plugger66 wrote:
The problem you have Gringo is looking through rose coloured glasses. its a good problem but makes it hard to really look at players ability. At the moment baring the old mids it is likely that Jack will be elite. There will be the Armo types in ability but there will also be the LJ conners types in ability. Maybe not as weak as he was but 3 or 4 on that list will never be mids of any note at all. names I will give you are Milera, Murdoch and saunders. They may make it elsewhere and I have pretty high hopes for saunders but not as mids. Even Wright and newnes may not end up as real mids. The only real mids on that list are Curren, Ross, Armo and Steven with Geary doing a tagging role if needed but again he is better elsewhere. We are 5 class mids short and that is why the 2 years is going to be very painful.
I think we need mids of quality but if you look back over the drafts a lot of the elite mids are taken between 8 and 25 in the draft. Ball and Judd were an exceptional pair of highly rated mids but using your number one to five pick on a mid can often bring a Bryce Gibbs, Scully, Trengove etc.
Fyfe was pick 20 something from memory in 2009. I think the only other close to elite mid from that year was Dusty and he went at 3 but still is a fair way from elite. I don't over rate all our players and I said we need some but you can keep getting them in and sending them out but you need to play the ones you rate.
To get 5 very high quality mids you need to get them in and develop them. They obviously think those above are worth trying to develop because they are being given every chance. I didn't say we don't need them I just said it's over stated. If Longer was taken he is not a bad recruiting decision because he isn't a mid fielder.
There are some very good mids that should slide to the late teen early twenties. Dumont, Dunstan, Hartung, Tsitas, Kennedy Harris etc.
You have no idea who will become elite out of the guys currently on our list. I think Armo will improve again and was starting to show some real dominance, Jack obviously made the biggest leap forward, Newnes has been earmarked to be fast tracked, Saunders has some special traits as does Wright who could easily transition into a fast outside mid, Curren looks like he's player for 4 years already and should get better as he adapts to the pace of AFL, Ross was starting to show plenty to suggest he could make it remembering it usually takes about 4 to 5 years to step up to an elite level for most mids.
i just hope we get the best player available not some one who is picked just because he dominates as an outside mid in the TAC cup.
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