SaberFang

We were only paying the minimum, and Clark/Frawley leaving probably freed up $1m/year. Not sure where that money is going to now?! Lamumba wouldn't be on more than $300-400k surely, and Garlett/Frost wouldn't command much either. Hopefully we just front-end a delicious new contract for N. Jones to secure him for life.

I know we went cold on Merrett but why not Merrett for 23? Another experienced player, wouldn't be too expensive, is very aggressive, takes more pressure off Hogan and stops other teams for double teaming Dawes all year... if that's overs for him, Brisbane could send back a later pick and we secure Frost with it. We can then take another player with pick 2 in the PSD.

I don't buy that the only reason Danger fell through was because we couldn't get pick 12. As if we wouldn't have thrown up Howe/Watts/Toumpas/Grimes that very instant and seen what was on offer. Toump still has currency in the first round IMHO.

If we got pick 6 for Howe, Roos would be doing backflips off his hotel balcony.

I don't think anyone would be complaining if we got Kennedy or Dangerfield in exchange for speculative draft picks that could up like every other early draft pick we've had.

If Plans A through F have all now fallen apart, we might have to settle for Plan G: taking the scraps from other clubs.

Well we know they want our second rounder. They can have it with pick 3 if they throw in a genuine midfielder.

I have it on good authority that the Dangerfield and Kennedy deals were almost over the line. All we needed was Jack Watts traded for a second rounder to complete the trades, but Roosy got wind of this thread and tore up the contract right before signing it.

Because those 3 will all be banging down on our door? For one year under Paul Roos and an unknown future with Goodwin? This was the key trade period that we desperately needed to get in the personnel to get us the hell off the bottom, and give us some hope leading into Roos' final year. If we end up bottom 2 again, we will be the most unattractive team in the league.

Methinks Lamumba will come in with a bit of Bernie Vince/Daniel Cross about him. Pushed out of his old club for various reasons, and with an axe to grind.

Practically a starting 22 player then.

Won't deny he's not all of those things, but I didn't have much time for his spray at JKH for that "selfish" goal, when he did the exact same thing himself multiple times, despite players presenting in the goal square. There's one such example in this video.

Yes, please. Screams 'Roos AFL player template'.

How about we aim on getting out of the bottom 2 for a change?

Why? He defied the leadership group pretty spectacularly. He has a lot of growing up to do. It really perplexes me how so many GWS players don't seem to care about: a) living away from home b) earning well unders compared to other clubs on offer c) playing in the NEAFL every second week d) playing in front of 3000 people in home games Some AFL career that is. I really didn't think it would be that hard to shake out a developing midfielder from there. Doesn't need to be Shiel or Treloar, but Coniglio would be a good get.

Shuey ain't going anywhere. WCE were very good to him after a personal tragedy of his, including moving his parents over to live with him in Perth.

Here's a wild one, but why not 23 for Toby Greene? Surely GWS don't want him around the joint after his indiscretion earlier in the year?

Way to keep the pressure off the kid. This injection of youth just further emphasizes how desperately this trade period needed to be about injecting senior, ready-made players into our list. We already had more than enough quality youth developing in the wings, with Stretch and Lovett coming in as well.

Seems to be widely speculated that we decided to go for the best of the best rather than settle for mere great midfielders, hence we haven't even bothered getting involved in deals for types like Greenwood/Hallahan and so forth. I'm assuming pick 3 + 12 + 23 was the currency we intended to work with, and when that fell to pieces the respective clubs probably demanded 2 & 3 or something equally insane. Roos is big on Brayshaw so he's probably canned the whole thing. This frustrates the hell out of me because in a draft that supposedly goes deep for midfield talent, early picks hold much less currency. And for a club like ours, the difference between pick 3 and say ~10 is minor if we're trying to bring in a good young mid. Unfortunately all the other clubs would be acutely aware of that, and thus aren't entertaining our deal. Our only really hope was clubs desperate for a key forward and the Bulldogs went a different direction, and the Saints are basically guaranteed McCartin or Wright if they do the pick 1 for 4 & 6 trade. So... we're up [censored] creek without a paddle. Someone said the club had big wraps on Lever, so I could've seen him slipping (ala Salem last year) and Roos still being able to get him with a pick downgrade like the Tyson deal last year. Unfortunately, the success of that trade means other clubs know our strategy and won't easily let us replicate it this year. It also serves other clubs well if we continue to take all the supposed high-end talent in the draft, only to keep losing senior players to free agency as we can't mature enough as a list to make it off the bottom of the ladder. Other clubs will make it nigh on impossible for us to poach any elite talent and inject instant experience into our list because they know that's exactly what we need to get off the bottom. I know Garlett and Lamumba are starting 22 players for us, but let's keep some perspective: both players were pushed out by their previous club. Perhaps encouragingly, so were Cross, Vince and Riley last year.

What player on our list could we possibly have that Sydney would want?

Well Mahoney ain't going to come out and say he was shopped but everyone laughed in our face, is he?

6 wins vs 4, and they've just gotten a star in Griffen and will get the best midfielder in the draft. They'll still have pick 6 or 7 for yet another depth midfielder as well. Yep, they've knocked this out of the park. The AFL should be ashamed of the concessions they were given at their inception. They can literally replenish faster than they are losing players.

Geez, clearly well liked.

Infuriating to think we're one pick away from GWS bending over backwards to get Petracca, in a trade period where we've done SFA to improve our midfield.

Think he meant because now GWS will pay a ridiculous sum to secure pick 1. They want quality, not quantity. They've no need for 3 picks inside the top 7. Imagine if we'd had picks 1 & 2.