This Can't Be Easy for Nathan Buckley.

This can’t be easy for Nathan Buckley. He seems like a nice fella, albeit he is one of the world’s most prominent FIGJAMs. Right up there with Elon Musk and Gwyneth Paltrow.

Nobody deserves this. Nobody deserves what? You might ask. Well, getting accidentally cucked every single week by Craig McRrae. Buckley has to sit and watch McRae give Steele Sidebottom his 11th orgasm of the night (the secret to his fountain of youth) at least once a week as the bones of his Collingwood list plays intoxicating, fast, aggressive footy. Not only does he have to watch it, he has to break it down on TV as well, right after everyone has finished (again) and is basking in the afterglow.

And this is AFTER McRae beat him in two grand finals as a player.

A less generous writer might call him Nathan Cuckley.

The fact that Collingwood is winning and winning like they are still doesn’t have me convinced. In a season where genuine excellence is in short supply, certainly in shorter supply than it was in 2022, however, nobody should have anybody convinced.

In fact, I would peg them as the second favourite for the premiership as of today.

That reality doesn’t change the fact that, by the standards of previous great teams, the bottom end of this list is not excellent. Their team yesterday included recycled players like Oleg Markov, Tom Mitchell, and Billy Frampton. They didn’t have a true key forward, depending on how you rate Brody Mihocek. And they only have one gun key back in Darcy Moore, who might have to play in the ruck if they don’t start getting some players back soon.

So, how have Nathan Buckley’s boys gone from being in a dour, loveless marriage to having a new bull who wrote a kama sutra book? Well, as has been written 100 times, McRae has released the shackles.

In 2020, Nathan Buckley’s last full season as the Pies’ head coach, they ranked dead last in the competition for metres gained, 10th in inside 50s 14th in score involvements, and 14th in shots all while kicking less than 6 goals per game (with abbreviated games). This season the Pies are fifth in metres gained, first in inside 50s, third in score involvements, and 6th in shots all while kicking just under 14 goals per game.

What is remarkable is that the list is largely the same. Of the players who played on ANZAC Day, 16 of the 23 were on the Collingwood list when Nathan Buckley bid adieu to the club. The seven new additions are: Nick Daicos, Billy Frampton, Bobby Hill, Ash Johnson, Nathan Kreuger, Oleg Markov, and Tom Mitchell. None of those players, bar one notable exception, is a real needle mover.

In fact, by my count, the Pies had 5 certain, and at most 8 genuinely elite players on the field on ANZAC Day (The Daicos’, Moore, Sidebottom, Pendlebury, De Goey, Crisp and maybe Maynard).

That needle mover is obviously Nick Daicos. He is possibly already the best player in the competition and prompted me to whether you’d rather have Daicos or Jeremy Cameron for the rest of the season. I think it’s Cameron because of positional value and his preternatural size and speed, but it isn’t a slam dunk.

Adding Daicos to this Pies team has been like adding some new character to a middling TV show and helping it explode into the stratosphere. Kind of the anti-Meryl Streep in Big Little Lies. Think Fleabag when the hot priest came in for season 2. It took a show that was just okay and propelled it into excellence.

But even he, the number 1 player in the AFL in disposals, kicks, effective disposals and metres gained – an extraordinary high wire act to be sure – is a good enough answer for what was once (and arguably still is) a middling list without a genuine alpha key forward.

Yesterday they didn’t even have a ruckman. In my view, other than at the poles of excellent or terrible, the ruck does not matter. If you have one of the middle 10-12 ruck situations in the AFL you will be fine and more depends on the midfielders than anything else. But yesterday, the Pies trotted Billy Frampton out as the number 1 ruck against Draper and Phillips, the duo that just worked Brodie Grundy like a speed bag. The Pies were terrible and the Bombers were excellent at the position, and yet the clearances were basically even. Then, despite having no ruckman, when the game was there to be won the Pies were +16 in inside 50s and +34 in disposals as they completely owned the ball and the game on their way to a quarter that they won by 41 points. They kicked 4.1 from clearances.

So, with all of that said, what are we supposed to make of Collingwood?

This would be the least impressive list since Richmond in 2017 to win the premiership. By my count, the Tigers had either 4 or 5 elite players in that 2017 premiership team depending on how you defined Dylan Grimes in 2017. But that Richmond side revolutionised the game, applying extreme heat on the ball carrier and embraced the imperfection of the game in such a way that the whole was greater than the sum of its parts. The anti-Carlton, if you will.

That has to be the Collingwood blueprint.

When the game was there to be won yesterday Collingwood attacked the corridor and were able to improve their inside 50 entries markedly. They played that last quarter like they were the embodiment of a tidal wave, picking up energy with every metre of turf they chewed up. That is their innovation, taking the best of what that Richmond side did but while also dominating clearances and showing an incredible ability at winning time to transition the ball from D50 into game winning positions. They won’t win all of the games where they find themselves in a losing position at ¾ time, but the belief that they can could be enough to potentially propel them to a premiership.

That, especially, can't be easy for Nathan Buckley.