Looking at the last 10 drafts you'd have to say Melbourne have misused some of their top picks in the National draft . . .

1997 - Travis Johnstone - pick #1 - 160 games.

one could argue that he was a validated choice but you only have to look at who was drafted after him to see the Dees missed out

1997 - Troy Longmuir - pick #22 - 17 games

missed out on one of Nick Stevens, Brodie Holland, Simon Black, Adam Goodes or Nathan Thompson

1998 - Chris Lamb - pick #13 - 21 games

21 games sums it up, and even if Melbourne were determined to get a KPP, they missed Luke Penny, Aaron Henneman, Craig Bolton and Danny Jacobs. Admittedly none have set the world on fire (Bolton aside perhaps)

1999 - Paul Wheatley - pick #20 - 114 games

definitely serviced the club well but Adam Hunter was taken at #29

2001 - Luke Molan - pick #9 - 0 games

up there with 1997 as far as strongest draft goes and didn't even scrounge together one game. missed out on - too many to list

2002 - Nick Smith - pick #15 - 4 games

yes well . . . apart from the obvious here Minson and PJ were taking shortly after

Yeah but its all relative. Check out every other club and you'll see that they would have made as many mistakes with early draft picks as we have.

I blame our player development more so than drafting.

yeah and have a look at some of the beuties we have got with late draft picks...it is very hard to tell how a player will mature if are great little youngsters in the little leagues...you could probably blame development for a major slice of this

there were a lot of highly credentialed youngsters taken after all those draft picks that have turned out to be good.

Lamb, Molan and Smith hurt the most

Looking at the last 10 drafts you'd have to say Melbourne have misused some of their top picks in the National draft . . .

1997 - Travis Johnstone - pick #1 - 160 games.

one could argue that he was a validated choice but you only have to look at who was drafted after him to see the Dees missed out

All 16 clubs would have made this pick. TJ is regarded as the most dominant under 18 player in TAC cup history

Fair enough.

Wasn't the worst pick ever, but not Riewoldt, Hodge et

1997 - Travis Johnstone - pick #1 - 160 games.

one could argue that he was a validated choice but you only have to look at who was drafted after him to see the Dees missed out

Who? Luke Power, who else? Besides, it was always going to be Johnstone or Ottens, and i'm certaintly not devastated about missing out on Ottens

Simon Black, Adam Goodes.

Look at the half dozen I mentioned with Longmuir then throw in a few other 100 gamers inbetween the top 5 and him

This argument again, can we confine these threads to draft week.

Simon Black, Adam Goodes.

Look at the half dozen I mentioned with Longmuir then throw in a few other 100 gamers inbetween the top 5 and him

15 clubs passed on Simon Black, 15 clubs passed on Adam Goodes. I don't think you understand just how much of a lottery the draft actually is.

I have no respect for people that make claims but have absolutely no intention of backing them up. "Worst only ahead of Richmond in the last 10 years" ?, it's an easy throw away line.

Come back to me tomorrow with a full analysis of all 16 clubs draft picks over the period you mention.

please note the question mark.

Only opened this for a debate on something other than who's head's next on the chopping block from the first 22

Just had a quick look at Carlton's recruiting since 1995, the following is a list of their first pick in each draft.

1995 - Adrian Burdon

1996 - Jim Walters

1997 - Kris Massie (pick7)

1998 - Murray Vance (pick6)

1999 - Richard Kelly

2000 - Luke Livingston (pick4)

2001 - Justiin Davies

2002 - Tim Fleming

2003 - Andrew Walker (pick2)

It's a lottery, sometimes you get lucky, sometimes you don't.

rivers, davey, bruce, green, mclean, scott thompson, jones, robertson, newton have all been good picks considering where they were taken. I'm sure there were better players below them but I'm sure most of them would have been top 10 draft picks in their draft pool. As for Mclean, while he was pick 5, ryley dunn, kepler bradley, tenace etc could all have been chosen.

please note the question mark.

Only opened this for a debate on something other than who's head's next on the chopping block from the first 22

Ohh, saved by the old '?'.

Pizz off.

