Don't blame Lyon

[older saint]

IF Lovett did commit this crime it is no way RL's fault.

Lovett is a grown man and can make his own decisions. RL is his coach and boss if you like. Does your boss have to take the wrap if he hires you and you do the same type of thing - no.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing but this blaming of RL is absolute crap!

[Moods]

No-one's blaming Ross Lyon for what LOvett is alleged to have done. I agree Lovett makes his own decisions. I don't blame RL solely. Taking Lovett would have been a footy department decision, not just RL.

I never thought he worth the risk b/c of 2 reasons
a) Never thought he was/is half as good as many on here do.

b) History of being a knob jockey, but more importantly of being LAZY, hence harder to improve his game.

c) Then again I didn't want the club to take Cousins eithr - but at least he's a bloody good footballer who has a history of working his butt off at training and in games.


I agree it's easy in hindsight to shake ones head. Ross has more than enough credits on the board with me to allow it to go through to the keeper - this time.

[wasoncestkil58]

You are dead right there. If Lovett has done the wrong thing he is a slow learner.

[Longwayfromhome]

Who is to blame ?
Me or you or maybe Grant Thomas.
No one else wanted the piss head but we went ahead with the deal. Good decision or bad ?
Get rid of bad rubbish and bring on one of the rookies.

[Batnoe]

Who is to blame ?
Me or you or maybe Grant Thomas.
No one else wanted the piss head but we went ahead with the deal. Good decision or bad ?
Get rid of bad rubbish and bring on one of the rookies.

mmm nice post Longwayfromhome... he has the skill, how about you wait until he has been proven guilty and if we arent going to keep him before you say sack him and get a rookie....

[AnythingsPossibleSaints]

No-one's blaming Ross Lyon for what LOvett is alleged to have done.

Exactly. Ross wasn't responsible for that and I haven't seen anyone say he is. But surely Ross is the one most responsible for bringing him into the club. And for using up our first round draft pick on him. And if not, who is? And if not, what are we paying Ross the huge money for?
The simple fact is that in the past 3 months we've lost Luke Ball, Matt MaGuire, Xavier Clarke and maybe now our first round draft pick and all we look to have gotten in return is pick 60 (Jesse Smith, who may or may not play). And we also blew a Grand Final. If Ross is not responsible for all this, as head coach, then who is?

[SydneySainter]

No-one's blaming Ross Lyon for what LOvett is alleged to have done.

Exactly. Ross wasn't responsible for that and I haven't seen anyone say he is. But surely Ross is the one most responsible for bringing him into the club. And for using up our first round draft pick on him. And if not, who is? And if not, what are we paying Ross the huge money for?
The simple fact is that in the past 3 months we've lost Luke Ball, Matt MaGuire, Xavier Clarke and maybe now our first round draft pick and all we look to have gotten in return is pick 60 (Jesse Smith, who may or may not play). And we also blew a Grand Final. If Ross is not responsible for all this, as head coach, then who is?

This post has merit. Lyon is the head coach and ultimately, the buck stops with him. I'm a Lyon fan but if that's the attitude I had with GT, then that's the attitude I'll have with any other coach. How we traded this year will be remembered, depending on what kind of season we have.

If we have a great season and win the flag, no one will care.

But, if we have another 1998 or 2006, or worse...it will be remembered as the worst trade week in our history.

As for Maguire, given at how late he was taken in the draft, a lot of clubs clearly reckon his body will really struggle at the current pace of AFL footy.

As for X Clarke, it's about time we let go of this candle we've all held for him for the last six or so years. 'Next year will be his year', it was starting to sound like a broken record.

[matrix]

obviously im not going to blame RL
that would be a completely stoopid thing to do and would make me a pratt.

i blame one A Lovett.

[Maxstar22]

Blaming RL is like blaming my boss when I f**k up.

Noone else to blame but yourself.

[stinger]

Blaming RL is like blaming my boss when I f**k up.

Noone else to blame but yourself.

when people i hired f***ed up.....i didn't blame myself for their indiscretions....but i blamed myself for not seeing what dipshits they were in the first place.....in this case everyone knew he had form....

...draw your own conclusions....

[plugger66]

Blaming RL is like blaming my boss when I f**k up.

