tall players don't get any shorter as the game goes on. and tall players that can mark and kick a goal are invaluable

We should take Butcher, as last year we didn't go for best available (Jack is going to be a great player and maybe the best in the draft but wasn't best available)... The main thing people are forgetting about butcher is he is not just the best tall forward he is rated a top three prospect maybe top five not a twenty something pick... If we don't pick him up we need either Newton or Miller to be our second fwd target behind watts..... LJ, Pettard and Bate are not Key forwards...

Why wasn't Watts best available, Wolfmother? Who was rated best available? By whom?

How do you mean best available?

Like i said earlier in this thread,if we take Butcher,our forward line is set up for 10+ years with Watts & Jurrah and all our smalls.

We can then spend all our picks on mids for the next 5 drafts and try and snag another key back along the way.

Imagine Beamer having a couple of bounces off half back,looking up and seeing this:

Bate-Watts-Sylvia

Wonna-Butcher-Jurrah

Scully & Grimes will be great acquisitions to our midfield next year to complement Brock,Beamer,Jones,Macca and Davey,Green,Bruce and Sylvia can rotate through there.Not to mention Blease,Strauss,Jetta and co.

This year is our last year we can pick up a key forward of Butcher's quality with GC17 and WS18 coming in but we can pick up more mids along the way and develop the ones we've got.

In this weeks final between Lions and Blues,lets say that Carlton can only play Gibbs or Fevola and the Lions can only play Brown or Rich,who misses out?

Gibbs and Rich are out and Fevola and Brown are in.

Why,because Gibbs and Rich can be covered by the other 8 rotating mids and Fevola with 86 goals and Brown with 78 goals cannot be replaced.In fact,i'd go as far to say that if Brown or Fevola miss,the other team most likely wins,key forwards are THAT important,especially in finals.

That's why i'd always take a key forward over a mid if they are similarly talented.

Why wasn't Watts best available, Wolfmother? Who was rated best available? By whom?

How do you mean best available?

I think what is meant is someone like rich or hurley were picked later even thou they were the most ready instantly to play afl, yet blokes like watts, niknat and hill were drafted higher on potential later down the track... Bit like the whole delidio/tambling vs roughie/franklin thing... Receuiters I think are thinking more about 'potential' to improve and be the more dominant player down the track rather than instantly good but limited in how much improvement is in them depending on where they think their list is at

No, that's not best available. The best available has nothing to do with how ready made a player is to play footy, otherwise everyone would have drafted Harry Taylor instead of Jack Grimes.

Wolfmother stated that we should pick up Butcher (a tall forward) because picking up Watts, who wasn't best available, showed that we weren't interested in drafting the best available player.

If he wasn't best available then back it up. Which recruiter said that he wasn't and who was the best available last year?

Axis Bob... maybe my comments were a little off but not by much as not all rated Jack as no.1 (I'll see what I can dig up)... I think Nicnat and Rich were considered better players but melbourne needed a fwd rather than a ruck or midfielder... Then again Freo and Port rated Harlett and Hill over Rich, so FD rate players differently.... If St Kilda had the no1 pick they would of taken Nicnat of Rich rather than Watts because there isn't that much between them and they have two big forwards

My comments are mainly aimed at the people talking up trengove and bashing of butcher on here mainly due to media hype...

Trengove is rated highly as he is playing well in the SANFL exactly like Rich and had a good carnival

Watts had a good carnival unlike butcher but both stand out becuase of their height, one grab marks and leap.

So I think a lot of demonlanders need to take the blinkers off as we have a very good chance of securing a great bigman in this draft... which is exactly what our team needs rather than another midfielder which I believe we have stocked up on in the last two drafts

Axis Bob... maybe my comments were a little off but not by much as not all rated Jack as no.1 (I'll see what I can dig up)... I think Nicnat and Rich were considered better players but melbourne needed a fwd rather than a ruck or midfielder... Then again Freo and Port rated Harlett and Hill over Rich, so FD rate players differently.... If St Kilda had the no1 pick they would of taken Nicnat of Rich rather than Watts because there isn't that much between them and they have two big forwards

My comments are mainly aimed at the people talking up trengove and bashing of butcher on here mainly due to media hype...

Trengove is rated highly as he is playing well in the SANFL exactly like Rich and had a good carnival

Watts had a good carnival unlike butcher but both stand out becuase of their height, one grab marks and leap.

So I think a lot of demonlanders need to take the blinkers off as we have a very good chance of securing a great bigman in this draft... which is exactly what our team needs rather than another midfielder which I believe we have stocked up on in the last two drafts

Watts, after the draft camp, was considered the equal of those other two.

We saw a CHF as among the best players and we took Watts. Star mids are hard to find, star KPP are harder to find.

