Conference System

Hey Bitches, been a while.

Thoughts on the possible conference system?

I'm not against breaking into conferences if the Comp moves to 18, where during season teams play conference teams home/away, and non conference teams once. The obvious negative is the non Sydney conference has a reasonable gripe regarding additional travel. Perhaps a payoff regarding that travel issue could be that, instead of non conference games being 4 at home and for away, the Sydney conference teams must play 5 of the 8 non Sydney teams AWAY, 2 at home and 1 rural. Thus reducing non Sydney team travel and increasing Sydney team travel to more equitable levels.

Re finals, no way in the world should they go to a system where GF can only be Non-Sydney v Sydney. I know it works well in the states, but the NRL MUST have a system whereby at the start of the season every single two team combination is a possibility of occurring.

Finals - Top 10 Perhaps, and I haven't run the full Ice Finals system development software over this yet, but at a pinch, reward for topping conference is auto progression to week two, with the team with the best win/loss being seeded 1, the other 2.
Teams 2 and 3 in each conference play their opposite conference number, for a final 8 ranking position. I.e 2 v 2 (winner ranked 3, loser ranked 4) 3 v 3 (winner 5/loser 6)
Teams 5 plays team 6 in own conference in wildcard knockout. Winners file position 7 and 8 based on regular season win/loss. So In the non-Sydney conference 5 v 6, (assume 6 upset 5) and 5 beat 6 in Sydney conference, but 6 in the non Sydney conference had the better home/away win loss, they get ranked 7 in week 2.

From there, play out the usual,Final 8 system based on rankings. The accounts and Tv will love it due to additional finals games.

Or, more simply, scrap all that, and just run the normal top 8 based on win/loss for/against. Bringing both conferences together to begin finals.

I hate it. It works for the NBA because they have so many teams and the travel is massive. It's shit for the NRL and has the potential to turn me off the sport.

I hate pretty much everything about 'the 'proposed' conference system, though I don't mind 'a' conference system, I like the idea of splitting the comp into 2 groups of 9 with their own ladder, that play each other twice and the other group once, so their W/L record can be compared to teams that have played the exact same teams they have, but:

- after the regular season, the finals system should stay the same, albeit modified to reflect the new rankings, so week 1 would be A1 vs B2, B1 vs A2 for a week off, and your elimination finals as either A3 vs B4, B3 vs A4 OR best rank 3 vs Wildcard #2, worst rank 3 vs Wildcard #1, then continue from there.

- it has to be as fair as can be expected geographically, none of this splitting into Sydney and Non-Sydney shit, 4 Sydney teams in each conference, 1 Brisbane team in each conference, then work out how best to split the other 8.

Ice wrote:The obvious negative is the non Sydney conference has a reasonable gripe regarding additional travel

It's a legit gripe but all teams in that conference will face the same travel challenge to reach their top 4 and make the finals, if that's how it ends up working, top 4 from each.

Just writing down the conferences to see how it would look

Wests
Easts
Souths
Cronulla
Penrith
Parra
Dogs
Manly
Saints

total points this year after round 8 - 76 points

Melbourne
Canberra
Newcastle
Gold Coast
Brisbane
North Queensland
New Zealand
Dolphins?
+1

total points this year after round 8 - 48 points (2 less teams)

Top 4 right now are Sydney teams. If we give the 2 new teams 3 wins from 8 each (enough to be in the top 8 right now) that's 12 more taking the conference to 60 points vs Sydney's 76

Looking at that it seems for at least the first few years the non-Sydney conference would be easier to qualify from. Depends if the new franchises can come in and be instant juggernauts like Storm were. I doubt that will happen.

I don't really care how it goes, but more Sydney team derby's would be good from a banter point of view for us Sydney based fans.

At the earliest is 2026. They've floated the idea to get people talking, to get people use to the idea. It will happen, now it's fine tuning. We've done most of the heavy lifting (as usual) for them.

Trying to keep some rivalries but make the travel fairer and the cross conference finals is a given

Tigers
Penrith
Parra
Dogs
Broncos
Storm
Knights
Quokas
Titans

Cronulla
Manly
Saints
Easts
Souths
Dolphins
Warriors
Raiders
Cowboys

It’s a terrible idea and I can’t think of a single problem it solves that can’t be fixed in a less disruptive way.

