32 minutes ago, SFebes said:

1 Premiership as Captain

1 Premiership as assistant 2016

1 GF for Saints in 2009

3 GF's in total. 2 flags.

Part of Geelong system under Bomber Thompson, Chris Scott. Played under Ross Lyon, assistant to Bevo. Learned struggle street under Dew (who learnt off Clarkson And Choco Williams as player/assistant), which is also a good thing. Done the time.

While I'm excited we have King now he was an EX-captain in the 2007 GF.

@Adam The God Wikipedia says King was with the suns from 2021-3 while Geelong won their last flag.

35 minutes ago, SFebes said:

1 Premiership as Captain

Tom Harley was the Captain.

19 minutes ago, SFebes said:

Re King, I think it's important for everyone as a whole not to expect a rebound or too much in 2026. May be wise to expect more in 2027. Patience while he settles in would be appreciated.

So, I shouldn’t have got a Demons Premiership 2026 tatt just yet?

15 minutes ago, Bombay Airconditioning said:

I disagree, I’ve also disagreed with the notion over the years that it takes twelve moths or longer to learn a new game plan. End of the day there’s only so many ways to play the game & we still have a more than capable list. We are not Richmond who traded out the majority of senior players for picks, we’ll not anyway.

12 minutes ago, Ted Lasso said:

Craig McRae took a worse pies list from the same position to a 1 point loss in a prelim in year 1. we shouldn’t put a limit on anything we can do (granted they had Nick daicos come in) but we’ve got some really high end young players too.

9 minutes ago, Demonstone said:

Tom Harley was the Captain.

More so for him finding his feet, list changes etc. I agree that there isnt too many new ways to play the game, it all has the same core.

Thanks Demonstone, misinformation everywhere, he was captain for 4 yrs 2003-2006.

Edited 10 hours ago10 hr by SFebes

I am astonished that the usual media suspects have already tried to pot the club, with comments being along the line that ours was a shoddy process.

Apparently, Buckley has commented that the process was too quick for him and his media mates have fallen in behind his position. It is clear to me now that Buckley played the MFC and used his so-called candidacy as a strategy to put the wind up Tassie. In other words, it is obvious that Buckley never intended to take the Melbourne job.

Very cynical in my view and I am p155ed off.

Anyone who thinks King won’t be a hard taskmaster should remember that he currently works under Chris Scott, who is arguably the hardest taskmaster of all.

King was also a Saints assistant for the 2010 GFs

14 hours ago, Norm Smith's Curse said:

I think Buckley was mindful that he could be paid massively if he got the Tassie gig with almost no pressure whereas while he might have thought of the idea of winning a premiership as attractive, a lot of things can - by historical evidence - go wrong at the dees.

I was warming to Buckley mainly because I was impressed with how detailed his awareness of game plans, tactics and even obscure players on every list and I also thought he might help to attract talent.

But Kingie comes out of the club that just never bottoms out and that turns middle-range players into guns.

I think all coaches are clever and intelligent. Buckley is just a good communicator and has had media training. He is also talking from a position of no pressure. Dont you remember how snarky he used to be in his pressers ? He may have warmed to people in his current role, but dont forget when the camera's and microphones are on, the TV radio personalities only show you what you they want you to see. Not having a crack at Bucks - just saying that he does his current job really well but that does not guarantee him doing coaching well.

Like I suggested earlier, I think we may have dodged a bullet with Bucks. I know someone who was at the Pies (& still is), who would been close to Bucks, and had negative things to say about him. He also said Bucks wouldn’t have had good relationships with some of our senior players.

10 minutes ago, Jaded No More said:

Anyone who thinks King won’t be a hard taskmaster should remember that he currently works under Chris Scott, who is arguably the hardest taskmaster of all.

I really hope that is what he brings.

1 Premiership as player (Geel) 2007

1 Premiership as assistant 2016 (Bulldogs)

1 GF for Saints in 2009 as a player

2 GF for Saints as an assistant )Came on to coaching team mid season after injury), (2 GF's 2010)

5 GF's in total. 2 flags.

Part of Geelong system under Bomber Thompson, Chris Scott. Played under Ross Lyon, assistant to Bevo. Learned struggle street under Dew (who learnt off Clarkson And Choco Williams as player/assistant), which is also a good thing. Done the time.

*edited previous post

1 hour ago, Go Ds said:

It can be amusing how namesakes crop up. Stephen is less common than John but I can't remember tons of John King's as one example. Technically the writer is 'PH' and our new coach is Steven with a 'V'. But I'm sure there'll be some puns. Also there was a jockey SteVen King, best known for winning the Melbourne Cup on Let's Elope in 1991. Here's hoping for more Melbourne cups!

Dontchya just love a random stream of consciousness 😅

50 minutes ago, Ghostwriter said:

So, I shouldn’t have got a Demons Premiership 2026 tatt just yet?

Just get the '2' on your left cheek and for the last 2 digits wait ! 😉🤣🤣🤣

Good luck King.

I think it was a strange decision by Buckley. Tassie is no certainty to even come into the competition and they will be a cellar dweller for the first 3-4 years if they do come in. He should have been 100% in on the role. I think Tassie will be a disaster.

The club needs to work out if we’re still a premiership chance with this list or not. This is the key decision, more so than the coach.

49 minutes ago, I'va Worn Smith said:

I am astonished that the usual media suspects have already tried to pot the club, with comments being along the line that ours was a shoddy process.

