Rodney (Balls) Grinter

On 7/4/2023 at 10:43 PM, John Demonic said:

... Was a thing of beauty.

 

 

I think he was just showing off with that shot for goal.  Could have comfortably got another 5m closer to the man on the mark and kicked from around 55m as the man on the mark seemed to be not much further out than 45m.

Not many players these days can reliability make the distance from 55m, but Bennett consistently kicked them from 60m.

8 hours ago, bandicoot said:

Maybe we should also ban sugar drink and junk food. This is becoming a nanny state 

So says the person with the avitar of David Schwartz who's was nearly financially destroyed by a gambling addiction.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.nine.com.au/article/12174638-63f5-455f-85b2-b589dd9ddaa6

4 hours ago, 58er said:

I told a WC supporter last week ( on a Train Special Trip all around Switzerland heavy AFL discussion) that no one on the East Coast of Australia especially in Vic cared a toss about the Eagles and their predicament. 
In fact that them and The Pies are most hated opponents as their supporters are the worst and most arrogant in the AFL. 
He still thinks that it will only take 2 seasons to be back in the hunt but alas is a bit impatient about who they are going to trade out and when are they going to start getting rid of most of their gassed and banged up heroes of 2018. And who is going to want any of them in their present malaise? 

That's just taken the MFC gone to the snow in the Range Rover stereotype to a whole new level 58er! 😂

Perhaps it's the overwhelming WA support for our Demons in 2021 and winning a flag ourselves that has tempered my outright hatred of WC into something less bitter.  They were a bloody good side under Malthouse through the 90s, so disiplined with their ball use, game plan and had a winning habit that I was quite envious.  They probably should have won a few more flags during that era. 

Still the PF losses we had to them in the West in 94 and 18 cut pretty deep and I was particularly [censored] in 94 when we had such a gun side that had been very competitive for a good 7 seasons, but couldn't crack a flag. Their arrogance in the aftermath of the 2018 prelim was also pretty hard to stomach. Travelling over the West for a prelim is always going to be a hard ask, still in retrospect on both occations they pretty much earnt the right through being consistent through the season and finishing the home and away in a ladder position that set them up for finals sucess - something I'm hoping our Demons of this era can emulate.

On 5/25/2022 at 11:39 AM, drdrake said:

WCE have to look to off load players as they have Salary cap issues.

Not a good place, well and truly past their best with some big contracts and no kids coming through.

Getting Tim Kelly was meant to keep them in contention.

It will be a very slow rebuild.

Somewhat prophetic. 

When you look at their performances in 2023 on aggregate as shown up in % I'd say they are in the same sort of hole that we were in around 2011.  Of course, we'd already off loaded all the veterans by then and were already attempting to invest in youth.

West Coast have been one of the most successful teams of the AFL era, so I'm not particularly empathetic to their current predicament.

23 hours ago, ElDiablo14 said:

Surely Hawkins is also close to retirement. Once you remove that second threat forward, it becomes easier to defend against Cameron.

I keep waiting for Hawkins to drop off and leave a huge hole in their side, but he seems almost phyically immortal at this point.  Surely there's a big hamstring tear and or a bunch of soft tissue injuries sometime in the next couple of years that at his age his recovery will be slow and impactful on his performance?

I don't think I wish ill on the guy personally, as I actually admire how well he's been able to play for so long, but in the interests of fairness to the competition with respect to him propping up Geelong's performance and keeping them compeditive, I do hope the end on his career is near.  Boomer Harvey was similar.   Maybe the AFL should bring in a mandatory retirement age.

4 hours ago, Dee Viney Intervention said:

Rebrand complete.  No where's our $1M consulting fee for this service.

8 hours ago, dice said:

Absolute nonsense. You are talking about two of the absolute greats of the game. They would have made it in any "era"

They may or may not have.  Not sure any of them were great trainers and may not even have made it onto an AFL list just based on their respective body shapes and if they did make it they may have been cut quickly due to attitude issues.

It's a pretty hypothetical question and there is obviously The counter argument that they may have risen to the professional environment around them and thrived.  Guys like Alan Jackovic who has openly spoken about his lack of preseason training early on (which he attributed his being injury prone to) might actually have benefited from the more professional environment and that would have been great to have seen him perform at his peak for longer (for us).

1 hour ago, A F said:

No, you're absolutely right. Billy Brownless and Tony Lockett were elite athletic specimens.

That they were not, but they could certainly play football.  Add to that guys like Abblet senior, Dunstall, Alan Jackovic and others that may not have made it in the ultra professional, money and image driven AFL era.  These guys all put on a show and I think the game had more character back then, due to the diversity of players backgrounds and physical attributes.

Also miss the local suburban grounds like Princess Park, the Western Oval and Windy Hill etc.  Oddly enough, I even miss Waverly - again character and the game was accessible to the everyday supporter.