Noone else to blame but yourself.

when people i hired f***ed up.....i didn't blame myself for their indiscretions....but i blamed myself for not seeing what dipshits they were in the first place.....in this case everyone knew he had form....

...draw your own conclusions....

Yep took a risk with a risky player.

[Milton66]

Fact: This time last year it was Cousins

Fact: The club did their due dilligence but for whatever reason, didn't draft Cousins

Fact: There was a massive backlash on here because of the decision

Fact: Supporters derided the coach and club for being weak

Fact: Some supporters carried on about how we'd be no chance whatsoever in 2009

Fact: Supporters called the club gutless and insisted that to win a flag, they had to take risks

Fact: The club did it's DD on Lovett

Fact: The club took a risk in order to win a flag

Fact: So far it looks like a bad risk

Fact: Bow supporters are blaming Lyon and the club for doing what they wanted done with Cousins

Fact: There are some serious moronic supporters

[Mr Magic]

Blaming RL is like blaming my boss when I f**k up.

Noone else to blame but yourself.

when people i hired f***ed up.....i didn't blame myself for their indiscretions....but i blamed myself for not seeing what dipshits they were in the first place.....in this case everyone knew he had form....

...draw your own conclusions....

In this case, if the reports are to be believed, the Club went to great lengths to talk to the people who had been involved with Lovett previously and they overwhelmingly said he was worth the chance.
John Quinn (he's spoken about it publicly on SEN)
Kevin Sheedy
James Hird
amongst others.

Were they all wrong?
Did they all conspire on behalf of Lovett and/or the Essendon Football Club?

Clubs make decisions about the 'character' of players all the time. Sometimes they get it wrong.
Most times they get it correct.

[Eastern]

In this case, if the reports are to be believed, the Club went to great lengths to talk to the people who had been involved with Lovett previously and they overwhelmingly said he was worth the chance.
John Quinn (he's spoken about it publicly on SEN)
Kevin Sheedy
James Hird
amongst others.

Were they all wrong?
Did they all conspire on behalf of Lovett and/or the Essendon Football Club?

Clubs make decisions about the 'character' of players all the time. Sometimes they get it wrong.
Most times they get it correct.

Agreed.

Ross Lyon, Michael Nettlefold, Matthew Drain, John Quinn, Kevin Sheedy & James Hird are all professional, intelligent people. I would suspect that ALL of these professionals would have many different feelings about this situation; Anger, sadness, guilt, betrayal etc, etc. I could not even begin to believe that any of these people would be sniggering about this situation, as suggested in another thread !!

[stinger]

In this case, if the reports are to be believed, the Club went to great lengths to talk to the people who had been involved with Lovett previously and they overwhelmingly said he was worth the chance.
John Quinn (he's spoken about it publicly on SEN)
Kevin Sheedy
James Hird
amongst others.

Were they all wrong?
Did they all conspire on behalf of Lovett and/or the Essendon Football Club?

Clubs make decisions about the 'character' of players all the time. Sometimes they get it wrong.
Most times they get it correct.

Agreed.

Ross Lyon, Michael Nettlefold, Matthew Drain, John Quinn, Kevin Sheedy & James Hird are all professional, intelligent people. I would suspect that ALL of these professionals would have many different feelings about this situation; Anger, sadness, guilt, betrayal etc, etc. I could not even begin to believe that any of these people would be sniggering about this situation, as suggested in another thread !!

ask yourself this question...then answer it honestly....are you surprised????....sure ..we are all saddened, disappointed ...pissed off even.....but surprised.....?????...i'm not.....


...anyway...for what it's worth ...he hasn't been found guilty of anything yet...we are being a bit too judgmental for my liking....

[stinger]

i also have to agree with the last line of one of the posts above...there are some moronic supporters of our club......we all have them ...that's life...cousins was a confessed drug addict...a sickness...never charged by the police for that though....bit different to a guy who allegedly imprisoned his girlfriend in his car and then beat the s*** out of her for an hour.....proven enough for a court to grant her a restraining order which lovett then broke ....

...way different story to cousins.....

...seems we were wrong both times in our selections .imhfo that is...

[sainter35]

Jesus stinger if you're a bloody lawyer surely you know you can't make those kind of a allegations on an internet forum. Or because you said allegedly it's OK?

