Have I mentioned that one of my favorite things about this league is that it constantly surprises you?

This week,

we congratulate the Adelaide Crows women on winning the Premiership,

we recap Round 1,

look forward to Round 2,

and update the standings of our Footy Tipping Contest.

All this and more on

Welcome to Balls of Steel’s AFL Beat!

We start off,  chronologically,  with the now traditional Opening Day matchup of Richmond v Carlton at the MCG. This takes place on Thursday Night in Australia, which meant the ass crack of 1:20 AM Pacific on Wednesday night/Thursday morning here in North America.

With a fortuitous assist from Metamucil (*NOT a sponsored post), I somehow woke up at 1 AM to take a dump,  so I managed to catch the first quarter on the can. That was indicative of the Blues’ performance and all I needed to see as the Tigers took a three-goal lead at Quarter Time and never looked back in a 43 point romp. Here is the highlight package:

The next game was again at the ass-crack of 1:40 AM, but this time it was Thursday night/Friday morning and it was the defending champion Western Bulldogs against the Collingwood Magpies. This time,  I forgot my Metamucil and so I slept through it.  When I woke up,  I discovered that the Pies had played bravely and even taken the lead in the 3rd quarter.  In the end,  however,  the Bulldogs’ class showed and they were a bit too good for the Pies.  The four points went to the Doggies after a 100-86 win.  Here is the highlight package:

***

Chronologically,  we now take a break from AFL and focus on the AFL Women’s Grand Final which was held on the Gold Coast on North American Friday night at the perfect time of 8 PM Pacific.

Unfortunately for my Brisbane Lions, that was the only thing that was perfect .  For one,  the AFL had to move the venue from Brisbane to Gold Coast because a fucking Adele concert made the turf at the Gabba unplayable.  The AFL CEO was rightfully pissed off about that.

Then,  the Adelaide Crows simply outplayed the Lions and snuck out a 6 point victory.  There were some questionable calls from the umpiring crew (I watched it live with a bit of a biased eye, I admit), but, to be completely honest (and the Lions’ coach agrees),  the Crows deserved it.

The Lions must have been left angry and disappointed. At least I was.  Dammit! Who would have thought I would give that much of a shit about AFL Women’s?!?  Reason #7420 why the AFL is run better than the NFL.

Next year,  they are looking to expand the finals to add preliminary finals as well as other changes. I love that they constantly evaluate what went right,  what went wrong, and make the right adjustments. That includes changing a rule from the regular season that allowed the clock to continuously run.  The Grand Final was devoid of time-wasting and that was thanks to this smart decision.

Here is the highlight package:

and a few more reminders that AFL Women hit harder than the Jets:

I will miss you, AFL Women’s! Great first season!

***

We continue now with AFL Round 1 and two matches that started simultaneously at 10:35 PM Pacific on Friday night: St. Kilda v Melbourne and Sydney v Port Adelaide.

You know,  I should have listened to my good friend,  Litre_cola, who,  prophetically said last week in the comments:

Oh Mr balls, the Saints always find a way to fuck it up.

And so they did. To the tune of a 120-90 loss to the Demons at home at a venue (the Etihad, where, again, thanks to fucking Adele, they had to throw the ball up instead of bounce it!) where Melbourne had lost their last 24 games. Yeah. I’m not sure exactly what happened as I fell asleep at Half Time (Hey,  I’d been up since 4:45 AM, ok?) and at that point it was a close game.

Apparently, the Demons continued their domination of the second quarter and cruised to the 30 point win. Adding injury to insult, the Saints’ Nick Riewoldt suffered a knee injury late in the game.  Preliminary reports are that he avoided serious damage, but this is not the start the Saints wanted and/or needed.  Here is the highlights package:

As previously mentioned, the Sydney Swans were playing at the exact same time at home against the Port Adelaide Power.  I assumed this game would be a blowout, which is why I watched the Saints-Demons match (crap!  I forgot to make my Good vs Evil joke!).  Well, as my childhood hero, the OG Maxwell Smart would say, not so fast.  BTW, did anyone else have a crush on Agent 99 like I did?

