What surprises me the most in all of this is why so many people care of what is written and said in the media! Get over it, its just an opinion.

A lot of alpha-male sports media jocks projecting their views onto Brodie - I don't think he's like them.

Who remembers when Gawn had a serious knee injury at the start of the season and we thought he would be out for a year?

No one in the media was questioning the Grundy trade then.

Edited July 18, 20231 yr by Clint Bizkit

He's great back-up for Max this year.

Let's face it. It's highly unlikely Grundy will become a serviceable KPF. Next season and perhaps the season after he'll have to accept fewer playing minutes as back-up to Max. This may not be what he wants to do. And it may not suit us either. We're paying $650k (reporting) for a back-up ruckman. Thats a lot of coin that could be deployed elsewhere. He would be perfect for Port so I don't think a trade is impossible. It might actually be the best for all concerned depending on what we can get in the deal (2nd round pick or a Port player?)

28 minutes ago, Clint Bizkit said:

Who remembers when Gawn had a serious knee injury at the start of the season and we thought he would be out for a year?

No on in the media was questioning the Grundy trade then.

Grundy being available made it easy to resist the temptation to rush Gawn back in from injury, and also eased the load on him when he did return, allowing Gawn to train fully and rebuild his fitness base. Very little chance Gawn could have had the game he just had against Brisbane without that.

Getting Grundy has definitely helped the club and if he can just improve a few basics and we can learn to zone the two rucks so they aren't interfering with each other's games too much, the pay-off can still be huge.

I mean, it is quite realistic that we are freshening Grundy now to make sure he's good for finals. 

Flashback to Ben Brown 2021!

I'm going to hark back a little to the days I used to wander around with my trusty Minolta.....  What's a camera got to do with this..??   It's how you see it. It's perspsctive, framing and context.  Put one lens on...a 'particular' image appears in the viewfinder...change that lens..suddenly a lot more can come into focus.  Alter your point of looking...a different picture again.

That's how I see all of this. Many, mainly the media , have got this ALL wrong. But they don't care. That's not their purpose, their m.o.

We need to step back for a moment and see the big BIG picture and how all the  particpants fit into it and what role they are playing.

The Club.  Melbourne understandibly were/are looking to extend Max's career.  Opportuniuty presents. ( B.G.)

Max Gawn: If he's to play the #1 Ruck week in week out, two things.  He will shorten his career and his effectiveness will wain. 

Brodie Grundy: Brought in to provide Ruck relief and be a stand in should Max incur injury.  Also to provide a forward target.

Timeframe:  Ostensibly the length of Grundy's contract....so approx 5 years hence  ( 4 and a bit now)

 

Where the media starts going off the rails:  You can NOT have 2 #1 Rucks. It's contradictory, literally.  What is the longer term aspirations of the club?  As I see and understand it it's to transition from one #1 to the other.  It's posited that  Grundy is being stooged because he's not the #1 ( presently ) .  A heads up to the media type...  he isn't supposed to be right at the moment, that will come.  In the meantime it's been determined , in the context of our evolvong  Forward structures that  Brodie needs to refine his understanding of how that works and how he works within it.

There is NOTHING sinister about this. We are talking about transition througha protracted timeline.

I'm not surprised about Figjam.  The more he opens his mouth the more stupid he looks.

I'm neither surpised by Lyon though I am disappointed.  Both these past great players as well as any number of other parrots seem immune form the requirement to actually ask teh most important question of all...i.e  "What is the club trying to achieve??"  Is it entirly plausible, indeed highly likely, that in the context of the original idea that as things panned out and we got to see how it al lmight work that there would be some caressing of the process.  Added to this I'm sure that it's wasn't desirable that Max would suffer injury when and how he did but how "lucky' for us we had a backup.. Golly, who would have ever thought of that ?  Certainly not the media maggots.

I can't see this 'story' disappearing anytime soon it's just so juicy a morsel for the scavenging wannabe journo's.

The problem for many of these 'mouths' is even should they realise they have the whole thing inside out and upside down their own egos won't allow their to concede and backtrack.

In the meantime I'll ignore the Fugazi and look forward to seeing Grundy return , as he will, a little later in the season.

Grundy is one of us and I would like to think that he will finish his career with us. He will not only play a significant role this year but in future years.
Like to think he will help us snag a few flags along the way.

I could be proven wrong but I am very confident that I won’t be.

The question the media should be asking is will it be JVR or BB that Grundy takes the spot of. 

