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What has happened to Clayton Oliver?

Elegt
Elegt
in Melbourne Demons

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1 hour ago, binman said:

Bump.

In my opinion Tracc is now a better player than Oliver.

And I rate Oliver super highly so tbat is no small statement.

Had a much underrated season last year. Addressed his inconsistency.

Has addressed his fitness and got his psychology spot on.

In 16 minute quarters is now averaging mid 20s for possessions, despite playing forward 30% of the time. Elite.

And contested possessions are off the chart.

Goal average has gone from 0.9 a game (with 70% of his time forward) to 1.1. In 16 minute quarters this season.

Has always been able to do things only a very small handful of players can do..

Is now doing it week in week out. Martin is absolutely an apt comparison and tracc is plsying much better this year.

Tracc is a lock for AA.

Oliver has leveled off a bit, but still been very good and was terrific last two games. Great to see him kicking more and getting metres gained.

If Oliver keeps that form up he is a good chance of a second AA selection, which would put him in a very small group of players who achieved that before their 25th birthday.

But try a thought experiment. Imagine you are the coach of the Saints. A team on the rise.

And you have the choice of tracc or Oliver to come to your club.

Who do you select?

not disagreeing with you but Oliver has been elite for many years. petracca has been elite for 7 games. big difference.

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    • Like 3
     
    3 hours ago, TeamPlayedFine39 said:

    I've never really noticed his ball-drop until recently.  It's not so much 'high' as it is forced down onto his boot from up high.  It's as though he's standing in the middle of a pack and slamming it onto his boot as he doesn't have the time/space to build momentum.  The problem being, he uses this ball-drop even when he's running into space.

     

     

    Yeah it's a big slow action that takes time. Obviously not every player has to be the same but a lot of Salem's brilliance with his kicking is how quick and compact his action is. No wasted movement as he gets the ball straight to the foot.

    If he can get the ball on to his boot quicker and with more reliability he'll trust himself to kick more.

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    1 hour ago, binman said:

    Bump.

    In my opinion Tracc is now a better player than Oliver.

    And I rate Oliver super highly so tbat is no small statement.

    Had a much underrated season last year. Addressed his inconsistency.

    Has addressed his fitness and got his psychology spot on.

    In 16 minute quarters is now averaging mid 20s for possessions, despite playing forward 30% of the time. Elite.

    And contested possessions are off the chart.

    Goal average has gone from 0.9 a game (with 70% of his time forward) to 1.1. In 16 minute quarters this season.

    Has always been able to do things only a very small handful of players can do..

    Is now doing it week in week out. Martin is absolutely an apt comparison and tracc is plsying much better this year.

    Tracc is a lock for AA.

    Oliver has leveled off a bit, but still been very good and was terrific last two games. Great to see him kicking more and getting metres gained.

    If Oliver keeps that form up he is a good chance of a second AA selection, which would put him in a very small group of players who achieved that before their 25th birthday.

    But try a thought experiment. Imagine you are the coach of the Saints. A team on the rise.

    And you have the choice of tracc or Oliver to come to your club.

    Who do you select?

    When Petracca wins two B&F s and All Australian then I will rate him as equal , but not just yet,. Seriously good player who needs to keep producing at the same intensity game after game after game. At the end of the day, who's to say that all three of Tracc, Clarry and Max are all AA at seasons end and if that happens, gees we will be very hard to beat!

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    1 hour ago, rjay said:

    Still want to play him (Oliver) as a forward 'bin'???

    Actually I would love to see oliver doing some stints forward Rjay.

    He is a pretty good mark and his fierceness at the ball, strength and general footy smarts would work well inside 50 in bursts. Perhaps swapping sometimes with tracc. 

    The best mids kick goals. Always have done.

    He is yet to kick one this year. In his 86 games has snagged 26 goals, which i guess is not too bad - comparable to cripps actually (oliver is 0.3 and Cripps is 0.5 per game).

    But we are talking about a player who is on track to be one of the best mids of the current era. So i want to see more goals.

    As point of comparison Dangerfield has an average of 1.1 goals per game and at the same age had an average of 1.6 goals per game in 20  games he played in the 2013 season..

