Career High SuperCoach Score: 192 Vs Carlton (2018)

Career High AFLFantasy Score: 195 Vs GWS Giants (2018)

Career High SuperCoach Average: 129 (2018)

Career High AFLFantasy Average: 129.1 (2018)

Impact on new club

During the trade period, the club had four key goals to meet. First, secure a versatile tall defender; this was achieved through Billy Frampton. Bolster the forward line with a small and a tall. The arrival of Dan McStay and Ian Hill ensured those goals were met. The last piece of the trade puzzle was to secure an inside midfielder who excels in winning contested footy. That need has been well and truly addressed with Tom Mithcell.

At his peak, Mitchell is a strong clearance and contested ball winner. In 2021 alone, he ranked inside the top 50 players in the AFL for contested possessions, centre clearances and stoppage clearances.

His arrival will immediately take the clubs dependency off Taylor Adams and Jordan De Goey. Both are the only actively listed Magpies players that averaged over two centre clearances and two stoppage clearances a game. As a result, they become a much deeper and more potent team with Mitchell in the midfield.

However, he isn’t just a one-trick inside midfield pony; he’s got other elite skills. For example, in 2021, he ranked first in the league for uncontested possessions. That’s proof that his ability to create space through workrate is elite.

Impact on the old club

It’s hard not to be fearful for the Hawthorn Football club in 2023. The club has allowed two of their best ball winners and accumulators to walk out the door for effectively not much compensation. With no Tom Mitchell or Jaeger O’Meara, the midfield leadership now clearly lands on Jai Newcombe. Based on the end of 2022, alongside him should be Dylan Moore. The crafty forward showed some midfield chops and was regulalrly attending over 60% of centre bounces in the final eight weeks of the season. The other obvious regular in the midfield will be Josh Ward. He showcased why he was so highly rated as a junior and is showing all the signs of fulfilling his potential

It’s after these three that the questions and unknowns emerge. Can and will James Worpel get back to being an AFL level midfielder? Will the experiment in the midfield of Connor Nash continue? Does the lack of leadership in the midfield core mean that Chad Wingard is permanently deployed there? Or will the Hawks fully invest major minutes into the kids of Connor Macdonald and Finn Maginness? Then of course, there’s whoever they land at the draft this year. The club will be a big preseason watch. Because they might provide some fantasy relevance prospects.

Fantasy Summary

There are two schools of thought regarding the fantasy football impact & relevance of Tom Mitchell at Collingwood. The first is that he’s no longer the fantasy football beast he’d been in his early seasons at Hawthorn.

The concern isn’t due to a scoring dip of approximately 20 points per game from the 2021 to 2022 season. Instead, part of that dip can be accredited to him seeing a substantial slide in centre bounce attendance. Rather it’s more to do with the Collingwood game style and subsequent fantasy football relevance.

Last year the Magpies ranked 14th in the league for disposals and 17th for marks. In AFLFantasy/DreamTeam, they ranked 12th for total team points scored and 13th in SuperCoach. Specifically, from an individual player perspective, just one listed Magpie in Jack Crisp averaged over 90 for the season. While in SuperCoach, it was three, Scott Pendlebury, Nick Daicos and again Jack Crisp.

No current Collingwood player averaged 100 or higher in 2022. That’s not due to a lack of fantasy pedigree but more to do with an AFL system that isn’t fantasy football friendly. It’s similar to what we’ve seen from Richmond for the past five years.

All this data can and does start to create a rather compelling narrative, but the key to remember is that Mitchell was specifically recruited to address the clubs clear deficiency in winning contested possessions. Last season, the Magpies ranked 13th for clearances, 14th for contested possessions, and just two players ranked inside the top 75 for centre clearances in the AFL. So the Pies have seen an issue and believe they’ve addressed it with Mitchell.

From 2017-2021 ‘Titch’ was among the most beloved and selected players across all game forms. In this five year window, he frequently averaged 115+ and, for several seasons, was a permanently fixed captain selection. Not only did he score well in these years, but he featured in the top 25 in the competition for disposals and was a fixture among the best contested ball winners in the game.

Whenever there are two extreme viewpoints among a player’s potential fantasy output, I tend to lean towards the truth being somewhere in the middle. Is he washed and destined to be a 90s guy? I don’t believe so. Is he destined to be back as the 120 monsters? Statistically unlikely. But can he be a consistent performer around 105-110? I believe so.

If that’s the case, he’s a serious preseason consideration, if not a genuine value premium to start the season.