I also think a big variable not being spoken about in all of this is how the game changes in the finals series. It's not as open, it's more contested, it's a lot of long to contests etc. 

If Brodie and Max can bring the ball to ground forward of centre, they'll have done their job from a forward perspective. It's then ensuring they impact the game in the ruck as well.

Prior to the Brisbane game, the most underrated game Max played this year was against Collingwood, where he repeatedly ensured the ball was not intercepted and brought it to ground. That's not evident in the stats, but he was essential that day.

In the same game, Grundy had 2 shots on goal of his own and they basically shared the ruck that day. Max had 37 ruck contests, Brodie 42. We won clearance, CP and intercept.

That's the model that can work going forward IMO. We'd like to get a more even performance from both of them though, but in particular Max. 

It's kinda whack...  For the most part of the season...well , save some earlier games we've all, nearly to a one , bemoaned the forward section of our game. Blind Freddy could see it just wasn't going well. It needed attention, tweaking, fixing.

So as I view it the club starts reconstruction.  As part of this anyone who is to be participatory in the area of the game is being asked/told to work on their game.  No one doubts or would be disappointed in Grundy's rucking but how he, indeed anyone playing forward fits into the evolving 'plan' needs work. 

The idiotic media are evaluating our "experiment" over the past few months.   That's bogus..  this is a long(er) term event.

This is a work in progress. It was always going to be.  That Max sat out with injury just changed the timelines.

 

 

2 hours ago, beelzebub said:

I'm going to hark back a little to the days I used to wander around with my trusty Minolta.....  What's a camera got to do with this..??   It's how you see it. It's perspsctive, framing and context.  Put one lens on...a 'particular' image appears in the viewfinder...change that lens..suddenly a lot more can come into focus.  Alter your point of looking...a different picture again.

That's how I see all of this. Many, mainly the media , have got this ALL wrong. But they don't care. That's not their purpose, their m.o.

We need to step back for a moment and see the big BIG picture and how all the  particpants fit into it and what role they are playing.

The Club.  Melbourne understandibly were/are looking to extend Max's career.  Opportuniuty presents. ( B.G.)

Max Gawn: If he's to play the #1 Ruck week in week out, two things.  He will shorten his career and his effectiveness will wain. 

Brodie Grundy: Brought in to provide Ruck relief and be a stand in should Max incur injury.  Also to provide a forward target.

Timeframe:  Ostensibly the length of Grundy's contract....so approx 5 years hence  ( 4 and a bit now)

 

Where the media starts going off the rails:  You can NOT have 2 #1 Rucks. It's contradictory, literally.  What is the longer term aspirations of the club?  As I see and understand it it's to transition from one #1 to the other.  It's posited that  Grundy is being stooged because he's not the #1 ( presently ) .  A heads up to the media type...  he isn't supposed to be right at the moment, that will come.  In the meantime it's been determined , in the context of our evolvong  Forward structures that  Brodie needs to refine his understanding of how that works and how he works within it.

There is NOTHING sinister about this. We are talking about transition througha protracted timeline.

I'm not surprised about Figjam.  The more he opens his mouth the more stupid he looks.

I'm neither surpised by Lyon though I am disappointed.  Both these past great players as well as any number of other parrots seem immune form the requirement to actually ask teh most important question of all...i.e  "What is the club trying to achieve??"  Is it entirly plausible, indeed highly likely, that in the context of the original idea that as things panned out and we got to see how it al lmight work that there would be some caressing of the process.  Added to this I'm sure that it's wasn't desirable that Max would suffer injury when and how he did but how "lucky' for us we had a backup.. Golly, who would have ever thought of that ?  Certainly not the media maggots.

I can't see this 'story' disappearing anytime soon it's just so juicy a morsel for the scavenging wannabe journo's.

The problem for many of these 'mouths' is even should they realise they have the whole thing inside out and upside down their own egos won't allow their to concede and backtrack.

In the meantime I'll ignore the Fugazi and look forward to seeing Grundy return , as he will, a little later in the season.

Great post, especially the camera lens analogy. 

Are the Media maggots afraid of what could happen? 

Could they both play against the Cats?

Will Max have a sudden holiday in Bali?

And will they, above, stop saying our last flag was a fluke?

