1 minute ago, mo64 said:

@Dannyz relayed info about a conversation last week had between Steven King and Judd McVee. By your reckoning, Judd relayed the details of the convo to Trac, who in turn passed it onto Dannyz, lol.

Certain Demonland posters have been getting reliable info from within the club for years. Some people have a fixation with Tom Morris, who is just a journalist doing his job. To suggest that Trac is Tom Morris' source is beyond ridiculous.

There is clearly a leak within the football department. Given the mass turnover of staff, it narrows down to a select few.

The club has had leaks all over the place. Recent turnover has shown a reduction of leaks but a few still occur, indeed they occur at all clubs.

Interestingly was listening to the Bartel and Mcguire podcast the other week and he blamed a lot of our leaks on coeterie groups not knowing their place.

Just now, mo64 said:

@Dannyz relayed info about a conversation last week had between Steven King and Judd McVee. By your reckoning, Judd relayed the details of the convo to Trac, who in turn passed it onto Dannyz, lol.

Certain Demonland posters have been getting reliable info from within the club for years. Some people have a fixation with Tom Morris, who is just a journalist doing his job. To suggest that Trac is Tom Morris' source is beyond ridiculous.

There is clearly a leak within the football department. Given the mass turnover of staff, it narrows down to a select few.

I would happily go on record and say i 100% believe either Trac or someone within his circle is likely passing info to Tom Morris, of course i don't have proof of this, but it's fairly obvious isn't it? Go and find me one single story or article from Tom Morris relating to Trac in the last two years that isn't heavily skewed to pro Trac and anti MFC.

the theme has been identical including today where the magical story of the MFC pushing Trac out when he didn't want to leave has come up 24 hours after the club released a statement saying Trac was driving it.

This sort of thing isn't unusual, and is a tactic to put pressure on the club, but it's a really bad look for Trac in my opinion, I don't think anyone seriously thinks we're going to push Trac out given we don't even have a good replacement lined up.

We're pushing Trac out because we desperately want the Crows pick 14 in a heavily compromised draft?

14 minutes ago, GS_1905 said:

How do we know the leak wasn't self-instigated?

“Because there’s zero evidence it came from him, only lazy assumptions. If it was self-instigated, why would the article itself say he raised issues in a private meeting? That’s management spin, not a player planting stories.

5 hours ago, dimmy said:

I am really confused about how a person can sign a contract for x amount of years for $$$ .

He the wants out , BUT the Club (i.e.MFC in this case) are duty bound to continue to pay that player.

Could someone please explain how we could be paying a "wantouta" or "renegger" his salary and getting nothing back.

What is the point of a legal contract ????

I'm gonna go and get a hair cut and look up the value of my Petracca cards

1 hour ago, D4Life said:

I’ll be disappointed if the club is paying any attention to the supporter base on this topic.

The decision needs to be what actions are required to put us back in the premiership window!

Guerra comment seemed to indicate we are taking the right pragmatic approach! Leave emotions to the supporters!

Yeah, and where do you think supporters will direct their emotion? They don’t live in a vacuum. I would love to think that the admin can withstand the pressure to ‘get him out of here!1!’ but only to a point. King will not want Rd 1 to be about CP5 getting harassed as he ascends out of the rooms.

Talk about hiding to nothing

I dont think our CEO would say Trac wanted to look elsewhere if the meeting went along the lines of "i feel you are pushing me out".

In any event it doesn't matter, we have been crystal clear something has to turn our heads to let him go, the whole 50/50 is irrelevant, Trac's manager must know that and its why no club has been nominated, we wont agree to a nominated club only a deal that suits us. However the story came out it doesn't help Trac get a deal done.

4 minutes ago, mo64 said:

@Dannyz relayed info about a conversation last week had between Steven King and Judd McVee. By your reckoning, Judd relayed the details of the convo to Trac, who in turn passed it onto Dannyz, lol.

Certain Demonland posters have been getting reliable info from within the club for years. Some people have a fixation with Tom Morris, who is just a journalist doing his job. To suggest that Trac is Tom Morris' source is beyond ridiculous.

There is clearly a leak within the football department. Given the mass turnover of staff, it narrows down to a select few.

Having this type of 'mail' would be a commonplace with all clubs. You will never be able to stop this type of information coming out and i'd hardly call it a leak.

I'm talking about the juicy stuff, you know Goody's dismissal, May's exit interview, Trac's private leadership discussion etc. These are leaks and i wont go as far as laying the blame solely on Trac, i think he is suspect #1 if i was doing an investigation.

