Leaderboard

I attended the camp at Maroochydore and to suggest that Jack was anything but super fit is ludicrous. He trained with vigour and displayed his usual class during match practice. I was very surprised at his omission at the weekend.

So.....Let me get this straight.........A senior player doesn't get picked in the first practice match of the year in Feb (horror horror) Coach wants to see how young blokes go against a top four side (Great) Said player has a thumb or finger in a cast at family day. Club or coach gives no explaination for who or why certain players played or didn't (Great) Media goes into melt down and Jack Watts is in dought for round 1 which is still a month away. DL blames it on Jack's new hair cut (Geeze JJ from the bulldogs is in trouble with his new do) So I can only conclude that Jack is lazy, full of himself, unfit, has a bad attitude, and really wants to go to Collingwood? Have I got this right?????

When asked who would win a contest between Oliver, Brayshaw and Petracca, he felt Oliver would be the most likely.

So, to summarise - Some guy called Mitch Clearly ( who was given a <100 article space online to share it) reckons Watts is in the naughty corner and his 'round one place is in jeopardy'. ProDee, who is on record as maniacally obsessed with how much Watts sucks balls, is really into this and also reckons the rest of the world in general are morons and probably vote green. Everyone else is offering a mix of 'wait and see, I'm not going to jump at a rumour' or 'hang on, he's been looking fit and engaged in all the training'. I guess we wait and see. Will ProDee have to have Watts as his avatar for another year? Only time will tell!

i don't care what they're saying. i still reckon chip will stay.

I have seen training three times since start of pre- season. Jack Watts has trained hard, trained well and is a class and a half above ALMOST anything we have on the list! PERIOD!

Maxy didn't talk enough about Jack Viney being promoted to the role of co-captain during this interview, and I read between the lines that Nathan Jones isn't happy and it's causing lots of friction off the field to the point where they won't even go into the showers at the same time. Just my take.

If he needed a kick up the backside he just got it so let's see how he responds.

I'm happy to be a trickster and chicanerist (not sure what the word is here lol) given the pricing those who control this form of media have imposed. They increase the size of the competition and reduce the amount of games on free to air - a compounding effect that means that I am less likely to see an MFC game on channel 7 than 10 years ago. They demand that to be able to watch 2 hours of content per week on my TV, I must pay $520 per annum. They package up content I don't want to consume and call it a 'deal'. It's not a deal. I ONLY want MFC games and will not pay for the rest of the junk on Foxtel to get it. The only legal alternative is the Telstra app, which is more affordable at $90 per annum. This is a price point I can accept, as it works out to $4 per game. It's so cheap over the course of the year that it's close enough to free. The drawback of course is that I can only watch it on a phone. And why is that? To protect Foxtel's exclusivity and enable the price gouging arrangement above to continue. So I won't shed a tear for the poor AFL or Telstra when I use a third party application to enlarge the surface area of a stream I have legally paid for. Remember, the chromecast will not increase the resolution (ie quality) of the stream. I am still getting the same product. I have simply enlarged the image - the TV effectively becomes a fancy magnifying glass in that respect. I could buy one of these, would it be a violation of ethics?

If I were picking a team for a practice match and I wanted to see how the team functions with two genuine ruckman, I would not play three tall forwards, otherwise the two ruckman experiment wouldn't be properly tested. I would therefore not play the most experienced of my tall forwards so as to get extra time into younger players such as Hogan and Weideman. Ergo, I wouldn't play Watts or Pedersen. The above seems to have as much merit as any other argument posted here.

Melbourne Bitter. Because I'm Melbourne. And I'm bitter.

I also heard this "'Wattsy' has come a long way in the seven years that I've known him and he's probably in the best headspace he's been in for a long time. "So I don't think it's an attitude problem this year. The Jack Watts we saw last year will be the Jack Watts we see this year, we just didn't see it on the weekend." As well as discussion on experimenting with 2 true ruck men during the practice games. There are many ways to read the situation. Could be attitude, could be his hand in a brace, could be trialling new/young players before R1, could be a mismatch against the Bullies backs, and so on. Might even be a number of these or more. The only certainty is the gleeful bias of the op here.

I think there is enough reportage to now say that there is some substance to the rumour. Sounds like Goodwin is making a statement and that is not a bad thing. Looks like anyone not giving 100% will given a kick in the arse, no matter who they are.

JACK Watts is "absolutely" in Melbourne's best 22, but needs to maintain consistent training standards to win his place back in the Demons' side, according to teammate Tom McDonald. "Jack's had a really good two or three weeks and understands what is required to be selected in the team," McDonald said. "Jack's been doing the right thing, especially the last two or three weeks and he's in line to play again soon. "He understands what he needs to do to get picked in the team and so does everybody else." How anyone can be in doubt that Goodwin sent a message to Watts is actually quite amusing.

