mo64

The point you make is a good one. It basically comes down to ball movement into the forward line. At the few training sessions I attended this year, in the drills, the only players leading out from the goal square were Hogan, Dawes or Pedersen. For mine it was predictable footy, bigs lead, smalls crumb. There's no reason why a mid/small can't lead out if the delivery is good.

In the highlights package I saw of him, his first 2 kicks were right footed, and 1 went 50 metres. Some coaches have a directive to the players of kicking on your preferred foot.

Say what? What interest would draft picks be to GWS after they just gave up picks 7 and 8 for SFA? They would rather have Neale and Appness and cut out the middle man.

We won't know until next years draft, and see what becomes of the 1st rounder we gave up.

Correct. And we've upgraded pick 6 to pick 3, but lost our 2nd round pick. Losing next years 1st rounder for pick 7 could bite us on the bum if Prestia wants to return home, and even if he doesn't, the talent pool is supposedly a lot stronger.

Great outcome, but the proof will be in the players recruited. We've been down this road before.

Explains why Bugg deal is taking so long. We won't bid for Hopper with pick 3. We'll exchange 10 + clump of picks 43-50 for pick 7 and Bugg.

You get elite key forwards with early picks. I reckon we'll go with Curnow or Weidemann with pick 3. Not sure if Parish has that much of point of difference to warrant the trade.

Nickname - Salty?

I'm sorry, but early draft picks in isolation mean nothing. Draft picks equates to draft recruitment. Our tanking years were designed to get early draft picks. It ended up being a massive fail.

Nobody disagreed that if we leveraged pick 29 to get another deal done, that's ok. But also, nobody can say that this is a good or bad deal. When you're talking about draft picks, only time will tell.

Bringing in 2 kids doesn't guarantee immediate improvement. If pick 10 is used on a genuine A grader, then fair enough. It also doesn't answer the question of how we get Prestia next year.

That's my question? Plus don't we already own pick 43?

Like who?

Because we've run out of things to say about Melksham and Kennedy?

Howe was injured in the preseason, so Hogan, Dawes and Pedersen were the only lead up forwards during match sim. Howe came straight back in as a backman so I doubt that he would have trained as a lead up forward under Roos. I'd be curious to know how many times Hogan and Howe started together in the forward line? IMO, Howe was a better foil than Dawes.

Fringe players at top clubs are a far more tradeable commodity on reputation alone. Jed Anderson has spent a majority of his time developing at Box Hill, which he needed to given his body size. He commanded a 1st round pick. If we spent time developing Anderson at Casey, people would question his ability. There's no stopping clubs like Geelong trading back into the 1st round next year. They'll have fringe players like Horlin-Smith who are tradeable commodities.

When you don't get the ball inside 50 that often, forwards don't get the easy goals to inflate their goal tally. Howe will play more as a lead up half forward at Collingwood, and Cloke and Moore will rotate through FF/CHF. I don't expect him to kick more than 30 goals playing that role.

Apart from Molan, the remaining top 10 picks were not shock selections. The ones that really sting are the ones you've mentioned above, excluding Clark who was crippled with injury.

It's funny how people think. Howe - Low draft pick, played 100 games and gave us some return at the trade table. (F'off) Toumpas - High draft pick. Spoke to a rival club mid year. Played like a sack of spuds when he got a game. And we got a sack of spuds as a trade. (All the best)

The club clearly thought it was an issue when they pursued Tom Lynch. Unless you pick up an elite junior KPF in the pointy end of the draft, trading for an established one is the way to go.

Bugg hasn't been offered a contract by GWS, so anything other than an exchange of late picks would be stupidity on our part. Tell that to the other 16 clubs who all haggle over what seems to be minor draft picks (excluding Hawthorn who haven't had to worry about the draft in years). With the points sytem in play for academy/FS selections, it does matter. We were still in play for other deals, so why not try to improve our draft position and potentially try to unlock another deal.

Do you understand the difference between "contracted" and "uncontracted", or just couldn't comprehend what I wrote?

Yes.

I'm just saying that the trades haven't necessarily improved our list. From where I sit, it's a break even at best.