Alwyn Davey

[mo64 5,209]

Rucks: PJ has improved this year and although we still lack that A-class ruckman (White pre-circle rule changes) Meeson has shown some good things

Just to add to your argument, we have actually recruited Simmonds and Jolly over the past 10 years.

[Dee Fan 3,247]

I wont say that I am happy with those areas but all of them have vastly improved in the last couple of years with the drafting that has happened.

Backline: Bell, Frawley, Martin, McNamara, Petterd, Rivers have all shown some promise that could prove to be a very good back line in time

Rucks: PJ has improved this year and although we still lack that A-class ruckman (White pre-circle rule changes) Meeson has shown some good things

Forwards: Juice, Davey, Sylvia, Weetra, Dunn, Bate, Maric all have talent and when joined with the experience of Neitz and Robbo could prove quite lethal pending on the delivery of the forwards which was the main problem last year

While I am at it

Midfielders: McLean, Bartram, Buckley, Jones, Moloney - That is a very young midfield if you add PJ or Meeson as the number 1 ruckman but has the making with three proven in and unders with two outside receivers with natural pace and skills. Then add the fact that there are numerous players that can fill in from the backline and forward line as well as unproven but with great potential in Grimes and Morton.

To say that our Drafting in the past 10 years has been abysmal is partly true but the past couple of years has been very good that should prove to be the core group in the next couple of years. Our under 26 list is ver strong with a lot of talent. Even our Under 20's list is promising with the last couple of Drafts. Remember Jones has only turned 20 and is almost the number 1 midfielder and maybe even playing as it the past couple of weeks.

You think so; I would go the opposite and say we have gone backwards.

Where among our backs is a player that can hold his own against Bradshaw or Lynch or Richardson, who is going to hold Pavlich or Brown or Franklin? We have a number of untried kids who may or may not prove to be good players but at the moment they are not. How can you classify Martin and McNamara as showing some promise after a couple of practice games where we have been flogged? Frawley would want to show a lot more than he has to be classified as a good player, he may well do that but at the moment he has isn’t.

I was a bit of a fan of Meesen but he has, from all reports, no idea about Ruck play and positioning, PJ is a bit small to handle the bigger Ruckmen and is really only a stop gap. Jamar, I won’t even go there. When we come up against the bigger Ruckmen we don’t stand a chance, Cox, Sandilands, Everitt, and other top ruckman consistently beat us. Why is Warnock’s brother playing for Freo and not for us?

Forwards, some of the ones you mentioned have yet to strike a blow in a real game so let’s not get carried away with them, the others are indeed not too bad but when the skipper and Robbo go do you think they are good enough to carry the forward line?

We do not have a genuine clearance player and as I have said before even when we win the tap we lose the clearance, we will have to alter our game plan if that is going to change.

Of course we have potential but so does all the other sides, we have been carrying players with potential for the last 20 or so years the problem is they have never converted that potential in to consistent top quality performance. I would love to see the current group do that but call me cynical if you like because I can’t see it happening. We need a big talented Full Back a big talented Ruckman a big talented CHF and some players in the middle that can get their hands on the ball first.

[Dee Fan 3,247]

Just to add to your argument, we have actually recruited Simmonds and Jolly over the past 10 years.

All part of the problem, we let them go and kept Jamar.

It's not just the recruiting it's also list management, we have had other players leave us over the years and no one asks why.

[Jarka 767]

I agree with RobbieF, our record of recruiting KPP's and rucks is dismal, at best. Sure we got Simmonds and Jolly but what's the point when they play their best footy with another club?

Our only true KPP or ruck success story is Rivers, but even he plays as a loose HBF, not a true CHF.

We have alot of developing to do

[mo64 5,209]

Why is Warnock’s brother playing for Freo and not for us?

Do you realise that there is no brother-brother rule? We didn't draft him because like every other club including Freo, we didn't believe that he was worth a 1st round draft pick. With our only selection prior to Robbie Warnock being picked, we picked up Nathan Jones. Have a whinge about that!

