This is it.

And it's only this year that the club has finally poured the requisite amount of money and resources into this are.

We'd be fools to expect it to action drastic change in such a short time.

Jose you could drive the majority of this group around in Rolls Royces for the next five years

You could have JC as the coach.

It will make no difference.

The majority of them are not up to it.

Silk purses and sowes ears comes to mind.

Jose you could drive the majority of this group around in Rolls Royces for the next five years

You could have JC as the coach.

It will make no difference.

The majority of them are not up to it.

Silk purses and sowes ears comes to mind.

You almost have me tearing my hair out sometimes, old dee.

We have so much to work with on the list already.

There is no reason to give up on it so prematurely.

The one thing in common a lot of our recruits seem to bring to the club is a bad attitude.

Not sure they bring a bad attitude, but they sure as he'll develop one!

We got Scully right.

We got Scully right.

I think we did too.

Talk about 1st round draft picks can be, well, revealing. Our 1st rounders back to 2000 are:

2011 Nil

2010 12 Lucas Cook

2009 1 Tom Scully

2 Jack Trengove

11 Jordan Gysberts

2008 1 Jack Watts

17 Sam Blease

2007 4 Cale Morton

14 Jack Grimes

2006 12 James Frawley

2005 12 Nathan Jones

2004 13 Matthew Bate

15 Lynden Dunn

2003 5 Brock McLean

2002 14 Daniel Bell

15 Nick Smith

2001 9 Luke Molan

2000 16 Scott Thompson

Of these, there are 2 total duds: Molan (injury) and Smith

Thompson is an A grader who wanted to go home to Adelaide; Frawley may yet be an A grader; Jones is a good B grader. Grimes and Tregove (and Scully) may get there; the rest are journeymen; BUT they are still on the list (McLean the exception).

Hawthorn, on the other hand, except when they got it right in 2001 (Hodge) & 2004 (Roughead, Franklin - thanks Richmond) , have been disasterous - with many playing few/no games. Richmond is the other notable disaster.

In short; we have got players who can play, but no stars.

I was talking to someone that use to be at the club and has plenty of mates still there. The point he brought up was the three guys that have excelled this year in Clark, Magner and Jones are the three guys that over the preseason not only trained the hardest but were also doing all the extra work and sessions. Not only fitness but rehab and a like.

I think we got the selections right and it's not that the club isn't developing players sometimes it's on the players themselves to put in the extra work. A great example is Gary Ablett. One preseason he simply just worked his arse of doing a lot of extra runnning and weight work and we all know the story from there!

We recruit talent, we do.

We don't fulfil their promise, which is why Craig and Misson are here.

The Hawks were far more physically developed. We need big arses and thighs.

I don't think we have given our recruits the same opportunity than at other clubs.

Your right about arses and thighs. I've had that same thought for years. They seem to make for good solid tough players. A big arse seems to help in contested footy.

Edited May 13, 201213 yr by Theo

Either we have chosen our players poorly or we are expecting too much of them too early. Development is also obviously an issue because its unlikely we have picked nothing but duds over the last 10 years or so.

I wonder what would have happened if we threw a lot of money at Scotty Thompson. We've never recovered from losing him in my opinion.

Talk about 1st round draft picks can be, well, revealing. Our 1st rounders back to 2000 are: 2011 Nil 2010 12 Lucas Cook 2009 1 Tom Scully 2 Jack Trengove 11 Jordan Gysberts 2008 1 Jack Watts 17 Sam Blease 2007 4 Cale Morton 14 Jack Grimes 2006 12 James Frawley 2005 12 Nathan Jones 2004 13 Matthew Bate 15 Lynden Dunn 2003 5 Brock McLean 2002 14 Daniel Bell 15 Nick Smith 2001 9 Luke Molan 2000 16 Scott Thompson Of these, there are 2 total duds: Molan (injury) and Smith Thompson is an A grader who wanted to go home to Adelaide; Frawley may yet be an A grader; Jones is a good B grader. Grimes and Tregove (and Scully) may get there; the rest are journeymen; BUT they are still on the list (McLean the exception). Hawthorn, on the other hand, except when they got it right in 2001 (Hodge) & 2004 (Roughead, Franklin - thanks Richmond) , have been disasterous - with many playing few/no games. Richmond is the other notable disaster. In short; we have got players who can play, but no stars.