3 hours ago, beelzebub said:

I'm going to hark back a little to the days I used to wander around with my trusty Minolta.....  What's a camera got to do with this..??   It's how you see it. It's perspsctive, framing and context.  Put one lens on...a 'particular' image appears in the viewfinder...change that lens..suddenly a lot more can come into focus.  Alter your point of looking...a different picture again.

That's how I see all of this. Many, mainly the media , have got this ALL wrong. But they don't care. That's not their purpose, their m.o.

We need to step back for a moment and see the big BIG picture and how all the  particpants fit into it and what role they are playing.

The Club.  Melbourne understandibly were/are looking to extend Max's career.  Opportuniuty presents. ( B.G.)

Max Gawn: If he's to play the #1 Ruck week in week out, two things.  He will shorten his career and his effectiveness will wain. 

Brodie Grundy: Brought in to provide Ruck relief and be a stand in should Max incur injury.  Also to provide a forward target.

Timeframe:  Ostensibly the length of Grundy's contract....so approx 5 years hence  ( 4 and a bit now)

 

Where the media starts going off the rails:  You can NOT have 2 #1 Rucks. It's contradictory, literally.  What is the longer term aspirations of the club?  As I see and understand it it's to transition from one #1 to the other.  It's posited that  Grundy is being stooged because he's not the #1 ( presently ) .  A heads up to the media type...  he isn't supposed to be right at the moment, that will come.  In the meantime it's been determined , in the context of our evolvong  Forward structures that  Brodie needs to refine his understanding of how that works and how he works within it.

There is NOTHING sinister about this. We are talking about transition througha protracted timeline.

I'm not surprised about Figjam.  The more he opens his mouth the more stupid he looks.

I'm neither surpised by Lyon though I am disappointed.  Both these past great players as well as any number of other parrots seem immune form the requirement to actually ask teh most important question of all...i.e  "What is the club trying to achieve??"  Is it entirly plausible, indeed highly likely, that in the context of the original idea that as things panned out and we got to see how it al lmight work that there would be some caressing of the process.  Added to this I'm sure that it's wasn't desirable that Max would suffer injury when and how he did but how "lucky' for us we had a backup.. Golly, who would have ever thought of that ?  Certainly not the media maggots.

I can't see this 'story' disappearing anytime soon it's just so juicy a morsel for the scavenging wannabe journo's.

The problem for many of these 'mouths' is even should they realise they have the whole thing inside out and upside down their own egos won't allow their to concede and backtrack.

In the meantime I'll ignore the Fugazi and look forward to seeing Grundy return , as he will, a little later in the season.

I also don't think the money we've spent to acquire Grundy is that huge. Not these days anyways.

7 hours ago, Katrina Dee Fan said:

Okay, I'm going to go full rant mode here. I'm sick to death of the media discourse around Brodie Grundy at the moment, and the so called sports journos' tendency to stick the knife in, having him being traded, it hasn't worked, etc etc.

 

It was always Melbourne's plan to have Brodie as a ruck/forward combination, and it was always the club's intention to have him play some VFL games to strengthen his forward craft. The only thing that delayed that from happening sooner was Gawn getting injured and waiting for him to get back to full strength. This has now happened, hence Grundy was named for the 2s. To say the Gawn/Grundy combination isn't working and it's all Grundy's fault is, pardon my French, complete [censored]. As a ruck combination, they outrucked Cox/Cameron combination, they outrucked the Jackson/Darcy combination in Fremantle. In fact they have consistently outrucked the opposition throughout the season. If there was ANY reason for lack of efficiency, it could be put more down to the fact Gawn's knee injury at the start of the season prevented him from being his best. Not Grundy.

 

In fact for the weeks Gawn was out injured, Grundy was invaluable, he proved his worth in my books. Grundy isn't going anywhere.

 

Media hacks, lay off. We know how much these so called "professionals" hate Melbourne.  They've moved on from Oliver onto a new target.  And it's not fair on Grundy.

 

Rant over.

I don’t remember the FD saying he would need VFL games to hone his forward craft.

And I don’t think they are saying it’s Grundy’s fault - they are laying blame at the FD which is a fair critique at this stage. 

It’s all immaterial - I want to win finals - if that is with BG playing FF and rucking 20 mins - great! 

If it isn’t, I don’t give a damn.

4 minutes ago, rpfc said:

I don’t remember the FD saying he would need VFL games to hone his forward craft.

 

Goody and Richo said it.

But they never said he would be a key forward, only that they wanted more from him when in the forward line. Totally reasonable.

TBH, I would imagine a club FD would want more from every player, in every position .

