deanox

Strange: odd; unusual or surprising; difficult to understand or explain. It is strange that people think they should comment negatively on someone's motives or reasons for signing a contract when they don't know the full facts (and aren't even asking the questions to determine those facts). That you don't think the word fits the sentence and would like to keep arguing about it is strange as well.

Yep, ok ill retract ridiculous comment, but I do think its overly harsh. The misses stand out in our memories, because they have come at times we could have won if he kicked them, but overall his kicking for goal has been good and I'm not sure he has been poor often enough enough for it to be a pattern or concern yet.

He has 46 goals 25 behinds for a career accuracy of 65%. Ridiculous comment.

It's strange that ppl are commentating, ie offering commentary on the situation, without actually knowledge. Asking questions about the situation is perfectly reasonable. But again, those questions shouldn't be loaded with misinformation i.e. "why did he sign a contract when he knew his kids would be interstate?".

Also why not read direct quotes: "The best way to look at it is we’re bringing our First Round pick forward a year, as we did last year when we were able to secure Kozzy Pickett. "We believe that there is more of a variety of player in this year's draft (compared to next year) which suit the type of players we need on our list. "We think there is an opportunity this year, with the lack of footy that has been played by the Victorians, that clubs lists could potentially be more different than usual. “There’s definitely the potential that players we rate very highly in this draft could still be available with our three picks.”

If they were going short term then they would have traded all the picks for players. That we are taking the picks to the draft now and not in 2021 is a medium term strategy not short term strategy. I am calling Occam's Razor here: the club rate our list as quite good and think we have underperformed. They are betting that we will rise up the ladder and our picks will be worth less in the future. Pick 18 and 19 this year is arguably better than just pick 15 or 16 next. We swapped our 2nd, 3rd and 4th next year for other clubs as well. Brisbane's 2nd, Dogs 3rd and Norths 4th. I reckon we are betting that will be a collective win.

I thought there was one relatively insightful take away (well, insightful because it came internally not from us) when Gawn said something about "the midfield has another level to go, the defence is holding up to a high standard but we felt we lacked an A grader up forward, and now we've got one".

My expectation is that there was a verbal agreement, and that it is in line with what the dogs were expecting. The reason it isn't written down is the same reason clubs get a week to finalise: there is normally a bit of an agreement window, say $50k, to allow clubs to balance their caps once they have the full picture. And I reckon the pies are reneging on the agreement, claiming porkies like "we didn't mean that for every year" and "that was the original discussion but we thought that changed when we agreed to the lower picks" even though those explicit conversations never happened.

On Weid he has kicked reasonable amount of goals and his stats are ok vs his peers. I think his problem hasn't been taking the number 1 defender, its been taking all of the defenders, as the only forward (literally, or figuratively when TMac was playing). When this happens he struggles to get to the contests because he is being blocked and bumped etc. by the additional tall defenders. We don't seem to kick it "to him" very well, instead kicking it to the forward line and hoping he gets there.

Dawes' abilities suited Malthouse's game plan perfectly. He could run and get to contest after contest. He could always halve those contests and where he couldn't mark it he was able to control it to create a stoppage i.e. throw in. This allowed Collingwood to play a stoppage game of kick long to the contest as a get out of defence, and also as a form of attack where the opposition zone had them covered i.e. instead of trying to beat the zone they were able to set up for a stoppage forward of centre. Need tried this style with us but the game was moving past it tactically and it was the polar opposite to our Bailey era attack, so it was a terrible option for our list. Dawes was never really able to reinvent himself as a forward, largely due to those concrete hands!

Well yes obviously, but it's about opportunity cost, and timing. This year we were able to get both a mature forward and still keep our second round pick. Wait till next year and we have a mature forward, and a mature ruck in the 2s, but no draftee. The question was "should we have kept him another year" and without a first round pick, the loss of a 2nd rounder itself may have not been a preferable situation.

This will slow the game down though. Every stoppage we'll need to stop and have a few bloke's run 100 m to get back to position. Or we get penalties for being out of position. It just won't work.

Agree with this except the timing was wrong for us to hold him. Press for a pick for Brown was a great opportunity vs the risk that his value wouldn't go up next year. Also, if we play Preuss we'd risk hindering the development of Jackolson, and also risk disenfranchising him with the go home WA factor looming.

That seems like the appropriate outcome, but will the AFL have the guts to enforce something like that?

He was in the UK and signed a contract to return to Melbourne. I'm not sure of the situation, but his wife and kids were with him during his time at Arsenal, so the divorce could have happened after he returned. Perhaps it happened while in the UK and his wife said "I'd like to go back to Aus" and the job at the MFC was an opportunity for them to all come back to Australia. Maybe there were no plans to live in separate states? Maybe there were plans to live in separate states. Melbourne would be a short flight from his kids. He could regularly do 2-3 days a week in Adelaide without affecting his role. Except this year, with covid, he has been stuck behind borders, presumably in the hub. We don't even know how long his contract was for! Maybe we signed him for 1 year, but he has agreed to stay on for another because he knows how hard it will be to replace him with the pandemic? I find it strange that any of us are commentating on something like this when we don't actually have the info.