[Dee Fan 3,247]

Do you realise that there is no brother-brother rule? We didn't draft him because like every other club including Freo, we didn't believe that he was worth a 1st round draft pick. With our only selection prior to Robbie Warnock being picked, we picked up Nathan Jones. Have a whinge about that!

Mate I'm not having a whinge about anything just pointing out a few facts.

If you are not in agreeance then that's your call.

Yes I'm aware that there is no Brother-Brother rule but you would assume that we would have known about him and in fact if he turns out to be like I think he will, then yes I would have taken him before Nathan Jones. You are aware that we have a massive Ruck problem aren't you?

[mo64 5,209]

Mate I'm not having a whinge about anything just pointing out a few facts.

If you are not in agreeance then that's your call.

Yes I'm aware that there is no Brother-Brother rule but you would assume that we would have known about him and in fact if he turns out to be like I think he will, then yes I would have taken him before Nathan Jones. You are aware that we have a massive Ruck problem aren't you?

Every other club knew about Warnock as well. I thought we learnt our lessons from the Cockatoo-Collins, when we overpaid to get the other brother to the club. The names Jay Viney and Brian Stynes also come to mind. To solve the problem, let's ship Matthew Warnock off to Freo.

I do agree that we have a massive ruck problem. This is hindsight recruiting, but if I was critical of our recruiting, I would've traded our pick 37 to the Kangas for Brad Moran. Meesen wasn't even a 1st choice ruckman for Norwood. Played predominently as a forward.

[jacey 333]

Yes I'm aware that there is no Brother-Brother rule but you would assume that we would have known about him and in fact if he turns out to be like I think he will, then yes I would have taken him before Nathan Jones. You are aware that we have a massive Ruck problem aren't you?

Ur kidding right, taking Robbie instead of Nathan Jones?

Going with that theory, i guess you are still happy with Luke Molan?

Robbie was and still is a skinny beanpole. He was picked 30ish not because he was skilled (actually he was far far from it) or showed much footy nous but because he was so freakin tall. Freo punted and got it right.

U want to punt with our first round draft pick on someone with the right size and shape?

[Dee Fan 3,247]

Every other club knew about Warnock as well. I thought we learnt our lessons from the Cockatoo-Collins, when we overpaid to get the other brother to the club. The names Jay Viney and Brian Stynes also come to mind. To solve the problem, let's ship Matthew Warnock off to Freo.

I do agree that we have a massive ruck problem. This is hindsight recruiting, but if I was critical of our recruiting, I would've traded our pick 37 to the Kangas for Brad Moran. Meesen wasn't even a 1st choice ruckman for Norwood. Played predominently as a forward.

Not sure what you mean by hindsight recruiting when we were already aware of him, we had a Ruck problem and didn’t recruit him to solve the problem. I stand by what I said before we should have recruited him.

I doubt we recruited the Cockatoo-Collins boys for any reason other than we thought they could play. The same with Luke Ottens, Brian Stynes and Jay Viney, they were recruited because we thought they could play, so I’m not sure what your point is there. Perhaps you think we recruited them to keep their brothers happy?

[Dee Fan 3,247]

Ur kidding right, taking Robbie instead of Nathan Jones?

Going with that theory, i guess you are still happy with Luke Molan?

Robbie was and still is a skinny beanpole. He was picked 30ish not because he was skilled (actually he was far far from it) or showed much footy nous but because he was so freakin tall. Freo punted and got it right.

U want to punt with our first round draft pick on someone with the right size and shape?

Time will tell who got it right. We desperately need a tall ruckman and picking midfielders will not solve our problems.

No I wasn't happy with Luke Molan but in fairness to him he suffered some horrendus injuries. It was a bad choice none the less.

[mo64 5,209]

I doubt we recruited the Cockatoo-Collins boys for any reason other than we thought they could play.

If I recall correctly, they weren't drafted in the same year. We promised their dying mother that we would draft the other one if he was still available. We ended using a top 10 pick for him, which he was never worth.

[Jarka 767]

Going with that theory, i guess you are still happy with Luke Molan?

