Rodney (Balls) Grinter

Pruess is pretty good with his feet. Love those goals he has kicked for the MFC seniors where he has grabbed it out of the ruck, hacked it on his boot and slammed it through for 6 points or the ones where he has unloaded it from just on/outside 50 and drilled it home. When you can kick like that, why handball !!

For both AVB and the MFC's sake, I'm just hoping that he can make a full recovery and play some good footy for us over the next few years. The MFC has had way more of it's fair share of career ending or debilitating injuries to gun players over the past 30 or so years - Trengove, Bartram, Clarke, Lyon, Schartz, Jackovich being the ones that most readily come to mind. Throw in guys like Wonnameri, Jurrah, Sean Charles and Martin Pike that had to leave the club for personal reasons and I almost cry at all the wasted tallent we have had over the years that could have elivated us to multiple premierships in that time had we got the management of them right.

This is how I want our current crop to be remembered and I don't think they are far off it.

AVB is definitely best 22 material when fit. Joel Smith has shown glimpses that he could definitely mature into it and despite some reservations I've previouly had, Tim Smith has suggested to me this year that he could also has potential to play a role in a successful team. The only one of those I have significant doubts about is Maynard and he cost us next to nothing, as did all those mentioned. I haven't seen to many superstars develop out of pick 80, but the success rate out of rookie/mature age picks is through the roof respectively across the AFL. There is value there for the picking. That all said, I'm absolutely in favour of us holding onto early draft picks and getting some really good young kids into the side as well, unless it was the deal of the century like picking up a Patrick Cripps from Carlton somehow (which is never going to happen, but whats the harm in dreaming). A ballanced approach is what we need, both to drafting and in assessing our recruiting.

Looking forward to seeing my first live game at the ground this season. Would love for us to bring home a win, but whilst I have high hopes, I'm not particularly confident that we can get the job done. Credit where it is due to the MFC administration team. I applied to claim one of my interstate membership games earlier in the week and the sent me an email with a link for me to download my ticket. Slightly unbeknowns to me was that the email didn't contain the actual ticket, so I got a polite phone call from the club this morning telling me that an email with a pdf of my actual ticket would be appearing in my inbox, as a result of the MFC administration team doing a quick round up of those that hadn't yet done it for themselves. Well done and thanks guys - customer service at it's best! ?

I actually don't see the selection of Oscar on the bench as that unreasonable: a) If we lost a key back prior to the game through flu or something, he is about the only legitimate option you could bring in; b) I have hopes for Petty, but he isn't exactly setting the world on fire just yet and it's almost like he is the guy getting games for his development and future potential in much the same way as Oscar previously; c) We saw how much better Frosty played last week in a winning side and being relieved of the No.1 defense position - I think similar would apply to Oscar; d) Oscar is way better than your average VFL backman.

Having Preuss play against Martin could be good for his development, but going off previous weeks, I doubt it will happen. When they didn't pick Preuss to go against mummy for the GWS game, I thought this guy isn't going to get a game for the rest of the year, unless Max gets injured. If I remember correctly, Martin is beast like strong, but also has a pretty decient tank. What could have been if Max and Martin had have got together ...although one of them would probably just have become the most dominant ruckman in the VFL, hence we are where we are.

If I recall correctly Sam Mitchell also had a knack of playing ugly/dirty Hawthorn unsociable football that I've not really seen from Trac. How Mitchell and some of the other Hawthorn players of those teams got away with it still somewhat astounds me. Melbourne players would get rubbed out multiple weeks all the time for that sort of stuff, the BS 1 week suspension of Steve May at the start of this season being case in point.

Despite being a whiping boy of sorts (i.e. No.2 pick should dominate every game), my take is that Trac has been one or our better performers over this season. The main thing which has let him down is his erratic goal kicking in the 20m - 35m range. But do I think he can and want him to go to that next level - hell yeah. Like most of our team, I think Trac is struggling for that edge of confidence. Once Trac and our on ball brigade get up and going again, I think that they will dominate and bully the opposition. Trac can be every bit the power on-ball/forward option that Dusty has been for a few years now. Don't forget, it took Dusty a few years and almost being traded to get there too.

OOOOOOOZ

Number of posts it was on during the podcast is a bit ironic, or was it planned?

Seriously though, I'd be interested in Balls helping out a few of our players with some goal kicking practice. Big Maxy and Trac are a few that come immediately to mind.

Looking forward to chatting.

This really is a stupid thread. Contracted till the end of 2020. Has shown some capacity to be a servicable backman over the past 4 years as a small, young developing player. Why would we put in all that time and development into a guy just to let him go now. Steve May and Michael Hibbard are not exactly spring chicken either, so if Oscar can continue to build his game over the next few years, we could well have the need for another key back.

Yep, so I wasn't hearing things. Nothing against Magner, he was a player that tried hard and had a crack, but I think he would wish he was as good as Harmesy over the journey.

Winning - I like it. ...ALOT!!! The winning had the edge taken off it a little for me though, as I was watching the game with about an hours delay and my Foxtel recording died 5 mins into the third quarter. Endless minutes of my life wasted on the Foxtel not helpful line to try to get my IQ3 working so I could at least download the game last night resulted in nought and I had to wait until this morning to watch the last half already knowing the result. Bye bye Foxtel - hello Kayo Spot I think.

