Smokey

Round 1, injuries considered; FB - Jetta May Hibbo HB - Salem Omac Lewis C - Kolo Viney Brayshaw HF - Melksham Tmac Petracca FF - Fritsch Weid Hannan Fol - Gawn Oliver Harmes Int - ANB Vanders Jones Spargo Lewis to be phased out once Lever is fit, straight swap and that's our full strength back 6. Looks delicious on paper. No idea where Pruess fits in all this yet, don't think we'll see him in Round 1. Hopefully Jones to be used up forward and not in the middle, the guts ain't for him anymore but he's obviously still best 22 (can kick a decent goal after all). Kolo coming out firing is probably the thing I hope for the most. He will be a very important key if we are to go deep. Give us a Richmond 2017-style lack of injuries and I'd rate us as short priced favs in 2019. Here's hoping, on paper we look deadly across the board.

Genuine excitement at our prospects next year? Dangerous thinking round these parts

I see what you mean. But my point still stands - you can't invest profits you don't make back into the game, therefore profit must be at the forefront of thinking to enable reinvesting back into the game. My view on this indirectly goes hand in hand with others here, its just a case of needing to make the money before it's spent on improving and maintaining the game.

No sleep lost, just another name added to the list of w4nkers on DL who apparently find comfort in talking down to complete strangers on the internet who are sharing an opinion. Well done big man!

AFL pay tax I would assume

Your passive-aggressiveness and pompous attitude toward this discussion has been duly noted. You can bang on about how the AFL as a body is more than just a business till the cows come home, but in the end it is a business with the objective of making profits as any other. There are a number of examples I can think of off the top of my head that support this; - Expansion teams in Sydney and Gold Coast before Tasmania - The AFL neglecting to reduce the number of home and away games to better balance the competition at the expense of revenue - AFLX - The fact the AFL has an ABN (97 489 912 318) and reports yearly profit/loss statements I'm simply making the observation that the AFL conducts itself like any other private business and the yearly fixtures reflect that in that they maximize revenue. Feel free to keep playing the man if you must. A team of business analysts probably do the draw each year, not a group of ex hall of fame players with the intent of preserving the sanctity of footy.

You remind me of a Simpsons episode with Lionel Hutz "Imagine a world without the AFL ..."

That could be relevant if the supporters ran the AFL, but alas, they don't. Doesn't matter what you or I see the goal as - in the end it comes back to money, as do most things in a free market. The AFL is not a democracy. Sentiment won't get us a better fixture. A larger member base and continued success will (we've had one good season since 2006, we are not a powerhouse by any stretch of the imagination). Until we prove ourselves to be money makers again, we will continue to be worse off than other clubs fixture-wise. Do I like it? No. Can I appreciate the reasons for it - absolutely.

People complaining about the fact the dons got more primetime games even though we are a better performing team seem to forget that the AFL is a business. The goal of a business is to maximize profits. The dons will make more money than we could in primetime slots due to their significantly larger supporter base. It's really as simple as that.

Can anyone give me the reasons as to why we all seem to be married to the idea of having co-captains? Any danger of us going back to a good old fashioned single skipper?

So you’re saying he didn’t do his best, but he couldn’t have done any better. Right.

Yes please

Completely agree. We have struck a great balance in the force this trade period.

Good result. Well done Mahoney and co.

I predict the trade period will finish at exactly 2030 this evening

You’ll never find less of a watts fan than I - but lacking in talent he was not. Highly talented in fact. All came down to work rate with him, which is starting to looking the same with hogan in some ways, but hogan has already far surpassed anything we ever got out of watts.

Cool story bro. If you know us MCC members so well, riddle me this - why aren’t I rich and why am I a member of the MFC?

"We need to stick to our guns - 2x first rounders or nothing" Not sure if anyone has said this yet so I'm throwing it out there

If Max goes down, and Pruess goes down, and the rookie goes down, then we wont have a ruck. Best recruit a backup for the backup for the backup, and grab an extra backup just in case. Basically we need 8-10 fully functioning rucks on our list.

I can’t believe people actually think Tyson is in our best 22. He is depth only with a full strength list. Straight swap is fine. Ruckmen don’t grow on trees. Inside midfielders do at Melbourne however.

Yeah my mistake was thinking Sydney for some reason

It’s much closer actually. Roughly 90 mins flying time.

Yes that’s what the club should start doing - act like his dad and tell him he cant have a holiday after a hard years work because some people online are wondering if he’s going or staying

As opposed to notionally living in Perth

That actually doesn't make any sense whatsoever. My point is - saying things along the lines of "who cares if Tmac goes down and we don't have Hogan, we'll win the game out of the middle" is ludacris. Football is not that simple.