22 hours ago, deespicable me said:

Look at Frawley at Hawthorn. He was similar to Tom in that he was prone to turning the ball over and many supporters were keen for him to go and get in the brand new Brayshaw. Frawley took a while to learn how to fit into the Hawthorn backline but his last two finals in 2015 and his early 2016 form is very good. He doesn't turn it over and takes safer options when he has the ball.

We have a guy in Brayshaw who we all hope will be a gun in a year or two but isn't yet.

I think its time Melbourne stopped being a kindergarten for the big clubs. We need Tom as part of a mature backline that grows together, not another potential kid champion that we all slobber over then cut down in their third year because they haven't performed miracles.

Adam your post annoys me. When are you going to start up the "Brayshaw is too slow" thread and start cutting another down. Try being a "SUPPORTER" for a while.

Don't bother reading it then. It's a simple question for discussion. If you actually read the thread carefully, you'd also note that I say I haven't made my mind up yet.

21 hours ago, The Reverend said:

Player	Kicks		Handballs		Disposals		Disp eff %	Marks		Hit-outs		Frees For		Frees Agst		Tackles		Goals		AFL Fantasy
	TOT	AVG	TOT	AVG	TOT	AVG	TOT	TOT	AVG	TOT	AVG	TOT	AVG	TOT	AVG	TOT	AVG	TOT	AVG	TOT	AVG
1Neville Jetta	41	6.8	47	7.8	88	14.7	87.5	20	3.3	0	0	6	1	3	0.5	26	4.3	0	0	378	63
2Lynden Dunn	42	10.5	13	3.3	55	13.8	87.3	15	3.8	1	0.3	6	1.5	6	1.5	10	2.5	1	0.3	232	58
3Colin Garland	12	6	6	3	18	9	83.3	9	4.5	0	0	1	0.5	1	0.5	6	3	0	0	97	48.5
4Max Gawn	38	6.3	50	8.3	88	14.7	80.7	28	4.7	242	40.3	9	1.5	15	2.5	14	2.3	5	0.8	592	98.7
5Tom McDonald	64	10.7	34	5.7	98	16.3	79.6	40	6.7	0	0	3	0.5	3	0.5	6	1	0	0	398	66.3

Given the statistics above, we should be trading out some of the real turnover kings at the club. TMac is fifth on the list for effective disposals. Jack Viney and Bernie Vince are rated as 1 and 2 for clangers with 27 and 23 respectively, whilst Tom MacDonald sits on 11 clangers. I understand that stats don't always tell the whole story and that a mistake in the back-line can be costly but consider also that if the midfield clangers weren't occurring, maybe the ball wouldn't be in our defensive half quite as much and defenders like TMac who attack the ball would not be under so much pressure. In fact if you have a look at the top five here, it's interesting to see that four of them are defenders. i find that sort of comforting.

Let's not be too hasty in finding a whipping boy. There are plenty more with worse decision making skills than TMac.

GoDees!

I like your posts, but please don't use DE to mount any argument. For starters, Viney and Vince are in the heat, the contested ball arena. The defenders mark or gather the ball and have time to upload in a much more a efficient, less pressured manner, hence the top 3. For example, Garland plays it so safe these days that I'm surprised he's not going at a higher DE. Doesn't make him good at what he does. It means he takes the safe option.

14 hours ago, olisik said:

This is Jack Watts all over again 

Yeah, exactly like Jack Watts. What?

13 hours ago, beelzebub said:

Ay ..here's the rub eh

It's not if, but what.

What do you want?what coukxyou get, what benefit / improvement for doing so ? These are what governs a trade.

Not if. Of course he is.

Did deeluded get ahold of your password again, Bubs? :D

11 hours ago, Radar Detector said:

A friend of mine had a sponsors "inner sanctum" day with a top four club recently and had incredible access to the club. He trained with the team and spent the entire day tagging along with the coaching staff. One of the things that coach said to him that really resonated was that good clubs approach trading by looking at players who have desirable elite attributes and their flaws are almost irrelevant to the decision. Good clubs back themselves to exploit the positive traits and iron out any faults the player may have.

