MELBOURNE champion Garry Lyon has implored Christian Petracca to return to training early, urging the hybrid Demons forward to replicate Max Gawn’s off-season example in order to get the best out of himself.

100% agree with this.

Some players believe they are so good that don't have to train for the last few % improvement.

I think Petracca is one of those players.

Hope I am wrong but I doubt he will change but I am far from convinced.

10 minutes ago, Collar-Jazz-Knee said:

100% agree with this.

I don’t see why it has to be Gawn. Lyon has only used him as an example because of the stellar year he had. 

Thrres lots of other hard trainers at the club like Stretch, ANB, Jones etc so I can’t fully appreciate the link to Gawn alone. 

Hell, what are coaches and high performance staff there for if we need to rely on other players to convince him to ‘improve’. 

Petracca might be one of these player types that has never had to exert himself, to get to the point he is happy with.

The Lazy talents.

The bit where Garry Lyon says that he might train hard and hard,  but doesn't realise he can go up a level if he really wanted to is absolutely spot on.

I believe Garry Ablett Jnr and Bernie Vince are on record to say that they thought they were training hard until their leaders sat them down and told them training hard just wasn't enough.

I would be surprised if Jordan Lewis and Nathan Jones haven't had this conversation already with Petracca.

If this photo doesn't cut at Trac, then we might as well trade him.

And to go even further, if Maxy's arms were a bit longer, then next in line for the group hug would be Harmes.  That, too, should be motivation enough for Trac to have a cracking preseason.

2 minutes ago, The Chazz said:

If this photo doesn't cut at Trac, then we might as well trade him.

And to go even further, if Maxy's arms were a bit longer, then next in line for the group hug would be Harmes.  That, too, should be motivation enough for Trac to have a cracking preseason.

Why bother with a group photo when you can buy new runners every week and take photos of them?

A bit of a nothing article, but I certainly agree with Lyon's sentiment.

Petracca's stats weren't bad, but for a Pick 2, we need more from him. I hope we get it from him in 2019.

1 hour ago, old dee said:

Some players believe they are so good that don't have to train for the last few % improvement.

I think Petracca is one of those players.

Hope I am wrong but I doubt he will change but I am far from convinced.

Agree.

At the end of the day, you can have all the coaches, performance managers, and mentors in the world but the desire to work hard and improve comes from within. 

The athlete needs to have a driving desire, ambition and commitment to improve. It needs an almost masochistic drive to endure the pain of hard work and a single minded and at times selfish attitude to make the necessary sacrifices. Social life and sometimes personal relationships have to take a second place to the athletes sporting ambition and pursuit.   

I watch Garry Lyon train in the old days and he never pushed himself either so he knows what a waste of talent is when you think you can just turn up and perform.

One of the great athletes of all time Carl Lewis used to have a saying 'when you are number 1 you have to train like number 2' also Jesse Owens had a saying 'that people say I am lucky but the harder I train the luckier I get' the saying's are basically true but lazy sportsmen blame other things for their failure to get to the top of the heap.

Is he hanging out with LeBron and Ben Simmons this off season?

Agree with Lyon. He's a fair way behind fellow top 5 picks in Brayshaw and Oliver, when on talent and under age reputation one would think he'd supposed to be ahead of them...well certainly Oliver.

Had an absolute stinker in the prelim against West Coast. Yes I know 80% of the side did as well but off memory but he was pretty much our worst player on the ground. It would've been nice in his development as a player and potential leader in a couple of years if he was one of the rare few that stood up, but it wasn't to be. 

1 hour ago, McQueen said:

I don’t see why it has to be Gawn. Lyon has only used him as an example because of the stellar year he had. 

Thrres lots of other hard trainers at the club like Stretch, ANB, Jones etc so I can’t fully appreciate the link to Gawn alone. 

Hell, what are coaches and high performance staff there for if we need to rely on other players to convince him to ‘improve’. 

I think it had more to do with Max turning things around from being lazy/making poor choices, whereas Jones, ANB and Stretch have always trained hard from the start. Gaz just making a point that CP can turn it around like Max if he wants to.

And on Harmes, I'm hoping he doesn't take his foot off the pedal either and re-doubles his efforts to improve even further. If he gets to A grade, with a fit Viney, we'll have the best midfield in the competition (if we don't already).

