Goodvibes

Just quietly, how boring must it be to follow anyone other than Melbourne? And people call us irrelevant!

Maybe he told the truth. Sack him.

Not much to elaborate on but it was interesting to see Caro making references already to the Stynes "legacy". I also find it amazing how easily some around here slag off Schwab, Connolly, Bailey and McLardy but avoid laying any blame at the feet of Jim. This is a right royal mess. And as a bumped thread of mine, that will very quickly drop off the bottom of the page shows, very few held concerns about the impact our obvious tanking would have on culture and nobody predicted the potential for AFL investigations. Most here are worried about losing draft picks. I worry about the impact on public perception, future sponsorship and our ability to lure a star of the competition over the next couple of years.

Stynes.

Is anyone brave enough to mention the elephant in the room?

I'm not in the habit of bumping threads but thought I'd try out the triple-bump. As many intelligent posters on here are often heard to say, "we live in interesting times". And here I was worried about culture. Who would have thought the AFL might actually take this stuff seriously.

What constitutes bringing the game into disrepute? A) Melbourne throwing a couple of games OR B) the AFL allowing two start up clubs to enter the league with less than a handful of players over the age of 22, under-perform to the point most football fans have little interest in watching over 50 games over the past two seasons. OR C) the AFL constructing a series of rules that put a 19 year old in a position where he has to lie to the club president and in public for 12 months before moving interstate to become one of the top 5 players in the competition when he's not currently in the best 100 players. OR D) the AFL continuing to provide a "draw" that provides huge advantages for some teams over others to maximise profit and prioritze financial reward over fairness and equity.

Just wanted to say that I'm really quite excited by this guy. Most here have him pigeon-holed as a depth player and many listing best 22's have him in the backline. And others are making Sellar comparisons. He's going to surprise many. Quite a few north supporters preferred him to Hansen and Tarrant and couldn't understand why he wasn't given more of a chance. I can understand why North were keen to pump games into Tarrant and fast-track his development and why they wanted to give Hansen every opportunity to finally justify his high draft position and obvious talent. With Petrie as their other key forward, there's no shame in finding yourself in the VFL. And if you are going to find yourself in the VFL you might as well go ahead and dominate and win the B & F. Pederson will at least be a very solid inclusion that provides that enhances our structure but I think he will be even better than that. I think Neeld will play him forward with Clark and Dawes and he will have a huge year. He's got a great pair of hands, a long accurate kick, seems to work hard defensively and will be hungry to prove himself. All aboard the Pedersen bandwagon!

Cheers. It's an interesting decision for the club. The current consensus on Demonland is the safe bet is the best bet. And I can completely understand that position given we've just sent Cook, Gysberts, Morton and Bate packing. All of those first round picks were of a speculative nature. Bate, if I remember correctly was youngest player in his draft year and Cook, Gysberts and Morton all obviously had pretty light bodies (and damningly still do). But we also know that the stars of the competition are found in the first round and sometimes those stars are a long way from the finished article. Do we take a 9/10 chance that we'll get a Scott Thompson or do we take a 5/10 chance that we get a Patrick Dangerfield. My nerve has been tested too but I'm ready to roll the dice again. Let's have a crack at O'Rourke.

And what do you think O'Rourke will become?

People keep talking about tough, hard, clearance types and fast, skillful, skinny types as if there is no middle ground. I want an inside/outside mid who is strong through the core, reads the ball well in clearance situations, has breakaway pace and the kicking skills to deliver. Is that too much to ask? The closest player to that description available at pick 4 appears to me to be O'Rourke and that's why he got my vote. Like many I'd love Toumpas but doubt his availability. I really respect the way Wines goes about it but fear that many over-rate him.

IN: hope OUT: under-achievement, wasted talent, ill-discipline and athletic deficiencies

And while we're at it we should save the Tassie Tiger. We can't change the past. We need to move on. Our current Footy Dept certainly have.

My other team (Sheffield Wednesday) have a supporters forum that is far more rowdy than here. One of the funniest things the posters over there pulled off was creating a false rumour that Terry Henfleet was in transfer talks with the Owls. Both Sheffield newspapers published articles making reference to the fictious player and a club official was even quoted as saying no-one would be ruled out when asked whether the club were interested in said players. Henfleet shirts are still commonplace at Hillsborough. It's the in-joke that returns every transfer period. Nice work Chook.

He was highly rated two years ago. Today he's a half-back flanker who has shown a limited appetite for the contest and only managed 13 games over 2 seasons for a start-up franchise handing out games to youngsters. The heart condition is incidental and also a little ironic given his dubious levels of enthusiasm for the game. On the two occasions I've seen him this year at reserves level, he's looked disinterested.

Michael Long, Stephen Hill and Lewis Jetta comparisons being made. This should be fun. Glad his name isn't Cockatoo-Collins.

And in the black and white extreme world that is Demonland, Gysberts will now be viewed as having officially seen the light and is now working hard to stay on the list after the cleverly orchestrated and public kick up the backside given to him by our ruthless footy department.

Mark Jamar!

We're being absolutely crucified on Bigfooty. I like it! I'm getting the same vibe from the rabble over there as I got after we grabbed Clark last year. Every Monday expert was lining up to tell us how we overpaid. I feel like we've moved from being a lowly corner hopper to a real trade week mover and shaker in the space of 10 days.

I'm not sure we've got our hands on an elite mid in my lifetime.

It's a good thing you're all about the journey.

So are you all telling me he's not going to be Joel Corey now?

Anyone as crazy as me and prepared to take a risk on Stringer at 4? He's my boy.

Who's the closest to Patrick Dangerfield?

I've been thinking exactly this. Viney plus pick 4 and a rejuvenated Trengove and Blease with a bigger tank makes us far more impressive in the midfield in 2013. Add topline midfielder from GWS or Gold Coast in 12 months and our jigsaw is near complete.