Rodney (Balls) Grinter

Not counting any chickens by any means, but this is a must win game for the MFC. So sick of the excuses rolled out by sucessive MFC coaches in recent years (including Roos) that Rd 1 is just another game. Getting on the front foot and off to a winning streak of 4 or 5 games first up would setup our season entirely differently to the usual MFC act of loosing 4 or 5 of our first six games and playing catch-up for the remainder of the season to make finals.

Does Williams have indigenous heritage himself and/or has he got a good track record of understanding and getting the most out of players with an indigenous background? I'm genuinely interested.

Who knows where any potential rookie listing or not might lead young Kobe with the MFC and I'm sure there are those whom might take a clinical view of the world and suggest that if he wasn't taken in the draft that perhaps there is some good reasons for that and why would we now rookie list him. However if Kobe is anywhere near just good enough and ticks all the right character tests etc for us to use a rookie spot on and develop, I really do like us having some father sons around the place. Think it adds some depth of character and meaning to pulling on the MFC jumper if we can maintain and build a good sense of club loyalty and history, which elevates the retention/attraction of playing for the MFC in general.

Yeah, so AFL complaining about travel costs, yet scheduling preseason games completely obvious to this agenda = typical. Against MFC = easy target = typical. What have we come to expect. What our Demons need to become accustomed to is that we are favoured by no-one, loathed by and feared by everyone.

I'm a believer in such a thing as a premiership window, it's just I think interpreting that into the probability of a flag win is fraught with danger. No one would say that any of Sydney, Hawthorn, North and Adelaide are anywhere near it. You'd have to think with the number of top ten players in their early to mid 30s that teams like Geelong, West Coast and Collingwood are about to go off a cliff in the next few years unless they can pull off some massive trade heists in the same period. Loosing all of Hawkins, Selwood, Dangerfield, Touhy, Taylor, Abblett to either retirement or loss of output over the next few years is going to hurt Geelong big time. Kennedy is on his last legs at WC, will be a huge loss for them and I see no credible replacement, similarly Sidebottom and Pendlebury will rip the guts out of Collingwoods strength and DeGoey hardly seems like the type of character you'd build good team culture around. I'd take the rating of the Saints above us with the same huge grain of salt that I did, when after 2018 all the so called experts had us as seriously challenging for the flag in 2019. I'd agree with Pert and others here that our team still has some maturing to do, in order to make playing consistently and winning a habit, as opposed to playing in bursts. However once that clicks for us, surely we are well in the mix with the talented mids and solid backline we have. Where as, how to fit Harmes and Brayshaw into the midfeild in 2020 presented some challenges, I actually think the depth of our mids will play out far better with longer quarters and could seriously exposure a lot of teams in 2021. When it all comes down to it, I think that Leigh Matthews had it right with his assertion that even with the best recruiting, strategy and training standards in place, the difference between a good season and winning a premiership still involves an element of luck ...and surely we are due a bit of that sometime this century.

Ironically, having two league standard grounds /stadiums in SEQ Qld went a long way to saving season 2020. I'm a solid believer in the future of the Suns and based on the demographic, projected population growth and a strong grass roots Aussie Rules presence in that part of the world. However, I do struggle to justify the huge sums of money spent on subsidies for the Suns in the present, particularly with the general austerity measures the AFL has put in place due to COVID. It's going to be a very long term project you suspect. You would assueme that the AFL probably has set a hard timeline of finacial KPIs to determine if they continue with the Suns or cut their losses, but it's unlikely to be ever made public.

I'm all for a Tassie team, but I think the above is a fairly flawed statement. It could also be said that the NT and to a lesser extent ACT, could also make fairly legitimate claims to requiring a team for it to be a truely Australian competition.

...with him holding the premiership cup aloft. I think I'd almost get an A0 size framed poster for every room.

Pates, went to all the games this year at Carrara/Metricon. Almost always a decent breeze, with very little protection from the minature grand stands and virtually no protection at one end. I do remember Weid missing those set shots and thinking if he had just nailed one, we would have been home. But he wasn't Robinson Crusoe that night, by a long way. Harley Bennell, who was a gerally a beuatful shot on goal also missed an absolute sitter that I thought he would have nailed in a heartbeat 99 time out of 100. Our feild kicking in general against the Dogs at Carrara was abysmal, resulting in numerous abhorrent and costly turnovers that went a long way to loosing us the game - again quite windy conditions. Perhaps this is something for Yze to work on with the team?

To me, I agree absolutely with Lockhardt and Chandler ( also agree Re Jordon/Bedford whom you mentioned). I do think Mitch Brown is reasonable key position depth/insurance based on his quite serviceable performances throughout the year. I guess he is a fairly short term backup too given his age. Probably on pretty modest coin too, so ticks that box for us as well.

Very happy to seal the deal with North and Ben Brown and such a good deal at that. His unruly mop always gave me the [censored] when we played Nth, but that's probably because he was kicking bags of goals against us. Now that he's with us, the mop can stay and give our opposition supporters the [censored] - particularly if he's kicking goals!

He wasn't directly from North, but Shaun Smith was a super star and a great contributor for us.

