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Gibbs is now a Crow - they paid two first rounders for him and a swap of other picks. If anyone thinks we overpaid for Lever, then the Crows have wildly overpaid for Gibbs. At least Lever is 21 - Gibbs is 29 and won't have the longevity that Lever will have for us. Puts our deal in perspective.

http://demonland.com/Podcast

Agree I thought it was a hugely successful trade period for us. To the whingers, a coupla things: 1 - Jake Lever. You clearly have NFI how good this kid is and how big a coup it is for our club to land him at 21 years of age. Some of the lack of opposition player knowledge is genuinely embarrassing. 2 - The reason next year's draft is predicted to be a 'super' draft is purely because of how many potential quality top 10 picks there'll be vs this year. There will be many more potential number 1 picks next year. This year there are still plenty of players who are hard to separate from picks 15 -35. The club obviously believe there will be some quality remaining at 29, 31 and 36 and that it'd be smarter to take three second-round picks to the draft vs one late first round and later picks. Our chances of landing some good players at those three are very good. Our development program, the coaches and leaders we have mean that any new talent coming through will be given every chance to shine. I think we're in a very strong position. Our 'core' now comprises of: Hogan (51 games) Weideman (10) Salem (46) Petracca (39) Viney (88) Brayshaw (36) Oliver (35) Hunt (41) Lever (56) That's a beautiful spread of talent across all lines and that group coming through together have the potential to really take this club to the top. There are plenty of great support players underneath this group who I haven't named. But I think people forget how young and inexperienced these guys are. Look at what Viney is doing at game 88 and now imagine what Petracca, Lever, Hogan, Oliver etc will be like when they reach that point.. Or 100 games.. We just need to keep adding smartly in and around this group. Looking forward to the draft.

We've just picked up arguably the best player from the 2014 draft, certainly top 3 with Petracca and Heeney. When is the last time a club got such a quality 21 year old out of another club ? The Lever deal by itself makes this trade period a huge success and without question the best deal we've done in 20 years (Jeff White) and I suspect will be our best trade ever.

Absolutely laughable some of the posters on this site, saying the trade week was a disappointment Is just mind boggling 1: we got lever who is the best young defender in the game 2: we got balic for a bag of chips 3: we got rid of watts who doesn’t fit our list profile 4: still have 3 picks in the 2nd round has been a very good trade period for us, and no we didn’t overpay for lever it was a very fair deal

About the only thing that's staggering is that people think that the Lever deal is staggering. Thank god some of you aren't "negotiating" for us. The object of the exercise is to get the player you want, there are no bragging rights in not getting a deal done. To come out of that Trade Period with our picks intact but nothing to show for it but Harley Balic would have been a disaster, especially in light of what Lever brings.

There were far worse deals out there than anything we did. The Crows gave up two first rounders for a bloke who is 29 at the start of next season. GC, trying to emulate the Freo of the 90's, coughed up Pick 2 for a bloke who clearly isn't worth it. The Pies passed on a future second rounder for Sam Murray, a bloke taken late in the rookie draft and hasn't played a game of AFL footy. Not to mention the Lions coughing up Pick 12 for Charlie Cameron and also needed an exchange of picks to get a bloke who is coming out of retirement. So before you pot the club and the deals we did, put everything in perspective and realise we did exactly what we wanted to do and did it with minimal fuss. We also still have 3 picks in the second round this year for Taylor and co. to work more of their magic.

Imagine if Lever had walked into the draft and been picked by another club, because we had hard balled a deal? The Clubs planning would be in disarray. We got the player we wanted, a gun 21 year old

Fantastic week for our club, think they achieved all their objectives and secured the players they needed to improve our list Picks Available - 29, 31, 36 and 47 1/ Lever - huge get, the best kid traded to our club in many, many years. 2/ Balic - good upside for the price we paid I saw this kid a number of times in WA this year. 3/ Picks - essential brought in an extra usable picks into this years draft ie pick 36 Outs 1/ Pick 10 - pretty much a raffle pick in this years draft so I'm not worried about exchanging it to get Lever & another raffle pick pick 36 2/ Watts - sad to see Jack leave and wish him all the best at the PAFC, he will always be a Demon to me. Wish to thank the FD for all their efforts in this tough, stressful and often emotional week. Im very happy and looking forward to embracing our very positive and bright future. Go Dees.

sorry BBB but that is surely one of the dumbest things Ive read on this thread. You have NO idea what would have gone on behind the scenes and the work put in , over probably a couple of years , by many, to get lever to "fall in our laps" . So much negativity about what we paid, that we did it too quickly that Mahoney is a fool and the club doesnt have any balls. FFS...we just signed one of the up and coming guns of the comp and one of the most important signings we've made for YEARS. . If you think that happens all by itself your living in a cloud.

