The mongrel punt. Preseason preview

[saynta]

https://themongrelpunt.com/afl-season-2 ... questions/

[gringo]

This is really well researched, it's worth paying $6 for access, I tried to post it with the members only bit unlocked on Bigfooty and I got a friendly message from the author asking not to so I won't do it here either. They are consistently the best researched footy journalists left and independent. It's the best $6 I've ever spent, cheaper than a bottle of water.

[shanegrambeau]

Thanks Gringo
It’s nice and I agree it’s probably a quality article but I didn’t see anything in the appetizer to pull out the credit card.

Let’s look at it.
Gresh suits forward more - agree ! 100%

(But didn’t that our midfield is weak) .

Howard is almost elite, ditto Marshall
Agree

Sharman
Too early to call..but looks great ..yep

And when it comes to the comp, we should realize most pundits have us falling off this year, not going higher. Why? Cos other teams have gotta more obvious improvement in them.
I hope Mongrel punt gets into that bit..just what teams will fall for us to rise..we don’t all get better. Lol

[shanegrambeau]

Thanks Gringo
It’s nice and I agree it’s probably a quality article but I didn’t see anything in the appetizer to pull out the credit card.

Let’s look at it.
Gresh suits forward more - agree ! 100%

(But didn’t that our midfield is weak) .

Howard is almost elite, ditto Marshall
Agree

Sharman
Too early to call..but looks great ..yep

And when it comes to the comp, we should realize most pundits have us falling off this year, not going higher. Why? Cos other teams have gotta more obvious improvement in them.
I hope Mongrel punt gets into that bit..just what teams will fall for us to rise..we don’t all get better. Lol

[WellardSaint]

Thanks Gringo
It’s nice and I agree it’s probably a quality article but I didn’t see anything in the appetizer to pull out the credit card.

Let’s look at it.
Gresh suits forward more - agree ! 100%

(But didn’t that our midfield is weak) .

Howard is almost elite, ditto Marshall
Agree

Sharman
Too early to call..but looks great ..yep

And when it comes to the comp, we should realize most pundits have us falling off this year, not going higher. Why? Cos other teams have gotta more obvious improvement in them.
I hope Mongrel punt gets into that bit..just what teams will fall for us to rise..we don’t all get better. Lol

I have been saying the same as you.
Everyone else has more upside than us.
Even if we improve 10% on last year, every other team has 15% or more.
Maybe not Suns and Norf, but Bombers, Blues, and the others, have better players in their squads- better fringe players than us.
Ross- he's hit his ceiling and is going downwards.
Kent- can't contribute and is just depth (bottom of barrel)
Geary- too old and injury prone.
Hannas- see Gears
Long- we've seen some of his best but he can't be relied on to bring it more than a few times a month
Joyce- should be delisted, can't be trusted.
There's others who escape me, but the entire fringe group shares one trait- unreliable and just there to make up the numbers

[magnifisaint]

Thanks Gringo
It’s nice and I agree it’s probably a quality article but I didn’t see anything in the appetizer to pull out the credit card.

Let’s look at it.
Gresh suits forward more - agree ! 100%

(But didn’t that our midfield is weak) .

Howard is almost elite, ditto Marshall
Agree

Sharman
Too early to call..but looks great ..yep

And when it comes to the comp, we should realize most pundits have us falling off this year, not going higher. Why? Cos other teams have gotta more obvious improvement in them.
I hope Mongrel punt gets into that bit..just what teams will fall for us to rise..we don’t all get better. Lol

I have been saying the same as you.
Everyone else has more upside than us.
Even if we improve 10% on last year, every other team has 15% or more.
Maybe not Suns and Norf, but Bombers, Blues, and the others, have better players in their squads- better fringe players than us.
Ross- he's hit his ceiling and is going downwards.
Kent- can't contribute and is just depth (bottom of barrel)
Geary- too old and injury prone.
Hannas- see Gears
Long- we've seen some of his best but he can't be relied on to bring it more than a few times a month
Joyce- should be delisted, can't be trusted.
There's others who escape me, but the entire fringe group shares one trait- unreliable and just there to make up the numbers

Don't agree with this at all. The season comes down to many things. Too numerous to list but the number of variables is great with injuries being the most important one, luck then comes after that. Get those right and everything then falls into place.

[magnifisaint]

Thanks Gringo
It’s nice and I agree it’s probably a quality article but I didn’t see anything in the appetizer to pull out the credit card.

Let’s look at it.
Gresh suits forward more - agree ! 100%

(But didn’t that our midfield is weak) .

Howard is almost elite, ditto Marshall
Agree

Sharman
Too early to call..but looks great ..yep

And when it comes to the comp, we should realize most pundits have us falling off this year, not going higher. Why? Cos other teams have gotta more obvious improvement in them.
I hope Mongrel punt gets into that bit..just what teams will fall for us to rise..we don’t all get better. Lol

I have been saying the same as you.
Everyone else has more upside than us.
Even if we improve 10% on last year, every other team has 15% or more.
Maybe not Suns and Norf, but Bombers, Blues, and the others, have better players in their squads- better fringe players than us.
Ross- he's hit his ceiling and is going downwards.
Kent- can't contribute and is just depth (bottom of barrel)
Geary- too old and injury prone.
Hannas- see Gears
Long- we've seen some of his best but he can't be relied on to bring it more than a few times a month
Joyce- should be delisted, can't be trusted.
There's others who escape me, but the entire fringe group shares one trait- unreliable and just there to make up the numbers

Don't agree with this at all. The season comes down to many things. Too numerous to list but the number of variables is great with injuries being the most important one, luck then comes after that. Get those right and everything then falls into place. I really do hate whinging at this time of the year. Everything has to be rosy, right!
Come on have some faith.

