How Far?

[dragit]

The past 4 years are the least of our worries... The previous few were the bigger problem.

Tell me which of these clubs now challenging haven't spent time down the bottom in the past 15 years.... Hawthorn, Fremantle, Collingwood, Port, WCE? That would be NONE.

Geelong & Sydney have bucked the trend with some significant advantages.

[gringo]

Plugger and Dragit

Your loyalty and support is fantastic. Reality is though, over the past 4 years the club has put itself in a position of having to rebuild, because of a number of poorly managed decisions.

Salary Cap management poor... Been stated
Drafting poor... Now understood
Development whilst at the top poor... It now shows
Drafting of multiple mature age players delisted from elsewhere was desperate... And showed that the understanding of the list was limited and limited development
Maister, Polo, Begley, Milera, Saad, TDL, Lee, Shenton, Johnson, Pattison
Loss of Ross Lyon .... Careless
Coaching selection.... Unfortunate


Decline is never inevitable as has been proven by other clubs.... But to justify our position... Apologists lead us to believe that.
I don't accept that you can't develop when you're at the top.... Because of that
I also don't accept that you only have a window... It's rubbish
Proven so by the very clubs whose window has been open for a decade .... And is still wide open

Bottoming out will NOT ensure us any success down the track other clubs have roved that.


Sustained success gives. You the best opportunity ....

We dropped the ball wrt player development whilst on top... And that has come back to bite us.

We rebuild now...
We compete with Port, Bulldogs, GWS, GC.... Good Luck there

Now
It's a long road ahead. With absolutely NO guarantees.

Begley was traded out of St Kilda to Adelaide? He was from the national draft wasn't he. Tim Watson said he was our next captain.....good judge. Will johnson, Milera, Shents and Saad were playing state league footy not at other clubs.

Ross Lyon had a very stagnant list management attitude and saw a stable team as the way to go. Hardly any kids got played under him compared to teams like Geelong, Collingwood and hawthorn. So Lyon probably would have needed to continue to bring in outside ready made players.

Geelong has defied gravity to stay up but they have three top stars at least that will go in the next couple of years then they might hit the ground a bit more. Hawthorn and Collingwood were both down the bottom before going back up for a sustained period. We had nearly a decade of being at the top end of the ladder, that's success despite not getting the final prize. Hawks claimed they based their rebuild model on ours.

I see it as mistakes are made by all clubs and while we haven't done as well as some we have given a red hot go. Compared to Richmond and Melbourne who spent huge amounts of time down the ladder and still failed to get moving again. I don't like being uncompetitive but I can swallow the bad times if I believe we have a cohesive plan in place and people I believe are on the right track. I'm pretty happy with our off field recruitment ATM and the plan seems to be being implemented in a responsible and structured way. It seems they are trying to speed up the process and have markers in place. Not the best place we find ourselves but at least there is a light at the end of the tunnel.

[BigMart]

Colm Begley

[BigMart]

Dragit
If you go back far enough every team has been on the bottom

15 years is a generation ago.

If you believe that Sydney and Geelong won premierships because of a few players you fail to understand how they are won.

Geelong have lost since 2007
The best player in the game
The best FB possibly ever
Both those F/S picks that weren't there in 2011
2 captains
Joel Corey
Paul Chapman
Josh Hunt
Brad Ottens
Darren Millburne

They've almost managed to turn over a whole team.... Whilst at the top of the ladder, by continually evolving their team/list.
smart drafting, good developing at VFL and AFL level... And better management.

Sydney
Just have a good onfield culture

[BigMart]

Anyways

Back on track...

We will need 2 key defenders and a spare
Delaney
Bruce
XXXXX

We will need a small defender and a spare
Geary
XXXXX

We will need a third tall defender/Utility and a spare
Roberton/Shenton
XXXXXX

We will need two running backs and a spare
Webster & Wright
Shenton

We need 6 inside Midfielders (2 Run With)
Steven, Curran/Saunders, Dunstan, XXXX, XXXXX, Weller

We need three outside mids 2+1 (w) and two spares
Newnes, Acres, Markworth
XXXXX, XXXX

