John Demonic

What's our derogatory nickname? Cheeseboards?

There is a balance though. Overlooking that they took their foot off the pedal last week, to suit a narrative, ain't it. The eye test right now suggests they are playing better, will be favourites and will beat us on the balance of probability next week. Goody in his presser even said they were the team to beat. Smash us? That's the other extreme end of the spectrum.

Beat the dumbest footy team I've seen in years by 3 goals. Will take it I suppose. Reaffirmed why I haven't bothered to watch a blues game all year.

Agree with these changes. Also we will have to draft 3 kids, so that's another 3x100k and 3 list spots for each season of two. I'm pretty much assuming we are chockers based on the language and feeling from last years interviews, when it seemed Grundy would only get done if Jackson left - And that wasn't just for positional reasons, but the money we offered LJ simply was transferred to Grundy. With maybe 100k saved, with what the Pies chipped in. Not sure if I remember correctly, but Hogan/May might've been dependent on not only the pick, but also the cap space? The club seems transparent about everything As for other players, Darcy Parish as a free agent could bolster our midfield. And on the Gettable podcast they had a segment on pre-agents 1 year out from Free Agency - I think Andy McGrath would suit what we are looking for. Skilful and quick player with high footy iq that can run through the midfield and play anywhere. Might require one of of first rounders and Harmes.

I'm just relieved this was only a vfl footy charge. Seeing the title made me think 'Oh no another off field incident'

you know those are all end of 2024 right? As that's when the BBB, Tomo and TMAC contracts end. So that takes approx 1.5mil off the table of the 1st year of any offer to Himmelberg Edit: And with a view to all players contracts ending, the club may have allocated any/all cap space to kozi, Grundy, Brayshaw, Trac, Clarry etc for next year, 2025 and beyond already. Edit 2 And Harmes end of 24. So another 500k gone

Definitely worth a crack. Would we have the cap space to pay him the rumoured 800k+ needed at 5 or 6 years? Would he have to take slight unders compared to what Richmond and another club are going to offer? Tigers also have Taranto/Hopper there from last year that he may want to join. The Dimma resignation has come at a good time in regards to their lack of a clear future direction. Which players would we have to cut or trade? Harmes and Jordon seem a given. Retire Melksham, and Hibberd? Would we need to somehow get Tmac or BBB's contract off our books for next year? Or is there another player we would need to lose? https://www.zerohanger.com/richmond-believed-to-be-in-a-decent-position-amid-pursuit-of-gws-free-agent-harry-himmelberg-136471/

Still not used to the Kings Birthday. Thought you were nonsensically talking about losing Kevin Bartlett for a minute, and then scrambled to think which player on our list is KB if not.

Unless you're Spargo from 30 out, then you should be looking for leads

My world for a Beau McCreery. Has that mixture of explosive speed and frightening aggression.

We should be good for two goals next week, if a player sneaks up and gets the handball receive from Spargo as he lines up for goal from the long distance of 35 metres out. Op won't know what hit em.

or 6 from Jack Martin https://www.carltonfc.com.au/news/1329660/vfl-practice-match-team-martin-to-return His timeline is even on track to Kent Kingsley us.

I never thought we'd go 4/4 or 3/1 from the month of: Freo, Carl, Coll & Geel. 2/2 was always the most realistic. I reckon we can take care of Carlton and then if we're a club that can win through adversity, then we get an "upset" win against Collingwood or Geelong. This loss against Freo then begins to looks a lot more like a random result where we were off by %2, than it does about where we are in the grand scheme of things.

I reckon JVR should focus on athleticism and endurance in the off season. Be top 5 in time trials and be able to work your way up the ground and find some space to mark it. The way the game is played, contested marks in the forward line are rare, it's not a sustainable approach to have that as your major strength by bulking up and trying to be a physical beast to the exclusion of endurance. His ferocious attack on the ball will never leave him, no matter how many kg's he takes off. We need a creative Jeremy Cameron/Harry Himmelberg type of dynamic forward more then we need a Tom Hawkins/Harry McKay clunk it type imo. Although we could try our hand at recruiting Harry Himmelberg if we can clear the cap space.

Absolutely echo this thought. I was just thinking about how every win or loss is becoming a referendum on whether you can win the flag or are making up the numbers by the media/fans - It's a pendulum flipping from the extremes of Happiness and Hope to Stress and Despair. And it doesn't reflect the reality of the season at all right now, with almost every club bar North and WCE competing hard in every contest and match from week to week. It might be that Collingwood and Brisbane are separating themselves as 'dominant' teams, but its round 11 and we still wait to see whether they are going to sustain it too. There might be a massive logjam of 10-12 teams in the last month of the season, all vying not only for finals, but positioning in the top 4 and 8, And yeah we'll probably be one of them (unfortunately for those that want a stable top 2 position)

Opened the ladder this morning thinking we'd be 7th or 8th and we're actually still 4th and will stay there given everyone below us lost lmao. As I said yesterday. It really only appears that Collingwood and maybe Brisbane and/or Port Adelaide right now are the three clubs that are impervious to the week to week contender/pretender referendums over their form. And will all now have a significant 2/3 game gap on us. The season aint over no matter what some may think. Its a marathon not a sprint. There are obviously some issues we need to work on, and have come up against two very tough 210+ pressure gauge teams this fortnight. We desperately need a break to refresh and I still think we should take care of business v Carlton to get there. Then we're STILL in the top 4 going into the 2nd half of the year. Not the crisis many are making it out to be, given we will have time to iron out our deficiencies and refresh

Mate im relieved we actually have two decent forwards to focus our efforts on. Will work to our advantage given that's all they focus on when they bomb it up forward.

Would rather they just take the tackle for a ball up/htb risk or punt it to the boundary for deliberate and worsen the angle. Dump snapping it to 30-40m out directly in front in a panic and hoping we'll have a player there, is costing us massively. Just want to get my 1 knee jerk post-loss reaction post for the year out of the way. This drives me up the wall. Along with Healys grumpy commentary.

Sounds like @Die Hard Demon is the one with the soft underbelly. Time to go on holidays and forget about watching the Dees again, if you think the season is over.

Edit. Delete post. Duplicate/Changedmind

It's not like anything has changed. In 2021 we drew with Hawthorn late in the year, and the questions were asked about our capacity to beat a top 8 team all year. It's 2023. The competition is fairly even and it seems 12 teams are in it with maybe 1 or 2 standouts currently. The weekly referendums on whether you're a Contender or Pretender are going to be asked of you all year, unless you're a dominant team. And if Collingwood go 21/2, then they're the only team that won't be asking that question.

The media loves a weekly referendum.

Exactly. Some DL posters think a loss to Freo ends our season, but fail to take into account that WE ARE CAPABLE OF UPSET WINS AWAY or as UNDERDOGS too.

The most important thing is cap space. I'm pretty sure we don't have much to lure anyone? Unless we lose some players (Jordon, Harmes, another) and find another club to take the last year of the contract of Tmac or BBB ? Although I'm just guessing.