rodgerfox wrote: ↑Fri 19 Jul 2013 4:07pm
We're in deep s***.
Well, let me clarify that....we
could well be in deep s***.
We sit in that unfortunate position of missing a generation of good players. And by good players, I mean players who will win you games. If you're lucky (or maybe it's more than luck) you develop young guys whilst you still have mid-old guys performing at their best.
That way, when the mid-old guys retire or get older and their input diminishes, there are other dudes ready to go. Geelong are an example of that.
The other thing Geelong are an example of, and so are we, is that our old guys aren't genuine ball winners. Geelong's are.
If you're trying to blood young kids whilst they have to win their own ball each week and play key roles, you're going to get killed more often than not.
If you have Coreys, Enrights etc. still winning their own nut - life is far easier for the Christensons etc. of the world. Go back a few years and the same thing applied. They were able to bring Selwood in as a 4th onballer, Taylor came in as a 3rd defender and so on and so on.
However if you look at us, our 'old guys' aren't really genuine ball winners. Roo is, but Milne, Dal, Joey, Fisher probably aren't. For Fisher to be at his best, he gets free and/or plays 3rd man up. But to have that luxury, you need a key defender to hold the contest. Suddenly we're either getting Fisher to hold that contest himself (whic hisn't really his go) or asking a child to do it. It means we lose the contest more often than not - and at the same time Fisher's influence is reduced.
Our backline and midfield are in dire imbalance in regards to the above point at the moment.
With Roo, our forward line has been able to ease a few dudes through. They will be better for it as time goes by and will develop faster.
So at present, we're in trouble. But that's Ok, it happens. You have your highs then you will then have your lows. Some lower than others (due to the above). Carlton will be in exactly the same boat. However at least we had 2 GFs to show for it.
Carlton's older guys aren't ball winners. So when it comes tmie to blood new guys, they're going to have to do it the hard way.
As for the future, this is why I say we
may well be in deep s*** going forward....
The team we see right now, may not be the team that takes us forward. From the current crop of 'middle tier players', some may not improve. Which means any improvement in the team will come solely from the kids. That will take years.
What if the kids we see playing now, don't come in in the next 1-2 years and give genuine glimpses that they'll be good enough to take us forward as a contender? That would mean we'd then have to wait for another crop of kids to come through and hope for the best. The difference there would be that in that scenario the new crop would be very high in the draft!
6 weeks ago, I didn't really see anything to give me confidence that our kids were going to be any good. However now, I'm starting to like what I see. I watched Sandy last week and I'm quietly pleased with what we have coming through, and how we seem to be managing them for the future.
With any luck, we may have a crop of 5-6 genuinely good players come through together, and notch up 50-100 games around the same time. This is the recipe to success that we need to hope for. A crop of kids coming through, learning the trade together and peaking together. Getting one top 3 draft pick isn't the key. Getting a bunch of good kids coming through is what you need.
If we can do this, which I tend to think we can, and Armitage, Stevens, Gwilt, Gilbert etc. get better or don't get any worse, and we use the draft well and get another couple of good kids each year - we could be contending again in 3 years.
However, if we can't get at least 4-5 of our current kids being A or B graders within the next 3-4 years - we're in deep s***.