The amount of pathetic handwringing in this thread is laughable. Go follow North if you want your club to never make any trades.

After years of being in the bottom 4, we've become too attached to draft picks. When the season inevitably finished in June, all our attention turned to who we would select in the hope they could help turn the club around. Now that we've moved on from those days, and we're on the cusp of something special, we can't let go of the past. When we give up a few high draft picks for one of the best young players in the league, we instantly scream 'overs' and we're angry for giving up high draft picks. We know what comes with those - sometimes you get an Oliver, other times you get a Cale Morton. It's a lottery. What we've done is take the lottery aspect away and recruited a player who we know is not only a terrific footballer, but a total professional off the field and a bloke who is a competitive beast. We should be excited by that, not holding on to our feelings on draft picks of the past. Some might say we didn't get a draft pick that reflected Jack Watts' value - I say we did. We got Pick 31 for a bloke who has barely polled a Brownlow vote, never been in AA discussion, has never been a leader for the club and who has only finished inside the Top 5 of a best and fairest once. To me, he is worth the pick we got. I think Jack is a ripper bloke who has done some positive things for the club, but even he knew his time at the club was up. We needed to move on, and we did so as quickly as we could. If he had picked Port on the first day of trade week we would have traded him by the end of the day. Plus, we turn a nothing pick into a kid who, before injuries, was a highly touted junior. He may work out, he may not, but we've paid nothing for the opportunity. It's another win. Our 'premiership window' is beginning to open, and we've made moves that reflect that. The best young tall in the competition picked us over countless others, and that's the best thing to come out of this trade week. I'm super excited and I hope most of you will be as well.

There's some on here that will whinge when we win the flag that we should have won the GF by more. 1 point will [censored] do!!! We got what we wanted so I'm happy with that. The reports that Maxy and Tracc are close to new deals tops it off nicely.

Kudos to Andy for landing this interview with a much-loved but reclusive Demon, who has shunned the spotlight and turned his back on countless requests from media outlets for more than 20 years. Great get ?

Not related to the trade period exactly but I’ve been told by a reliable connection that max gawn is nutting out the final details of a new medium term deal. And Christian petracca is talking to the club about a new four year deal.

A great week for the club. A statement made by Goodwin and the F.D. over Watts. Untapped potential and popularity with fans does not win Premierships. A fair price paid for Lever. A known quantity, unlike a high draft picks. The club has sufficient young players being developed already. What's to lose with Balic. Pick 66.

I didn't see any cup or medal awarded to any club at 2PM Thursday. You don't "win" or "lose" at trade week. You "improve" your list, or you "don't". We won't know for sure until next season is underway, but at this stage it looks like we have improved ours. That's the nearest to "winning" we can do in October. Go Demons!

You must be kidding?? We were the big duds of trade week, in fact spectacularly so! 1 Sold the farm for Jake Lever 2 Got 1 square metre of Quick sand for Jack Watts 3 As for Harley Balic, a same mans Ben Kennedy who we just delisted. A poor a Drafting result as ever! IMV

I'm looking forward to that Victorian midfielder joining us in the next 40 minutes!

I've written to the club commending them on making the tough and unpopular decisions in pursuit of success. So I guess we cancelled each other out.

You mean the same Adelaide that gave up picks 10, 16 and 73 to the Blues along with a future second-round selection for a 28 (soon to be 29) year old Gibbs?

In the end MFC FU! We are the easy beats in trade weak... We should have got Lever for Pick 10 & 2nd Round 2018. That was our offer and it was fair. Should of held the Crows to the last minute with a take it or leave it. They wouldnt have got Gibbs and Leaver would have left for nothing. Stringer and Watts went to there club of choice for below what there original club wanted. Adelaide held out on Brisbane for Pick 12 and the Lions buckled. I hope MFC have long memories and regret they dont have a 1st Round Pick in 2018. Because the F@#$ing should! Poor negotiating!

Would any other club desired Lever? Where did he land? We obtained the best player we could have, ahead of all others . Completely naive to suggest Lever did all the work

I couldn't give a rat's toss bag who gets or doesn't get the credit. Simpletons worry about the applause. I'm interested in the result.

Freo essentially traded Pick 2 for Lachie Weller. Bloody hell. The bloke has been okay, but we paid 2 far later first rounders for a 21 year CHB who was almost in the AA side. We've done far better than some will give us credit for. In come Lever and Balic, we still have 4 picks inside the Top 50 with 3 of those in the second round and we moved on Watts, which I think in the end will work for both club and player.. We got our deals done quickly, without fuss and we can move on to getting better over the pre-season.

