2025 - Team Ratings After Round 7

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MoSSBODS re-ranked 11 teams this week, but none of the Top 3, and only Carlton (up 2 to 5th), Geelong (down 2 to 6th), Gold Coast (up 3 to 8th) and GWS (down 2 to 11th) by more than a single spot. MoSHBODS moved the same number of teams as MoSSBODS, and also moved four of them by multi-spots: Lions up 2 to 5th, Blues up 2 into 3rd; Geelong down 2 into 5th, and GWS down 2 into 8th.

That all left MoSSBODS with a Top 3 of Dogs, Pies, and Lions, and MoSHBODS with a Top 3 of Pies, Dogs, and Blues.

The correlation between MoSSBODS and MoSHBODS Combined Ratings still stands at +0.97 and, roughly speaking, each team’s Combined MoSHBODS Rating is about 0.86 times its Combined MoSSBODS Rating.

On the Component Ratings, on offence we find MoSSBODS with a Top 3 of Dogs, Lions, and Pies, and MoSHBODS with a Top 3 of Dogs, Pies, and Lions. On defence, MoSSBODS now has a Top 3 of Pies, Dogs, and Blues, while MoSHBODS now has Pies, Blues, and Giants.

MoSSBODS still has 12 teams rated as above average on offence as does MoSHBODS (and the same teams). MoSSBODS has 10 teams rated as above average on defence, but MoSHBODS has only nine, omitting Sydney.

Offensive ratings on MoSSBODS currently span a range of 1.26 standard deviations and defensive ratings a range of 1.36 standard deviations. Offensive ratings on MoSHBODS span a range of 1.05 standard deviations and defensive ratings a range of about 1.31 standard deviations.

We can also review the trajectory that each team has followed to arrive at its current MoSHBODS Rating (with thanks to www.footyjumpers.com for the use of their exquisite team guernseys)

On MoSHBODS, 9 teams are now rated positively on offence and defence (down 1), 6 are rated negatively on both (no change), only 3 are rated positively on offence but negatively on defence (up 1), and none is rated negatively on offence but positively on defence (no change).

The correlation between the teams’ MoSHBODS offensive and defensive Ratings now stands at +0.83, which is down a little on last week.

To put the latest MoSHBODS Ratings in some historical context, here are the Ratings of teams across V/AFL history as at the end of their respective Round 7s.

There is still no team sitting above the median Combined Rating for teams that went on to make their Grand Final, but Collingwood and now the Western Bulldogs seem to be making a push for that line.

And, finally, it’s time to take a look at MARS, which re-ranked 12 teams this week, including moving Collingwood up into 1st, Brisbane Lions up into 2nd, Western Bulldogs up into 3rd, and dropping Geelong down into 4th.

Further down, the big movers were the GWS down 3 into 6th, Carlton up 2 into 7th, and Sydney down 3 into 11th.

About 15-and-a-half Rating Points now separates 1st from 12th, which roughly equates to a score gap at a neutral venue of about 12 points.

By way of comparison, at the end of Round 7 last season, the gap between 1st and 12th was 24-and-a-half Rating Points, or roughly 19 points. Geelong was at that point ranked 1st with a Rating of 1,021.5, St Kilda were 12th on 997.0, and North Melbourne were last on 954.0.

There are currently 12 teams rated better-than-average by MARS.

Looking across the rankings of all three Systems and comparing them with the teams’ competition ladder positions (determined based on percentage of possible competition points collected and then for and against percentage), we find relatively large differences between the teams’ ladder positions and their rating system ordering for:

HIGHER ON LADDER THAN ON RANKING SYSTEMS: Gold Coast and Adelaide

LOWER ON LADDER THAN ON RANKING SYSTEMS: Western Bulldogs and Carlton

MARS this week provides the most outlying rankings at 10, ahead of MoSSBODS with 9, and MoSHBODS with 3.

MoSSBODS is particularly different in terms of its ranking of Sydney.

MoSHBODS and MARS agree about the ranking of only 8 teams, MoSSBODS and MARS about only 3, and MoSSBODS and MoSHBODS about only 6.

Looking finally at the range of rankings that the three Systems have attached to each team we find that GWS has the widest range of rankings at five spots, and that there are seven other teams whose rankings span more than two spots. All but two of these eight teams (Brisbane Lions and Carlton) have MoSSBODS defining one end of the range of rankings.

There are three teams that the Systems unanimously rank: Fremantle, Melbourne, and West Coast.