1 hour ago, Willmoy1947 said:

Are the Media maggots afraid of what could happen? 

Could they both play against the Cats?

Will Max have a sudden holiday in Bali?

And will they, above, stop saying our last flag was a fluke?

Who in the media says our flag was a fluke? Not even Caro or Barrett have gone that far.

13 minutes ago, Redleg said:

Goody and Richo said it.

But they never said he would be a key forward, only that they wanted more from him when in the forward line. Totally reasonable.

TBH, I would imagine a club FD would want more from every player, in every position .

They said this week, the comment in the post from Katrina was that ‘it was always expected BG would need VFL time’ and it just isn’t the case.

The fact remains that BG had famous issues with being effective forward and here we are asking for something we might not get.

 

'The media' have been the most frequently used words on DL today.

Love how the media think we’d just make Port (a premiership contending rival) stronger by handing over the main piece of the puzzle they’re missing…

6 hours ago, beelzebub said:

I'm going to hark back a little to the days I used to wander around with my trusty Minolta.....  What's a camera got to do with this..??   It's how you see it. It's perspsctive, framing and context.  Put one lens on...a 'particular' image appears in the viewfinder...change that lens..suddenly a lot more can come into focus.  Alter your point of looking...a different picture again.

That's how I see all of this. Many, mainly the media , have got this ALL wrong. But they don't care. That's not their purpose, their m.o.

We need to step back for a moment and see the big BIG picture and how all the  particpants fit into it and what role they are playing.

The Club.  Melbourne understandibly were/are looking to extend Max's career.  Opportuniuty presents. ( B.G.)

Max Gawn: If he's to play the #1 Ruck week in week out, two things.  He will shorten his career and his effectiveness will wain. 

Brodie Grundy: Brought in to provide Ruck relief and be a stand in should Max incur injury.  Also to provide a forward target.

Timeframe:  Ostensibly the length of Grundy's contract....so approx 5 years hence  ( 4 and a bit now)

 

Where the media starts going off the rails:  You can NOT have 2 #1 Rucks. It's contradictory, literally.  What is the longer term aspirations of the club?  As I see and understand it it's to transition from one #1 to the other.  It's posited that  Grundy is being stooged because he's not the #1 ( presently ) .  A heads up to the media type...  he isn't supposed to be right at the moment, that will come.  In the meantime it's been determined , in the context of our evolvong  Forward structures that  Brodie needs to refine his understanding of how that works and how he works within it.

There is NOTHING sinister about this. We are talking about transition througha protracted timeline.

I'm not surprised about Figjam.  The more he opens his mouth the more stupid he looks.

I'm neither surpised by Lyon though I am disappointed.  Both these past great players as well as any number of other parrots seem immune form the requirement to actually ask teh most important question of all...i.e  "What is the club trying to achieve??"  Is it entirly plausible, indeed highly likely, that in the context of the original idea that as things panned out and we got to see how it al lmight work that there would be some caressing of the process.  Added to this I'm sure that it's wasn't desirable that Max would suffer injury when and how he did but how "lucky' for us we had a backup.. Golly, who would have ever thought of that ?  Certainly not the media maggots.

I can't see this 'story' disappearing anytime soon it's just so juicy a morsel for the scavenging wannabe journo's.

The problem for many of these 'mouths' is even should they realise they have the whole thing inside out and upside down their own egos won't allow their to concede and backtrack.

In the meantime I'll ignore the Fugazi and look forward to seeing Grundy return , as he will, a little later in the season.

 Really enjoyed your analysis and I'm buying in

why do people care what the media say about Grundy?!

[censored] em. stay strong in house and win games 

In hindsight, perhaps the club should have had Grundy listed as 'Managed.'

Instead of Richo stumbling over his words trying to explain the Grundy omission, he could have said "Grundy's a little bit sore but nothing serious. We'll give him a little bit of a hit-out over the weekend and see how he pulls up."

Problem solved and none of this media codswallop.

Edited July 18, 20231 yr by Roger Mellie
" missing

 

6 minutes ago, Demonland said:

 

If i may ask... why are you peddling this [censored] ??

6 minutes ago, beelzebub said:

If i may ask... why are you peddling this [censored] ??

Because it’s news about the club. What are we so afraid of? If it’s [censored] it’s [censored], but we have a highly prized recruit playing VFL 6 weeks out from finals to build ‘forward craft’. It is going to generate stories like the one Andy has linked to.