Maybe no-one wants to trade 'down'?

Official http://www.melbournefc.com.au/news/2017-10-19/garland-retires-but-takes-on-new-roles “We are really excited that he’s moving into a role in coaching – it’s a role that is going to cut across a number of our programs and allow him to develop many aspects of his coaching skills. The role includes positions within our AFLW side, our next generation academy, our AFL team and we’re also very happy to announce that he’ll be the inaugural senior coach of our VFLW Casey Demons team.” Well done Col on getting the VFLW coaching gig. Has always put the club first and got the most of himself. Great that he will still be involved as the red and blue runs thru his veins.

So now that Adelaide have paid the same price we did for Gibbs, a 28yr old past his prime can the whiners and hand wringers finally accept we paid a fair price and move on? probably not

This sort of stuff is rubbish. Fanboys - sheesh

We'd be stiff not to get Bonar.

I've found some more pre-draft info, including a summary from Quigley on BF, who;s one of the best in the business. Pick 12 (Adelaide) – Harley Balic Position: Midfielder/half-Back Size: 187cm/80kg Player Comparison: Scott Pendlebury In the Mix: Francis, H McKay Having lost Dangerfield in the trade period, Adelaide will be looking for a taller midfielder with a bit of class. Balic fits this criteria perfectly as a midfielder who can play forward or back. Balic excels in traffic thanks to his basketball and that, along with his height, has seen him compared to Pendlebury. When forward Balic leads to the right places and has a terrific overhead mark. The Crows will be hoping that Francis gets through to this pick, while Mathieson is another option. Quigley 13. Harley BalicHt – 187 Wt - 82Balic seems to be slipping down a few mocks in the media and I am not really sure why. If he goes where a few of those pundits have him going he could easily end up the steal of the draft. Up until this year Balic has been splitting time between basketball and AFL and as a result there are still some rough edges to be polished. I can see there being a fair bit of difference in the ratings for Balic between teams and it is not out of the question that a team could love him and take him much higher than most expect. He has a very high ceiling and if he developed to his best he could be an elite midfielder at the next level.Balic is at his best when he is the focus of a unit whether it is in the midfield, up forward or down back. When he is, he tends to rise to the occasion and good things happen around him. He is very good one on one and can impose himself on a game like few in this draft. He has improved quite a lot over the course of the year but there are still areas he needs to work on.One of the areas he has been working on, and one that still needs some work, is his kicking. There is quite a lot of difference between Balic’s best and worst and at the moment there is still a bit too much of the worst in his game. There is not a lot wrong with his kicking style and I expect that with some intense work he will flatten out the flight on his kicks and be more consistent about getting it where it needs to go. Up forward his set shot technique is entirely too variable. He needs to get a routine and stick to it and work on improving his balance in his approach a bit more. With all that said though there is quite a bit of class in what he does even by foot. He has brought a heads-up approach from basketball and he has excellent peripheral vision. He tends to play to the short options but he usually takes good ones and is very good delivering into the 50.Balic has played a lot more as an inside mid this year and he has shown pretty decent potential in that role. His kicking out of the clearances was a bit ordinary but by hand he is really good. His vision in the contest is excellent and is creative by hand getting it to good attacking options. As mentioned above he is very good one on one and he has good strength over the ball. He works through traffic well and is one of those guys who never looks rushed even when there are opponents all around him.Athletically Balic seems pretty good in everything but pace. He ran a 15.3 beep last year and he plays with excellent agility. He can also fly when he has to and tends to play tall. Speed wise he looks like he is cruising around at ¾ pace for most of the game. He is smooth around the park and, for those of you old enough to remember, moves a lot like Michael Long. He is quite solid but has a loose limbed, very agile style.Balic made a name for himself last year as a half forward and he is a very good mark. He can get up and he watches the ball into his hands very nicely. He also has very good body control in the air and he can keep the defender where he can’t get to the ball. He is not a good converter though and if he is going to play as a half forward at the start of his career he is going to need to improve his finishing.On the outside Balic looks calm and composed and can often create opportunities for his team. He has improved his spread this year a lot and upped his disposal count to 23 disposals a game in the TAC and went at 22 a game at the Champs. At times at the Champs he was in a mile of space with no-one in cooee indicating that he is working out how to use his running ability more effectively. Balic is a talent and I think could be an excellent player in a few years.