1 hour ago, dice said:

Better footballers than most of the current crop. And Plugger is probably fitter now than most too

I knòw this isn't the 'AFL look a likes' thread, but:

Looks scarier than when he was leading towards Peter Craven, elbow aimed.

9 hours ago, rjay said:

Sounds like a good job for Joel Selwood...

And lure him back from rugby league - no thanks.  I'm happy with him right where he is.

Seriously - how does a bloke that made a career out of ducking to get tackled around the neck get employed by a sport that the aim is to takle the opposition in the place where a neck should be, but has is absent in it's players due to an evolutionary process of genetic selection?

1 hour ago, La Dee-vina Comedia said:

SEN's tweet says, "the hugely popular Gather Round". Was it hugely popular? I didn't get the sense that it was at all popular, let alone "hugely" popular, at least, outside SA. Or is that just my bias coming through?

1 hour ago, Rab D Nesbitt said:

Don't know what's so "hugely popular" about 80% of the regular match going AFL public around the country not being able to go and watch their team play live. 

The 'hugely popular Gather Round TM" is like the '100% all beef TM' burger at McDonald's just a bunch of marketing BS.

I can't stand this concept.  The Melbourne Vs Essendon game was hardly attended this year, because all the locals were mostly intered in the Crows game later in the day.

14 hours ago, leave it to deever said:

Checkout the yob with the finger.

 

Actually...

5 hours ago, leave it to deever said:

Checkout the yob with the finger.

 

Collingwood - what, you expected better?

5 minutes ago, Demonland said:

The following image was created by AI and includes 3 stereotypes in the one photo. 

Arn't AI cars dogs?

...what kind of dog would a Range Rover be?

With recruiting veterans, there is always going to be some element of risk in terms of performance towards the end.

At Melbourne, we got great value out of Leiws for most of his contract.  Eventually he became pretty marginal as a player, but I'm sure the value he bought to our culture from finals sucess etc was invaluable.  Even if he makes no further contribution, I think BBB was an important ingredient to our 2021 premiership.

Similarly Brisbane got pretty good value out of Hodge and who knows what mentoring Gunstan might provide off the feild that might help the further development of Brisbane's forwards.

I'm just glad we didn't recruit Gunstan close to the end.

7 hours ago, jnrmac said:

They just need to enforce the rules as they are. When you get tackled you have to make an attempt to dispose of the ball. Just because you have one arm held doesn't negate that.

I don't think that discriminates against the ball winner too onerously. If the umps blow their whistles quicker you wont have tacklers spinning guys around in 360 degs and ball winners will try to dispose of the ball more quickly

But while we are at it. These are just as frustrating:

• Holding a player while he is trying to get the ball Happens to Clarry and Tracc all the time. Particulalrly in the centre bounces
• Push in the back? WTF is going on with that
• Jumping on a players back when he is on the ground? WTF
• Kicking the ball as its crossing the line. The McCreery decision was terrible. It used to be your foot could not be in contact with the ball as it crossed the line. When did that change?
• Handballs over the head.  How is that a stationary palm as it used to be
• Front on contact is now paid for the slightest of touches - in some case for no contact at all just getting in the players face as it were - and yet it was brought in to stop people being shirtfronted whilst they were in a vulnerable position
• Shepherding off the ball. You are allowed to bump a player within 5m of the ball. This is paid randomly - such as Oscar bakers ridiculous decision on the weekend  - yet Max was shepherded off the ball every single time the ball went into our 50m. And Collingwood had two shots at goal because of it.
• Sliding the knees. This was the Adam Goodes rule brought in to stop the dangerous sliding when approaching from the opposite direction - ie when you could break a players legs. Now its paid for anyone going for the ball and  the oppo player dives over the top of them. ANB does this quite often to milk a free.
• Tackles that slip down low and players get tripped. Rarely paid as a trip

Most of these rules modifications are designed for TV and faster play - supposedly more goals and more commercial breaks.

But the lack of consistency and rule of the week is infuriating. When was the last time a player got pinged for being in the 'protected zone'?  Yet you now see it all the time.

As for the 'standing the mark rule. The variation in intrpretation is mind boggling.

 

AFL are idiots.

 

Agree with all that too Jnr. 

The other that frustrates the heck out of me is players doing cheap push in the back etc of their opponent towards the fence once the ball had crossed the boundary line.  I can't think of any particular culprit players or teams who are better or worse than any other and I'm sure we have many that do it repeatedly.  Maybe the AFL will just wait for a player to become concussed hitting the fence or the hard astroturf section near the fence and then any player that breaths on a player near the boundary line will get a 2 week suspension.  It's really dum if you ask me.

On 6/14/2023 at 5:49 PM, Lucifers Hero said:

A very easy fix:  eliminate 'the 'no prior' rule:  if ball is not immediately and legally disposed of it is HTB. 