You missed Sylvia (pick 3, 2003)

Hawthorn also got Rioli right and have traded away a number of their top picks over the past few years in order to recruit more mature players. Hawthorn haven't been great in recent years but it shows the importance of a few top quality recruits. Let's wait and see how good Watts, Trengove et al are in a few years before making a call on how successful we were.

Scully would have stayed, he just wanted to play for a team that would get a few wins this year. PS i Jest.

All will be fine just give the coach time

Prendergast never even bothered interviewing Martin. Says it all really. Not even an interview!!!

Neck tatts scared him off.

Except Martin didn't have neck tatts when he was drafted.

I think our list is talented, but many of the young guys aren't driven to succeed. Hopefully the new regime helps this. Surely the guys will get sick of loosing and do something about it.

Gysberts is part of the future and trengove will be a star. the rest im not convinced by, particularly when you measure them against their peers gone to other clubs on 'desire indicators' in particular.

I think our list is talented, but many of the young guys aren't driven to succeed.

How do you know ?

Most young players start out being more concerned by their own performance than the teams, but in time that changes.

Judging by what a lot of the players have been saying in recent articles, like Jones, Morton, Grimes etc, many have commented on how the standards being expected of them are so much greater now, and that it is a much more professional environment at the club. So is it the recruitment that is the problem, or is it the fact that the club was running a very amateurish football department prior to this season. The players are much fitter from all reports, but even Neeld has said they're only about 60% of the way towards where he wants them to be.

So it's same old question, is it the recruitment or development that is the problem? I can't help but think that if we had Neeld instead of Bailey as coach when Watts was drafted, that Watts would have more of the toughness we want from him, that Morton would now be a consistent performer providing match-up problems across the ground, and that we would currently be in a similar spot to richmond (or better), pushing for a finals spot.

Judging by what a lot of the players have been saying in recent articles, like Jones, Morton, Grimes etc, many have commented on how the standards being expected of them are so much greater now, and that it is a much more professional environment at the club. So is it the recruitment that is the problem, or is it the fact that the club was running a very amateurish football department prior to this season. The players are much fitter from all reports, but even Neeld has said they're only about 60% of the way towards where he wants them to be.

So it's same old question, is it the recruitment or development that is the problem? I can't help but think that if we had Neeld instead of Bailey as coach when Watts was drafted, that Watts would have more of the toughness we want from him, that Morton would now be a consistent performer providing match-up problems across the ground, and that we would currently be in a similar spot to richmond (or better), pushing for a finals spot.

If anyone saw TAC Cup FutureStars today, Terry Wallace recapped the 2008 draft and re-ordered in to how the players would be picked today.

Of course it's subjective, but Watts, Blease and Strauss were all knocked out of the top 20.

To conclude, Wallace did a winners and losers list of the teams that failed that draft, based on the output of their picks.

The winners were West Coast, Collingwood and Essendon - teams that have heavily invested in development.

The losers had MFC topping the list, along with teams that haven't been great at, and haven't invested, for whatever reason, in development.

i also saw this. Some real talent has come out of that draft.

Of course it's subjective, but Watts, Blease and Strauss were all knocked out of the top 20.

The assessment was primarily based on who had established themselves at AFL level. Not surprising that Blease and Strauss, serious injuries each, missed out. And with Watts currently playing VFL, no real surprise there either.

Be interesting to do the same exercise in 2 or 3 years.

Chris Yarren is going to be a star.

From what I've seen of Yarran, he essentially seems to play the defensive sweeper role. The same defensive role that Watts was canned for playing only recently.

He's certainly a whipping boy, young Watts, and he'll have to work very hard to shift that mantle.

Is Watts fast enough for that role? Composure under pressure?

By all accounts, Watts is one of the quickest at the club.

Smarts with the ball is also one of the last things I'd question when discussing Watts.

By all accounts, Watts is one of the quickest at the club.

Smarts with the ball is also one of the last things I'd question when discussing Watts.

I think Watts uses the ball pretty well, it may be worth trying him in that half back role more as a Bob Murphy type than Chris Yarran.