There are differing views as to the value/currency of draft picks and the hit and miss rate. In Lever we have a fair idea (barring injury) as to what we will get for the next TEN years. The childish behaviour of the Adelaide representative (forgot his name)walking out on talks and the unprofessional public lambasting of Lever (who did everything professionally and respectfully) by Tex and Co. should be the biggest indication of how much they valued Lever at the Crows. The whole club was livid that he was leaving. Even uninviting him to the B&F even though he said he wanted to go. I have never seen such behaviour by a club, players and FD as with the loss of Lever to the Crows. Lever is the ultimate professional in all aspects. He chose us over bigger offers from other VIC clubs. Absolutely the biggest trade of the week.

Or maybe 2 clubs were prepared to pay market value for the key player they targeted - that's the simpler explanation.

I'll never forget the interview where he said "success wouldn't mean anything to me unless it was with Melbourne" Fantastic clubman and a great role model. Good to hear he is pursuing the coaching path with the MFC. I wish we had more like him. Cheers Col

Really like this. I remember him saying that he was told he should go look at clubs he could win a premiership with and he said that if it wasn’t with the Dee’s it wouldn’t mean as much. Glad we get to keep him at the club. Good job to all involved

This is a generation that has never been told no, therefore individuals think they can do whatever they want, just because they feel like it. Hence the attitude of "Sure I have 99% of the physical characteristics of a man, but I feel like a woman, therefore I should be able to play football in the women's league". There's plenty of things I would have liked to have done in my life, but wasn't able to because of rules and regulations that serve to protect the greater good.

We clearly negotiated a deal that we were happy with. As it turns out, it was a deal that Adelaide was happy with too. Common trend? It was a deal. Wait until the death and you never know what way it goes. Would you be willing to potentially lose a player that we committed to, just to improve our draft position by a handful or so spots? Yeah, let's want to become a destination club by being impossible to deal with...

Fascinating pretzel logic there - so according to you the Crows holding out in the Cameron trade indicates they wouldn't have held out in the Lever trade? Hmmm OK. Here's what I think happened. Brisbane made an offer for Cameron, the Crows held out until they got a better offer. We made an offer to the Crows for Lever, they said they wanted a different offer which we then delivered, otherwise they would have held out just like they did in the Cameron trade.

Exactly. Not only is he the best player traded, he is also the one with the highest ceiling at 21 and doesn't come with a bag of personal off field issues! I'm confident we will get back into the 1st round of the draft next year, if we strongly believe we need to. Imagine how North fans (sorry, fan), must feel.

We got Jake Lever, we won trade week long ago.

There isn't one I would be interested in really... None of them fixes a problem we have. Only 2 quality players have changed hands so far this trade period and we have one of them.

Nuh bugger him, he chose the $. Suck it up.

Agree we would have looked silly if we had missed out, and there would have been a lot of clubs lining up. If we had gone into the draft, we could have missed him. Psychologically and tactically, it is difficult when both player and club commit so strongly to one another and clearly had for some time. When there is that trust and commitment, it is natural that the club wants to take no risks, get the deal quickly, and enjoy the satisfaction of pulling off the move.

Carlton bent the Crows over. If we had held out on the Lever deal we could have done the same. Unfortunately we think its a good idea to get trades done early rather than get a good deal

How very appropriate that "Judy" should coach the girls' team! LOL Seriously, while it's sad that he feels he isn't up to coming back from that dreadful injury to play top level footy again, it is wonderful news to hear that his passion and loyalty to the MFC is being rewarded with the coaching opportunities. Feels like a bit of an end of an era, what with the departure of Watts, Trenners and Col from the list. I wish them all well, and now look forward to the dawning of the next golden age of the MFC! (Just sorry they couldn't be on the list as part of it!)

Dream on... he is probably just scouting around to see if anyone wants to pay unders or get overs on any last minute deals

Great outcome given retirement is never an easy decision for a player, and well done to Garland on his career! Always one of my favourites, gave his all and got the most out of himself. Wishing him the best in the next part of his career and glad he is sticking around the club doing something he is clearly passionate about!

I won't argue with this trade. Not like the other much discussed one. Here, we have a guy who has played 4 games in AFL and done well in them versus pick number 66 who could be a dud. Might be a rival for ANB or Dean Kent. BTW I saw Kent at a Perth Shopping centre last week. He looked very fit and muscular. He was looking for a phone box but had no luck and the crooks got away! Seriously though, he looked like he was ready for a big pre season. Let's hope so because he could be useful if fully fit. .

Easily top 4 next year.............. There is every chance Jack Watts will be a premiership player within 2 years and Goody and Macca will no longer be at Melbourne.