Re: The Great Ruck Debate.
Reply #6 –
Grundy is an interesting case, because for much of his career like TDK he was dependant on the vertical jump to better opponents, a few injuries have brought him back to the field and now he's become far more active around stoppages and it's giving him a second start to his career.
But Grundy was never a strong F50 presence like TDK might become, historically in tactical utility I'd have Grundy closer to Pitto in the drop behind play and intercept marking role.
If TDK is having problems in the ruck he's a genuine option to rest in F50, and doing so retains the F50 advantage we normally have with BigH and Charlie in combination. But BigH is not a genuinely competitive ruck option, he is a placeholder, and it hurts us two ways when we have to ruck BigH, we lose ruck competitiveness and we weaken our F50. In my opinion that is not a viable long term tactic, it's a shock /emergency option when things aren't going our way. In my opinion we still need a viable option to ruck when TDK isn't on the ball, and on our list the only option is Pitto.
Then we have to consider the Rucks role when someone like Weiters or McGovern is off the boil or unavailable, or just needs a chop out.
Melbourne are losing games at the moment because they have no backup ruck option, not the only reason but some of it, they went all in with the solo Gawn and if he's out, off the boil or beaten they are screwed.
We just defeated Geelong basically because they have disrespected the Ruck options, at least in contribution, they do use Blicavs who is , but using Blicavs takes away their equivalent of losing Cripps around stoppages or a McGovern type intercept marking player. Another example of being hurt two or more ways by a simple tactical error, the price is too high.
One ruck can be fine, but you better have a truly viable backup option at hand, or a bit of bad luck can see your day over before it's barely begun.