[axcellence]

I think it's really funny... in a sad way...

Cousins was not the main choice.. because of age... and preference of youth....(besides a drug addiction).

Lovett, a 27 year old (who will be 28 year old in his 1st year) was chosen despite history of bad behaviour including assaulting his ex-girlfriend... among other things....

Really consistent recruitment....

Oh... and Riewoldt wanted cousins... and had reservations about Lovett... both time overruled.

Along with the Ball fiasco, I think the entire post 2009 off season feels like a session on rebounding off after hookers after getting dumped by your gf.

[joffaboy]

Blaming RL is like blaming my boss when I f**k up.

Noone else to blame but yourself.

when people i hired f***ed up.....i didn't blame myself for their indiscretions....but i blamed myself for not seeing what dipshits they were in the first place.....in this case everyone knew he had form....

...draw your own conclusions....

In this case, if the reports are to be believed, the Club went to great lengths to talk to the people who had been involved with Lovett previously and they overwhelmingly said he was worth the chance.
John Quinn (he's spoken about it publicly on SEN)
Kevin Sheedy
James Hird
amongst others.

Were they all wrong?
Did they all conspire on behalf of Lovett and/or the Essendon Football Club?

I believe they did conspire to get Lovett out of Essendon.

if he was such a good risk, why would Essendon not want to keep him after his best season ever???

Essendon are pissing themselves laughing at us and thanking God they disposed of this time bomb before it blew up in their faces.

It has blown up in ours.

And it is the coaches responsibility. he brought him to our club.

Why cant Lyon be critisised? Is he the new Grant Thomas or something.

Facts are it looks like Lyon has farked up badly on this one and coupled with not getting anything for Luke Ball now makes this look ever worse.

Lyon is the one responsible for the club and recruitment - deal with it.

[Mr Magic]

Blaming RL is like blaming my boss when I f**k up.

Noone else to blame but yourself.

when people i hired f***ed up.....i didn't blame myself for their indiscretions....but i blamed myself for not seeing what dipshits they were in the first place.....in this case everyone knew he had form....

...draw your own conclusions....

In this case, if the reports are to be believed, the Club went to great lengths to talk to the people who had been involved with Lovett previously and they overwhelmingly said he was worth the chance.
John Quinn (he's spoken about it publicly on SEN)
Kevin Sheedy
James Hird
amongst others.

Were they all wrong?
Did they all conspire on behalf of Lovett and/or the Essendon Football Club?

I believe they did conspire to get Lovett out of Essendon.

if he was such a good risk, why would Essendon not want to keep him after his best season ever???

Essendon are pissing themselves laughing at us and thanking God they disposed of this time bomb before it blew up in their faces.

It has blown up in ours.

And it is the coaches responsibility. he brought him to our club.

Why cant Lyon be critisised? Is he the new Grant Thomas or something.

Facts are it looks like Lyon has farked up badly on this one and coupled with not getting anything for Luke Ball now makes this look ever worse.

Lyon is the one responsible for the club and recruitment - deal with it.

I don't know if you're being serious or just winding everyone up Joffa, but I heard Quinn on SEN when the 'drunk & disorderly' charges were laid on Lovett and he was either speaking honestly and openly or he's an actor deserving of an Oscar.
He sounded legitimately shattered by what had supposedly transpired and not like someone who had 'conspired with others to offload a bad apple' onto St Kilda.

And in regards to Luke Ball, I don't believe that the 2 issues are connected at all.

My understanding is that we would have gone after Lovett whether Ball stayed or not.

And of course Lyon can be criticized, when it is warranted.

Only GT reached the exalted status of being above criticism on here.
Lyon's not even close to reaching that position yet.

[MC Gusto]

lovett is a jet. i am glad he is on our list. no will complain when he burns a tab from the wing and bombs a goal from 55 out.

[barks4eva]

Blaming RL is like blaming my boss when I f**k up.

Noone else to blame but yourself.

when people i hired f***ed up.....i didn't blame myself for their indiscretions....but i blamed myself for not seeing what dipshits they were in the first place.....in this case everyone knew he had form....

...draw your own conclusions....

