12 minutes ago, D4Life said:

Petracca not at his best and still rebuilding confidence off the back of injury, and wanting to leave finishes 2nd in B&F. Kossie missed 3 games, so maybe Trac ends 3rd.

Options 1:

Another season body starting from better position and new coach/environment with King and Hopefully Petracca has an even better year. Then consider trading him if he wants to leave!

2:

Vs trade now at lower value in a weak draft!

---

Personally I’m keeping him in 2026 and trying to increase his value and get a pick in a stronger draft!

Yeah, I think that his 2025 B and F result is heavily inflated, given his output. Draw from that what you will given what we're hearing.

Lots of hypotheticals here so let's go with it....It's pretty obvious he isn't 100% invested in the club.

I think we are actually in a fantastic position with this and have all the bargaining power.

We've shown we are willing to hold him to his contract for starters.

Secondly, that's now forced him to open up and realise if he is to get a "clean start", unless the club can get something in return, they won't trade him.

For me the GC are the club we should be pursuing to do a deal with. Draft picks mean a totally different thing to them as it does to Victorian Clubs.

They know they are going to continue to get high talent through their academy.

From our perspective, we have to keep in mind we have 2 more year of draft before Tassie come in and its compromised. We need to load up on young talent now in my view.

Whilst i think Langford will be a star, Lindsay looks like he could be the same, Windsor is promising, I don't think anything else is certain. I like Kolt, but have not seen anything yet that has shown me he is going to make it. If we somehow can get 3-4 first round picks in the next 2 drafts we are well set up if we nail another 3 of the 4.

The GC have pick 6, 13, 16, future firsts and Flanders to play with, while we have Trac, pick 23, and some late picks for their academy bids. I cannot see any other club getting us anything remotely as good as that, unless we are part of a 3 club trade to land a fish of similar value to Trac.

If we want WIN / WIN, Suns look like the best option (at this stage!). Exciting times

Let me start this post by saying Tracc helped win us a flag and has been a Dee for about 11 years.

We should all appreciate that and I for one do and will always regard him as a great Dee.

Now if he wants to leave and that would make him happy and we can be fairly compensated, then I have no problem with that.

Do I think he is as good as before the injury, no I don't. Is he still a very good player, yes he is.

Players move clubs. He will be 30 soon. If that is his desire and we can accommodate it, then so be it and no hard feelings.

Given the GC lifestyle and their picks and list, they would seem the best to do a deal with, but we will see what happens.

9 minutes ago, Demonland said:

OOoooooh that hurt but true

6 minutes ago, Demonland said:

Hodge is right.

We need to move off the trio of Petracca, Oliver and Viney and find midfielders with better disposal. Viney and Oliver are esentially untradeable unless we pay a chunk of salary - so they should be the ones we retain.

I think if we trade Petracca and not pay his wages we won't lose that much. Petracca has lost some of his breakaway speed and his tackling is a liability. I see him being a bad contract going forward.

10 minutes ago, Fat Tony said:

Hodge is right.

We need to move off the trio of Petracca, Oliver and Viney and find midfielders with better disposal. Viney and Oliver are esentially untradeable unless we pay a chunk of salary - so they should be the ones we retain.

I think if we trade Petracca and not pay his wages we won't lose that much. Petracca has lost some of his breakaway speed and his tackling is a liability. I see him being a bad contract going forward.

And don't forget he never fixed his kicking skills, too late to do it now.

2 hours ago, Ghostwriter said:

Didn’t she just!!! That b!ttch was scathing. 😅

Difference is, she never liked Tracc BEFORE his injury. After his injury she got to talk with him at length and realised the impact of the trauma and how it had monumentally changed him… for the better. He declared his loyalty to the club and (with tears in his eyes) said (quote) I [censored] love these boys, I don’t wanna be anywhere else.

amsuing that people still down't know that WCW has just had an identity change. lol. Thanks for the snags at Casey at the girls game by the way

53 minutes ago, BLWNBA said:

Yeah, I think that his 2025 B and F result is heavily inflated, given his output. Draw from that what you will given what we're hearing.

Any inkling on destination?

I have always been a Petracca fan but am getting slightly cheesed off with him.

Nowadays he seems content to let rumours of his dissatisfaction swirl on and on at the end of every season, which is hardly calculated to endear him to the club or his teammates.

It is high time he commits himself firmly to Melbourne or asks in a respectful way for a trade.

Either way, he needs to remember that the club is bigger than any individual, no matter how talented.

@john delosa handing out more "thumbs down" than a night of missed targets by Petracca up in here.. 😂

2 hours ago, binman said:

Cover 400k of tracc's salary every season until 2029?

Play a bloke 1.2 million dollars to play for another team. I don't think so.

Or pay him $5.8million to supply $3million of output and potentially stop us getting some more young A grade talent. I get that it looks kind of ridiculous but as has been said Collingwood have been paying Treloar and Grundy over $500,000. In what world do we line up with Petracca, Oliver and Viney and improve our win/loss? The changes need to continue and it’s pretty apparent he’s still keen to leave.