This, to me, is the right approach with Tom. His "good attributes" are extremely desirable. By the time we are really challenging, the club should back itself to improve his weaknesses. Many players, our captain included, have managed to overcome issues with disposal and decision making over time.

Very good post and similar to PD's. I think the idea that we back ourselves in to iron out his flaws (despite the 88 games it's taken, with seeming little result), is the best way forward. I was on the fence with this discussion, I've jumped down onto Tom's side now.

10 hours ago, djr said:

So on your logic you would have traded Alex Rance years ago. 

And no. It's not my logic. I'm posing questions. This is a discussion forum. If we're not free to question and examine our own opinions and thoughts, why the hell would we bother?

This idea misses the point that the power in AFL trades lie with the players and thus we wouldn't get fair compensation in any McDonald trade.

4 hours ago, Deespicable said:

What a disgraceful post - can everyone please take note of this guy and add him to your [censored] list.

He doesn't even have the guts to attempt to explain his view in a balanced way.

So which defender in the league always makes the right decisions? And which Demon showed off sensational kicking skills last week - I can't think of one. It may surprise you that when team's lose the ball usually spends more time in the defence and probably means opposing sides are pressing well which means that errors become more common among all players - but this may surprise you - amazingly the errors made by backman have more impact because surprise, surprise they are closer to the goal they are attempting to defend.

As a case in point on kicking skills, our best kick as judged by Paul Roos, given that he is given the kick-out duties, is apparently meant to by Christian Salem. Did you happen to notice that last week he was racing down the wing and stubbed a short kick to Pedo that was about as bad as Jordie McKenzie.

So instead of picking on the guy who most sane people regard as our best defender, why don't you spot all the good things he does each week and make a note. You never know one day you may even appreciate him. 

And please do not ever start a topic again unless you have something to say!  

Wow. So because the question was asked I therefore hold that opinion? A narrow mind you have there.

For the record, as I've mentioned a couple of times on this thread, when I started this thread my view wasn't one way or the other. 

9 hours ago, Choke said:

Maybe we need a new stat, like 'clanger goal assists' or something. A stat showing if a clanger resulted in a goal or not.

Or maybe a different word it? Like 'clanger' is just what we mean right now, but a 'glanger' is a clanger that directly results in a goal?

So Viney/Dangerfield/Ziebell would have might clangers, but Tmac has high glangers.

Edit: yes, I am a wordsmith. Fear my wordly power.

Impossible to measure and record but the degree of clangerness correlates directly with the force and emotion with which faces of supporters are buried in hands. I've been pulled up elsewhere for mentioning this weakness of Tom's (though acknowledging his many offsetting plusses) but his clangers do have a high Facebury score....

Not if he signs.

Should play him at CHB to increase prospective trade value if he is giving that travelling vibe.  He can show off his marking.

Not going to happen,he and his bro will form the dynamic duo of defence sometime this year. They will be known as the Mac Attacks. All you people out there just wait. 

56 minutes ago, ENYAW said:

Not going to happen,he and his bro will form the dynamic duo of defence sometime this year. They will be known as the Mac Attacks. All you people out there just wait. 

 

56 minutes ago, ENYAW said:

Not going to happen,he and his bro will form the dynamic duo of defence sometime this year. They will be known as the Mac Attacks. All you people out there just wait. 

They can take it in turns to kick it out of bounds on the full or straight to an opposition player.

Diamond ( JIM ) rem thge 2 Krakours who played for the Kangas,absolutely great,as single players not that good. Give be an optimist give the Macs a chance. If I am correct will you be changing your name? Have a good day.

If Fremantle offer Nat Fyfe for Tom McDonald in a direct trade then most people here wouldn't go ahead with it?