Apparently, Buckley has commented that the process was too quick for him and his media mates have fallen in behind his position. It is clear to me now that Buckley played the MFC and used his so-called candidacy as a strategy to put the wind up Tassie. In other words, it is obvious that Buckley never intended to take the Melbourne job.

Very cynical in my view and I am p155ed off.

Can you explain this further? I'm not sure Buckley has lied at all. It is possible since Melbourne started their coach search he always genuinely considered both Tassie and us, yes?

1 hour ago, Bombay Airconditioning said:

I disagree, I’ve also disagreed with the notion over the years that it takes twelve moths or longer to learn a new game plan. End of the day there’s only so many ways to play the game & we still have a more than capable list. We are not Richmond who traded out the majority of senior players for picks, we’ll not anyway.

Our list isn't good enough. We'll need to do some form of list overhaul before we can contend again which will take years.

3 minutes ago, Fat Tony said:

Good luck King.

I think it was a strange decision by Buckley. Tassie is no certainty to even come into the competition and they will be a cellar dweller for the first 3-4 years if they do come in. He should have been 100% in on the role. I think Tassie will be a disaster.

The club needs to work out if we’re still a premiership chance with this list or not. This is the key decision, more so than the coach.

Some people love a challenge. If Buckley got Tasmania from basket case to premiership in , say, five years it'd be the stuff of legend and some people would love having that legacy.

It's easy to forget that coaching Melbourne means a (Melbourne- based) person's life is not uprooted whereas moving , working and being about as important and as well-known in Tasmania as the premier may cause extra snags for the first Tassie coach. Certainly I could see why potential coaches would avoid the Devils and wait for teams like Essendon and Carlton be looking again.

9 minutes ago, lorn said:

Our list isn't good enough. We'll need to do some form of list overhaul before we can contend again which will take years.

who’s list is? I keeping asking the same question, who are all of Geelong’s and Hawthorn’s big name players, even Collingwood to a lesser extent. These teams have great systems in place, their players are all on the same page and execute their gameplan perfectly. Yes we have some skill issues and lack a big target up fwd but I disagree that we’re years away from being competitive again, things can change quickly. King was asked where he thought our list was at, I think a lot of our issues this season were driven by frustration.

17 hours ago, Jaded No More said:

Sorry but if you’re coaching for the money, you’re in it for the wrong reasons.

I’m glad we dodged that bullet

Never a truer word spoken JNM.

Poor Bucks wasn't first choice and media and him will spin it somehow. The analysis on SEN this morning was laughable. Clearly those boys - Gerard included - have never had a real job or been in the employment business.

They just can't get their head around Bucks not being preferred and attempts to justify this were comedy gold.

As I have said on here before, my Pies maes are rapt for the Dees. They were scarred by 10 years of Bucks at their team and absolutelty warned me off him.. As well as the appalling handover process by McGuire but taht's another story.

I’m not sure why we needed to make a decision on Friday and not wait till Wednesday especially if we were considering offering it to Bucks. If we never were then it’s a moot point.

23 minutes ago, lorn said:

Our list isn't good enough. We'll need to do some form of list overhaul before we can contend again which will take years.

Ok then.

Probably good we are not paying too much for a senior coach while we have such lacklustre players.

We should let Pickett, Petty, Langdon, Langford, Chandler, Petracca, Oliver, Viney, Gawn, Rivers, Lindsay, Sparrow, Windsor, Turner, Lever, Bowey, May, Howes, Culley, McDonald, Melksham, and Fritsch that they can just phone it in because there is no way to contend with this lot…

Thanks fully tho, I don’t think King is such a weak kneed defeatist and can think of a way to get more out of what we have and play in a way that asks more from those that have it to give and draws more from those that haven’t had it pulled from them.

The Pies rebounded from a successful era into a successful era, same with the Hawks, Geelong - at some point we can sit up and ask more of ourselves…

Just now, OhMyDees said:

I’m not sure why we needed to make a decision on Friday and not wait till Wednesday especially if we were considering offering it to Bucks. If we never were then it’s a moot point.

Obviously we never were. If Buckley was our number one choice we would have pushed harder and waited for him.

And if this was the boat race everyone said it was in the media, then we wouldn’t have paid an external team of people to join the search, nor gone thru a process. We would have spoken to Buckley, and given him the job if he was keen. That’s usually how experienced coaches go about getting their next job. Don’t think Clarkson or Hardwick or Brad Scott went thru anything like what we put Buckley through.

At the end of the day Buckley would have been the easier choice, and definitely a choice for the now. Buckley would raise the club’s profile, and take care of the media noise. King was the long term choice with an eye on real sustained success.

Doesn’t mean King will achieve that, but if you were after a great tactician with aggressive ideas around game plan, in the same mold as McRae, then you got what you were after.

We wanted experience, we wanted a good tactical mind, we wanted a fresh new voice, and we wanted someone who understood the modern game. King ticked all those boxes. IMO Buckley did not.

3 minutes ago, OhMyDees said:

I’m not sure why we needed to make a decision on Friday and not wait till Wednesday especially if we were considering offering it to Bucks. If we never were then it’s a moot point.

I think the committment issue is paramount. If we took Buckley and he still had half an eye on Tassie he might bolt in 2 or 3 of years when Tassie might actually have a team (or being closer to player related decisions at least). Particularly if things weren't going well at Melb.

47 minutes ago, Go Ds said:

Just get the '2' on your left cheek and for the last 2 digits wait ! 😉🤣🤣🤣

Too late, I’ve already got it done… across my forehead.

It’s over to you now Stevie 😂