Those who are suggesting we trade one of our ruckmen

[SinCitySainter]

It is irrelevant this year anyway as we can't trade one this year as we will not get fair value for them.
It looks like Kruzuer, either Luenburger or Stefan Martin and possibly Lobbe are going to be up for trade and all would be more desirable than either of our two.
There are also a couple of others as well, I think it is Smith up at GCS and you would imagine either Griffen or Clarke from Freo will want more footy.
You can only get fair value for a ruck man if they are thin on the ground, this year they are not.
Keep them for one more year and then reevaluate.

[saintspremiers]

I'm happy if we keep Longer Hickey and Holmes for next year. Plenty of hacks to delist so it's not
like they are taking up valuable list space at this stage

[Jacks Back]

Why cant we trade a ruckman? One in a side is fine but as someone suggested you need to have the right one.

Hickey plays as a forward, gives Longer a chop out - you do mean we keep both, don't you?

The club will be flat out just replacing the guys who haven't made it, plus retirees. Some of the recruiting really has been poor, not just under Ross, but under Scott as well. Looks like Lee and White won't make it now, and we can probably add Markworth to that list as well, which is sad for the guy, but what can you do?

Then we have a few with massive question marks next to their name as well.

Hickey played well yesterday apparently but I don't think it works most times having him as a forward and Longer rucking. The problem we have is Longer can only play ruck. I think having Hickey as mainly a forward limits out ability to play Membery or McCartin. If it was me I would play Hickey in the ruck and he would be our lone ruckman.

We need to keep them both in my opinion. McCartin is going to take years, and Membery may or may not be the forward we all hope he will be.

Membrey kicked 5 today for Sandy on top of 4 last week. He should come back in this week really but then what do you do with the Hickey/Longer combo? I would tend to play Hickey as first ruck as he has more strings to his bow (marking, going forward, kicking goals) than Longer has (imho).

[Con Gorozidis]

Its a good problem to have? As others have posted, no rush on this. We have a luxury in the Ruck division. Lets wait and see.

[citywest]

If any team is willing to give pick 20 or better for Hickey then we should take it. We then have picks 5, 20 and 23 to use in the National draft. Pick 5 Darcy Parish, pick 20 Kieran Collins and pick 23 the best available midfielder. Then we promote Holmes and he becomes the backup ruck along with Pierce. It's a calculated risk worth taking IMHFO.

[skeptic]

I like our ruck stocks as they are to be honest.

Hickey and Longer fighting for the number 1 spot

Holmes looks likely but has a lot of of work to do... He has time

Pierce has been described as the most naturally talented of them... Starting to play well for Sandy. Could be a ruck forward. He also has time.

I say lets run with this

[whiskers3614]

If any team is willing to give pick 20 or better for Hickey then we should take it. We then have picks 5, 20 and 23 to use in the National draft. Pick 5 Darcy Parish, pick 20 Kieran Collins and pick 23 the best available midfielder. Then we promote Holmes and he becomes the backup ruck along with Pierce. It's a calculated risk worth taking IMHFO.

Are you Ross Lyon's investment adviser?
You keep peddling this line about Hickey and pick 20.
What pick did he cost us, has he gone backwards that much?
While we're promoting Holmes on VFL form , we might want to grab that Jones guy who keeps getting 30plus possessions!

[citywest]

If any team is willing to give pick 20 or better for Hickey then we should take it. We then have picks 5, 20 and 23 to use in the National draft. Pick 5 Darcy Parish, pick 20 Kieran Collins and pick 23 the best available midfielder. Then we promote Holmes and he becomes the backup ruck along with Pierce. It's a calculated risk worth taking IMHFO.

Are you Ross Lyon's investment adviser?
You keep peddling this line about Hickey and pick 20.
What pick did he cost us, has he gone backwards that much?
While we're promoting Holmes on VFL form , we might want to grab that Jones guy who keeps getting 30plus possessions!

I'm just looking at ways to improve our list but not for the now. For 2018 and beyond. Parish would be a replacement for Montagna, Collins would be a replacement for Fisher/Dempster and pick 23 will be used on a much needed midfielder.

[LTN16]

If any team is willing to give pick 20 or better for Hickey then we should take it. We then have picks 5, 20 and 23 to use in the National draft. Pick 5 Darcy Parish, pick 20 Kieran Collins and pick 23 the best available midfielder. Then we promote Holmes and he becomes the backup ruck along with Pierce. It's a calculated risk worth taking IMHFO.

