BY DAN

A few weeks ago we claimed that Matt Timoko was a star only no one was noticing.

Surprisingly it seems that might be changing. That was seen in the commentary on both channels during the All Star game but also in the lead up, such as when Bryan Fletcher called him the best centre in the game. Fletch actually said

They [the Raiders] have two players there who I think are the best in their position. Joe Tapine…and Matt Timoko…He does it all himself. He comes back on that line where he just goes through the middle. He’s big and strong and fast, he didn’t have a five-eighth throwing him a long ball and putting him through holes. I mean Joey Manu is very similar.

Fletcher here

Both the takes in our pages and Fletch’s are based on the old fashioned eye test, hampered by the imperfect numbers that are collected around rugby league. How do you mark what Timoko achieves when everything he does comes from scratch? The 158m on the ground he averages a game sounds like a lot but it’s only 33rd in the league and the same as Albert Hopoate. He was 12th in tackle breaks. This is impressive given nearly every carry he has is accompanied by three sets of eyes all focused on him instead of anyone else in the vicinity. But it’s hardly the kind of countables you can normally associate with a top line player.

And yet me, you, and apparently Bryan Fletcher are of the opinion this is a very special player. But because of the context in which those stats are accrued, and their general imperfection for capturing what makes a centre ‘good’, we are left mostly vibing harder than Roy Ayers.

But then a hero comes along.

We’ve long celebrated the work of the rugby league statistics page the Rugby League Eye Test. Carlos fills a necessary gap in the discourse. Rugby league (and Australian sport in general) has always had a problem in that most statistics available publicly are old-fashioned measures that are more corollaries of success than indicators of it. That leaves us at the behest of a media that, for reasons too numerous and structural to bother with here, is unwilling to discuss the game with any sophistication. That means we’re left pointing at Timoko yelling ‘fire’, unable to tell you how it got started and what will happen next.

One of the great things that the Rugby League Eye Test is allow us to start building an alternative understanding of a poorly explained world. Recently the site launched a new advanced stat (I’ve never understood what got included in that category of stats, but it feels right in this circumstance). This stat – Expected Run Metres – allows us to take in the quality, and context of a run into account when we assess what players contribute.

As the site explains it

If an average player started a run from the same situation based on location and tackle number, and whether the run was started by a forward or back, how many metres should they have gained?

The Rugby League Eye Test

Of course something like this is a ready made mechanism to explain Timoko’s brilliance. Here is a player who on the off occasion he does get the ball is doing so in often disadvantageous positions. He gets given lemons and paints that shit gold. You won’t be surprised that Timoko ranks highly in this metric, but you equally might be surprised that he was number one in the league last season.

Being the aggregrate of run metres over expected, the above statistic rewards people who take plenty of runs over the length of a game (i.e. backs). Timoko does he share of yardage work, so while impressive at this level it may overrate his impact as a ball-runner. But you can see that even when it accounts for a ‘per run’ basis Timoko still stands tall across the competition.

It’s amazing what he can achieve given for the most part there was little threat to the line outside him. He so often had multiple defenders in his lap upon catching the ball. The magic of someone like Jason Saab is to turn space into pace. Timoko doesn’t really ever have the luxury of space he didn’t create himself.

As we’ve noted there’s still work for Timoko to do. His defence at times has been imperfect. He showed of a creative side to his game playing for New Zealand that he has never got to display for the Milk. That’s more to do with the his club side’s structures (or lack thereof) than anything. If Timoko keeps making metres hand-over-fist (and over-expectation), breaking tackles like they’re hearts and maybe gets a few more chances to operate before the line, me, you, Fletch and the advanced stats might not be the only people touting his abilities.

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