6. Viney (heart and soul of the club) 5. Gawn (really wanted to have T Mac as second BOG, but Gawn's performance and contribution was huge - as usual) 4. T Mac (Good for most of the game and stood up in big moments. I really hope that is a corner turned on his season) 3. Lockhart (great response from being dropped a fee weeks back and hope he keeps backing up that kind of performance) 2. Frost (really showed how dangerous he can be when May takes the No.1 forward and he can play with that fraction more freedom. His reading of the play, intercept marking run and carry, linking handballs and feild kicking and ball use were all excellent. Generated a significant number of rebounds from the back half that we scored from.) 1. Trac (kicked a good goal early when we needed one and worked hard all game). Even though statistically he didn’t have a huge game, I thought Nathan Jones actually played quite a good game and did some influential things. I actually didn't mind that free kick reversal thing that much - showed intent, that we were not going to take being bullied around and I think was emblematic of the bit of swagger that the team got back into it's step yesterday.

Hardly unpredictable. This guys ball drop during his goal kicking routine is a joke. He was spinning it round everywhere, jiggling it about and it was didn't suprise or disapoint me at all, when he shaked it all over the place from some pretty simple set shots. Didn't stop BT and the comentary team from praising him up all over the place as some kind of champion, dispite this obvious flaw in his goal kicking. Shiiit me to tears with all their Collingwood love crap. Had this guy been any sort of decient kick the game would have been all over by quarter time for the MFC ... not that it made much difference in the end.

Many opposition supporters would claim a hatred and dislike for the MFC and that we got our comupance over the last 50 years of premiership drought for effectively buying players in the 50s/60s. I think the same rational is fair to apply to Carlscum, they were buying flags and players up until the early 2000s in my book, with the likes of John Elliot running the show and their salery cap breaches. Even Chris Judd was bought in with the assistance of Richard Pratt money. I recon the cap breaches which were admitted were just the tip of the iceberg. I'd also be quite happy to see Collingwood, Hawthorn, Essendon and Westcoast starved of anymore real sucess for a number of years, but there is unfortunately some bad prospects of WC or the Pies having more sucess this year.

I read somewhere that as of about our 100 point belting of them last year Carlton have actually won less games (finals appearances included) than the MFC since 2000.

Rawlings is now in a no loose situation as far as I can see. Casey's season appears to me to have not got off the ground this season due to a severe lack of AFL listed players. Getting back more of our best list pre and post bye, the MFC's season should be on an upward trajectory from this point onward and Rawlings would no doubt get more Kudos for reviving the floundering forwardline of an a senior AFL side than anything which he might have achieved with Casey for the remainder of the season. Personally, I'm glad to see Rawlings more involved at the most senior level. I kind of get it, but why should the MFC do more favours by Rawlings by giving him the opportunity of showing his wears coaching his own side at Casey, than getting more value out of him where he is most presently needed at AFL level? I care more about the fortune of the MFC than I do about Rawlings coaching aspersions at another club and that's the way the MFC should see it too. McCarthy has been widely acknowledged as a great development coach, both at the Cats and the Dogs, so : i) I don't know why we would move him from that role in the first place; ii) I think it's good he is now back in that role and it doesn't indicate to me he is on the way out; iii) Would Maca have been a better fit for the Casey coaches position than Rawlings either in the first place or now that Rawings has been promoted? Or it best to keep the team coach and development coaches roles seperate?

If I remember correctly, Roosy originally publicly said he wasn't interested in coaching the MFC either. Not saying that means he will end up at CarlsIcum or not, but just that until the new coach of the scum is named, that we shouldn't completely dismiss it either. I really do hope that Carlton get the coach they deserve, i.e. one that keeps them out of finals and anything that remotely smells like sucess for another 20 or 30 years. Carlton are currently ahead of us as being the least sucessfull team this century and let's hope that we put a complete gulf between us and them over the next 2 - 5 years. I want it to get soo bad for them that Carlton are part of the talk of relocation to Tasmania, a third Sydney side or maybe a merger with North. LET them feel some more PAAAAIN

It is a fair bit different to outright tanking or putting the cue in the rack. Those developing/fringe types that we would be putting extra games into would be going pretty hard at it with the opertunity they are given I recon. I'm in agreement that it's the approach that we should take, but only from around Rd 18 - 19 onwards. We need to get games into as much of that best 22 as we can get on the feild between now and then to build back confidence, build that game style and winning culture for 2020. I think once we do build back a bit of confidence and system, it should actually be easier to slot a few of the lesser likes back into the lineup and give them a go at the end of the season.

I'm looking forward to more of winning. Really want us to get that compeditiveness, confidence, dominance and respect back in our game. Last season I genuinely felt like we were a better than even chance to beat any side we came up against. Contrast that with this season, where I feel like there is some chance we could beat sides if we switch on and find some confidence there is a chance that we 'might' be a small chance to win. I'm hopeful that with the players we got back in the past few weeks and some of that good attacking ball movement through the centre of the ground in patches of the second half against the Pies from Gus (who looked to have regained some form ), Hannan, Hibbard and Weid looked to have regained some touch, that we are close to regaining that dangerous 2018 form again. I'd like us to win at least 3 of our next 4 games and then be right up there and beat whatever top 8 sides we can before the end of the season, with Richmond, Collingwood, the Crows, Port and Geelong? being prime targets. If that has us giving up a good draft pick for pick 10 or 11 because we end up finishing outside the 8, then so be it. Whilst I don't want us to put the cue in the rack of our season as a team at any point, if there are players carrying injuries that need surgery, put them in at round 18, so they get a full preseason and hit 2020 in top condition. I want some respect back for our club. Whilst I never one that thought that the 2019 flag was in the bag and all the outside noise, I utterly detest joke and flash in the pan, that we have become. So most of all, I'm looking forward to winning back some respect and the club showing the AFL world and us as supporters that we can be a genuine threat next season.

Reminds me of my first Jnr coach who had this smallish dog that use to chase the ball. Usually it was just at training, but it did make one or two match day appearances, which was an interesting interlude from normal game play.