This will eliminate so many other aspects of tackle/HTB confusion and illegal disposals eg throws.  And players being taken to ground will become the exception with lower risk to a player's head. 

Not my original idea:  I heard Nathan Buckley discuss it a few years ago. 

I get that the AFL wants play to be 'free flowing' rather than have lots of frees.  What is more important free flowing game or protecting players and not have stupid suspensions.  I reckon once players get used to a new rule they will dispose of the ball faster and play will be free flowing any way.

 

My fear is that a team could have several players could before the Tribunal in finals for "accidents".  What then!  The AFL turns a blind eye to its rules and not suspend players or suspends them and disadvantages a team and compromises the integrity of the finals and possibly the GF.

100% this Lucifer.

Was watching a game from the 80s a while back and it struck me how much less time/oppertunity players had before it was considered holding the ball.  But it didn't result in the game being dominated by umpiring, or players not going in for the ball because players adjust.  Don't take on the tackler so readily, not as many rolling mauls, more kick / leading type behaviour players spread over a bigger area of the ground and everyone had more space, because the ball could be moved faster by foot than players able to flood back.

I'm not sure if it was a 'no prior' interpretation or if the threshold for holding the ball was just lower, but definitely wouldn't have had players being bought to ground with the ball and it not a free kick, so players a) generally avoided letting that happen as the ball winner and b) knew they didn't need to pile drive players to be awarded the free kick.

3 hours ago, daisycutter said:

i believe it was a second offence.  might have had something to do with size of penalty?

don't know for sure but i think a third offense might be automatic suspension?

I'd go along with that.  I seem to recall Salem doing something like this before.

23 minutes ago, AmDamDemon said:

Absolutely love him. Consistently has time, composure, awareness and plays at a level of hardness that belies his size. He and Salo both working off the same line was a thing of beauty this week. More Judd!

Add Bowey back to that at some stage and our backline including Hibberd, Lever, May, Rivers looks pretty elite at the moment.

Tomlinson did a great job there on Monday, I really prefer Petty there and Brayshaw can also be fantastic down there on his day.   It's a bit of an embarrassment of riches down back at the moment and would be making life super tuff for the selectors.

Love Judd.  He does some great work at half back, but I feel his pin point passing and good option selection is almost wasted there.  Wounder if he'll graduate to a wing one day and/or be given a bit more licence to run off his man to get more ball across half forward and deliver the ball inside 50 or take a few shots at goal every now and then as time goes by.

Went to a function with Max Gawn the other week and he was a huge rap on Judd.  Also pointed out that nearly every week Judd is being assigned one of the opposition's most damaging forwards, such is the coaches faith in him and makes his performances even more impressive.  Just as impressive is that he rarely gets beaten one on one.

27 minutes ago, binman said:

I all seriousness, i'm with the pies fan on this one.

Rubbish fans are rubbish fans whoever they barrack for. And frankly, when they are dees fans i get embarrassed. 

I had a fella a few rows back from me on Monday who was yelling abuse at the top of his lungs at dees players all game. Not unlike me, he had a very loud voice and he wasn't afraid to use it.

From the start of the game to the very last seconds he, he was relentless in his vociferous attacker on any dees player that crossed one of his imaginary red lines - too soft, can't tackle, hopeless, clueless, how did they alow that to happen yada yada yada.

He was dees fan.

 

Fans eating their own and being supercritical of players efforts is the worst.  As if these cretins had played at anything like that level.

31 minutes ago, The Lobster Effect said:

Bailey (plus Collingwood bogans)

Dragonball character

 

Actually a better hairstyle for Bailey.

Needs more Dragonball if that's what gets him kicking goals.

More GF power boost mode!!!

1 hour ago, djr said:

I heard Tracc said Trump’s a crook. 

From what I understand, Cox is actually an anti Trump kinda guy.  Yeah he has some American traits, but I actually have some respect for this dood.

Going a bit against the grain, but I don't actually see anyone here comming up with anything solid on what sparked all this.  Yeah Maynard saying to leave it, but I don't take that for anything.

Let's face it, if I'm a Collingwood fan, I'm heaping it on Trac for being a big mouth as well.  And I love Trac and his extroverted nature, but he is pretty good at getting animated at the best of times and from what I could see from the vision was doing a fairly good job of getting in Cox's face as well.

According to the official reports posted here, I honestly think both players have been pretty respectful about it in the aftermath.

1 hour ago, Demons1858 said:

Max's podcast might he interesting this week, given he witnessed trac's likely retaliation and will have heard what Cox had to say today

Yeah, nah.  Max will be doing the same as Trac and Cox on this one and playing it with a pretty strait bat, be it with a huge grin and a giggle.

1 hour ago, Monbon said:

Isn't that called money laundering?

More like flushing it down the toilet.