NRL - How has Nathan Brown gone as Coach of Newcastle?

Look, as a Knights fan I am a bit jaded here. I though 2019 was going to be a finals year. Unfortunately, it is all for naught. So I am a bit jaded about how the whole Nathan Brown sacking came about.

But the fact of the matter is there had been some improvement in the Knights over the last 4 years.

If you look at the Z-Scores of the Knights over the last 10 years

This year has been the best year since 2013, when Wayne Bennett was at the helm and they made it deep in the finals. 4th best year in the decade. So probably not worthy of the boot for mine.

NRL '19 Ranking the best Locks

QUALITY

Jason Taumalolo

Jai Arrow

Nathan Brown

OK

Ryan Matterson

Dale Finucane

Jake Trbojevic

Paul Gallen

Joe Ofahengaue

Cameron Murray Adam Elliott

SHIT

Tyson Frizell

Lachlan Burr

Joseph Tapine

Liam Martin

Tim Glasby

Victor Radley

NRL '19 Ranking of the best halves

Standard Methodology

QUALITY

Nathan Cleary

Luke Brooks

Daly Cherry Evans

Ben Hunt

Mitchel Moses

Mitchell Pearce

Adam Reynolds OK Blake Green Aidan Sezer SHIT Chad Townsend Cooper Cronk Lachlan Lewis Brodie Croft Jake Clifford Ryley Jacks Jake Turpin

NRL '19 Ranking of the best 5/8ths

Standard Methodology

QUALITY

1. Jack Wighton

2. Cameron Munster

3. James Maloney

4. Tyrone Roberts

5. Shaun Johnson

6. Michael Morgan

OK

7. Dylan Walker

8. Kieran Foran

9. Luke Keary

10. Cody Walker

SHIT

11. Benji Marshall

12. Darius Boyd

13. Chanel Harris-Tavita

14. Dylan Brown

15. Gareth Widdop

16. Mason Lino

NRL '19 Ranking of the best Hookers

Standard Methodology as before

QUALITY (in order)

1. Damien Cook

2. Cameron Smith

3. Josh Hodgson

4. Isaac Luke

5. Robbie Farrah

*ALL OVER > 0.5 SD better than the average

OK (in order)

6. Cameron McInnes

7. Andrew McCullough

8. Danny Levi

9. Reed Mahoney

10. Apisai Koroisau

*Between 0.5 and -0.5 SD than average

SHIT (in order)

11. Jake Granville

12. Nathan Peats

13. Jayden Brailey

14. Sam Verrills

15. Michael Lichaa

16. Mitchell Kenny *Less than -0.5 SD than average.

Weird that the Knights want to get rid of a OK hooker in Levi, for a shit one in Brailey. I think Levi is getting the blame for a lack of attack from the 5/8th

NRL '19 - Ranking of the best fullbacks

On my these of the best of the best, I have ranked the best fullbacks into
QUALITY, OK, SHIT categories

QUALITY FULLBACKS (in Order)

Roger Tuivasa-Sheck
James Tedesco
Tom Trbojevic
Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad

These guys are all better than 0.5 Standard Deviations than the average Fullback.

OK FULLBACKS (in Order)

Clinton Gutherson
Dylan Edwards
Jahrome Hughes
Corey Thompson
Kailyn Ponga
Dallin Watene-Zelezniak

These guys are between 0.5 and -0.5 Standard Deviations of the average Fullback (i.e they are the average fullback)

SHIT FULLBACKS (in Order)

Alexander Brimson
Scott Drinkwater
Matt Moylan
Anthony Milford
Adam Doueihi
Corey Norman

NRL 2019 Contenders update - 3 teams clearly ahead

And after 21 games played we have

3 Locks (clearly the best this season)

Storm
Roosters
Raiders

Then we have 3 Probables

Manly (lacking Attack)
Rabbits (lacking Attack)
Eels (lacking Defence)

The rest are filler.

NRL Season 2019 - Most improved teams

Season is slowly coming to a close unfortunately, so its interesting to see the improvement within teams over the last year. Some surprises really.

I am using z-scores again to determine improvement. z score calculation is (Win% for team - Average Win% for league)/ (SD of Win% for League)

Comparing 2018 Rd 20 z-scores to 2019. Results below:-

So as you can see, the Eels, Sea-Eagles, Raiders, Storm and Cowboys have all had superior improvement (SD >0.5). Eels especially have had a stellar improvement...The two coaches (Brad Arthur for the Eels) and Des Hassler (Manly) should be fighting it out for Coach of the Year.

On the negative side, the Rabbits, Panthers, Sharks, Broncos, Titans Warriors and Dragons have all gone backwards substantially.<-0 .5="" and="" arriors="" barely="" be="" being="" booted="" bothering="" by="" dragons="" especially....after="" finals="" head="" kearney="" last="" making="" mcgregor="" office="" p="" ragons="" scorer="" should="" stat="" the="" this="" to="" year.="" year="">