Not a good comparison to aid your argument because Daniher asked for the toughest KPP available, not the best (drafting 101 for dummies). From memory Matthew Maguire would have been the guy we should have taken with that pick in that draft because he was considered to be the next best available.

[Dee Fan 3,247]

If I recall correctly, they weren't drafted in the same year. We promised their dying mother that we would draft the other one if he was still available. We ended using a top 10 pick for him, which he was never worth.

I think you will find that they were both drafted in the same year, they are in fact twins.

[Gouga 508]

Are our ruck stocks that bad compared to other clubs?

We are ahead of a lot of clubs. We would be much further ahead if we retained one of Jolly/Simmonds however there is no way any of us posters can change that.

[Dee Fan 3,247]

Are our ruck stocks that bad compared to other clubs?

We are ahead of a lot of clubs. We would be much further ahead if we retained one of Jolly/Simmonds however there is no way any of us posters can change that.

Our ruck stocks are dreadful, when White retires we are stuffed. We have Jamar and PJ neither of these would rank as top class ruckmen or in fact good ruckmen. We have to compete against players that are over 200cm consistantly and out tallest player is Meesen at 200cm. We have a ton of players that range from 190 - 196cm but none of them is capable of rucking.

One of the major problems is we are consistantly beaten in the centre and this puts our backline under enormous pressure, which eventually results in scores against us. It's no good having a good forward line if the ball never gets there.

In 2006 we recruited Jones, Buckley and Bartram all small to medium players. Of course we also recruited Pickett that year and traded pick 29 for him, Warnock was taken at pick 42.

[deanox 8,643]

robbieF i think you're posts are a bit out of line. your arguments are simply that 'we can't recruit' and your only reason or justification is 'because thats your opinion'.

dig back through and find the thread on KPP and rucks that was done last year, and have a look at how many players we actually missed out on. most of the competitions good KPP and rucks have come from draft picks ahead of ours or from speculative rookie or late round draft picks where there is an element of luck.

can't you understand that everyone passed on alwyn davey, not just us? he wasn't good enough. simple. every other club agreed with us. he wasn't drafted and went back to the sanfl to play. if he was that good, don't you think another club would have picked him up then? can you give a reason why no one else picked him up but we should have except for the tired old line 'i watched him and i knew he was good enough?'. could you explain why he slipped to the 3rd round in the 06 draft where essendon finally snared him with pick 36 their 4th pick of the draft, where they rated him below tom gumbleton, leroy jetta and tom hislop in their drafting order? have yuo considered that our drafting department thought he was too much like aaron to have a big enough impact on field for the mfc (ie he has the same weaknesses that can be exposed)? your arguments need some kind of rationale behind them to be a bit more credible.

RE the cockatoo collins brothers: donald was drafted at number 11 in the 95 draft. his brother david was taken in the 95 pre season draft i believe.

out of interest what year did ND and CAC join the Dee's? because we have just had the end of a 10 year long era that was ND's reign, yet we are arguing about drafting that took place 12 or 13 years ago, prior to the previous administration?

[Gouga 508]

Our ruck stocks are dreadful, when White retires we are stuffed. We have Jamar and PJ neither of these would rank as top class ruckmen or in fact good ruckmen. We have to compete against players that are over 200cm consistantly and out tallest player is Meesen at 200cm. We have a ton of players that range from 190 - 196cm but none of them is capable of rucking.

One of the major problems is we are consistantly beaten in the centre and this puts our backline under enormous pressure, which eventually results in scores against us. It's no good having a good forward line if the ball never gets there.

In 2006 we recruited Jones, Buckley and Bartram all small to medium players. Of course we also recruited Pickett that year and traded pick 29 for him, Warnock was taken at pick 42.

White probably has two more seasons left, that gives us a chance to recruit a kid and obviously develop Jamar/PJ/Meesen. Jamar showed he was capable in 2006 and played injured in 2007. I think he deserves a little more credit.

I think our recruiters have got the mix right in the last few years. We have stocked up key positions both forward and back and have added hardness and quality to the midfield. Ruck will probably be a priority come the end of the year as it should be.