28 minutes ago, durango said:

32 minutes ago, durango said:

I watch Garry Lyon train in the old days and he never pushed himself either so he knows what a waste of talent is when you think you can just turn up and perform.

One of the great athletes of all time Carl Lewis used to have a saying 'when you are number 1 you have to train like number 2' also Jesse Owens had a saying 'that people say I am lucky but the harder I train the luckier I get' the saying's are basically true but lazy sportsmen blame other things for their failure to get to the top of the heap.

Trac was low on confidence this year, X factor players like him need to be oozing confidence. Hard training and a sole focus on his footy will bring results which will give him back that confidence! 

I believe he'll get there, and if he does, it will give us every chance at a premiership.

 

A bit hard for him to come back early considering he won’t be back until the new year given his post-season clean up surgery.

1 hour ago, A F said:

And on Harmes, I'm hoping he doesn't take his foot off the pedal either and re-doubles his efforts to improve even further. If he gets to A grade, with a fit Viney, we'll have the best midfield in the competition (if we don't already).

Harmes will be in top ten of Brownlow this year.

Maybe it's just me but I think Petracca's  2018 season was very underrated by DL posters.  I'd rate his season as good as he averaged 20 possessions a game playing predominately half forward.  He had over 40 shots at goal but was inaccurate compared to his previous year but all his major stats were up.

He came with a lot of expectation and I understand some are disappointed he isn't yet a superstar but it's only his fourth season in the AFL with his first ruined by injury.  What I find more disappointing is people questioning his attitude when the reality is I doubt many know and are just guessing.  Questioning someone's attitude by guessing is poor form.

As for Lyon's view - I couldn't care less. 

 

Tracc has to become more accurate in front of goal. I thought his 2018 was pretty good, but for his goalkicking

Speaking about his goal kicking I think Trac seemed to lose confidence in front of goal. He seemed to always look to give it off when in range.

 

51 minutes ago, Sir Why You Little said:

Tracc has to become more accurate in front of goal. I thought his 2018 was pretty good, but for his goalkicking

His numbers are traccing as good as Jordan De Goey's, he just needs to kick more goals and take more marks as it's a noticeably large difference. I wonder how much of that can be attributed to playing more midfield time than JDG though, as he's definitely not the focal point of our forward line like he is theirs.

It was spoken about on another thread, but Tracc is 5cm shorter and 5kg heavier according to those stats. So maybe Lyon just wants him to lose a bit of weight in the off and become a more aerobic player to give him an extra yard of elusive pace.

Footywire comparison

Edited November 8, 20186 yr by John Demonic

1 hour ago, Dirts said:

Harmes will be in top ten of Brownlow this year.

Are they voting retrospectively? ?

i'd prefer him to work on his goal kicking. a horrific year in front of the big sticks. for a 'match winner' he missed about 5 clutch goals last season to ice games 

Complacency is our biggest opponent this year; I would hate to think our guys thought they had achieved anything last season. Lewis will earn his pay this off season I reckon

2 hours ago, Baghdad Bob said:

Maybe it's just me but I think Petracca's  2018 season was very underrated by DL posters.  I'd rate his season as good as he averaged 20 possessions a game playing predominately half forward.  He had over 40 shots at goal but was inaccurate compared to his previous year but all his major stats were up.

He came with a lot of expectation and I understand some are disappointed he isn't yet a superstar but it's only his fourth season in the AFL with his first ruined by injury.  What I find more disappointing is people questioning his attitude when the reality is I doubt many know and are just guessing.  Questioning someone's attitude by guessing is poor form.

As for Lyon's view - I couldn't care less. 

 

I agree with the view that Petracca's 2018 is underrated by some Demonland posters. The comparisons with De Goey are always going to be there, but what people don't realise is due to Petracca's injury, he's played a season less than De Goey. I expect and hope year 4 (of game time) will see a step up, because we really do need him to fire in the forward half and in stints through the midfield.

He is a pick 2 so the pressure to perform is rightly placed, given our investment in him. Some of his goal assists in the 2018 finals series were absolute gold though.

Edited November 8, 20186 yr by A F