I don't see Butcher as a star KPP in the making whereas Trengove screams 'elite' mid.

Much has been made of , with arguable merit, the notion that adeqaute forwards can be seen to be stars , champs, playing better than expected etc if they are given good service. The engine thatdrives that delivery van is the midfield.

Now for me there is a simple choice. We, now, concentrate on revving up that service and provide it to a forward 50 that will include th elikes of Watts, Jurrah, Maric, Wonnaemirri , possible Bate/Martin etc or we load up the forward line with so much that they will be all but sittign arond playing cards as the ball goes 180 deg the other way....because the mids are losing their battle.

We already have talent to kcik goals...we just need to give them the ball. The added thing is mids CAN and DO kick goals... Not too many KP forwards can play anywhere else... except Liam.. of course..

We have taken the time and hurt to develop players with some multifunctionality and some advocate we now get a stay at home forward. Thats just going backwards for mine.

That's fair enough and well reasoned, Wolfmother.

I've heard people say before that Watts wasn't best available (mainly because he didn't impact in his first year) but it's fair to say that the other contenders had flaws (Rich's running and Naitanui's lack of football nous) and Watts was comfortably in the top bracket along with a few others. Port said that they rated Hartlett as their number 1 while Geelong said that they'd take Watts first. That's why it's so hard to use the phrase 'best available' because it's so hard to measure. Did we consider him the be the best available? Who knows - I'm sure every club will consider the player they chose to be the best available.

As for people ignoring Butcher, I agree with you. I think that he hasn't been getting as much love as he should, mainly due to a poor performance in the game at Etihad. He's a very talented player who should be considered among the top players in the draft - regardless of type.

I suppose that is the danger in making definitive judgements on players when you have only ever seen them play once or twice.

Mainly looking for an answer from people who have seen a bit of underage footy.

Is Butcher just the best KPP in this draft, which may actually be that he isn't that great it's just there isn't many good KPP players in the draft.

Or would you say he would have been up there with other highly rated KPP players from previous years such as Watts, Hurley, Gumbleton, Lach Hansen, Kreuzer etc.

People are saying that Trengove reminds them of a young Nathan Buckley. Who does Butcher remind people of?

Unless he has a massive finals series i dont know whether we will go with someone that hasn't been All Australian in both of his Under 18 years at PICK 2. Something also to consider is that Trengove is listed as a medium size forward for the draft camp meaning he can play HFF and does kick goals as a mid. Scullys biggest knock is that he doesn't kick enough goals as a mid why wouldnt we take Trengove to compliment him? To me we should take the BEST 2 kids then maybe look at our 2nd round/3rd round picks to get what they are needed for team structure and also we arent going to win the flag next year. i think we will be around 10th to 13th. We could use our say pick 9-12 to get a key tall. We will still get a good pick next year!

Got no preference who we take as I haven't seen either player and trust our recruiters. However, after the pros and cons are taken into account if we rate Butcher and Trengove roughly the same I think we have to go Butcher. Remember the guy is nearing 200cm and going by the logic that bigger blokes take more time to show something I'd say he's shown more than enough form in the champs last year and the TAC cup to be selected at 2. The guy is not exactly built either going by the youtube videos, so he wouldn't have been monstering others kids at lower levels like Tom Hawkins did in school footy who was pretty much a tank already when he got drafted.

The more i think about it the more i think we will take Scully and trengrove.

I think Baily still has questions marks over Jones having dropped him in the past, and we need more midfield class. I think Bailey has mentioned during interviews that he sees Morton as being capable of playing a key forward position further down the line and has said simmilar things about Garland. I think with those two options plus Martin, one of them should develop into a solid key forward and as long as Jurrah and Watts continue to develop as expected we will be pretty set for talls with Bate thrown in there. I think that is where the coaching staff are looking for their next KPF.

As such i think we will take scully and trengrove with per haps best available KF at pick 18.

Just my view.

Axis Bob... maybe my comments were a little off but not by much as not all rated Jack as no.1 (I'll see what I can dig up)... I think Nicnat and Rich were considered better players but melbourne needed a fwd rather than a ruck or midfielder... Then again Freo and Port rated Harlett and Hill over Rich, so FD rate players differently.... If St Kilda had the no1 pick they would of taken Nicnat of Rich rather than Watts because there isn't that much between them and they have two big forwards

My comments are mainly aimed at the people talking up trengove and bashing of butcher on here mainly due to media hype...

Trengove is rated highly as he is playing well in the SANFL exactly like Rich and had a good carnival

Watts had a good carnival unlike butcher but both stand out becuase of their height, one grab marks and leap.