[Dee Fan 3,247]

robbieF i think you're posts are a bit out of line. your arguments are simply that 'we can't recruit' and your only reason or justification is 'because thats your opinion'.

dig back through and find the thread on KPP and rucks that was done last year, and have a look at how many players we actually missed out on. most of the competitions good KPP and rucks have come from draft picks ahead of ours or from speculative rookie or late round draft picks where there is an element of luck.

can't you understand that everyone passed on alwyn davey, not just us? he wasn't good enough. simple. every other club agreed with us. he wasn't drafted and went back to the sanfl to play. if he was that good, don't you think another club would have picked him up then? can you give a reason why no one else picked him up but we should have except for the tired old line 'i watched him and i knew he was good enough?'. could you explain why he slipped to the 3rd round in the 06 draft where essendon finally snared him with pick 36 their 4th pick of the draft, where they rated him below tom gumbleton, leroy jetta and tom hislop in their drafting order? have yuo considered that our drafting department thought he was too much like aaron to have a big enough impact on field for the mfc (ie he has the same weaknesses that can be exposed)? your arguments need some kind of rationale behind them to be a bit more credible.

RE the cockatoo collins brothers: donald was drafted at number 11 in the 95 draft. his brother david was taken in the 95 pre season draft i believe.

out of interest what year did ND and CAC join the Dee's? because we have just had the end of a 10 year long era that was ND's reign, yet we are arguing about drafting that took place 12 or 13 years ago, prior to the previous administration?

I don’t get paid to recruit, our football department does and they haven’t done a great job at it so far, have they? I don’t care what the other clubs do I care what we do, we were constantly told that CC was a very good selector of talent well I am not so sure he was. He missed too many good players and recruited too many ordinary players imo to be classed as the master recruiter.

I never suggested that we should have picked up the top KPP particularly the ones that went early in the draft, if you don’t have the pick you don’t have the option. I’m suggesting that given the opportunities we have had we haven’t used them wisely. We haven’t traded wisely either and one of the reasons that other high finishing clubs continue to succeed is that they have.

This is not just about Alwyn it is about the other players that have slipped through our grasp and the ones that we have recruited that have failed. Take 2001 where the three players we recruited were all picked under 30 but 2 never played a game for the club and 1 played about 30 games, none of them are still with the club.

But having said that I was surprised that we didn’t take the chance and recruit him there were several good reports about him at the time and Football is just that isn’t it, taking a chance. We could have rookied him for next to nothing and if he failed then so be it but we didn’t and history shows we were wrong. There is no problem having two players like he and Aaron in the side, they can play in different zones of the ground and it would have allowed Aaron to inject some pace in to the midfield. But we didn’t and that’s that.

If you are happy with the way things have gone then good luck to you I’m not.

It wasn’t me btw that brought up the Cockatoo- Collins boys so you can direct that question to someone else.

[old55 21,356]

... I won't do the statistics ...

Groundhog Day ...

Others have done the research and opinion remains divided.

The only final proof one way or another is how our players performs over the next few years with our new coaching department including the beefed up development department.

[Dee Fan 3,247]

Groundhog Day ...

Others have done the research and opinion remains divided.

The only final proof one way or another is how our players performs over the next few years with our new coaching department including the beefed up development department.

That will indeed be interesting.

[Jarka 767]

Groundhog Day ...

Others have done the research and opinion remains divided.

The only final proof one way or another is how our players performs over the next few years with our new coaching department including the beefed up development department.

Or you could look at the last 10 years...

Daniher & CAC had the role for a decade, more than enough time to make their mark. We'll give them some leniency, say first 5 years to settle in. So what was their best result in the last 5 years? A flaky win against an undermanned St.Kilda outfit in the first week of the finals and then we bow out with barely a whimper.

Story of the MFC really over the last decade, NOT GOOD ENOUGH

[Redleg 37,704]

To solve the problem, let's ship Matthew Warnock off to Freo.

I do agree that we have a massive ruck problem. This is hindsight recruiting, but if I was critical of our recruiting, I would've traded our pick 37 to the Kangas for Brad Moran.

Agree on both.