I can't speak for others PD but i share your disappointment. Not good enough (again, if true and Gawn's comments - and in particular what he didn't say - suggest the rumour has some basis i fact). I am hoping however that it does in fact impact his season. Positively. You have pointed out a number of time how well goody is regarded is by the players as a man manager (and also that the players love him) and he appears to be very measured and smart. It is reasonable to assume not selecting Watts was a well thought out strategy and as someone has pointed out perhaps also an opportunity for a new coach to lay done a marker as a warning to all players that there will be no favorites and everyone will need to earn their spot. I am confident the strategy will bear fruit and Wattsy will double down his efforts. It will be fascinating to see if he is selected this weekend.

Ha ha..Sen have just said that Max Gawn has said that Watts is battling to be in Melbournes best 22. Talk about twisting words to suit your agenda or to seemingly create an issue where none exists...

jeez, i hope no senior player gets "rested" for any of the next 2 jlt games. the rumours will really fly

What we have is: -'Leoncelli36' (I think) in the post game thread said Watts was 'punished' for his attitude (no mention of poor condition). It was also mentioned in the 'Who was Missing' thread. To give 'Leoncelli36' credit he referred to his source's mfc connections and reliabilty. -This Cleary guy (from Perth) embellishes it adding Jack came back unfit; no sources but alludes to Goodwin. For mine, all our DL training reporters can't be wrong when they said Watts came back in great nick. However, in one thread (the intra club, I think) one or two posters were disappointed Jack wasn't really having a go. So there may be some truth in Leoncelli36's info on Jack's attitude but there has been nothing from anywhere to support the Cleary embellishments on lack of fitness. To say Jack was being punished is a stretch. But, lets assume Goodwin thought it necessary, then I say: hooray for Goodwin! It is exactly what I expect of a coach if a player, any player does not show the behaviour expected.

yeah dazzle, clear as mud

Still quite comfortable with my initial call of BS - but as ProDee says, others can please themselves.

The medias obsession with Watts is unhealthy.

I told you all why he was not picked on another thread. The club is unhappy with his preseason form and attitude. Simple as that. There are no walk up starts at the MFC anymore. Gawn is a leader. He knows why. Not going to throw him under the bus, is he? But he made it perfectly clear that nothing other than blokes doing harder yards over preseason had caused the 'selection shock'.

Hmmm, an anonymous poster who claims to have it on "good authority" and a couple of very average journos who have heard it from "sources within the club". Watertight evidence so far. Maybe it's the bowling green massacre or the terror in Sweden...

But The Age Headline is: "Max Gawn insists Melbourne Demons teammate Jack Watts doesn't have attitude problem" http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/max-gawn-insists-melbourne-demons-teammate-jack-watts-doesnt-have-attitude-problem-20170221-guhi2q.html I wonder if the HS people actually listened to the interview. Max said Goodwin wanted to try playing 2 rucks (him and Spencer) and test other forwards who had trained well, specifically Van d and Weideman. No room for another tall last week. He also said Watts' attitude wast the best he had seen in 7 years. He was then asked if he (Gawn) would be playing forward more this year. He said it depends if the ruck combination is Gawn/Watts in which case he will ruck most of the time. But if the rucks are Gawn/Spencer he will play forward more often. People can believe whatever but the JLT games are about experimenting with structures/players/positions so I see nothing sinister in Watts not playing. If he was left out for other reasons then so be it; a coach's prerogative. As a footnote: The most interesting things from the interview was that Max may cut his beard off later in the season and that Goodwin is considering a Gawn/Watts ruck combo. To me they are far more interesting headlines that click bait 'journo's' taking stuff out of context.

I'm not. If... and I reinforce the word if here... if the story has legs then good. We should have done these things 20 years ago. Good clubs do. They say here is the line, cross it and someone else gets your spot... don't care who you are, what money you are on, or what draft pick you were. If a senior player gets a bullet in the leg the little ones listen. If not they say 'well he does it too, and gets away with it' All players at every club need to know it's a privilege and not a right to wear the jumper. So assuming the story has legs I'm OK with it.

This is all Leoncelli 36's fault

What a blow-up. It's all fairly self-explanatory. The calls that Jack came back underdone/that he enjoyed the off-season are pretty far-fetched. Clearly he didn't perform as well as he needed to in the intra-club to get first look in and we have a host of forwards who did. Structurally we can't fit them all in so Watts was left out of the first JLT game. That's pretty much what Gawn suggested anyway and is hardly a surprise given this is the AFL. A good thing for Watts, keep him keen. Pro Dee loves a J Watts story but.