[shanegrambeau]

Thanks Gringo
It’s nice and I agree it’s probably a quality article but I didn’t see anything in the appetizer to pull out the credit card.

Let’s look at it.
Gresh suits forward more - agree ! 100%

(But didn’t that our midfield is weak) .

Howard is almost elite, ditto Marshall
Agree

Sharman
Too early to call..but looks great ..yep

And when it comes to the comp, we should realize most pundits have us falling off this year, not going higher. Why? Cos other teams have gotta more obvious improvement in them.
I hope Mongrel punt gets into that bit..just what teams will fall for us to rise..we don’t all get better. Lol

I have been saying the same as you.
Everyone else has more upside than us.
Even if we improve 10% on last year, every other team has 15% or more.
Maybe not Suns and Norf, but Bombers, Blues, and the others, have better players in their squads- better fringe players than us.
Ross- he's hit his ceiling and is going downwards.
Kent- can't contribute and is just depth (bottom of barrel)
Geary- too old and injury prone.
Hannas- see Gears
Long- we've seen some of his best but he can't be relied on to bring it more than a few times a month
Joyce- should be delisted, can't be trusted.
There's others who escape me, but the entire fringe group shares one trait- unreliable and just there to make up the numbers

Don't agree with this at all. The season comes down to many things. Too numerous to list but the number of variables is great with injuries being the most important one, luck then comes after that. Get those right and everything then falls into place. I really do hate whinging at this time of the year. Everything has to be rosy, right!
Come on have some faith.

Magnifisaint

You disagree with it all?
Most pundits have us falling off...that is a fact!
Luck will play a huge role. Absolutely! Yes. BUt it will for all teams, so it kind of cancels itself out.?
I don't know how vulnerable the other teams are re injuries.
We have in teh super high risk zone very few..

-Hannas
-Gresh
-Paddy
-Marshall
-Jones

Not too bad.
We have an abundance of defenders, some great forwards and a paucity of quality midfielders.

Of course, it's anyone's guess who will go down, but I see West Coast, Port Adelaide, Sydney, the Bulldogs perhaps, falling off and we might pinch games off Hawthorn, Collingwood, Adelaide, Freo even our old enemy North. We are miles better than Carlton, so we are guaranteed to lose that one at the end of the season as is our annual obligation - especially when improving at season's end.

I can't tell.
Our attitude has to change.

Those thrashings last year were appalling.

And one thing I disagree about the article was that we were flying high in 2020. I don't think so. We had a flurry at the end, but from the halfway mark of the season the rest of the comp were 'on to us' and we were very ordinary.

I actually predicted a terrible start to 2021! hehe blows his trumpet..so I'll be wrong wahtever I say this time. I see us anywhere from 4th to 14th!

[mad saint guy]

We didn't do much in the off season to improve the list in the short term and will be relying on two factors to climb the ladder.

1 - Keep more key players on the park for more of the season (Marshall, Ryder, Gresham, Jones, Paton, Clark played a combined 54 games out of a possible 132)

2 - Natural improvement from King, Clark, Coffield, Higgins, Battle, Sharman, Byrnes, Bytel and Connolly


Given that our older brigade offered basically nothing last year (Geary, Frawley, Hannebery, McKernan, Hunter) outside of Ryder, there's no concern about key players slowing down so we should improve. By how much is yet to be seen.

[Vortex]

This is really well researched, it's worth paying $6 for access, I tried to post it with the members only bit unlocked on Bigfooty and I got a friendly message from the author asking not to so I won't do it here either. They are consistently the best researched footy journalists left and independent. It's the best $6 I've ever spent, cheaper than a bottle of water.

What's in that article that we don't already know?

The first five questions needed to be free because it answered questuon anyone with a keyboard can answer.

Sorry gringo but it was lazy internet journalism for mine and not worth paying for.

[Vortex]

We didn't do much in the off season to improve the list in the short term and will be relying on two factors to climb the ladder.

1 - Keep more key players on the park for more of the season (Marshall, Ryder, Gresham, Jones, Paton, Clark played a combined 54 games out of a possible 132)

2 - Natural improvement from King, Clark, Coffield, Higgins, Battle, Sharman, Byrnes, Bytel and Connolly


Given that our older brigade offered basically nothing last year (Geary, Frawley, Hannebery, McKernan, Hunter) outside of Ryder, there's no concern about key players slowing down so we should improve. By how much is yet to be seen.

You nailed I reckon; we didn't do much in the off season to improve the list so outside of improvement coming from individual players, we are going to need a hell of a lot of luck with injuries. If we get that finals is possible.

[shanegrambeau]

I’d also like to read critical insight and analysis about our fixture.
Looking at Rounds 1 through 9

Our players will not have fans at games…

We have,
Late Sunday games
Cairns, Canberra,
Noon games,
Our first old school Saturday game guaranteed to draw big numbers of fans is a late starter against Geelong in Round Nine.
By that stage I think we could be 3-6, if we beat Coll, Haw and the Suns but no matter

St Kilda gets a crappy fixture in terms of crowd friendly. I don’t think we have huge TV ratings even though our supporter base is so broad.