The odds of a staff member deliberately leaking information - whilst not zero - IMV is not a likely source. You just have to think about the motivation at play here. Whilst a player on the other hand is different. Especially in the case of Trac.

Those that naively believe Trac was all but reconstituted into the playing group from last year, clearly live in a Twilight Zone. He was most likely told, give us 12 months to turn it around and if you are not happy at the end of 2025, we will work with you to make a trade happen. In that time a disenchanted player will do all sorts of things and i think his motivation is to make him coming back to MFC in 2026 a highly undesirable option for MFC whilst without damaging his brand. I thought this 12 months ago, i thought this during the season and i still think this is his strategy. Think about it. it is a smart strategy. MFC will never publicly admit his unprofessionalism as it will lower his trade value but with keeping him, they are faced with the proposition of more of his fracturing / destabilising behaviour. So, they are forced to trade him out.

I can't prove it, but I'm highly confident his management have advised him to walk this path.

2 hours ago, Jaded No More said:

Well who didn’t see this story arc coming… Trac the victim again

If you can’t see how damaging he has been to our club for 18 months, then I don’t know what to tell you.

Wait till he actually leaves. They’ll be polishing Brand Petracca for years. My one hope is he and the club have done some work together on extracting a good deal from GC by involving Adelaide. I guess I’m hoping we’ve got someone working the strings on this 💩show.

9 minutes ago, GS_1905 said:

Having this type of 'mail' would be a commonplace with all clubs. You will never be able to stop this type of information coming out and i'd hardly call it a leak.

I'm talking about the juicy stuff, you know Goody's dismissal, May's exit interview, Trac's private leadership discussion etc. These are leaks and i wont go as far as laying the blame solely on Trac, i think he is suspect #1 if i was doing an investigation.

The odds of a staff member deliberately leaking information - whilst not zero - IMV is not a likely source. You just have to think about the motivation at play here. Whilst a player on the other hand is different. Especially in the case of Trac.

Those that naively believe Trac was all but reconstituted into the playing group from last year, clearly live in a Twilight Zone. He was most likely told, give us 12 months to turn it around and if you are not happy at the end of 2025, we will work with you to make a trade happen. In that time a disenchanted player will do all sorts of things and i think his motivation is to make him coming back to MFC in 2026 a highly undesirable option for MFC whilst without damaging his brand. I thought this 12 months ago, i thought this during the season and i still think this is his strategy. Think about it. it is a smart strategy. MFC will never publicly admit his unprofessionalism as it will lower his trade value but with keeping him, they are faced with the proposition of more of his fracturing / destabilising behaviour. So, they are forced to trade him out.

I can't prove it, but I'm highly confident his management have advised him to walk this path.

Good post.

When it comes to 'leaks', sometimes it is the club choosing to do it.

1 minute ago, GS_1905 said:

Having this type of 'mail' would be a commonplace with all clubs. You will never be able to stop this type of information coming out and i'd hardly call it a leak.

I'm talking about the juicy stuff, you know Goody's dismissal, May's exit interview, Trac's private leadership discussion etc. These are leaks and i wont go as far as laying the blame solely on Trac, i think he is suspect #1 if i was doing an investigation.

The odds of a staff member deliberately leaking information - whilst not zero - IMV is not a likely source. You just have to think about the motivation at play here. Whilst a player on the other hand is different. Especially in the case of Trac.

Those that naively believe Trac was all but reconstituted into the playing group from last year, clearly live in a Twilight Zone. He was most likely told, give us 12 months to turn it around and if you are not happy at the end of 2025, we will work with you to make a trade happen. In that time a disenchanted player will do all sorts of things and i think his motivation is to make him coming back to MFC in 2026 a highly undesirable option for MFC whilst without damaging his brand. I thought this 12 months ago, i thought this during the season and i still think this is his strategy. Think about it. it is a smart strategy. MFC will never publicly admit his unprofessionalism as it will lower his trade value but with keeping him, they are faced with the proposition of more of his fracturing / destabilising behaviour. So, they are forced to trade him out.

I can't prove it, but I'm highly confident his management have advised him to walk this path.

Your commentary is the exact reason why club's occasionally leak stories. The club want to be portrayed as the innocent party in the eyes of supporters, sponsors, etc.

There's a fair chance that Trac and Judd want to leave due to personal reasons involving someone still at the club. Their side of the story will probably never come out, because players don't want to get involved in a slanging match with their former club.