No Worries wrote:At the earliest is 2026. They've floated the idea to get people talking, to get people use to the idea. It will happen, now it's fine tuning. We've done most of the heavy lifting (as usual) for them.

Trying to keep some rivalries but make the travel fairer and the cross conference finals is a given

Tigers
Penrith
Parra
Dogs
Broncos
Storm
Knights
Quokas
Titans

Cronulla
Manly
Saints
Easts
Souths
Dolphins
Warriors
Raiders
Cowboys

Hardly surprising you've thrown the big drawcard Broncos into the Tigers division, to selfishly boost your ticket sales.....but can you imagine the uproar from what would become the poor cousins in the other division??

I honestly can't stand the conference system and I have no idea why it ever gets floated.

In fact, it shits me that we unfortunately already have an unofficial 'conference system', which funnily enough is usually one of the arguments put forth for the system....

The fact any proposed conference system is essentially shot down when the idea is put forward in black and white, tells me a couple of things:

1. The current system is shite too
2. The average NRL fan is a battling simpleton

The answer is blatantly simple - the season is clearly too long and should be shortened so everyone plays each other once.

Now before everyone has a meltdown about TV rights.....I think they could still fill the void with an extended pre-season and a better International schedule at the end of the year (particularly given all the players are less likely to withdraw if the season is shorter).

As we have seen with the Big Bash, there is no point flogging a product so much that it losses it's appeal.

OSM, I don't dislike the thought of each team only playing once, but as you rightly point out TV won't go for that and there is no way more pre season games is the answer, nobody cares about that shite. Literally nobody. Pretty much the same with Internatioanl league, no one cares. League is Club And Origin, that's about it. Reduce preseason, in fact have none and get straight into the season I reckon. As a coach I'd much rather get straight into it knowing everyone is in the same boat, and lose a Guy to a ACL in round one rather that in a Mickey Mouse preseason game.

Maybe the conferences shouldn't be 8, they could make em 2 assuming 2 new teams (Brisbane and NZ) and or 4 teams and forget weakening the Comp with additional teams.

Two team groups:

Penrith
Parramatta

Rabbitohs
Roosters

Dragons
Sharks

Manly
Newcastle

Bulldogs
Tigers

Raiders
Storm

Titans
Cowboys

Broncos
Firehawks/Jets/Dolphins

Warriors
NZ Cloud???

Play two home/away games against your Rival and every other team once. 20 games.

Forget current form and positions, there is good reason for all these matches.

16 team Comp, next post.

16 team Comp, not Sydney based, a balance of both:

Bush Conference

Division:
Battle of the West
Penrith
Parra
Bulldogs
Tigers


Battle of the something.....?
Rabbitohs
Roosters
Raiders
Storm

Beach Conference
Division:
Battle of the Beaches
Dragons
Sharks
Manly
Newcastle

Qld/Kiwi Diaspora (derbies and strong Kiwi communities)
Warriors
Broncos
Titans
Cowboys

Play division teams 3 times on a yearly rotating 2 home 1 away format. Play home & away v other 4 team in conference. Play once against teams in opposite conference, 4 home/4 away, rotating who has home game each year.

25 games
Top team in each Division auto qualify.
Final positions filled by best home/away records.
If winner of a division miraculously has a worse win/loss record than than any team that hasn't qualified, they MUST play Wildcard knockout v that team to retain position.

Or something, the reality is, the Status Quo will not remain.

I doubt many remember but it wasnt that long ago that the comp was essential set up as a 2 conferences but with 1 ladder and top 8 finals. Thats how they used to do the draw. At the start of each year they would do 2 groups (always changing) based on the previous years finishing positions with a few tweaks for local derbies then you would play your group twice and the other once.

Personally i dont think an 18 team 2 conference system could work, especially if its Sydney based. If they choose to split it it wouldnt be that way anyway, that was a media creation. American sports arent geographically broken down for conferences and the NRL wouldnt either.

The conference systems i could see working would be at a minimum 15 years away. A 20 team 5 conference (4 teams each) system. You play your group twice H&A and every other team once, 22 games, winner of each conference and 3 teams with next best record make 8 teams finals system.

Or a 20 team 4 conference system (5 teams each), play group H&A plus others once, 23 games, top 2 in each conference make 8 team finals system.