Axis of Bob

I think there is difference between what we are thinking a panel could look like. I'm not suggesting it is made up entirely, or even a significant number, of those experts. Just that there be a member be present. I think it's important that there be a (minor) presence to give those affected faith in it. I think the example of a judge that you used might be a good one when considering potential misgivings the indigenous community might have.

How is the panel supposed to understand the issues and the perspectives if there are no indigenous people or football people on the panel? And how would either side accept the outcome if there's nobody on the panel that can understand their perspective? Independent doesn't have to be synonymous with ignorant (ie, the panel, not you).

It's the problem with the AFL's short term management of the various issues that have popped up. It's all very well and good to make an issue go away by managing the issue in the short term (Goodes, Adelaide camp, Lumumba, etc) or by providing platitudes that don't require follow though (indigenous round, Dreamtime, etc), but when you need something from those whose issues you have been managing away, that lack of trust means that there's no genuine relationship. The families have every right, now, to say to the AFL that "We've told our stories but we don't trust you to act in our best interests, so #$%^ off". This is not their issue anymore, it's the AFL's. It's up to the AFL to repair the relationship with the indigenous community through genuine actions in the best interests of the indigenous community, which would only make an impact (slowly) over the longer term. There will, however, still be many whose bridges the AFL cannot unburn.

I do find it really interesting the idea of overvaluing what you can see and undervaluing what you can't see. As soon as posters saw "pick 7 for a salary cap dump and Bowes", they nearly fell over themselves to sign up. The questions of 'how much salary, how much do we have available, how does this fit into our salary strategy/structure' never really pops up because nobody know any of those numbers. It's effectively 'get pick 7 and Bowes for nothing because salary just goes into a magic box and those boffins will sort it out'. Every bit of salary we take on is salary that we can't use to bring in a player that we may really need. And that is either this year or in future years, as we can bring salaries forward to create space in future years. In our situation, is spending nearly 7% of our salary cap for 2 years in the middle of our premiership window really worth pick 7 (minus change) and Jack Bowes?

And I'd rather be paid a million dollars a year in my job ..... but my past actions and performances have suggested to my employer that doing that would be a terrible idea. It's the same with Collingwood and de Goey. I assume that de Goey is thinking that someone is desperate enough that they will pay him a contract without the behavioural clauses (probably St Kilda, if history is anything to go by) and then make Collingwood decide to match that contract (without the clauses) or let him go. The really interesting bit will be if Collingwood matches the contract or not.

The perceived injustices meted out to Jordan de Goey is a strange hill to die on.

Averaged 0.82 tackles a game this year. That ranked him 555th out of 571 players this year for tackling. Of those who averaged fewer tackles, he's the only one to have played more than 6 games and be under 190cm. The only semi-regular non-key position/ruck that tackled less than him was noted defensive hard man, Riley Bonner. I reckon that's got a fair bit to do with his non-selection in the second half of the year.

This is the comment that you originally took umbrage with. rpfc did not say that the outcome could not be fair. He merely said that having a panel made up entirely of white ex-cops was not the best idea. It's entirely possible that you assumed that he was meaning what you thought he meant but it's also entirely reasonable that he didn't mean it that way. But there is also no doubt that having a panel made up entirely of white ex-cops is not the best idea.

It's not just that, either. A recruiter's job is to identify the best talent but the player selection also depends on what the priorities of the football department are and the strategy that they're going for. For instance, you mention Essendon. I have mates tell me that Essendon's recruiting has been good and then mention the successes they've had. They're mostly right too, but selecting good players is only part of that puzzle because they now have a midfield of Parish, McGrath, Merrett and Shiel ..... 4 individually good players but also nobody over 6 feet tall nor defensively inclined. Then they get smashed every week in contested possession and end up losing. Essendon has selected a team of players whose whole is less than the sum of the parts. How much of that problem is with the rest of the football department's strategy for selecting players, and how much is the recruiter overvaluing the attributes demonstrated by smaller midfielders over the attributes of bigger midfielders?

Saying that Taylor has an awful record outside the top 2 rounds is like saying that Tony Lockett has an awful record outside of taking marks and kicking goals.

So when their good players retire, their age profile will look better?

That also is not true. Max's % of time rucking did not change throughout the year. He consistently spent around 55-60% the ruck, with Jackson spending 35-40%. In fact, for the Brisbane final he played even more ruck, with 66% of his time being spent in the ruck. Coupled with the fact that he played 90% total game time, it means that he only played 25-30% of games somewhere else other than ruck. Source: AFL Ruck Contests - DFS Australia

He's played over 200 games already, so you should probably have had a bit more doubt. Melksham is an experienced role player who can play a wide variety of roles and clearly follows the coach's instructions very well. He came into the side this year and did an excellent negating role on opposition intercept players and won us a game as well. He'll be very low cost, content to play VFL, provide leadership and provides decent cover if things hit the fan. He'll also be an easy delist at the end of next year, which could be important when the alternative would be on a two year contract. I can see why you'd keep him and see why you'd let him go. But overall the difference between those options is kind of whatever.

100% I agree with you. If you want a dominant key forward history shows that it's almost entirely in the first round because it's such a difficult skill set. My comment was only in relation to the correlation between underage goal kickers and dominant AFL forwards, not the value picking a key forward int he first round of the draft. There are a lot of ways to kick goals in juniors, it's a recruiter's job to know (and detect) what parts of a player's game translates from juniors to AFL .... and that's really tough!

Josh Schache kicked 34 goals in 7 TAC Cup games (4.9 goals per game) and 24 goals in 6 Championship games (4 /game). I'm not saying that Cadman is a dud (or making any judgement on him at all), I'm just saying that 'being a proven goalkicker' at junior level is often pretty uncorrelated to success at the next level up. The way those games are played, and the relative development of the different players, can often result in very different skill sets being rewarded.