Watching his highlights, I don't think it will matter if we kick it to him well or not. He seems to track the ball through the air so well, time his launch and clunk the marks from everywhere, so I think that suits us well.

I don't think it's quite like that. Yes the club was prepared to trade him on the basis that it could be mutually beneficial arrangement, rather than potenitally T Mac get shirty and frustrated at the prospect of competing for spots and playing twos week in/week out, but that's a bit different from 'wanting to get rid of him'. MFC footy department these days has more class than Collingwood.

The big Pedo bear put in some pretty decient cameo appearances when we needed them, so if that's how it turns out, I could well live with that. Like Pedo, I get the impression that Tommy is a pretty solid citizen, so I think we could do far worse than to have an influence like that around the club. I also think he's a pretty fierce competitor and that is the exactly the kind of attitude we need to have at the MFC to be putting pressure on Side Show, Wied and Jacko and others. I am really hoping that we have all underestimated T Mac, but time will tell ...who knows, he may even be part of a last minute trade for all we know.

Quite happy for T Mac to remain at our club. If he can shed the kgs, then I think he still has plenty to offer. Personally, I don't get the benifit of us paying several hundred grand a year for someone else to be getting a solid mature player, while we'd still be paying an additional few hundred grand for any sort of backup worth having. T Mac's versatility is a big plus he has going for him IMHO. Can do a respectable job up forward, down back or in the ruck. If Max gets injured, I don't want us to have to be in a position of flogging the guts out of Jackson if his body isn't quite there. Conversely, I'd be quite comfortable with rotating Brown, Jackson and T Mac through as ruck/forwards. Actually thought T Mac was starting to find form as a forward and clunk some good big strong marks before he got his eye poked out of its socket earlier this season. If Steve May goes down, we still need a player capable of taking on the gorilla forwards. Not so worried about his previous weaknesses woth disposal comming out of defense. It's true that he was pretty hit and miss by foot at that time, but we were a side under siege in those days without the same quality of players around him. Beyond all, I do like the sentiment of T Mac finishing in Red and Blue. He's been with us, copped pleanty through some pretty lean times and think he deserves some respect and an oppertunity to share in any success that we might have in the next two or three years.

Who's our Bart to thwart Side Show's plot? Of course if Side Show's evil plot is boot goals galore, then go for it Bob.

Potential to pick him up as a rookie under the AFL's new monthly rookie sign on rules (or whatever they are) potentially? But I'd hope we were not in pole position to get him based on us having a low enough ladder position at the time to pick him up.

Glad that Brown has now publicly nominated us, but I won't be celebrating until it's a done deal and/or we get through this whole trade period without giving up a player we'd rather hold onto. Something about counting chickens and hatching them.

Going back through the archives, some decient players have worn in the moden era Jetta, Dyson, Brett Lovett...but only for a season or so. Playing a bit on the number, some may say that 50 would be appropriate, because Brown is twice the player of T Mac... but I wouldn't be one of them. I do really value the contribution that T Mac has made over the journey. He played some pretty solid footy as a backman in a time when we were getting smashed every week, could have sought greener pastures but didn't. Really enjoyed his good work as a forward whilst it lasted. I wish him well where ever he ends up and do hope he has some good years of footy in him, just not against us!

To me the most of the review was just meh. I honestly don't have the inside knowledge or depth of understanding to know its good or not for Chaplin and Stafford continue in those roles or not. What we really needed is for our CEO/President to come out and state that the club will win multiple premierships in the next 5 years and become an AFL powerhouse over the next decade - that seems to work!

Agree. I recall it was suggested that there was a considerable undercurrent of disapoinment with Mahoney missing out on the CEO's role when Pert was appointed, which to me suggests that he'd be more than happy taking on a role with more of a commercial focus that his new one should provide. Richardson is much better suited to the intensive day to day footy focus. Whatever the formal roles might fall, I'm sure there will also be plenty of room for each of the assistants and even guys around the traps with strong leadership and football nous to also play a mentoring role in player development amongst the squad. I even feel like their could be a role for our current CEO in this capacity - was a pretty decient player in his day. I do actually like the cut in football department spending. It's more back to basics, which is what footy clubs should be about. When AFL finances recover somewhat I'd hope there could be a resistance to upping spending at the elite level, in order to channel those finds into grass roots footy, which could take a huge hit from COVID.

Very happy the club has signed up Hunt. He has actually been the 3rd highest goal kicker over the past two seasons combined. Remember watching him play what I think was probably his real break-out game against the GC at Carrara in 2017 and thinking wow - we have a player here. Just think he needs something to click to solidify his role in the side and become a really valuable asset to the team. I think we have a few like that with enough ability and potential which if realised will take us from being compeditive to genuine premiership contenders. Don't think this means that Jayden and other need to star every week, but they do need to find a way to meaningful contribute to the team every week, even when they are well held or having an off day.

Re "...or is a Melbourne midfielder on the Kangaroos' radar?" - I think we came out with the last time North swapped a tall for a mid, so deal away.

Doing the sums, I actually have Hunt as our 3rd highest goal kicker over the past two seasons on 31. Behind only Trac and Fristch, just ahead of Weid and Melksham.