Two Key fwds (one who can pinch hit ruck) and a spare
XXXX, XXXX
XXXX

Two small fwds (one who is defensive)
Saunders/Curran, Billings

A medium Fwd
Siposs/Murdoch

Trade potential
Seb Ross for Tayte Pears or try and get Tate as a FA
Sam Gilbert and Dave Armitage to Brisbane for picks (one inside top 20)
Stanley to Essendonn for Carlisle and pick exchange or to Adelaide for Josh Jenkins and pick exchange or Richmond for Vickery/Griffiths... Sam Reid Sydney
Key fwd with first selection in the ND (McCartin/Wright/Goddard)
Pre Season selection..... Best Uncontracted player..... GWS/Sydney... Would love Parker/Treloar
1 Free Agent at 25yo (look for a underrated player, good leader, ie/Robbie Gray, David McKay)


We need to go hard IMO

[Old Mate]

Trade potential
Seb Ross for Tayte Pears or try and get Tate as a FA
Sam Gilbert and Dave Armitage to Brisbane for picks (one inside top 20)
Stanley to Essendonn for Carlisle and pick exchange or to Adelaide for Josh Jenkins and pick exchange or Richmond for Vickery/Griffiths... Sam Reid Sydney
Key fwd with first selection in the ND (McCartin/Wright/Goddard)
Pre Season selection..... Best Uncontracted player..... GWS/Sydney... Would love Parker/Treloar
1 Free Agent at 25yo (look for a underrated player, good leader, ie/Robbie Gray, David McKay)


We need to go hard IMO

With Lenny likely retiring at the end of the season and Jones a possibility to be gone as well our midfield depth will further take a hit. We cannot afford to lose both Ross and Armitage. If we recruit a ready to go midfielder or two (Shiel, Gaff, Treloar etc) then we can look at trading to get extra picks.

Pick 3 and 23 for Shiel, O'Rourke and pick 19 (end of first round compo pick)
Armo for pick 21 (from Bris)
Pick 21 for Gaff
Gilbert for 36 (from Haw)
Picks 19, 31, 36 and 41 in the draft.

Stack the midfield and look at FA/out of contract talls from GWS in a year or two for tall forwards

Midfield group under 22:
Ross - inside (former pick 25)
Newnes - outside (former pick 37)
Billings - outside (former pick 3)
Dunstan - inside (former pick 18)
Acres - outside (former pick 19)
Shiel - inside (pre-selected, regarded top 5 pick)
O'Rourke - inside (former pick 2)
Gaff - outside (former pick 4)

Suddenly we've got one of the most young and talented midfield groups in the competition. Then up to our development program to get the best out of them.

[Dave McNamara]

Hi Mart, from your posts above, here's my assessment/s for what they're worth...

I'm a Rhys fan, but if we could get Josh Jenkins, or even Sam Reid...
I wouldn't touch Vickery though... total dud IMHO. They say Rhys needs more grunt. What's Vickery's excuse then?


Swines: I agree re the culture thing,
but don't forget that little matter of the extra $800K in their cap', coz it's soooooo much more expensive for blokes on an average of ~$250K a year to live in Sydney than Melbourne.
(And on that logic... no one has yet explained to me why the Crones, Nought Power, Teddies, Wogans and Hillbillies don't have their salary caps reduced... location hardship allowance maybe...? )

Mart, I reckon, look back at our recent flag 'contending' sides. The infamous 'bottom six' was always put up as a major reason why we never quite got there.
Now, if we had the Swine's extra $800K cap space to boost our 'bottom six'... how many flags would we have won?
I say more than the two that they did.
If we had their home ground advantage... add a couple more flags.

The deck is stacked in their favour. Breaking that down, sure I still admit that they've done well, but nowhere near as well as is made out.


Hillbillies: Like the Swines, have a fantastic home ground advantage. Brilliant on them for realising that this is priceless!!! Allows them to match that home advantage of the interstate sides.

They also make money... 26,000 crowd nets them $850,000, while it costs us ~$73,000... so we are spotting them not far short of a million dollars per home game.

How do we compete long term with that...?

The other brilliant things they have done are their recruiting, and their very flat pay rates.
No one was on more than $400K in those premiership sides...
c/f with our bursting cap, which was one reason that forced Ro$$y to recruit as he did.
(I suspect a lack of faith in our recruiters may have been another reason...)

We have now addressed recruiting, salary cap, and have evened-out our pay scales.
With luck the boutique home ground will be the final piece of the puzzle,
but as Pluggs knows on that one, 'Rome wasn't built in a day'.

