TruBlueBrad wrote:
They like the speed of the game, they don't the look of constant interchanges.
I think we need to be careful here with use of the word 'speed'.
I think they want to game to be in constant motion (quick or slow doesn't matter, as long as it's moving), and a lot of their recent rule changes have been aimed at that objective; don't dive on the ball, if the ball is knocked free in the tackle it's play on, significantly tighter interpretation of deliberate out of bounds (to the point of stupidity on that one, in fact) - whatever the cost, they don't want stoppages.
But of course with all these damned rotations the players/coaches are all stuffing it up by being able to sprint from contest to contest, then have a quick breather and hit the ground running again in a few minutes. And of course, players are clever, and are adjusting their approach to contested situations so that rather than giving away frees, they are forcing stoppages. Now they are trying reduce the numbers around stoppages. So there's a couple of tactics they are taking here - first is to tire the players earlier in games; i.e. interchange cap.
The second avenue they are chasing down is all around cutting down the time the ball might be in a stoppage so players don't have the time to get there; throwing up instead of bouncing, calling a ball up quicker, more rules/tighter interpretation of rules when the ball is contested, e.g. no matter how far out a players sticks his head and creates high contact, the umpires will continue to pay those frees because it breaks up a potential stoppage. Same thing goes with the sliding rule, and so on. The more free kicks they can pay, the sooner the ball is back in motion.
This is all well and good, but what are they sacrificing to keep the ball moving? The deliberate out of bounds is driving me crazy, they've gone way too far on that. More worrying for the AFL in a safety sense is their refusal to not pay high contact frees to players who lead with their heads, or actively engage high contact (e.g. Eagles/Selwood shoulder shrug). Someone is eventually going to be hurt badly, but players don't care because they know it's an easy (perhaps not cheap) free kick.