Also would have tried ( and maybe they did ) to trade Jamar to Crows and used that pick to take Moran.

[Dappa Dan 2,188]

Look. You've posted a dozen times and listed too many things, ad I couldn't be bothered bringing up all of them...

But in a nutshell... you are dissatisfied with the recruitment of A. Davey the second, and you are also dissatisfied with our recruiting as a whole.

The only thing I agree on is that we are each entitled to our opinions. Nothing you've written here is news to any of us, and nothing you've said has made me change my mind about our recruiting over recent years.

As far as I'm concerned we had a good period there where we made finals more often than not. We had a few mistakes, like Molan and Rogers, and a few trades that we were forced into that in retrospect hurt us a bit.

ANd yet you say things like this...

Once again I will state, I don't care what other clubs do or do not do I'm concerned with what we do and I would have to say it's not much.

So how are we supposed to take seriously any statement if you blind yourself to the simple facts. Recruitment is something that can easily be compared. If it wasn;t, guys like Craig Cameron wouldn't have been head-hunted.

As I said, MFC has made a few blues in recruitment. But so has EVERY club... Here's some items not discussed that are far too important to simply overlook in the way you seem to be doing so stubbornly:

- You're unwilling to mention successes such as Robertson, McDonald, Petterd, Bartram, Newton, Bate, Jones, Davey, McLean and Rivers. And before you start picking them apart individually, consider that each one has proven themselves to be useful already, and to have a future in the AFL. Some may not be stars but one thing they are not are players who disappear without playing games at all... And all have proven themselves to have been bargains in their places... eg Bate at 14 could have gone top 3 the next year, Petterd was one of the 10 best performed first year players last year despite being taken in the second round. Personally I'm thrilled with Jones at 14...

- You haven't mentioned the fact that we have been up for a while, and have a number of veterans who have enjoyed solid careers, who in recent years have occupied spots on the team, denying younger guys the opportunity to be blooded. In other words, we were up, now we're down... Courtesy of the fact that our prime players are too young to own the comp just yet, but are quality nonetheless. The Hawks did it, ditto the Lions, and the Blues have recruited some rippers after years of being down...

- You can't possibly expect credibility when you refuse to compare our recruiting to other clubs. Other clubs went for guys like Tenace and Ray who aren't guns... They all made mistakes, but you won't grade on a curve... Now I'm the first to admit we made mistakes... Sylvia hasn't returned our faith, but that has been largely due to injury... Bell is still yet to earn his first round rating... Frawley has a long way to go... Chris Johnson is a massive let-down... But for every stuff-up there are a couple of good calls...

- DB can deny it all he likes. We are rebuilding. He needed to offload about 12 players last year, but doing that would usher in greater disaster than the club can withstand at the moment. We could only select about 6 or 7 players with our picks, as well as a few rookies, so players who probably should have gone had to stay... I'm talking about Holland, Jamar, Cj can probably consider himself lucky, Ditto Warnock.... But for now there were simply more pressing delistings to be done... The trouble is we needed to years to offload the dead wood left by Daniher.

In the end I could go on and on submitting facts to justify my arguement, listening to your points and either agreeing and disproving them one by one...

When you boil it down, I'm not entirely satisfied with our recruiting, but am nearly there. Our lack of success is a shame, but I honestly believe we are a victim of our own mediocrity. The Hawks have suffered more than us in recent years, and they are now seeing their pain bear fruit with an extremely deep list. This is just the way of things. We may be in for a rough few years, but the importat thing is we are heading in the right direction... In a few years these players WHO ARE QUALITY, but can't be expected to win games off their own boot just yet, will mature and hit their straps all at the same time, and we will have something to be excited about...

But hey, if it makes you feel better to look at the glass half empty, more power to you.

[Nasher 33,068]

So how are we supposed to take seriously any statement if you blind yourself to the simple facts. Recruitment is something that can easily be compared. If it wasn;t, guys like Craig Cameron wouldn't have been head-hunted.

Dappa, I reckon you could've just written that line and your point would still be well made, and correct for mine. I think it's a bit hard to take someone's arguement seriously when they dismiss the only benchmark you can assess recruiters on because they're "not interested".