So I think a lot of demonlanders need to take the blinkers off as we have a very good chance of securing a great bigman in this draft... which is exactly what our team needs rather than another midfielder which I believe we have stocked up on in the last two drafts

i think it was pretty close between watts and nic, but iirc there was a fair question on richs running endurance, which was the reason he slipped a few places.

People are saying that Trengove reminds them of a young Nathan Buckley. Who does Butcher remind people of?

Unless he has a massive finals series i dont know whether we will go with someone that hasn't been All Australian in both of his Under 18 years at PICK 2. Something also to consider is that Trengove is listed as a medium size forward for the draft camp meaning he can play HFF and does kick goals as a mid. Scullys biggest knock is that he doesn't kick enough goals as a mid why wouldnt we take Trengove to compliment him? To me we should take the BEST 2 kids then maybe look at our 2nd round/3rd round picks to get what they are needed for team structure and also we arent going to win the flag next year. i think we will be around 10th to 13th. We could use our say pick 9-12 to get a key tall. We will still get a good pick next year!

Im aware of the comparisons and if he turned out anything like that WOW

If he does have the ability of playing a bit of HFF that would be pretty handy too

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH I dont know! I really dont! I believe the recruiters will know the best thing to do with the HUGE amount of games they have watched these boys play over the years.

Mainly looking for an answer from people who have seen a bit of underage footy.

Is Butcher just the best KPP in this draft, which may actually be that he isn't that great it's just there isn't many good KPP players in the draft.

Or would you say he would have been up there with other highly rated KPP players from previous years such as Watts, Hurley, Gumbleton, Lach Hansen, Kreuzer etc.

he was highly sought after last year as he was taking couragous pack mark (jono brown like, running bak with the flight into oncoming traffic) and kicking bags as an underage player in last year carnival. in a draft where there were quality talls, he would of been up there. i believe th thing that has dropped him down in people's opinions on here was that he didn't have a great carnival this year due to injury. a similar injury to that of fev at the start of this year. fev's still stiched up the coleman. now i know that does not really have any bearing on butcher, othr than he was not able to produce his bestunder duress, much the same as fev. more and more i lean towards butcher at two. i think its just to good a proposition to pass up. we can add to the midfield in future drafts. apart from the mclean/sylvia draft, i cant remeber using our first pick on a midfielder. they've been (failed) key position forwards, not including watts, or defenders. we can get a young ziebell or selwood next year with our first pick.

keep in mind we will have scully on the list next year as well.

You no what, ive now changed, i honestly dont care who we take with pic 2 weather its Butcher trengove or morabito. Either way ill be happy.

i want morabito but i know dee down that we wont go for a Wa boy. but i think he is the 2nd best player in the draft..and west coast/freo would have picked him over scully i believe

It might be interesting to see if we put some mids (ie Chook and Chunk) on the trade table. It would give us a fair indication that we are chasing mids with 1 & 2 and hoping to get another high pick for a tall forward.

It might be interesting to see if we put some mids (ie Chook and Chunk) on the trade table. It would give us a fair indication that we are chasing mids with 1 & 2 and hoping to get another high pick for a tall forward.

Watching trade week will give indications of who and what we're after. For all we know pick 2 may not be set in concrete yet by the club and is wholy dependent upon this outcome.

In the print edition of the HUN, this article has a little graphic with it that says that we are committed to taking the best available players with picks 1 and 2, regardless of position/size.

Also says we are prepared to make a 'significant financial commitment' if a high-quality player is a chance to slip to the PSD.

Also says we won't be naming our choice of pick 1 until Draft day to preserve the event.

In the print edition of the HUN, this article has a little graphic with it that says that we are committed to taking the best available players with picks 1 and 2, regardless of position/size.

Also says we are prepared to make a 'significant financial commitment' if a high-quality player is a chance to slip to the PSD.

Also says we won't be naming our choice of pick 1 until Draft day to preserve the event.

I'm pretty sure it would've been written up purely for the purpose of the photo, but the article did have an accompanying photo with the whiteboard in the background with factors affecting the decisions.

Can't remember exactly without the paper in front of me, but it was something like:

- Best v Needs

- Where

- ...

- ...

Bugger, can't remember the rest. It was basic and tells you nothing, but i was still happy to have a peek

After watching Gippsland Power go down to Calder Cannons today,I've come to the the conclusion that Butcher will not get drafted in the top 20 let alone No2. The age group seems to have caught up with him now. This is the thoughts of several Gippsland Power followers. He has played pathetically in last two weeks of the finals add to this is his poor performance in the championships and I've reached a conclusion stick to Newton well ahead of Butcher.

I would take at least 4 other talls in front of him- Talia, Griffiths, Temel who played well today top of his 8 goals last week and Panos.I think Vardy would also be a better pick up than Butcher. Anyone else whom watched Butcher over the last 6 months surely would agree with me.