Bang Bang Bang

WOW! Weeds is a big boy now. He's not a fast guy or a manic endurance athlete so he needs to rely on his excellent pack marking and strength in 1-on-1 contests. We saw a glimpse of that in September, with an extra few KGs and newfound confidence, and no Hogan, look out! Makes a mockery of those who wrote him off early. ME INCLUDED!

Dangerfield comparison is pie in the sky stuff, personally I'd be happy if he replaces vandenBerg down the track. Vanders is a pretty dodgy kick too but worth his weight in gold.

Yep I edited it. Forgot 23.

The Age running with the precise details of the deal. In: May, 23, KK and 4th round upgrade Out Hogan

It's happening. Brace yourself folks. Will the servers survive if we get reamed?

May, KK and pick 23 would be an OK result IMO. Only because Jesse doesn't want to be there. I'd expect May to push for AA and play 100 games, KK could be a bargain and pick 23 is a good hand for JT to play with. I wouldn't willingly trade Jesse for that price though.

Herald Sun saying our stance re. Two first round picks has softened. Noooooooo

I disagree. Jesse never requested a trade which fits in with Melbourne's narrative. And he's too good a player to move on for the sake of it. Expect another Bryce Gibbs 2017 situation where Jesse stays, has a good year, then moves to Perth in 12 months time.

To us?!? Balls14 doesn't have an extensive posting history but appears to be a normal fan with no history of big noting. Scully coming back would break these servers forever.

This is why Mahoney is prepared to pay market value for players. It creates trust between us and other teams like GWS. Will come in handy of a Kelly or Coniglio wants out down the track. All Peter Bell has ensured is that they get nothing and lose their prized asset to their arch rivals 12 months from now. Absolute idiots.

Remember how ordinary Brayshaw looked when he was played out of position? Bernie too went downhill at a rate of knots when he moved to defence. Same thing is happening to Dom. Good player made to look ordinary by the position he's playing. I get it though, he's 5th in line for a spot behind Oliver, Harmes, Viney and Brayshaw all of whom are younger. Trade him.

Nothing to do with chasing leather around is why.

Maybe Mahoney meant we can't afford May in terms of draft picks rather than $$$.

There's talk of Freo trading pick 4 to Port for 8+9. That helps us.

It's click bait. Just Roughead calling out that we're choking. I'd expect nothing less...

Twice in the past month we've been on the ropes at a critical stage. Once in Perth and once last night. On both occasions, someone needed to step up. Enter Jake Melksham. TWICE! But yeah nah, a second rounder was WAYYYYY OVERS for him.

The national anthem stance has been a thing for years. Geelong have never locked arms, and have won 3 flags from it. Nothing in it.

Whateley is just symbolic of the footy media getting carried away from week to week. I remember last year, at one point before Round 6, he said Sydney were no chance to make the finals. Fast forward to August and all of a sudden it's Sydney are unstoppable. September comes, they have a bad night and it's done and dusted. The Hawks game for us was 4 lost points againat a very good side and a disappointing percentage drop. Nothing more. Whateley wasn't the only one to overreact.

I always liked having Bugg in the side because of his ability to agitate, but his skills would constantly frustrate. I think we may have found his replacement in Spargo. By the way dazzle, not having a go at you mate and I really appreciate the inside info you shared, but GWS couldn't have been that filthy about losing the rights to him? As they overlooked him one pick before us.

Those quotes do bode well for his imminent signature. I know Scully said nearly exactly the same things in 2011, except for one difference. He had already put contract talks on hold til the end of the year (how did we not see it coming???). Petracca has indicated a contract will get done. Normally when players are on the way out, or considering leaving, they normally trot things out like 'I want to focus on my footy' and 'There's no hurry/timeframe.' No guarantees but I think Petracca will sign sooner rather than later.

Two things. Predicted superdrafts hardly ever end up being as good as projected. Rave about 2001 all you want, but then came 2006, 2008 and 2012, all of which have flunked. Meanwhile, 2013 and 2015 were considered weaker yet look the best of recent years. Secondly, we could have picked Scully (2x AA squad), Martin (best player in comp), Talia (AA) and Fyfe (AA) with 1,2,11 and 18 in 2009. That's just off the top of my head.

Every single year this happens. I remember the Gold Coast guy saying the exact same thing re. O'Meara. Brisbane were super strong re. Aish. Both ended up at their club of choice. You also need to factor in emotion, how would YOU be feeling if Petracca requested a trade to Collingwood three days after losing a GF we should have won? Yeah, I thought so. Burton will calm down and soon realise we're good and fair to deal with. We paid Essendon slight overs (at the time) for Melksham and they were good enough to return the favour with Hibberd for slight unders the following year. Playing hardball gets you nowhere. Lever is just about worth two first rounders outside the top 10. He's a very good player, although I question his selection in the AA squad. He's also injury prone. But draft picks are overrated, if it ends up being 10 and 20 or something for Lever then I won't be losing any sleep over it.

Haha, that guy was a pathological liar. Lucky I have an elephant's memory and remembered him claiming Dangerfield was 98% a Demon in 2014, thus taking the Rockliff stuff with a grain of salt. kurtneverdied did deliver the Brendan McCartney news ahead of time, so he has some credit in the bank. 1st and 2nd rounder will get it done if he has indeed chosen us. Expensive, but worth it. Lever is in his third year and in AA discussions. Oliver is in a similar boat (although only in his second). What price would we put on Oliver?

From memory Goodwin brought him over with the idea of playing him in defence. That didn't work out, but he's absolutely smoking it in his new role and fast becoming a favourite. All of a sudden I love that punchable head of his. Love his passion too. If you think about it, paying pick 25 for a steady role player in a Top 8 side is probably a fair deal, despite the early kerfuffles. A similar pick for Hibberd was quite simply highway robbery.

I don't think that's true. I seem to remember Roos stating publicly that McCartin, Petracca and Brayshaw were the clear standouts and we were always going to take the two St. Kilda didn't. I think Emma Quayle quoted our recruiters as rating McCartin first in one of her books (I read that second hand so don't take it as gospel). Certainly, Lever was in the mix and would have been a better pick than Gus but that's hindsight for you. In fact if we had our time again I'd be taking Petracca and Peter Wright, not Lever. Hopefully Weid ends up being the goods because Charlie Curnow is well ahead of him at this point in time too. Taylor has done an excellent job but you can't get them all perfectly right. We also took Salem ahead of Cripps. Not a bad decision per se, just not the perfect one.