    Interestingly in 2018, when we were flying oli kicked nearly half of his career total with 12  goals.

    Edited by binman

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    20 minutes ago, Dr.D said:

    not disagreeing with you but Oliver has been elite for many years. petracca has been elite for 7 games. big difference.

    True. 

    But who would you pick right now?

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    What is great about these two is they have different strengths.  They compliment each other.

    Clarry is VB, Trac is craft beer.  To have a ripper party, you need both.

     

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    • Like 3
    • Haha 1
    3 hours ago, binman said:

    True. 

    But who would you pick right now?

     

    that's like saying you'd prefer Lockhart over Oliver because people wanted Oliver dropped..

    Those people have cowardly gone into their shells

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    I like Oliver, he always looks like he's in for the long haul...

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    •  

    23 years old today... amazing.

    Clarrie has a very bright future at the MFC.

    Edited by Luther

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    • Like 4
    39 minutes ago, Luther said:

    23 years old today... amazing.

    Clarrie has a very bright future at the MFC.

    And has only played 88 games...

    Imagine when he gets to the 150 mark.

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    17 hours ago, Dr.D said:

     

    that's like saying you'd prefer Lockhart over Oliver because people wanted Oliver dropped..

    Those people have cowardly gone into their shells

    Quote

    I look forward to seeing the end of Goodwin. No emotion in him. God help us if we bring in a stkilda reject (Richardson) to be the head coach when Goodwin gets the flick. 

     

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    On 7/6/2020 at 12:17 PM, DeeZone said:

    Clary needs to get back to being Clarry maybe start playing with the ball more than the play station, not that he is the only one Gus & Jack need to sort out their issues as well, how is it possible for these three to have gone so far backwards in such a short time!!!

    Possibly because their skills - and then their combined skills at the midfield assisted enormously by the skills of Gawn  - enabled them to relax a little, to make up for the occasional error with high possession counts, including occasional brilliance in their respective contributions - leaving truly hard work behind, so frequently.

    We have all seen poor decisions being made by each of them, less than absolute effort being applied, statistics-building for the sake of reputations being upheld somewhat, not by reliability every contest, turning into capabilities half-completed as if  '...it's going to look easy to do... (something that we have all seen). 

    A little bit of salt needs to be expended by each of them and done so in a collective sense, as well - as these three midfielders are as good as any in the competition and capable of outstanding outcomes as we have all seen from time to time.

    A new exemplar has arisen from the mire of indifference - Petracca! He now refuses to give up - he hears the challenge of perpetual onfield effort and reason. He is a pillar of the whole team having seen the workrate of Gawn week in, week out. Let us hope his performance quality continues to shine now and in the future, while the others catch up to their rightful standards.

     

    Edited by Deemania since 56

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    19 hours ago, Dr.D said:

     

    that's like saying you'd prefer Lockhart over Oliver because people wanted Oliver dropped..

     

    No it not. Its nothing like that all.

    Ill ask again.

    If you were coach of the Saints, taking into account all the information you know about Oliver and Tracc (eg historic form, current foem, style, potential, impact, your opinion of their relative ceiling etc etc) which of those players would you choose if you could only have one? 

    It is a simple question with a binary answer.

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    • Like 2
    24 minutes ago, binman said:

    No it not. Its nothing like that all.

    Ill ask again.

    If you were coach of the Saints, taking into account all the information you know about Oliver and Tracc (eg historic form, current foem, style, potential, impact, your opinion of their relative ceiling etc etc) which of those players would you choose if you could only have one? 

    It is a simple question with a binary answer.

    01101111 01101100 01101001 01110110 01100101 01110010

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    • Haha 5

    39 minutes ago, binman said:

    No it not. Its nothing like that all.

    Ill ask again.

    If you were coach of the Saints, taking into account all the information you know about Oliver and Tracc (eg historic form, current foem, style, potential, impact, your opinion of their relative ceiling etc etc) which of those players would you choose if you could only have one? 

    It is a simple question with a binary answer.

     

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    50 minutes ago, binman said:

    No it not. Its nothing like that all.