Anyway, not even WhyEaglesWhy tipped his team to beat the Swans in Sydney, which is exactly what the Power did! By 28 points, too!  Like the Demons, the Power had not won in the SCG for 11 years.  Maybe this is the year old patterns die?  As we like to say around here, though,

The Power, as I mentioned in my preview, are perfectly capable of looking awesome one week and shit the next.  Let’s see if they can play this way next week.  Here is the highlights package:

There were two late late games on Friday night/Saturday morning: Essendon v Hawthorn and Gold Coast v Brisbane.  The first would tell us how much improved Essendon is now that they’ve got everyone back while the second would tell us who has the inside track to the Wooden Spoon.  I did mention that I love how this league surprises me, right?

I woke up at 4 something on Saturday morning to again take a dump (seriously, Metamucil, if you’re reading, I’m open to a sponsored post.  Don’t tell DTZM!) and I discovered two things:  1) The Essendon Bombers had actually BEATEN the Hawks by 25 and 2) The Suns-Lions game was still going on!

I fired up the Watch AFL app and caught the frantic last few minutes of the game. Here is the full highlights package:

In the end, it was a significant victory for the Lions.  They are now on good pace to catch the Women’s team in points for the season. It seems like the Women’s team’s success has rubbed off on the Men’s team, as the coach has indicated.  Hopefully, this is the start of avoiding the Wooden Spoon for the Lions.

Here is the highlights package for the Bombers-Hawks match:

There were three games left on North American Saturday night. The first one featured West Coast visiting North Melbourne at the Etihad. There were many questions surrounding this match as the two teams have had a lot of changes from last year.  The home field advantage didn’t count for much for the Roos as the Eagles soared (sorry) past them after the tight first quarter to win going away 136-93. Here are the match highlights:

The next game started slightly after the first one, so when it was clear that the Eagles were going to win (around the second quarter), I switched to the Adelaide-GWS game.  This one followed a similar pattern in that the game was close for the first half.  The Crows then soared (again, sorry but hey, they’re birds, it’s not my fault!) away in the second to blow the Giants out by 147-91. Here is the highlights package:

The last game of the Round had my beloved Cats visiting the Fremantle Dockers in Perth.  It started at 1:40 AM, so good fucking luck catching that, but I was happy to see on Sunday morning that the Cats blew them out by a score of 115-73. At press time (ha!), I did not see a highlights package on the AFL Youtube page, so you get a highlight of Tom Hawkins scoring a ridiculous goal:

Let’s take a look at the ladder, shall we?

It’s only Round 1, so the ladder is pretty much meaningless, but it’s still interesting to see some unlikely names in lofty territory while everyone’s Premiership favorites are in the Wooden Spoon position.

Speaking of, let’s see how we are doing in the Footy Tipping Contest:

So far so good as only two games separate the top from the bottom.  I’m glad everyone managed to get their tips in on time.  Please remember that this week’s games start again on Australian Thursday Night, which means Wednesday night/Thursday morning here in North America.  DON’T FORGET TO PUT THE FOOTY TIP IN!!

And now let’s see what we have on tap for next week (All times Pacific):

Thursday, March 30, 2017

1:20 AM – Richmond Tigers v Collingwood Magpies at the MCG

Friday, March 31, 2017

1:50 AM – Western Bulldogs v Sydney Swans at Etihad Stadium

7:45 PM – Hawthorn Hawks v Adelaide Crows at the MCG

10:35 PM – GWS Giants v Gold Coast Suns at Spotless Stadium

Saturday, April 1, 2017

1:25 AM – Brisbane Lions v Essendon Bombers at the Gabba

1:40 AM – West Coast Eagles v St. Kilda Saints at Domain Stadium

8:10 PM – Geelong Cats v North Melbourne Kangaroos at Etihad Stadium

10:20 PM – Melbourne Demons v Carlton Blues at the MCG

11:40 PM – Port Adelaide Power v Fremantle Dockers at Adelaide Oval

There are some juicy matchups with Western v Sydney and Hawks-Crows immediately coming to mind as must-watch games. I will finally be able to watch my Cats live as they play at a decent hour. Finally, I can’t believe that Melbourne is going to be undefeated after Round 2.  Sorry, Hippo.  Then again, as this week showed, anything can happen and the Blues could actually win.  That, as I started saying at the top, is what I love about this league.  See you next week!