titan_uranus

Dolphins, Browns, Seahawks

Happy for Lockhart. M Brown I guess is cheap insurance. Surprised re: Bedford and Chandler.

Just announced. Five Demons sign on for 2021 Bedford and Jordon stay senior, Lockhart promoted to senior list, Chandler and M Brown stay rookies.

I'm neither misrepresenting nor misunderstanding. The AFL wants players to stop running so that there are fewer players at each contest. I get it. I'm just not convinced that it will work. There remains the risk that reduced rotations will only serve to put a premium on runners, with coaches backing in fitter players over skilful ones, and the result being barely any different. There remains the risk that players who have been conditioned for years, if not decades, to run both ways, go full pelt, and leave nothing on the field, will continue to do so (no matter what their coaches say), and find themselves more fatigued than normal. None of it's a certainty, but it's a risk, and that's why I don't view Dangerfield's comments as a conspiracy theory/vendetta but rather just the voice of concern from the playing group.

I agree with the importance of fitness. I don't agree with your comment that "less rotations will see the better players excel in the latter stages of the game". Your comment would be more accurate if it said "less rotations will see the fitter players excel in the latter stages of the game". We have had many discussions on here about the club drafting players who are fit and athletic but not necessarily good football players. This could very well increase that trend: clubs will want players who can run out games, even if they can't kick. As to Dangerfield's comments, the issue the overarching playing group has is that they are being asked to produce high quality exciting football when the AFL has openly stated the goal of these rule changes is to make them fatigued. It's a genuine concern that isn't necessarily motivated by some sort of personal vendetta he has.

Does there always have to be a conspiracy theory? Maybe, instead, he's just doing his job as the president of the AFLPA and representing the majority of players who are concerned about the AFL wanting them to be fatigued/exhausted in matches and the potential for injuries to increase on the back of that.

I reckon the AFL's got this very, very wrong. I suspect most people will want to do anything but sit at home and watch football on a Sunday-Wednesday night next year. If we can get out and about, we'll want to. The success of footy on weeknights in 2020 was wholly abnormal and I don't think will be repeated. And the rolling fixture thing is ridiculous. Start with clubs. How are we supposed to manage training loads or plan for our season if we don't know when/where/who we'll be playing? Fans get shafted too, not being able to plan any more in advance than a month. A floating final month, maybe (with defined match ups and grounds already locked in, just timeslots to sort.out). Not this.

Peak Lewis Jetta would be a great get, but then again peak Lewis Jetta wouldn't have just been delisted. Unfortunately he's past his prime.

There's an opportunity cost associated with every good player. Anyone on a high salary or who cost high draft picks (whether as a draftee or in a trade) can have the same argument made: sure, they're good, but who knows what we could have done with that money/pick. It's a pointless exercise.

Steelers, Dolphins, Packers

Your anti-Lever bias is outstanding but if think May and Lever have "made us worse", I really don't think there's much point having any ongoing debates with you on the topic. As far as I'm concerned, that position is wholly untenable. Our defence, on any fair metric, was superior in 2020 to what it was in 2018, when it was our biggest weakness. The argument that Frost/OMac in 2018 = preliminary final is a classic case of correlation vs causation.

I agree with most of this but not reducing to 16 per side. A possible major side effect of doing that is that, as you've eluded to with rotations, you put a further premium on fitness. You also may well find that the empty space isn't at the contest but is at either end of the ground. Clubs may sacrifice a forward to ensure they can add a number to a stoppage. IMO it's not even close to a guarantee to fix any of the problems we have. Agree wholeheartedly with the two rules you've highlighted.

Why chalk and cheese? Are you suggesting we should be offering him 2-3 years more on his current base money? Why would he sign that? He's signing up to the end of his third year. If he lives up to the promise he's shown in 2020, he'll be asking for a bigger contract. Fair enough.

100-goal seasons are irrelevant to me. Higher scoring football can be exciting. But it can also be boring. Our Round 2 game vs Essendon last year is a prime example. Lower scoring football can be boring. But it can also be exciting. The 2005 and 2006 West Coast v Sydney Grand Finals are prime examples. My point is this: free flowing, high scoring football does not, IMO, always result in a better product. I'm not nearly as interested in the history of the interchange bench as I am the consequences of a change. Some of what you're advocating here relates to the position of players. IMO we're already seeing coaches moving towards holding forwards deeper and further away from stoppages - Brisbane and Richmond this year kept forwards deep to stretch the opposition's zone and defence. If we accept that reducing rotations has the impact you're suggesting (which I don't think is a fait accompli), it runs the risk of unintended side-effects as I've outlined. So I'd much prefer us look at less radical options which could assist in what is supposed to be the problem (keeping play moving and reducing "congestion") without opening pandora's box.

It's great news. I wonder whether those who wish it was a longer contract also bemoan the TMac contract?

How hard is it for a "journalist" like either of those muppets to Google Petracca's contract status before making [censored] up? What does that mean?

