NRL 2020: True Kicker Ratings: Top 15 Leaderboard
Last updated: Oct 28, 2020, 2:18AM | Published: Aug 18, 2020, 9:15AM
While they might not make the highlight reels and the time for fans can be better spent darting to the fridge, a kick at goal can ultimately be what decides a game.
There's a shock: Scoring six points is better than four.
But while that sounds simple enough, not every kick at goal is created equal. Simply looking at a players conversion rate doesn't offer a lot of insight into how good or bad they are off the tee.
That's why Stats Insider put together the True Kicker rating system to give us a better idea of who can be relied upon most after a try has been scored, and to provide clearer examples of when a bad night with the boot proves costly.
What is True Kicker?
True Kicker Ratings are a different way of ranking goal kickers in the NRL, which we introduced earlier this season in articles here and at NRL.com.
In a nutshell, they tell us how many points a player's goal kicking has earned (or cost) their team, over a set period of time, compared to the NRL average kicker - shown in the Overall True Kicker column in the table below.
While the Overall True Kicker Rating gives us a good gauge on just how many points a players goal kicking has earned (or cost) their team, much like a total goals leaderboard, it can be influenced by players who have attempted more shots.
Thankfully, the True Kicker Rating system also has a way to deal with this.
The kick by kick difficulty-adjusted-rating-system allows us to calculate ‘what we would expect’ a player’s goal kicking success rate (penalty goals + conversions) to be based on the kicks they have taken - shown in the Average Difficulty column below.
By comparing this to a player’s ‘actual’ goal kicking success rate we can calculate how much they have exceeded (or fallen below) expectation. This number is presented in the form of a percentage (shown in the Difference column) and represents 'how much better or worse a player’s conversion success rate is than we would expect it to be based on the kicks they have taken’.
True Kicker Leaderboard
(min. 20 shots at goal)
| Player | Attempts | Goals | Actual Success Rate | Overall True Kicker Rating | Ave. Difficulty | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jarrod Croker | 48 | 42 | 87.50% | 11.89 | 75.12% | 12.38% |
| Adam Reynolds | 56 | 48 | 85.71% | 11.07 | 75.83% | 9.89% |
| Cameron Smith | 59 | 51 | 86.44% | 10.69 | 77.38% | 9.06% |
| Shaun Johnson | 66 | 51 | 77.27% | 6.39 | 72.44% | 4.84% |
| Nathan Cleary | 59 | 49 | 83.05% | 5.90 | 78.06% | 5.00% |
| Kyle Flanagan | 68 | 55 | 80.88% | 4.62 | 77.49% | 3.40% |
| Mitchell Moses | 41 | 34 | 82.93% | 2.60 | 79.76% | 3.17% |
| Jamayne Isaako | 22 | 16 | 72.73% | 1.47 | 69.38% | 3.35% |
| Ash Taylor | 34 | 24 | 70.59% | 0.31 | 70.14% | 0.45% |
| Zac Lomax | 54 | 41 | 75.93% | -1.09 | 76.94% | -1.01% |
| Moses Mbye | 41 | 26 | 63.41% | -3.82 | 68.08% | -4.66% |
| Kodi Nikorima | 22 | 15 | 68.18% | -4.53 | 78.47% | -10.29% |
| Reuben Garrick | 50 | 36 | 72.00% | -5.60 | 77.60% | -5.60% |
| Kyle Feldt | 36 | 23 | 63.89% | -9.19 | 76.65% | -12.76% |
| Kalyn Ponga | 59 | 40 | 67.80% | -12.82 | 78.66% | -10.87% |
Jarrod Croker is the premier goal kicker in the competition through 14 rounds. He's earnt the Raiders almost 12 extra points compared to the average kicker while knocking them over at an NRL-best 87.5% -12.38% above expectation. Adam Reynolds with an 11.07 True Kicker Rating and Cameron Smith at 10.69 round out the top three most valuable kickers in the NRL before a big drop to Shaun Johnson at 4th (6.39TKR).
At the bottom of the list, Kalyn Ponga has left more points on the tee than any other kicker with at least 20 attempts. His -12.82 represents how many points he has lost for the Knights below the average NRL goal kicker.
However, Kyle Feldt's -12.76% is the worst differential between the average difficulty of kicks attempted and his actual success rate.
Feldt's horror night with the boot in Round 14 offers a prime example of his struggles this season and how a poor performance off the tee can be the difference between winning and losing.
We last looked at Reuben Garrick's nightmare with the boot in Round 3 when he landed just two of his seven attempts. We would expect the average NRL kicker to have knocked over five of the seven (rounded to the nearest whole number) on that occasion.
This time, it's Feldt coming under the microscope.
| Attempts | Goals | Ave. Difficulty Rating | Expected Goals | Rounded Expected Goals | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Feldt | 7 | 3 | 69.95% | 4.90 | 5 |
| Reynolds | 6 | 5 | 80.45% | 4.83 | 5 |
His North Queensland Cowboys lost to the South Sydney Rabbitohs in a 31-30 thriller in Round 14. The Cowboys scored six tries to the Rabbitohs five but the big difference came in the goal kicking.
While the game will be remembered for Adam Reynolds burying yet another field goal, he put South Sydney in position to attempt the match-winner by first kicking well off the tee. Given the attempts Reynolds faced, we would expect the average NRL kicker to convert five from six - just as he did on Saturday.
Feldt, on the other hand, fell short of the expected five from seven to kick just three from seven on the night.
The four expected points Feldt missed allowed Reynolds and the Rabbitohs to chase a field goal in the dying moments rather than the much more difficult assignment of scoring a try and landing the conversion.
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