[BigMart]

Old mate

I don't think we'll even look at trading picks... In fact the opposite...

We will look at one more inside top 20

Mid Grunt
Delaney, Acres, Weller have helped ease that.... Along with Jack and Joey
We will look for another from somewhere else IMO


KPP forward is the worry to me?

[Old Mate]

Old mate

I don't think we'll even look at trading picks... In fact the opposite...

We will look at one more inside top 20

Mid Grunt
Delaney, Acres, Weller have helped ease that.... Along with Jack and Joey
We will look for another from somewhere else IMO


KPP forward is the worry to me?

I can tell you right now we threw the kitchen sink at Shiel last year and we rated him higher than Billings. He's very highly rated by our club and wants to play for us. We'll have another crack at him this year and if GWS don't trade we'll go again in 2015 when his contract expires. Pelchen wants talent. Whether its via the draft or a trade doesn't matter.

Drafting talls is very risky. You just don't know whether they won the footy in the juniors because they were big kids or not. And even when they do work out they generally take at a minimum an extra 2-3 pre-seasons than mids/mediums to come on. The Swans know this and get their big boys with trades: Tippet, Buddy, Hall, Plugger, Richards, Mummy, Derickx, Laidler etc.

Investing heavily on talls with low picks in the draft is fraught with danger. Clubs are steering clear unless the player is a freak like Tom Boyd, Hogan, Patton etc.

[bob__71]

A. I think we have really felt the loss of Hickey this year.
B. I hope longer makes it, but he has a lot of work to do as far as a making an impact as a big man.
C. I dislike the new forum moderation. Ever since people get banned for having a go at your school teacher, condescending, "I'm the king of the forum" attitude you have become even more annoying.

[Dave McNamara]

I can tell you right now we threw the kitchen sink at Shiel last year and we rated him higher than Billings. He's very highly rated by our club and wants to play for us. We'll have another crack at him this year and if GWS don't trade we'll go again in 2015 when his contract expires. Pelchen wants talent. Whether its via the draft or a trade doesn't matter.

Drafting talls is very risky. You just don't know whether they won the footy in the juniors because they were big kids or not. And even when they do work out they generally take at a minimum an extra 2-3 pre-seasons than mids/mediums to come on. The Swans know this and get their big boys with trades: Tippet, Buddy, Hall, Plugger, Richards, Mummy, Derickx, Laidler etc.

Investing heavily on talls with low picks in the draft is fraught with danger. Clubs are steering clear unless the player is a freak like Tom Boyd, Hogan, Patton etc.

Great post Ole' Mate!!! A light bulb moment for me. (Ok, on reflection that's too hard. )

Are standout juniors doing it on talent, or on a size advantage...? That theory always made a hellova' lotta' sense to me. But your post has gone to the next step... the best way to get around this issue.


And thanks for sharing re our interest in Shiel. I'm sure that he and Rory will get along just fine together wearing our gorgeous tri-panel.

[BigMart]

Good post!

[BigMart]

Sorry, good post Bob!

Old Mate
Hasen't it been written in our blueprint that we will be trading into the draft for the next three year and increasing our top 20 selections by 50%
It seems as though it would go against what he's presented to the board?

I agree Shiel is a very high talent. But it would take a top 5 pick to get him, and having 3 elite junior Talls at the top of the draft... It's a huge risk.
There are countless very good mids.... Very good key fwds are like Gold
It's what makes Nick Riewoldt so important.

[Old Mate]

Sorry, good post Bob!

Old Mate
Hasen't it been written in our blueprint that we will be trading into the draft for the next three year and increasing our top 20 selections by 50%
It seems as though it would go against what he's presented to the board?

I agree Shiel is a very high talent. But it would take a top 5 pick to get him, and having 3 elite junior Talls at the top of the draft... It's a huge risk.
There are countless very good mids.... Very good key fwds are like Gold
It's what makes Nick Riewoldt so important.

We increased our top 20 picks by 300% last year so we are well ahead, and plans change. I don't think the board would care if we strayed from the plan if it involved getting high quality players onto the list that fit the right age group.

Getting Shiel would likely involve our first rounder (probably pick 3). Who's to say we don't get a top 20 pick thrown back our way like the Demons did in the Dom Tyson deal? Then we are still on target to maintain top 20 picks and follow the plan.