Are you Ross Lyon's investment adviser?
You keep peddling this line about Hickey and pick 20.
What pick did he cost us, has he gone backwards that much?
While we're promoting Holmes on VFL form , we might want to grab that Jones guy who keeps getting 30plus possessions!

I'm just looking at ways to improve our list but not for the now. For 2018 and beyond. Parish would be a replacement for Montagna, Collins would be a replacement for Fisher/Dempster and pick 23 will be used on a much needed midfielder.

You just worry about your own team chitypest.. We will be alright.

[Saint wagga]

Glad to see Hickey clunk some marks and look more dangerous up forward and he and Longer seemingly work more as a combo. Certainly an example of that setup working better. I hope it's not the last time, but I also expect more short term frustration and average performances along the journey. I just hope we stay the journey...and given Longer has missed like 1 game in nearly 2 seasos of footy, there will be injury along the way you'd where having a good stock of rucks will be key to a really powerful squad.

[plugger66]

Glad to see Hickey clunk some marks and look more dangerous up forward and he and Longer seemingly work more as a combo. Certainly an example of that setup working better. I hope it's not the last time, but I also expect more short term frustration and average performances along the journey. I just hope we stay the journey...and given Longer has missed like 1 game in nearly 2 seasos of footy, there will be injury along the way you'd where having a good stock of rucks will be key to a really powerful squad.

Do you think hickey will be happy to play second fiddle to Longer all next season? Im worried that if he plays up forward all year he will dropped a few times because he isn't really a forward. Good game this week but has struggled most weeks when playing forward.

[saynta]

If any team is willing to give pick 20 or better for Hickey then we should take it. We then have picks 5, 20 and 23 to use in the National draft. Pick 5 Darcy Parish, pick 20 Kieran Collins and pick 23 the best available midfielder. Then we promote Holmes and he becomes the backup ruck along with Pierce. It's a calculated risk worth taking IMHFO.

Rubbish, rubbish and more rubbish.

Bit like Armo to the Tigers rant last year.

Hickey just played one of his better games for the saints last week. There is no way that the Saints will trade him

Yes we might get pick 5 , then again we might not. Carlton may yet get picks 1 & 2, Brisbane 3 & 4, Essendon 5 & 6 and the Gold Coast 7 & 8. Our first pick could be 9 or 10 depending where the Dees finish up. God only knows what no our second pick will be.

Pierce and Holmes aren't really good VFL players at this stage. Who knows if either will make it to AFL level. I very much doubt both of them will.

[Saint wagga]

Glad to see Hickey clunk some marks and look more dangerous up forward and he and Longer seemingly work more as a combo. Certainly an example of that setup working better. I hope it's not the last time, but I also expect more short term frustration and average performances along the journey. I just hope we stay the journey...and given Longer has missed like 1 game in nearly 2 seasos of footy, there will be injury along the way you'd where having a good stock of rucks will be key to a really powerful squad.

Do you think hickey will be happy to play second fiddle to Longer all next season? Im worried that if he plays up forward all year he will dropped a few times because he isn't really a forward. Good game this week but has struggled most weeks when playing forward.

I'm just glad both are in the 1's because even though Hickey is playing up forward, he is still spending what 20-30% of time in the ruck as well...and I think the more time these young rucks spend at AFL level, with the speed of the game etc...the better. I'd think Hickey would see any chance to be playing the 1's as good and a chance to push his case for unseating Longer as current no.1 pick...but the psychology is all hyopthetical I guess.

Hopefully he can even the ledger between better games and below par games with more experience and development.

[Indigo Wolf]

should have a look at Essendon. They traded Jenkins, who is now at Adelaide, because they had Bellchambers and Ryder, and now they don't have jack.
And although the second half wasn't stellar, I thought we saw enough today to give us some evidence that the club is heading in the right direction.

Quite honestly, I think you're looking at it wrong. The second half was horrendous, I'd expect more from that move. Looks like it's going to be a looong season.

[samuraisaint]

Possibly Indigo, possibly. But I have also been following St. Kilda for a very long time, and I remember two blokes running around in the reserves at Moorabbin for years, who took a while to click playing together by the names of Lazar Vidovic and Peter Everitt, who when they did click, combined well enough to take us right to the very top of the ladder in over 30 years and our first Grand Final in a quarter of a century. When they both got injured within one week of each other at the very beginning of the finals, our premiership dream went with them. The big blokes take a bit longer to come on.
And North are a side who can beat anybody on their day, who are absolutely flying now. The third quarter was garbage; yes, but I'd rather follow us than 6 other teams doing the rounds at the moment.