Smokey

There is a concept in the criminal justice system called extrajudicial punishment; a punishment not issued by the courts. In this case the media scrutiny surrounding the case can be viewed as punishment in of itself for Balta. In the context of it being his first offence, I’d say that’s a perfectly valid position to take. Not everyone that commits an offence has their case thrust into the public domain like this. He now carries this for life, both on his criminal record and in the court of public opinion. For someone who hasn’t been in trouble with the law before and who took full responsible for his actions and showed remorse, I can’t see gaol as being the right option here given that.

OUT: Balta (Curfew)

Disappointing in a number of ways, Brad would have been well advised to not put anything out instead of this garbage. Highlighting how good we were against Essendon in the 3rd quarter is simply laughable. Essendon are not a good side, especially defensively. Don’t treat us like fools, Brad. I am encouraged by the fact he stopped short of putting the boards support behind Goodwin. Goodwin needs to go now and I’ll accept a wooden spoon this year to get there.

Game day energy

Same thing I’ll do if we win. Continue on with my life as usual.

I am filled with very little confidence we will be competitive, let alone a chance of winning. Sincerely hope I'm proven wrong somehow. If we switch on now there's no reason we can't still aim for September.

186 v2.0 is on the cards

Goodwin absolutely has to go.

Put a line through this season, find a new coach and figure out what we're gonna do with our draft picks. I'd be happy with a full rebuild at this point, including moving on Trac and Clarry if we can.

Shifting magnets isn't the solution to our key forward issues. Bottom line is we need more from JVR. I love his attack on the footy and has a beautiful kicking action, but I'm becoming very concerned at his inability to read the ball flight coming in. Watched him run under it too many times last week. Maybe Lever can impart some wisdom on him in this area.

Hawthorn looking ok. Interested to see how they go against better sides, such as GWS (and us!). Until then I wouldn't pencil them in for anything significant.

Nevermind the F1 was on and we were playing GWS This post is more pathetic than the crowd size

Disappointing but plenty to like about our game today

Always a pleasure watching the eternally hyped Carlton [censored] the bed Happy for the ooze ❤️

No injuries, please. Don’t really care what happens outside of that.

All I need to know is are we "training the house down" yet?

Huge day for the “told you I was right, I’m smart you’re stupid” cohort at Demonland

Passing on your lack of resilience to the kids hey? What a great lesson in life that is.

Beautiful words from Gussy. We love you mate ❤️

My advice to anyone who needs it - disconnect from footy media for a bit, focus on playing golf or whatever it is you do, and come back for the trade period. All of this speculation eliciting emotional reactions is exactly what the media want and get paid on. Ignore it, its 90% BS. You know in your heart of hearts that we'll look back on all this and wonder why we got so worked up about it.

Yet it would save face with the members. Not sure which is more valuable right now.

I highly doubt player contracts allow for arbitrary non-payment to players lol

All the best Mini. Very happy he’s gone.

Being good enough to win one and actually doing it are 2 very different things. And that's the point I'm trying to make - having any sort of expectation of winning flags doesn't make sense to me.

No list, however talented, is ever entitled to a flag. A lot needs to go right on many fronts, and often requires plenty of luck too. Are you suggesting our list over the last 3 years has been comparable to that of recent dynasty teams? We don't even have a single established, consistent key forward. In no way has our list been that good. Dee's fans tend to overestimate the quality of our list holistically. Our top end talent is as good as it gets, but our middle of the road and below players are what prevents us from having Richmond or Hawthorn type success. Your expectations far outweigh the actual quality of our list.