As did Gardiner, whom Ross Lyon gave an opportunity to and IMHO he was worthy of AA ruckman status, had a stellar season and helped us to make a Grand Final!

Be selective if you will, but we have Ross Lyon to thank for turning our club around and getting us into a Grand Final within 3 years after the shambolic mess he inherited.

You want to look at poor recruiting and player management, then look no further than your hero who F****** up ad nauseum.

Anyone with a clue knows that we should be very grateful that we have Ross Lyon coaching us and that he and the new professional football department have managed to turn this list around with some astute recruiting thus far and fast tracked it at that.

So a prima donna private schoolboy who was paid way over the odds at $600,000 walked, FFS who was the clown that had Ball on $600,000 to begin with?

Ball was required and considering he was only about top 15 in our B&F $350,000 a year is more in line with his output on what he was delivering.

Gardiner has been a massive bonus if you look at 2009!

I'm just a bit annoyed we didn't take Cousins, that's about all!

Blame Lyon if you want to stick your head in the sand, but IMHO it was a gamble worthtaking, as was Gardiner and IMHO so should have been the case with Cousins!

I have nothing to blame Ross Lyon for, other than turning this club around and making us a genuine premiership contender.

Ross Lyon is IMHO the best coach in the AFL bar none.


FAIR DINKUM!

[barks4eva]

Only GT reached the exalted status of being above criticism on here.
Lyon's not even close to reaching that position yet.

really,

I remember saying one or two negative things about Thomas, can't remember anyone ever having an issue with that!

[Saintersss]

Blaming RL is like blaming my boss when I f**k up.

Noone else to blame but yourself.

when people i hired f***ed up.....i didn't blame myself for their indiscretions....but i blamed myself for not seeing what dipshits they were in the first place.....in this case everyone knew he had form....

...draw your own conclusions....

As did Gardiner, whom Ross Lyon gave an opportunity to and IMHO he was worthy of AA ruckman status, had a stellar season and helped us to make a Grand Final!

Be selective if you will, but we have Ross Lyon to thank for turning our club around and getting us into a Grand Final within 3 years after the shambolic mess he inherited.

You want to look at poor recruiting and player management, then look no further than your hero who F****** up ad nauseum.

Anyone with a clue knows that we should be very grateful that we have Ross Lyon coaching us and that he and the new professional football department have managed to turn this list around with some astute recruiting thus far and fast tracked it at that.

So a prima donna private schoolboy who was paid way over the odds at $600,000 walked, FFS who was the clown that had Ball on $600,000 to begin with?

Ball was required and considering he was only about top 15 in our B&F $350,000 a year is more in line with his output on what he was delivering.

Gardiner has been a massive bonus if you look at 2009!

I'm just a bit annoyed we didn't take Cousins, that's about all!

Blame Lyon if you want to stick your head in the sand, but IMHO it was a gamble worthtaking, as was Gardiner and IMHO so should have been the case with Cousins!

I have nothing to blame Ross Lyon for, other than turning this club around and making us a genuine premiership contender.

Ross Lyon is IMHO the best coach in the AFL bar none.


FAIR DINKUM!

Yes but how much did we give up for Gardiner? Very little and so if it was a failure we wouldn't lose much. Same with if we got Cousins we didn't stand a lot to lose.
But if you use a 1st round pick you have to be almost certain that they will pay off. Considering how cheap Fev went, I think we overpaid for someone who had many offield incidents... (I guess its easy to say in hinesight though)
And no one is arguing that Lyon hasn't done well up until now, but this draft/trade period has been a blunder and I'd say even Ross would admit that, lets just hope it doesn't affect the 2010 season.

[Mr Magic]

[And no one is arguing that Lyon hasn't done well up until now, but this draft/trade period has been a blunder and I'd say even Ross would admit that, lets just hope it doesn't affect the 2010 season.

Why has it been a blunder?
Have we actually played a game since we drafted anybody?

Just because you don't like who we drafted, nor apparently agree with the published reasons from those who made the selections, doesn't make those selections wrong.

Even the drafting of Brookes, Watts, Howard, McGough et al can only be judged as poor after those selections have had sufficient time to be properly judged.

You may well be proved right, but IMHO, you're engaging in some premature evaluation in your call.

And lastly, how do you know what Ross would/wouldn't admit to?