    Ill ask again.

    If you were coach of the Saints, taking into account all the information you know about Oliver and Tracc (eg historic form, current foem, style, potential, impact, your opinion of their relative ceiling etc etc) which of those players would you choose if you could only have one? 

    It is a simple question with a binary answer.

    When they're 18 or now?

    If now, id take petracca marginally.

    If at 18, i'd take Oliver by an country mile. 

    You can't exclude the 4 years of top shelf football that Oliver has played while Petracca was wasting away in the forward 50. 

     So if they were in the same draft, at 18, Oliver by a mile. 

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    9 minutes ago, Dr.D said:

    When they're 18 or now?

    If now, id take petracca marginally.

    If at 18, i'd take Oliver by an country mile. 

    You can't exclude the 4 years of top shelf football that Oliver has played while Petracca was wasting away in the forward 50. 

     So if they were in the same draft, at 18, Oliver by a mile. 

    We all love Oliver, that's a given. However, he still has many issues he needs to tidy up. Featured in a segment on On The Couch last night alongside the Crouch brothers, Mcgrath and O'meera as one of the top 50 posession getters in the league with the lowest score involvements this season. He can and needs to improve significantly for us to be a good team.

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    https://codebeautify.org/binary-to-text

    01101111 01101100 01101001 01110110 01100101 01110010

     

    Don't you hate it when you think you are so clever but no one gets it.

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    On 7/21/2020 at 1:24 PM, binman said:

    Bump.

    In my opinion Tracc is now a better player than Oliver.

    And I rate Oliver super highly so tbat is no small statement.

    Had a much underrated season last year. Addressed his inconsistency.

    Has addressed his fitness and got his psychology spot on.

    In 16 minute quarters is now averaging mid 20s for possessions, despite playing forward 30% of the time. Elite.

    And contested possessions are off the chart.

    Goal average has gone from 0.9 a game (with 70% of his time forward) to 1.1. In 16 minute quarters this season.

    Has always been able to do things only a very small handful of players can do..

    Is now doing it week in week out. Martin is absolutely an apt comparison and tracc is plsying much better this year.

    Tracc is a lock for AA.

    Oliver has leveled off a bit, but still been very good and was terrific last two games. Great to see him kicking more and getting metres gained.

    If Oliver keeps that form up he is a good chance of a second AA selection, which would put him in a very small group of players who achieved that before their 25th birthday.

    But try a thought experiment. Imagine you are the coach of the Saints. A team on the rise.

    And you have the choice of tracc or Oliver to come to your club.

    Who do you select?

    Disagree with this mate.

    Trac had a solid season last year, but was still behind Oliver's output and then has played, what, 7 H&A games this year? 

    I agree that Trac has probably had a marginally better season (off a very small sample size) than Clarry, but this seems way too early to call.

    I think the fairer statement, IMO, would be that Petracca has had a better 7 games than Oliver. But what holds Oliver so far above anyone else except Gawn is his consistency. 

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    2 hours ago, Demonland said:

     

    I reckon some supporters massively underrate Clarry. IMO, they don't realise what he's done for a guy his age is extraordinary. 

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    • Like 2
    17 minutes ago, binman said:

    That's why my jokes are so simple!

    So Binnie who would you take 01010000 01100101 01110100 01110010 01100001 01100011 01100011 01100001  or   01101111 01101100 01101001 01110110 01100101 01110010 ?

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    •  
    23 minutes ago, A F said:

    Disagree with this mate.

    Trac had a solid season last year, but was still behind Oliver's output and then has played, what, 7 H&A games this year? 

    I agree that Trac has probably had a marginally better season (off a very small sample size) than Clarry, but this seems way too early to call.

    I think the fairer statement, IMO, would be that Petracca has had a better 7 games than Oliver. But what holds Oliver so far above anyone else except Gawn is his consistency. 

    errr.....make that only 6 games this year

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    petracca is having a ripper season; oliver has had an incredible career from day 1

    i already rate him as the #1 midfielder i have ever seen at melbourne

    some of his long, attacking handballs against hawks were fantastic

    very happy to have both of em

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