Assuming the purpose of recruiting is to add value to your playing list to achieve the ultimate success, then in the last 10 years we haven't been very good at it. Then again, the only clubs to have achieved the ultimate in the last 10 years are Adelaide, North Melbourne, Essendon, Brisbane, Port Adelaide, Sydney, West Coast and Geelong. Of those clubs you could mount a case for some of them having some serious drafting advantages - Geelong father/son; Sydney and Brisbane salary cap advantages plus Brisbane also having a number of players collected through zone concessions e.g. Voss etc; Port Adelaide who had a number of key players tied to the club such as Tredrea, Dew, Peter Burgoyne and therefore unavailable to be selected by other clubs. So out of that lot, the only "uncompromised" lists were really the Roos in 1999, the Bombers in 2000 and West Coast in 2006 ( although they may have been compromised by other things!) My views on our recruiting are quite well known, but it is important to note that the recruiting process has not really been a level playing field very often. As to where we rate overall, it is a matter of opinion. Like most supporters, I wish we had have been able to pick up a decent KPP or two - I still believe Henderson may be the one who got away!

I don't think we have the worst draft history, but rather the worst club culture. I have no doubt all of those players probably would have been better players had they been at other clubs.

I see alot of people saying that we have done so well in the draft over the last ten years, but if this is really the case then how the f*** do we find ourselves in the position that we're currently in?

Damn CAC, shame on him for not reading the future.

He picked up the best young players there were for the taking. It is Neale Daniher and the coaching panels fault that these players did not fulfill their full potential.

Look at players like Bruce, Green, TJ, Miller, etc. All these talented guys were at some stage in their early career considered potential superstars. But none of them took the next step. Would these guys have become stars had they played udner different coaches? We will never know, but you have to wonder how much of their lack of development is a result of Daniher.

Look at it from a different perspective - currently we are all very excited at the young talent we have: Davey, Rivers, McLean, Jones, Dunn, Petterd, Newton, etc etc. But who knows - all these guys could turn out to be absolute duds come 2 years time (I sure hope not). Will that be the fault of CAC and our drafting people or of the coach?

Drafting and recruiting are things that can only be looked at in hindight. It looks bad on paper, but who knows? If things went their way, Molan could have been the next Carey, Lamb could be the next Fletcher, Smith could have been the next I don't really know - what position was he meant to be in - ruck, key forward, key back?

Smith was an undersized ruckman that couldn't jump

All 16 clubs would have made this pick. TJ is regarded as the most dominant under 18 player in TAC cup history

LEIGH Matthews starts his search for a first finals berth since 2004 next Saturday in Perth. He reveals his thoughts on the season.

Will we see rookie Lachlan Henderson in round 1?

He's very exciting. When the first-year players come in, you look at them as people and as footballers. We were really excited with Matthew Leuenberger last year, and Lachlan Henderson I'd put in the same category. He looks like he can play.

LEIGH Matthews starts his search for a first finals berth since 2004 next Saturday in Perth. He reveals his thoughts on the season.

Will we see rookie Lachlan Henderson in round 1?

He's very exciting. When the first-year players come in, you look at them as people and as footballers. We were really excited with Matthew Leuenberger last year, and Lachlan Henderson I'd put in the same category. He looks like he can play.

Tonight he looked like a rabbit in the headlights. Nathan Brown for the Pies looks like this years Rising Star (toweling up Pav and Brown in games 1 & 2, he'd have to be a shoe-in wouldn't he?)

This argument again, can we confine these threads to draft week.

yeah its a stupid thread

Tonight he looked like a rabbit in the headlights. Nathan Brown for the Pies looks like this years Rising Star (toweling up Pav and Brown in games 1 & 2, he'd have to be a shoe-in wouldn't he?)

Nathan Brown is going to be a very good player, he's one I wanted from the '06 draft, and he's allready had a full 16 months strengthening & development @ the Pies.

Lachie Henderson has gone from the november '07 draft straight in @ Rnd 2 after only 4 months as a forward, a good effort.

Re Longmuir, we had already picked Johnstone and thus couldnt draft another 17yo, which most of the good players that followed were.