I think Lucifers hero is on the money. It is far more likely that Jack after a full pre-season has eased up a bit. I think that he did not push himself in the intraclub and that was noticed, raising the ire of the coaches. That is all. If he feels left out, good. I understand not wanting an injury and easing off a bit. The coaches are dealing with many players, few as talented as Watts, he may think he is a special case but in a team environment he needs to be a bit more like Viney, by the way which of them is co-captain? Watts is smart he will work it out and have a great year. No fire here, smoke machine operating.

Apparently, a sports journo would spread a rumour from a poster on a fan forum and pretend it's his own. People actually believe this is more likely than him having a source connected to the club. Apparently, training reports from boundary supporters are a legitimate source of whether this report is true or not. Apparently, if Watts plays well on Sunday, or in round one, there can't be any validity to this story, because the subsequent weeks/months wouldn't be enough for him to get his fitness to an acceptable level. No wonder the Greens get votes.

Annoyingly clever. Didnt technically break any rules at the time. Blame the afl for this one. They should have been stronger on everything salary cap.

Hand over the cup now I say. I think we were legit in that small window of integrity between our salary cap excursions in the mid to late 90's and our tanking in the 2009/10.

I continue to be blown away with so called supporters eagerness to jump on Jack's back... What a ridiculous beat up.

Copuchas, Binman, and Wrecker and a couple of others have rare sense. Simon Goodwin states "we want to get games into our best 24". That was the first time I thought it strange Watts wasn't playing. We knew why Tyson, Kent, Hibberd and Jetta weren't out there, but Watts was the anomaly. And Goodwin didn't reference him. A poster then says he had it on good authority that there was more to it and it involved attitude. Naturally, said poster pilloried. Now two journalists from different radio stations have said they've heard from sources within the club that Watts was fit, but not selected due to training standards. Naturally, it's claimed it's all BS and that they're making it up. The delusion on this thread is a sight to behold. Thick as bricks.

The point made by Choke re the relative absence of free to air coverage is very valid. It remains a fact that the air time given to MFC on free to air in Victoria is minimal. I suspect we are one of if not the least featured Victorian club on FTA. Foxtel will never have the audience of FTA and as Netflix takes over, its audience will continue to decline. Sure it will pay big money for the AFL rights as it goes through its death throes (assuming it does not re-invent itself) but the MFC needs to ensure that we do not suffer as part of that process. Delivery of coverage (read audiences) is vital to our sponsors and the well being of the MFC. An integral part of that audience is the increasing online audience who clearly demand a product far different than that which Foxtel is prepared to provide.

The Tom McDonald comments of afl.com.au make it clear that this is not a figment of ProDee's imagination, nor the original poster of the story. I think the Max Gawn interview did as well but accept it was somewhat open to interpretation whereas TMac is unequivocal and all that's left to ponder is whether a) Watts presented poorly for the intraclub; b) he broke or failed to adhere to team rules in the intraclub (presumably in terms of pressure acts / defensive actions). It is clearly not about how he presented for preseason training. Having said that, this is a storm in a tea cup and simply represents an early line in the sand from Goodwin around expectations and the fact that there will be no exceptions, nor any tolerance of non conformance. Only way to run a footy club that's seriously focused on a journey for mine. Watts will learn and others that have a propensity to end up in the same space eg Jeffy will sit up and take notice. All good. Move on.

or at least a sacred site, chook

Don't do it Max. Look what happened to Sampson. His beard should be protected as a national park.

Yeah, I heard the original interview on that show. They started off with the Watts non-issue (after asking max about his beard). Max played a great straight bat to all their questions and in my opinion just confirmed what most of us assumed...that he was rested to see how the two rucks and Weideman would work. Max said that a few players had been training well and deserved a chance. He dIdnt single Watts out, just answered a question by saying there's great depth and competition for places. That's what is irritating that despite all that, the original Watts non-issue was persevered with despite getting no encouragement from Max.

This ^ ^ Confirmation bias is only valid when the info is confirmed as being true. I'm not saying Watts hasn't come back underdone, I have no idea. Track watchers seem to indicate it's bs. But unlike some, I'm not going to jump to biased conclusions based upon rumours in the press.

Seemingly, I'm one of the few disappointed that a player entering his ninth year, off the back of one good year where he placed top 5 in the B&F, was left out of a squad of 29 due to unsatisfactory training efforts efforts. Granted, it's a small story and I doubt it will impact his year, but it reinforces an immaturity that helps explain why he's produced very little in the first 7 years of his career and has never threatened to get near the leadership group.

Yes. That 13th flag has been a bugbear, happy to win our 14th this year. And I hate Essendon.

this will be bigger than essengate. mark my words.