The problem is unless we are lucky with who wants him the trade it will be very one sided if you were to allow it, if it’s picks we would want to start with a top 5 pick and go from there which essentially limits you to WC, Richmond and Essendon none of whom would be interested I’d assume. In a player swap who is going to give an equally good player back when it’s essentially a net zero gain unless the player is already wanting out, and there is only 2 of those we know of in the market anyway in Merrett and Charlie Curnow. I think the reality is we are going to need to back in the new coach to get trac back to his best

The best thing for Petracca and his brand would be to meet enthusiastically with Steven King, pledge his future with the club there and then follow up in public. Commit to being the best teammate he can be and go on to succeed Max as next Melbourne captain.

1 minute ago, Roost it far said:

Or pay him $5.8million to supply $3million of output and potentially stop us getting some more young A grade talent. I get that it looks kind of ridiculous but as has been said Collingwood have been paying Treloar and Grundy over $500,000. In what world do we line up with Petracca, Oliver and Viney and improve our win/loss? The changes need to continue and it’s pretty apparent he’s still keen to leave.

Unless you are able to bring in that another A grade player to replace trac it’s still a net loss, pies completely botched there salary cap and had no choice and then got very lucky they landed on there feet by getting a generational player for nothing in daicos. We are under no such cap pressure so far as I’m aware and have no daicos in the pipe line either, all we would be doing is freeing up cap space and weakening our list for no reason. There is no reason we need to offload trac in advance of sounding out other players.

Tbh... I'm happy to to see what the new brains trust think. They'll be the ones guiding our game and selection. It's they who either desire that he stay or need be convinced of it.

I can see that King would be desirous of retaining both Clarry and Tracc but he being an intelligent man will no doubt have had to consider what if they dont... either or both.

Keep in mind thus is the prequel to the Circus arriving and is otherwise known as the silly season.

Im sure there is very little 'hate' for either. There could be a truckload of frustration though. It appears to this observer that its a condition Tracc shares and understands. Yet to be seen is if the meeting of new coach(s) and playing group makes for a hearty reset.

Very much doubt anything is really going to happen one way or another until.thst transpires.

If playing finals footy is the 'box to be checked' well... maybe no-one ought to go anywhere too hastily.

This may well be as much Kingy's call as it is any player's .

We might just be jumping at shadows right at this juncture.

2 hours ago, damienjr said:

I gather you are not a fan of AI. That's the problem – we all think we know everything. Have you ever considered a different on-field role for Tracc? Probably not. I hadn't either until I started thinking about it. I just like to explore different ideas, and AI can assist in that.

I don’t think I know everything. I’d prefer to listen to the opinions of others in this forum than those who are outsourcing their intelligence to AI. To suggest that re-posting AI slop is somehow bringing new perspectives to the discussion is ridiculous, and shows a complete lack of curiosity and thought

If you want to explore different ideas USE YOUR [censored] BRAIN

Edited 17 hours ago17 hr by deegirl
Spelling

Without referencing Petracca I asked CHATGPT which AFL club would be the best fit for a player that is focussed on personal brand growth and has a semi successful YouTube cooking channel and CHATGPT legit used Petracca as an example and said Collingwood, and..... Melbourne would be the best fit (due to the fact that Petracca does this already and Melbourne is big but not too big to be overshadow by other boutique clubs) hense allowing more room for your brand to breath.

Just thought that was king of amusing

Merrett for petracca straight swap?

36 minutes ago, Mouseymoo said:

@john delosa handing out more "thumbs down" than a night of missed targets by Petracca up in here.. 😂

Better a few missed targets than not getting the ball at all 😉

10 minutes ago, deegirl said:

I don’t think I know everything. I’d prefer to listen to the opinions of others in this forum than those who are outsourcing their intelligence to AI. To suggest that re-posting AI slop is somehow bringing new perspectives to the discussion is ridiculous, and shows a complete lack of curiosity and thought

If you want to explore different ideas USE YOUR [censored] BRAIN

I think we should have appointed Chat GPT as our new coach

we'd save plenty of soft cap for starters

1 hour ago, Trident22 said:

amsuing that people still down't know that WCW has just had an identity change. lol. Thanks for the snags at Casey at the girls game by the way

Pewpewpew knows precisely who WCW is but was making a none too subtle point.

I hope you enjoyed the snags! Maybe next time you’ll make yourself known. I don’t bite. 😊

4 minutes ago, john delosa said:

Better a few missed targets than not getting the ball at all 😉

Also, Mousey, Thumbs down don’t change the scoreboard, pretty easy to ignore!

2 hours ago, BLWNBA said:

Yeah, I think that his 2025 B and F result is heavily inflated, given his output. Draw from that what you will given what we're hearing.

Are you saying 4 mfc coaches/voters regularly gave him votes he didn't deserve? Big call.

Amazing that fans know more than those that work with players every day.

I wonder how long before people say he didn't deserve the NSM.

Edited 17 hours ago17 hr by Lucifers Hero

4 hours ago, Ghostwriter said:

Right? How quickly some fans turn. Pre his horrific injury he was a beloved Demons champion. All it took was for the media to go to town on him and in a flash he’s public enemy #1. Shameful really.

I never turned on CP5 😇 I fully supported his attempts to move to Carlton last year 😁