I enjoy good defence too. I'm a big rugby union fan, and great defence is amazing to watch. But in all sports we see scores trend down due to defence. It is easier to be solid and methodical in defence, back your system to prevent them scoring and hope they make a mistake that opens for you first. I can see AFL scores getting lower before they increase. I'll use another example: lets incentivise high scores with bonus points. Personally, I don't think this will work. Coaches will say "Who cares? I want the safe 4 points first, and I'll try for the bonus, only if I am in a safe position to put them to the sword, or I am desperate for bonus points in the back end of the season and can risk the loss because I won't make finals anyway if I don't get the BP." So incentivising attack isn't enough. And measures to try to reduce congestion aren't enough. We actually need to disincentivise congestion, make congestion a bad thing, not the preferred but unobtainable thing.

Is there any club who may be interested in the points available from 28 and 50, the list spots to actually "take them into the draft" and a willingness to give away a 2021 second? Alternatively, same deal but 19 and 50 for a 2021 first? (Using 18 and 28, keeping a list spot open for mid season draft)

Ok, re-read my post interchanging the word "stop" for "reduce"! The intent is the same, I understand there is no way to actually stop congestion. The point is that coaches love congestion. They'll do everything they can to create it. Why? Because congestion means it is easier to defend, there is less chance of an opposition fast break, etc. All the AFL thinking is about changing other things about the game that try to make it harder for coaches to create congestion (ie fatigue) or to create contrived situations where players can't truly compete (the man on the mark not being able to step sideways rule is designed to create heaps of free space for the player with the ball, making uncontested possession retention easier). But regardless coaches will try to force congestion. They'll pick athletes not football players to run despite reduced rotations. They'll devise strategies to implement mini zones around the ball location, holding the ball in. They'll kick to the boundary to allow a reset stoppage instead of risking kicking to a potential turnover. If players are forced back or forward into zones, they'll abandon the wings or flanks to have an extra player at the ball. Or some other tactics that creates congestion and restricts easy opponent balĺ movement. Fixed zones would be pretty effective at stopping or reducing congestion but it goes against the fabric of the game. So the rule changes need to incentivise "no congestion", not try to stop, reduce or prevent it.

With 18, 19, 28, 50 but only 3 spaces, we may well look to upgrade our picks or swap into next year in the lead up to the draft. That being said, not using pick 50 isn't a big deal.

I still think that relying on fatigue to stop congestion is a poor idea (for the reasons @titan_uranus mentioned), and that using positional restrictions goes against the grain of what makes AFL AFL. I think the only way to stop it is to remove the benefit of congestion itself. Pay holding the man quickly around contests to let the ball winner have a clear run. Remove ruck nominations, allow the third man up and throw the ball up immediately before teams can get numbers there and set up defensive stoppage positions. Pay holding the man immediately instead of theatrically. Penalise the 3rd player who tried to hold the ball in to create a ball up. These things remove the incentive for congestion. They encourage coaches to leave players outside the contest to receive or mop up the loose ball. Penalise sheparding in marking contests (where the initial defender doesn't try to win the ball and instead just holds body position, preventing the attacker from competing for the mark, and a third player marks or spoils). This will make one on one marking a feature again.

I haven't quite got my head around the exact permutations, but if Sydney are risking damaging their first round pick next year, perhaps they'd be interested in: Sydney's 2021 first and third round for picks 19, 50 plus our 2021 second. Or similar. Yes, they lose their 2021 first, but it was going to be damaged anyway. So they get another clean 2nd rounder to go with theirs, plus some extra points this year.

I think this is of particular interest. Most of these streaming services are international with large equity backing. They are buying market share and killing local "tv channels". Coming after big sport contracts is one of their next steps. Consumption of sport via streaming is becoming more common. This means that even though the Aussie economy may stagnant, there may be a premium to be paid for media if a competitor decided they wanted to kill off foxtel.

I agree because regardless, no one knows what the cap and list sizes will be in 2023 right now. He has also spent more time in the hub than in Melbourne city. I can understand a base reluctance to commit for too long. Any extension that means a player is not out of contract at the end of a coming year is gold. 1 year or 3 years. Doesn't matter in that regard as long as there is no media storm during the season. Also, every time someone signs for longer people lament their loss of form, saying they got lazy with security etc. For those people, short extensions should also be gold.

I reckon the opposite, go for needs at 18, then pick the best available slider at 19 ;)

He is one who I think was affected by the 666 rule. His strength was zonal play, getting to where the ball was headed and killing it. He did his best work leaving his man, or choosing which option to go to, and when to push hard up the ground, leaving his man exposed, during our Diamond Defence phase. He would have been a great combo with Jake Lever if we had ever got the full zonal defence going for an extended period. 666 exposed his man on man strength weakness and only ok ability on the lead. May was brought in to take the number 1, but he still needed to play a role as a lock down/lead spoiling defender, occasionally being a 3rd man. Unfortunately he is probably a little too tall and not agile enough to use his strengths playing the 3rd tall defender role in the current game. It isn't a surprise we tried players like Smith instead. As others have said, 81 games is a great effort for a limited footballer. If people understood his role better, I think they would have more appreciation for those 81 games.