Rodney (Balls) Grinter

Except the games we played them in 2016 I think actually did mark something of a turning point in our level of competitiveness and belief and the start of their decline. We played them early in the season and got within a few goals of them in a hard fought game. Second time we played them late in the home and away, we beat them quite convincingly. I think it was from our performance in that game and his relationship with Todd Viney if I remember correctly that helped convince Jordan Lewis to make the call to move across and join us. From that moment onwards, our trajectory has been mostly in the upwards direction (including against the Hawks) and Jordan Lewis went from being a loathed personality (simply by being a Hawthorn player), to one I now quite enjoy listening to.

Are you sure they were actually Hawthorn supporters Hatchman? The type of Hawthorn supporters I remember from back in the day were over boisterous, arrogant AF. Memories seared in my brain as a kid from walking out of games at the G or Waverly after any kind of loss and them telling us how good they were and how crap we were - and this is even during the mid 90s when we had an average to good side. I guess it's typically of life that we remember the 1% and they are the ones that ruin it for the majority.

Or alternatively, does it give us the opportunity to play Salem further up the ground? I really think we could do with his elite level smarts and foot skills distributing the ball inside 50 more. And/or they could both be rotated higher up the ground and get that opertuity and help the MFC find that next gear we've been searching for but haven't quite found so often this season.

Why? Why can't he just go through his 200+ game career undefeated 😊😉?

Chunk got in on the act of the rev-up as well, which I thought was great watching to have another ex MFC player asides from Garry in on the action.

Growing up as a child of the late 70s / early 80s, part of me finds some of this a bit of 'first world problems' for games played in Melbourne i.e. the home teams state (although Geelong isn't part of Victoria in much the same way as Tas is not part of Aus 😉) as there is a realistic oppertunity for supporters to get to those games in-person attending at the ground. When the VFL/AFL made the move to take the competition national, I think there is an implied obligation that they should be providing access to watch those games at an affordable price as well, ideally on FTA. Where I get somewhat pisssed is when the AFL takes things away from the everyday supporters. Examples being our game Vs Port in Adelaide which was shown in Melbourne exclusive on pay TV and games like the Anzac eve clash with Richmond where from as far as I can gather, there was no GA seating on ground/bottom level of the MCG. The later particularly pisssed me off, since every other MFC home game, there was significant sections of GA seating on the ground level of the MCG which either MFC members, opposition supporters or the general public could sit at for base level entry price. The at the ground seating issue is probably a bigger one for me, since at ~ $20 per month for a whole family for Kayo, it's realitively cheap to get premium quality access, compared to the $50 + dollars I'd guess it would have cost me to get ground level access reserved seating for a single game for my family at the G. When Gil first got the CEO job, he made a big song and dance about being the guy for the average supporter. Through 2 years of COVID and it's been the average supporters such as myself who didn't cancel memberships etc despite not being able to get to games in person that helped keep the clubs and AFL finacial and playing Gil's excessive CEO salary and that taking a family to the footy is helping to finance the long term sustainability of the game by ingraining it into the blood of the next generation of supporters. It would be a good thing if the AFL though about these things, but I won't hold my breath.

Which helped make Gawn the superstar he is today.

Perhaps @Bitter but optimistic can provide some coaching and advice? 😉

That's a great response to hear. Not an attitude of arrogance and elitism, but it's great that internally it well and truely sounds like we've broken the shackles of defeatism and negativity that must have held us back for so long and replaced it with an attitude of self assuredness that hard work and our systems will prevail in the end and that this has permeated through all levels and aspects of the club's administration.

Will be interesting to see how we continue to deal with the outright favourites status that we are almost universally been awarded at the moment. In days gone by, I'd be confident, but concerned about false hope, big heads and an imminent stumble. But this is the new Melbourne and I've got a much better sense of assurance that we'll just keep marching on. Even if we were to loose tonight, which could happen for a variety of reasons, I don't think it would have a crippling impact and the reset would be swift.

Looking forward to seeing Dunstan, Smith and BBB in action tonight for similar, but different reasons. Great to see Dunstan getting some reward for effort and faith in himself and the MFC for making the move across. Having someone who would probably fit into the best 22 at most other clubs in the league as depth is an outright luxury, but if they don't get opportunities, it would be easy for the motivation and form to drop off and frustrations to breed discontentment. I'm sure he'll have a red hot crack and is recognised for the effort he brings as in our team it isn't about people being superstars in every game. I thought Smith was showing some really good signs down back before he lost his spot in the side (ironically to health and safety protocols if I remember correctly). I see it as super important for the long term sustained sucess of the team that we continue to develop key defensive backline players. This time Smith is comming into a back 6 that looks considerably more settled than in the early rounds when he last played, with Harry Petty providing a great second anchor from day dot last week. The speed and marking strengths that Smith has started to show are a real X factor that could really help to shore up our defense in a post Hibbo, post May era that will inevitably come at some point and the more Smith plays, in my mind, the more assured he has looked with his reading of the play and positioning of the ball. I'm also convinced he has shored up his disposal which was pretty shaky (probably lack of confidence) in his early games for the club. With BBB I'm really looking forward to seeing him pickup where he started the season full of form and confidence. His season has cruelly interrupted by COVID and clumsy indiscretion, but I reckon he'll be chomping at the bit to get amongst it tonight. Will also be interesting to see how the Brown/Weid/Fritsch dynamic works.