So in the case of Judd, the narrative is that he wants to play a different role. And we've yet to hear from Trac because there is a real possibility that a trade doesn't get done, and he remains at the club.

Tasmanian draft concessions just announced.

When combined with Northern academy picks 2027 onwards will be a desert from a draft perspective for clubs such as the MFC.

They have been given picks Nos.1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11 and 13, and the first selection of each subsequent round in their first draft, which is expected to be in 2027, ahead of their AFL debut in 2028.

https://www.theage.com.au/sport/afl/suns-will-seek-info-from-afl-as-they-explore-ugle-hagan-trade-20251001-p5mz7e.html

Sure you can trade for some of these picks but it will cost. Expect the likes of Brisbane to become even stronger

38 minutes ago, GawnOfTheDead said:

Gotcha.

That would mean they would have to play the likes of Laurie etc.

Probably pushes us back 5-10 years for another crack.

Richmond suggested it would take 7 years for their rebuild,

I don't think we should do what Richmond are doing. They have been adopting a scortched earth approach. We still have enough young talent to be competitive. Kossie, Rivers, Bowey, Langford, Turner, Chandler, Sparrow, JVR, Langdon (could play a long career), Windsor, Adams, Lindsay and Tholstrup are all potentially good players with time on their side.

We should be looking at trying to do what Hawthorn have done and I would argue our base looks better than what they had 3 years ago.

It is hard a painful when you have to admit you are no longer in the window, but the sooner we do it the better.

It's so funny to me how badly some fans and the AFL media want to paint the MFC as a basket case. Clearly we haven't been perfect and we've made mistakes but in the last 5 years we've had 3 top 4 finishes, an AFL premiership, a VFL premiership, an AFLW premiership a McLelland trophy, we've signed most of our required players long term, we're on the verge of securing our long term home base.

We're not perfect but it's hardly basket case level stuff, we've been pretty good on and off the field if you actually peer through the media noise.

How does this relate to Trac? it's difficult to say, we'll probably know where the blame mostly lays with this but it's definitely not just one party, both sides have got huge elements of this wrong, and that's what can unfortunately happen in a messy break up.

1 minute ago, Ted Lasso said:

It's so funny to me how badly some fans and the AFL media want to paint the MFC as a basket case. Clearly we haven't been perfect and we've made mistakes but in the last 5 years we've had 3 top 4 finishes, an AFL premiership, a VFL premiership, an AFLW premiership a McLelland trophy, we've signed most of our required players long term, we're on the verge of securing our long term home base.

We're not perfect but it's hardly basket case level stuff, we've been pretty good on and off the field if you actually peer through the media noise.

How does this relate to Trac? it's difficult to say, we'll probably know where the blame mostly lays with this but it's definitely not just one party, both sides have got huge elements of this wrong, and that's what can unfortunately happen in a messy break up.

When the President, CEO and coach all get the sack, then the AFL media will see the club as a basket case.

Let's hope that we can turn things round quickly like the Pies did after the same things happened to them. The media saw them as a basket case when they had a fire sale of players, and they missed out on Voss as their first choice as coach. They won a flag 2 years later.

Crows say : We don't want to give you any senior players, but we want Petracca.

Dees: Petrecca has 4 more years under contract. Petracca was second in the 2025 best and fairest, polled 16 votes in this years Brownlow, he’s a four-time All-Australian, twice MFC best and fairest, and a Norm Smith Medal winner. Yes he is a premiership player.

Crows : You can have Pedlar, who doesn't play, and pick 14 - that's fair.

Dees: that’s a joke … you’re joking right!!!

12 minutes ago, Ted Lasso said:

It's so funny to me how badly some fans and the AFL media want to paint the MFC as a basket case. Clearly we haven't been perfect and we've made mistakes but in the last 5 years we've had 3 top 4 finishes, an AFL premiership, a VFL premiership, an AFLW premiership a McLelland trophy, we've signed most of our required players long term, we're on the verge of securing our long term home base.

We're not perfect but it's hardly basket case level stuff, we've been pretty good on and off the field if you actually peer through the media noise.

How does this relate to Trac? it's difficult to say, we'll probably know where the blame mostly lays with this but it's definitely not just one party, both sides have got huge elements of this wrong, and that's what can unfortunately happen in a messy break up.

Good post.

Carlton and Essendon front has been quiet lately....