Yes i wait for the Coaches word before i believe too much there are 3 practise matches. I doubt many will play all 3

Kicking it to players when they're looking in the opposite direction? Though that was Garland...

Not quite sure why people keep mistaking Salem for an outside midfielder. He can clearly play inside and out, and I've never seen him shirk a contest. For a bloke who isn't incredibly built and a beautiful kick, he's very tough IMO.

All this does is make you wonder what other dodgy dealings were done under the table, and how stiff (and probably stupid) we were for our salary cap sanctions in the late 90s. It also highlights what a bloody loose unit Ricky Nixon is. Why bring this up now? Hasn't brought himself under the spotlight in any other way recently, I guess.

I'd like the club to embrace sustainability and partner with Tesla. This might conflict with the current sponsor.

I was down from Sydney so went along. First time back to Western Oval since Rd 22 1987. Sadly still the highlight of my Dees following career. And I waited a long time for that highlight. Just a few observations. Firstly it was the first pre season game I've ever seen. I was incredibly impressed at the standard of the game for a first hitout. Still played at a ferocious pace. Obviously a bit rusty but still full on. Unlike many I have to say I was a bit disappointed at the way we played. While there were some great passages of play on the rebound where we moved the ball well and scored We seemed to go backwards a lot. A few times kicking from around the defensive 50m arc all the way back to fullback then getting stuck back there or worse turning it over. Jordin Lewis is going to be a huge asset. I'm more interested in the leadership he will bring. He showed how he just knows what to do in crunch moments. Eg saving the win by putting himself in the opposition goal square in the last 2 minutes when they were attacking and saving a couple of goals. Old habits die hard. I noticed his point of extraction from stoppages is to flick a hand pass backwards into space. Sam Mitchell would have been standing there whereas we often didn't have anyone set up for this so we would end up being under pressure and some of this great setup would end up being to the Dogs advantage. I know the stats say we did well in clearances but it was clear being there how much better their structure is setting up for clearances compared to us. They don't get too many sucked in to the contest and have a ring of players outside ready to distribute it around to then clear it with an attacking kick to space. Hopefully we'll learn from seeing this. I thought we would be doing it by now so a bit disappointed to see we aren't doing this setup and have too many too close to the contest. We are going to be competitive with any team at contested ball. Like plenty of others have said Clarry is special. Very special. Will be our best midfielder. No disrespect to Viney etc. The Weid is already solid enough to compete. He's bigger than Gunston & Watts. His 3 standout skills to me are his judgment to grab the ball at the highest possible point, his footy IQ and his kicking. He isn't nvolved enough yet but that's not entirely his fault. I was on the outside wing and he lead up there quite a lot in space and was repeatedly ignored. I suspect this probably happens a lot and we wouldn't know. It looks like he might have to earn the teams respect more to get the ball to him more. JKH an example of why you can't rely on training form. He just didn't seem to be able to get involved. AVB disappointing too. Doesn't seem to have the footy IQ to know how to get enough separation on his opponent. There are subtle overall improvements compared to a few years ago that I'm beginning to take for granted. Like level of competitiveness. More consistent 4 qtr performances, although there was a drop of composure at the end of the game. There's steady improvement not a leap yet which I guess I'm still waiting for. We are better but talking finals is premature. A lot of teams will be better this year. I'd only start discussing that after the halfway mark. Sorry if this is long winded but I've got a lot of time today. Being driven back to Sydney by my daughter on L's doing a max 90kph and regular stops. Go Dees

Random musings for you to think about: Gawn played 59% game time and Spence 48%. So basically they were rarely on the ground together. Max will play around 80-85% game time in the season - does this mean that we wont play two rucks because effectively we didn't yesterday? Our leading contested possession winners were Viney (12), Oliver (10), Brayshaw (9), Salem (9), Smith (9) - great signs that Salem is getting a hard ball. O-Mac took 9 marks for the game. Which was more than Cloke and he is a marking machine. Salem had 4 clearances. Which was more than Jones or Oliver. Melksham was blowing out the cobwebs but had more rebound 50's than anyone else in the game. He also had 3 1%ers. While I'm not convinced he is playing round 1, not a bad effort from him. Brayshaw had 5 inside 50's which was only behind Dalhaus for the match. Jones (6) and Viney (7) led the way with tackles but not to be outdone were Brayshaw (7) and Stretch (6). The boys are adding a defensive mindset as well. What this all means? We moved Lewis, Jones, and Vince out of the fire and the young boys stepped up. Specifically Salem and Stretch who are outside mids, who showed a little more balance. Our top performers are becoming our under 23's and that is only going to make us better.