Firstly Grant, I just wanna say that it's really appreciated that you come on here to Saintsational. I doubt that too many other/any other(?) fan forums can boast of a recent coach, Board member (bit less recent) and player (ok bit less recent again
) who has joined up
and can be bothered to share, and to participate in discussion/debate with us crazed fanatics. So thank you.
gringo wrote:Welcome back GT. I think you are probably entitled to feel pretty hard done by from your coaching career. You came close and in the end got sacked just as you were on the cusp. History shows you went close but I still wonder sometimes if the stability had been there we wouldn't have progressed. I think you were pretty unlucky with luke Penny too, his body stands up and you may have been the greatest footy story of all time. He trained like a rolls royce just couldn't get on the park enough. Instead your remembered as a bad guy who rolled Blight with out due process.
I reckon Gringo has nailed it with the Luke Penny observation. Great recruiting get! Around mid-2003 you got him on the park, to fullback, freed Fraser to go forward... and
immediately we started winning games!
It was just so obvious even I could pick that turning point.
Such a shame Luke's knee couldn't hold up.
Such a shame Aaron's kept him out for more than the 'two weeks'.
gringo wrote:I reckon you and Watters have a similar list style, he seems to be building a team able to attack from all angles. After watching some of the games you coached recently you had assembled a fantastic attack squad. We certainly had a more entertaining brand of footy under you.
I can see it too. Question Grant. Looking ahead about seven years, triple premiership coach Cuddles retires back to look after the 'troubled' youth of Rockingham or Peppermint Grove, whatever... Harves' decides not to 'pick himself', so you once again step down from your Board position and into the coach's box...
What key thing/s would you do differently?
Watching from the stands, for mine it was defence. Under you, I was always confident against weaker teams (obviously) and also against lower scoring teams (like the Swines... despite
that Preliminary Final).
But teams that flooded a bit less heavily than them, hence did not have all their players tied up in their back 50, and were quick...
so often we'd dominate, they'd then start to flood, we'd kick it to them(!)
They'd bring it out, and we would
not cover their loose men! Arrrrrrghhhh! So frustrating!
Stopping that rot was
the one big game-changing improvement under Ro$$y IMHO.
(As mentioned by another poster, Aussie was a major culprit, as was Frankie Peckett... though neither were orphans on that count. I can't comment on their training, but onfield I thought that both were very lazy. Once a piece of play was done, they'd pretty much stand around c/f running to man up/fill a dangerous space/create an option... That said, I do reckon they improved on that under you.)
Was that your take also Grant? Did you feel that under you it was attack at the expense of being caught on the rebound? Or were you also trying to get across that message of blokes needing to also 'do stuff' when they don't have the ball? Really interested in your thoughts on this...
StThomo wrote:dragit wrote:Hey Grant, (not trying to give you a hard time) just wondering if you feel like some of the early contracts (bally etc) you were a part of set an unsustainable precedence of paying top dollar for our stars?
Losing BJ was disappointing, but do you think the 'Geelong' model of pay structure is the way to go? Clearly we ran out of cap space in a drastic way of the past 4-5 years...
Do you like what Pelchan is upto list-wise?
Complete rot - with respect. Our cap was in saintsational order. Our players were not paid top dollar by any means. Speak to Cooky & Bomber and they will tell u they followed our model, on field and off.
That's
really interesting to hear Grant... so we are now just working our way back to that more level distribution of player payments!?!
The 'Geelong' model was really, originally, the Saint's model !?! 
I certainly believe that system went a long, long, long... way towards the Hillbilly's success. I base that both from external observation, and from knowing people (not the names you mentioned btw) who helped set that up for them... sadly my only contacts within any AFL club.
Seems the Skunks and Skid Marks are aiming for at least a somewhat similar system...
(When I first heard from my friends down there how the Hillbilly's had structured, and what that meant in terms of the quality of their overall list, c/f say, our supposedly infamous 'bottom six'...
well knowing how influential Saintsational really is...
I started calling on here for our club to adopt similar...
provoked some initial 'raised eyebrows' too, but I've noticed that now virtually ever poster seems to agree...
No doubt
that's why the Saints are now moving towards this...
Whoops, delusions of granduer kicking in...
I need to take more of Dr Spaceman's green pills... they always do the trick.
)
Back to the topic... so when and why did the pay scales at St Kilda change? Around the time those two new AFL love-children were spawned...?
What could have been, eh? Oh well, this sorta' thing seems to be our club's history... but only for just a little bit longer believe...
So Grant, what's your opinion on any of this, and on the current recruiting direction under the Pelican et al? Appreciated.
SaintPav wrote:Is it just me or is all this all just a bit NQR?
No it's not just you Pav...
clearly something a bit NQR...
this thread got well into page six before any posters started potting each other...