5 hours ago, Smokey said:

I dislike Trac as much as anyone right now, but don't conflate that with your lack of understanding on how contracts a work.

Manners

1 hour ago, mo64 said:

To suggest that Trac is Tom Morris' source is beyond ridiculous.

There is clearly a leak within the football department. Given the mass turnover of staff, it narrows down to a select few.

Not keen on an argument, suffice to say both of these assertions completely fail the Occam's razor test.

26 minutes ago, Ted Lasso said:

It's so funny to me how badly some fans and the AFL media want to paint the MFC as a basket case. Clearly we haven't been perfect and we've made mistakes but in the last 5 years we've had 3 top 4 finishes, an AFL premiership, a VFL premiership, an AFLW premiership a McLelland trophy, we've signed most of our required players long term, we're on the verge of securing our long term home base.

We're not perfect but it's hardly basket case level stuff, we've been pretty good on and off the field if you actually peer through the media noise.

How does this relate to Trac? it's difficult to say, we'll probably know where the blame mostly lays with this but it's definitely not just one party, both sides have got huge elements of this wrong, and that's what can unfortunately happen in a messy break up.

And at the same time saying the Saints are a destination club when they have spent half their cap on 8 players, to be in the 7-12 range when they were already there.

34 minutes ago, Dannyz said:

Good post.

When it comes to 'leaks', sometimes it is the club choosing to do it.

For sure they would - i dont deny that, but in most of our major leak scenario's i can't see that being the case - it just doesn't make sense to me. They 100% butchered Oliver last year. That was Pert acting from what we are led to believe in isolation but who knows. In the end Pert was ousted so i think ultimately the club 'corrected' its handling of the situation.

37 minutes ago, mo64 said:

Your commentary is the exact reason why club's occasionally leak stories. The club want to be portrayed as the innocent party in the eyes of supporters, sponsors, etc.

There's a fair chance that Trac and Judd want to leave due to personal reasons involving someone still at the club. Their side of the story will probably never come out, because players don't want to get involved in a slanging match with their former club.

So in the case of Judd, the narrative is that he wants to play a different role. And we've yet to hear from Trac because there is a real possibility that a trade doesn't get done, and he remains at the club.

Judd is a different case - similar to LJ from a few years back. You can have a crack at his values and loyalty, but he is away from home and wants to ultimately return. You dont have to agree with it, but you can understand it.

Lets not forget that Trac and his camp went a long long way tarnishing the clubs reputation by allowing that whole fiasco to play out in public the way it did. Now we may have butchered some of the optics of it, but the narrative that ensued was that we were largely responsible for his injury and the way it was handled. Once it was established that he was just as responsible for putting himself back on the field, the narrative shifted to the club not making adequate contact with Trac or his family and he felt alone and isolated.

1 hour ago, KozzyCan said:

Interestingly was listening to the Bartel and Mcguire podcast the other week and he blamed a lot of our leaks on coeterie groups not knowing their place.

Even unofficial coterie type groups not knowing their place.

If you spoke to the current bunch in the Coterie you’d realise the level of info they get is pretty high level. They won’t be the source.

It’s well known that we have a bunch of King Makers who lurk around the club. Want a rumour just ask them. Media know them.

51 minutes ago, Fat Tony said:

I don't think we should do what Richmond are doing. They have been adopting a scortched earth approach. We still have enough young talent to be competitive. Kossie, Rivers, Bowey, Langford, Turner, Chandler, Sparrow, JVR, Langdon (could play a long career), Windsor, Adams, Lindsay and Tholstrup are all potentially good players with time on their side.

We should be looking at trying to do what Hawthorn have done and I would argue our base looks better than what they had 3 years ago.

It is hard a painful when you have to admit you are no longer in the window, but the sooner we do it the better.

Like your thinkin. How long is the turn around where we are Hawthorn?

It can be faster than you think if we draft well. But we just need to be patient, because it is a bit of a lottery.

This means keeping cap space, gettting Oliver back to his best, recruiting players than can play on the periphery early in their careers and then hopefully moving inside mid later on.

He's got his money (guaranteed) so now it's more a matter of who he wants to play for

It's quite probable that he can't see much future success at the MFC

Happens in the NBA and other big sports on a constant basis

3 hours ago, Jaded No More said:

Well who didn’t see this story arc coming… Trac the victim again

If you can’t see how damaging he has been to our club for 18 months, then I don’t know what to tell you.

That last bit that we have been pushing him out, if in fact he said it, is pathetic.