Great to see West Coast get smashed again last night. Have seen this comming for a long time with the top heavy age profile of their list. It would be the first time in thier history, as they usually seem to bonce back into contention fairly quickly, but I'm hoping they are in for a long rebuilding process having given up overs for Tim Kelly and holding onto the veterans for too long in a Hawthorn/Geelong like manner of trying to squeeze one last flag out of the current group mentality.

Yeah, I generally love the show for all the aforementioned reasons as well. I do find it can be a bit long at times and I struggle a bit keeping up to date, but generally great listening. Do really like the very candid interviews they get with all the big name personalities around the club as well. Choco, Yze were great and I even found they were able to present Jack Viney as having a personality 🤣😉.

Agree, all though, there was actually an intersection between the podcast and the click bait a few weeks back https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.foxsports.com.au/afl/teams/melbourne-demons/afl-2022-angus-brayshaw-on-trade-rumours-to-west-coast-eagles-fremantle-dockers-melbourne-demons-free-agency-out-of-contract-max-gawn-whispers-news-latest/news-story/6bf630d2b1cf4e5eddbda56d43f7a6b7 Would rather eat a steaming plate of my own...’: Demons star Brayshaw’s cheeky response to Eagles trade link Generally I find Gus and Gawny to be the perfect ballance for each other background wise and both come across as possessing pretty high emotional intelligence. Listening to the buy-in he regularly exprrsses on the show, if Gus was to leave at this point, he would have run a way bigger and more convincing foil than even the master of "I'd like to be a one club player" Tom $cully. If Gus did ever swing towards leaving for reasons of his own, he comes across as the sort of mature high integrity person that would start openly delivering a honest message about where he was at with the club rather than the subtuflarge we got from $cully.

First up segment from around 1 minute 30. ... Rule18.2 e "No one must burn an umpires house down... 18.2 f - Everyone must give Joel Selwood free kicks" lol

Yep, asides from the humorous side, I think they actually had some well measured perspectives on the issue. Really well highlighted ridiculousness of Brad Scott's do as I say, not as I do.

The great benifit we have at the moment with so much depth and confidence in the 'stand-in' players is the luxury of taking our time and getting injured players back into top notch condition without rushing or excessive pressure to get them back in for the sake of the team. Similarly alot of credit has to go to our fitness, conditioning, coaching staff and the players themselves. For Petty to step back into the team and perform like he did on the back of one VFL game was quite sensational. Gives me alot of confidence that Salem and Hibbo will be as fit and firing as they humanly can be when the team most needs them at the pointy end of the season. Salem is pretty much an automatic selection in the seniors when fit. However, I think Hibbo could struggle to force his way into the side if everyone else is performing and there isn't a particular matchup only he can provide by his inclusion. One thing I think that is evident from the past season is that we don't make many, if any team selection changes unless there is a glaring need for it like injury or to make way for an A grade player. We tend to prefer stability and performance to promoting players based on past reputation and experience - Bowey's patient wait and then continued elevation over Hunt in last season's finals series as exhibit A.

Love the quotes and attitude from Goodwin in last week's press conference "we're not looking for perfection, we're just looking to be a really strong footy team ...looking to dominate every week is just not a reality in modern AFL footy. There's alot of great teams out there and we'll respect every one of them". Says to me that we value winning consistently more than being show ponies and Fig Jams. It's that sort of attitude that means we're more likely to be there in September than be March premiers. Winning ugly beats loosing any day and you can see that Goodwin and the teams attitude is that if there is anything they are about perfecting it's maintaining and tuning a system and team ethos to grind out the wins on a systematic basis. How many times do you hear opposition supporters these days say that about Melbourne - "they just grind you down and pressure your team into submission" - I love it!!

Looks like the membership cards have got microwaved already this year. Amazing how quickly they've all jumped off the band wagon, although not all that surprising. Their former stars have either retired, are cooked or have been traded and I don't see a whole lot of tallent coming through behind them to step up into the voids. Could be some lessons in this for us in a few years, although I'm not sure we're quite as top heavy age wise as they were/are.

Along with the general fear of us, the above actually makes me quite happy. Sure beats being irrelevant.

I'm assuming all these are the current running totals Jnr. I'm curious as to what the 'all time record' is say since say 1980? (go back too far in the history books and my suspicion is that not as many games got to 100 points for either team, so the stat would be somewhat void). Maybe a stats / IT guru out there can work it out. I've often wounded if an amature out there somewhere has a full offline data base or a script that can pick it's way through the AFL tables website online.

Yeah a bit more peroxide, less natural ranga! Lol

Quite true and I don't know the answer, other than to say, that it's a good problem to have.

Out of all the recient 'dynasty' teams, at this point, Richmond are dropping off the biggest cliff. They could become pretty irrelevant again quite quickly if it continues at the present rate.

...while we're on topic of umpires critique, has anyone else noticed that the 'protected areas rule is either being officiated differently / significantly relaxed? Has there actually been a rule change or is it just something that's being let go until an umpire finds an inopportune time to decide to pay one and artificially change the momentum of a game. To some extent I think I've also noticed a shift in what actions players take from a mark/free kick situation that could also be influencing things - less handball to a runner going past and more of just playing on taking on the man on the mark directly and why effectively waste a number at the source of the ball when they are better positioned to advantage elsewhere, but while the rule is there, it needs to be played consistently or else it has the potential to randomly create chaos and unfairness at some point.