It's all about tiring players. The rationale is by reducing rotations, players fatigue, and the fatigue forces coaches to instruct them to run to fewer contests as a result. Maybe it could mean a more skilled game. I've argued above why I think it could also lead to a less skilled game. I don't know what you mean by "less predictable", I don't think AFL football right now is "predictable". And the argument as to "attractive" is questionable - it relies on the assumption that freer flowing football is "attractive", and I disagree with that.

Well why didn't you say that? You don't get to hide behind the "it's constructive criticism" line when all you post is "about 70 of those [games] were gifted".

Coaches and players have spent the last two decades developing a brand of professional football based on rotations. It's absolutely radical to suggest we should diminish that substantially or entirely just so we can tire players out and see what comes of it. Maybe, for example, clubs will turn their focus even more so to fitness, at the expense of, say, goal kicking or skills. The advantage to be gained will be in those players who can run harder/longer than their opponents. I can easily see clubs continuing to draft and recruit athletes with less football skill. It won't matter if you can kick it well if you can get to more contests with fewer rotations. I don't see the need for a second tackler. It's often designed to lock the ball in, so that the player being tackled doesn't drop it or let it out. Ostensibly that's to try to get a holding the ball free, but half the time (or more) it's a defensive move to slow play down. There's no need for it. If a player's already being tackled, leave him be. If it comes out, that's good. If it doesn't, blow the whistle, throw it up and move on. I'm not against a sin bin but it needs to be worked out fully before implementation. Using a video umpire could slow the game down if we're making calls to sin bin minutes after the indiscretion.

He was never as bad as many of us (myself included) felt when he played poor games. Ultimately he was a solid but flawed footballer who didn't improve enough to press beyond those 81 games. No shame in that, but IMO the right call for our list moving forward.

On the flipside, they've just added Cameron to their forward line, Smith complements Duncan and Menegola on the other wing and allows Blicavs to go back into defence to cover Taylor, and Higgins is probably an upgrade on 2020 Ablett.

Point 3 is already happening, and is a step in the right direction. As to the centre bounce, I wonder whether we should get rid of the recall. If we're going to keep the bounce then we're at least in part keeping its randomness. If it skews off, who cares, just get on with it. Point 2 I'm not sure about and would be holding off on capping rotations further until we've at least tried some other, less radical, things that might have fewer side effects. Point 1 agree. Point 4 is tough - I appreciate reducing randomness and trying to get consistency in decision-making is important, but the pressure on umpires is tough enough as it is. Increasing their physical workload by 17% (from 33% to 50%) might be a bridge too far. But, one way to assist might be to vest more power in goal and boundary umpires - don't get the field umpire involved in decisions about score reviews, just get the goal umpires to do it. Let boundary umpires make calls on out of bounds and again, keep things moving quicker.

There are changes to the top 8 every year. Some of them are surprising. Would you have imagined GWS (6th on the ladder but made the GF) after 2019 to miss the finals in 2020? Of course, there's us in 2018, but Hawthorn in 2018 also finished in the top 4 but then fell apart. There will likely be at least one top 8 side this year who struggles next year. It might be Collingwood. Of the three players to leave only Treloar really hurts them. They were moving past Stephenson and Phillips. But the damage to their culture caused by flogging players off and mismanaging the salary cap could prove more of an issue. It might be St Kilda. I can't shake my view that they're flaky and play non-sustainable football. It might even be West Coast or Geelong, given their lists are older and the end can hit quicker than expected when players are past 30.

I'm something of an outlier but I don't believe the game's spectacle is so bad that rule changes are necessary to "fix" it. I don't agree that scoring = better product, either. But, if we are looking to reduce congestion, there are three things I would do before making changes that IMO will have unintended side effects (like reducing the game to 16 per side or capping interchange rotations): Get rid of the ruck nomination rule Properly adjudicate holding the ball and, possibly more importantly, holding the man. The biggest one here is gang tackles/stacks on. Make it one tackler allowed. If a team adds a second tackler, you're penalised. Why do we need two players jumping on top of the player with the ball? We don't. Start, within the current rules, penalising players for wasting time when they've conceded a free. How often do you see a player get caught holding the ball, but take an eon to get up, or pretends to be stuck on top of the ball without it, or whatever. All the while letting his teammates flood back. The rules prohibit time wasting so let's enforce them properly - if you don't get up, off the opponent and off the ball, immediately, you are penalised (either bring in a 25 metre penalty for these sorts of offences or just hit them with a 50 metre penalty)

Even if your fears were well-founded, that's not a good enough reason to hold onto a future first round pick. I have no problem with the club setting high expectations and accordingly trading away our future first round picks if they think they can be used to cash in for higher present value. We started last year's trade period with one 2019 first round pick and one 2020 first round pick. Right now we have two 2019 first round picks and two 2020 first round picks. Even if we don't get back into the 2021 first round, that's still a net gain of a first round pick over that time. I think Stefan Martin is their more important acquisition. Allows them to be competitive in the ruck and use English either forward or back, where he'll have more impact. Treloar alone doesn't really help them as they already had a strong midfield. They're just going to be squeezing more midfield minutes out of Dunkley and Bontempelli to fit him in (although I guess in the case of Bontempelli playing him more forward won't hurt!). But if they can play English as a sweeper defender or a third tall forward, they might improve their real weaknesses.