Last year we picked three teenagers in the draft....All midfielders....And then traded in three developed talls (Longer, Bruce and Delaney).

[spert]

It's not too bad overall- excessive injury problems and inexperienced coaching probably caused us to drop two games we could have won. The team is unbalanced across the lines and unsettled as a result and it will take this season to sort out quite a few of the newer players to see who is going to have a future or not at senior level.

[saintjake]

I don't even read posts that BigMart posts in anymore.
Just argues all the time, back and forth with other posters and constantly puts down other people's opinions.

The whole thing with Hickey is so over played.
Just drags the vibe of the site down

[BigMart]

Saint Jake

You just replied to a post, and to must have read my posts on this thread to form your post??

Are you making a point on topic... Or just announcing a personal POV to the forum about me? Why was/is that necessary .... You can have that opinion, no probs... Who are you broadcasting it to?

Why is any opinion on me, even worth writing or reading about?

[BackFromUSA]

Not pig headed, otherwise I' would put a line through him... Honestly I can't see the attraction?
initially I thought, hang on he kicked a few goals against GWS. But reality is reality, he is average. He is like the anti Ben on SS though??
Ben couldn't ruck because he didn't win taps? Tom also can't win taps but can? So strange.
He can't take a mark, and is not strong or physical enough... IMO ... And to be a smaller ruckmen you need high mobility (Jeff White) or high skill (Everitt)
At least Longer smashes in with his big body. And you'll find, when he develops, he can play too..

Gringo, you're out of control?! Relax mate, it's like you're defending your first born?!

Saunders stamped? I really rate Josh... But he's not Darren Jarmen I can assure you..
Lee? He's 23 and not even a good VFL player really. Not that it matters, he's played 10. But it's the VFL I am concerned with?
Webster is clearly talented

Longer
Younger, bigger, stronger, more skilled and will pass Hickey by years end and be the #1 Ruckman next year. Not sure what attribute of Toms you're taken with?

I find it amazing that you offer up these opinions on guys careers based on a vibe after 10 games or so.

From a frequent observer of the forum, It's funny how one can critique another for giving opinions (note OPINIONS) on guys' careers, when so many are saying that Billings will be a gun after his handful of games.

In saying this, I also believe Billings is something special.

However, at the end of the day, it's his opinion. I'd like to quote one of my favourite comedians here: "Boooo! Your opinion is wrong!"

BEST and FUNNIEST first post ever. Welcome Saintberra.

[gringo]

Trade potential
Seb Ross for Tayte Pears or try and get Tate as a FA
Sam Gilbert and Dave Armitage to Brisbane for picks (one inside top 20)
Stanley to Essendonn for Carlisle and pick exchange or to Adelaide for Josh Jenkins and pick exchange or Richmond for Vickery/Griffiths... Sam Reid Sydney
Key fwd with first selection in the ND (McCartin/Wright/Goddard)
Pre Season selection..... Best Uncontracted player..... GWS/Sydney... Would love Parker/Treloar
1 Free Agent at 25yo (look for a underrated player, good leader, ie/Robbie Gray, David McKay)


We need to go hard IMO

With Lenny likely retiring at the end of the season and Jones a possibility to be gone as well our midfield depth will further take a hit. We cannot afford to lose both Ross and Armitage. If we recruit a ready to go midfielder or two (Shiel, Gaff, Treloar etc) then we can look at trading to get extra picks.

Pick 3 and 23 for Shiel, O'Rourke and pick 19 (end of first round compo pick)
Armo for pick 21 (from Bris)
Pick 21 for Gaff
Gilbert for 36 (from Haw)
Picks 19, 31, 36 and 41 in the draft.

Stack the midfield and look at FA/out of contract talls from GWS in a year or two for tall forwards

Midfield group under 22:
Ross - inside (former pick 25)
Newnes - outside (former pick 37)
Billings - outside (former pick 3)
Dunstan - inside (former pick 18)
Acres - outside (former pick 19)
Shiel - inside (pre-selected, regarded top 5 pick)
O'Rourke - inside (former pick 2)
Gaff - outside (former pick 4)

Suddenly we've got one of the most young and talented midfield groups in the competition. Then up to our development program to get the best out of them.

Gee that's a sweet midfield. I'd pay to watch that.