differences between ladder position and Rating System rankings (ie three or four red dots, where Rating System ranking is much lower than ladder position) for only the Eagles, Lions and Saints, and large negative differences (ie three or four green dots) for none of the teams.