[Dee Fan 3,247]

So how are we supposed to take seriously any statement if you blind yourself to the simple facts. Recruitment is something that can easily be compared. If it wasn;t, guys like Craig Cameron wouldn't have been head-hunted.

As I said, MFC has made a few blues in recruitment. But so has EVERY club... Here's some items not discussed that are far too important to simply overlook in the way you seem to be doing so stubbornly:

- You're unwilling to mention successes such as Robertson, McDonald, Petterd, Bartram, Newton, Bate, Jones, Davey, McLean and Rivers. And before you start picking them apart individually, consider that each one has proven themselves to be useful already, and to have a future in the AFL. Some may not be stars but one thing they are not are players who disappear without playing games at all... And all have proven themselves to have been bargains in their places... eg Bate at 14 could have gone top 3 the next year, Petterd was one of the 10 best performed first year players last year despite being taken in the second round. Personally I'm thrilled with Jones at 14...

- You haven't mentioned the fact that we have been up for a while, and have a number of veterans who have enjoyed solid careers, who in recent years have occupied spots on the team, denying younger guys the opportunity to be blooded. In other words, we were up, now we're down... Courtesy of the fact that our prime players are too young to own the comp just yet, but are quality nonetheless. The Hawks did it, ditto the Lions, and the Blues have recruited some rippers after years of being down...

- You can't possibly expect credibility when you refuse to compare our recruiting to other clubs. Other clubs went for guys like Tenace and Ray who aren't guns... They all made mistakes, but you won't grade on a curve... Now I'm the first to admit we made mistakes... Sylvia hasn't returned our faith, but that has been largely due to injury... Bell is still yet to earn his first round rating... Frawley has a long way to go... Chris Johnson is a massive let-down... But for every stuff-up there are a couple of good calls...

- DB can deny it all he likes. We are rebuilding. He needed to offload about 12 players last year, but doing that would usher in greater disaster than the club can withstand at the moment. We could only select about 6 or 7 players with our picks, as well as a few rookies, so players who probably should have gone had to stay... I'm talking about Holland, Jamar, Cj can probably consider himself lucky, Ditto Warnock.... But for now there were simply more pressing delistings to be done... The trouble is we needed to years to offload the dead wood left by Daniher.

In the end I could go on and on submitting facts to justify my arguement, listening to your points and either agreeing and disproving them one by one...

When you boil it down, I'm not entirely satisfied with our recruiting, but am nearly there. Our lack of success is a shame, but I honestly believe we are a victim of our own mediocrity. The Hawks have suffered more than us in recent years, and they are now seeing their pain bear fruit with an extremely deep list. This is just the way of things. We may be in for a rough few years, but the importat thing is we are heading in the right direction... In a few years these players WHO ARE QUALITY, but can't be expected to win games off their own boot just yet, will mature and hit their straps all at the same time, and we will have something to be excited about...

But hey, if it makes you feel better to look at the glass half empty, more power to you.

Firstly Robbo and Macca were both recruited more than ten years ago. Of the other players you mention, some have proven themselves others are yet to do so. Players are only able to prove themselves as bargains once they have done that, the jury is still out on some of these players. I will give you the same courtesy that you gave me and I won't be bothered answering all of your points, but I will say you seem easily satisfied. You say that you could go on submitting facts but the truth is you haven't given any only opinions, just like me.

You want to talk about my credibility and the fact that I refuse to compare our recruiting with other clubs well lets do so, who would you like to start with, Geelong, Brisbane, Adelaide, Port Adelaide, West Coast? Who do you think has the better record? The thing is it is not just about who you picked up it's all about who you missed as well. If our recruiting department was as good as you believe why did we get so many dud's like Funke, Moorcoft, Molan, Rogers, Breese, Lamb, Armstrong etc. etc.

Do yourself a favour and have a look for yourself, the link I have provided will tell you all you need to now an if you are still convinced that we are super recruiters then you glass is not even half full you have drunk the lot.

http://www.footywire.com/afl/footy/ft_draf...amp;t=N&s=P