The fact that he has value is the precise reason he is tradable, but seeing as we already have very few key defenders as it is it is unlikely to happen.

He has a big game today on Tom Lynch, it will be interesting to see if he has learned anything after Nick Riewoldt pulled his pants down last week.

The sooner this big dopey log is out of the Club the better!

21 minutes ago, picket fence said:

The sooner this big dopey log is out of the Club the better!

He can take Garland with him too

2 minutes ago, Demon Disciple said:

He can take Garland with him too

Not sure wtf Colin brings anymore

Just now, beelzebub said:

Not sure wtf Colin brings anymore

well according to someone at the club, enough for a 3-year extension, FMD

16 minutes ago, Demon Disciple said:

well according to someone at the club, enough for a 3-year extension, FMD

=FD brainfade 

Word on the street is Tommymac manager has put in a ridiculous contract offer to club that hasn't gone down well within club???

Had interesting discussion with eldest and he thought with backlines yourebest to get good role players who combine well to do ajob. Big money goes to star mids and fwds.  Hisview and I agree is you don't overspend here on players like Tmac. 

I agree. IfTommy reaches too high he  goes

Just my view

24 minutes ago, Grimes Times said:

Word on the street is Tommymac manager has put in a ridiculous contract offer to club that hasn't gone down well within club???

Not liking what I've heard about Tommy lately.

7 minutes ago, AdamFarr said:

Not liking what I've heard about Tommy lately.

Been listening to too much Skyhooks perhaps 

34 minutes ago, Grimes Times said:

Word on the street is Tommymac manager has put in a ridiculous contract offer to club that hasn't gone down well within club???

Who does manage T Mac ?

44 minutes ago, Grimes Times said:

Word on the street is Tommymac manager has put in a ridiculous contract offer to club that hasn't gone down well within club???

There were also rumours that TMac wouldn't resign unless Hogan does. 

We are having a massive dig at Michael Hurley, while i'd love both him and TMAC in our backline it honestly wouldn't be the end of the world if TMAC left. 

1. We'd get a first round pick in return

2. our biggest weakness at the moment imo is our inability to move the ball well enough, consistently enough, mistakes out of the back half are costing us a lot of goals both goals that we aren't scoring ourselves but goals to the opposition as well.

3. He's talented, but he's got a huge weakness in his disposal that imo will keep him from ever consistently being considered an AA level player, his mistakes would cost him nearly as many goals as he saves at times.

Time will tell what happens here but if i am being 100% honest if we got an indication that Hurley would jump on board as a F/A i would not be very worried if TMAC did decide to leave. 

5 hours ago, Peter Griffen said:

We are having a massive dig at Michael Hurley, while i'd love both him and TMAC in our backline it honestly wouldn't be the end of the world if TMAC left. 

1. We'd get a first round pick in return

2. our biggest weakness at the moment imo is our inability to move the ball well enough, consistently enough, mistakes out of the back half are costing us a lot of goals both goals that we aren't scoring ourselves but goals to the opposition as well.

3. He's talented, but he's got a huge weakness in his disposal that imo will keep him from ever consistently being considered an AA level player, his mistakes would cost him nearly as many goals as he saves at times.

Time will tell what happens here but if i am being 100% honest if we got an indication that Hurley would jump on board as a F/A i would not be very worried if TMAC did decide to leave. 

How and from where do you know this?

I have not read it anywhere.

9 hours ago, Grimes Times said:

Word on the street is Tommymac manager has put in a ridiculous contract offer to club that hasn't gone down well within club???

I've heard Hogan's manager has asked for ridiculous coin too.

 

6 hours ago, Peter Griffen said:

We are having a massive dig at Michael Hurley...

I've also heard this coming from an Essendon source.

Hope he stays but not at any cost. Recently he said that he really wants to play with Oscar, so I'm not sure how much of a factor that is.