Watson11

Apparently every club except Richmond has spoken to him. Collingwood, West Coast, St Kilda, and Essendon are being a bit optimistic. Crows his preferred choice but went to school in Melbourne for a few years and moving to Melbourne wouldn’t phase him. I suspect he’ll end up at Crows at pick 4 or Freo at pick 7. They need a couple of new wingers.

Josh Kelly is behind Jade Gresham, who’s only elite stat is clearances which ranked him 50th in the afl last year!

Oliver is an A grader. I think he needs to bulk up to do what you hope and really dominate games so he take more tacklers when he wins contested ball. Also to use his pace out of stoppages more when he can. He’d go from A grader to multiple Brownlow medalist if improved a few things like that but he is already more impactful than all the A grader mids listed bar 2 or 3. Some of the A graders listed in other teams are baffling. Maybe I don’t watch other teams enough, but is he serious that St Kilda have 3 A graders.

Peter Bruckner, who was also the doctor at Liverpool FC and Darren Burgess would have the final say. If we take him I think they would be backing themselves to fix the chronic issues he has had. They seem to have some form. https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/48/11/929

Surely the Jackson talk is more about getting Freo to take him at pick 7 instead of someone we want because no way are we taking him at 3.

That pretty much follows the entire team. There were issues that caused it that hopefully have been addressed by Burgess. I don’t think it was preseason surgeries.

Clarko says hello. https://www.google.com.au/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/sport/2018/jun/28/from-collection-to-analysis-sports-data-and-its-profound-impact-on-the-afl

I’m not a close draft watcher, but I’m pretty sure this will be a draft like most before where number 1 and 2 won’t both turn out to be the best picks over time. Is rare they both are. Highlights packages don’t give us the full story, but I personally think from the highlight packages you can see whether players have something that is absolutely elite that can’t be taught. The deficits in 18 year olds can be improved to be AFL standard but elite can’t be taught. Young’s kicking looks elite and directly creates scoring opportunities, and Stephens with his ability to accelerate even while going quick and elite endurance are the two for me. Some others touted as top 10 I just can’t work out.

I think the view of most list managers (Except Norths) is next years draft is thin, and corrupted by 16/40 being NGA. ie If we kept next years first round (assume in teens) we may have ended up with a pick that would be equivalent to a pick around 25+ this year. No way would a Kemp quality player be available next year in the teens (or even at 8).

I went Young plus Stephens (With Robertson and Kemp if Stephens is gone). I like Dylan Stephens - genuine pace plus better 2km time trial than anyone on the MFC list and elite skills (went 80% disposal efficient in SANFL seniors). Seems less of a risk than picks like Serong and Ash. It Just seems WA and SA players are flying under the radar. Vic Metro and Vic Country didn’t win the U18 championships, yet dominate the top 10 draft prospects. That is not reality, and after Rowell and Anderson the next 10 picks should have 6-7 out of the non vic teams. Robertson is better than 10-20.

Spargo needed to build up his strength this year. Sticking tackles is a weakness. He went backwards in 2019 like every 18-23 year old on our list. Burgess will have him prepared to have a decent crack in 2020. If we draft Weightman I’d be really disappointed. His highlight reel doesn’t look any better than Chandlers from last year. Not saying he is not a good prospect, but he just does not look a top 8 pick.

This one has Weightman just inside top 20. https://www.foxsports.com.au/afl/afl-draft-2019-top-30-prospects-draft-rankings-afl-indicative-draft-order-matt-balmers-rankings-matt-rowell-noah-anderson/news-story/cb11a9251dd6a277a028f90551d5efa4 8 out of top 10 are Victorian. I suspect even recruiters read these rankings and then pay closer attention to the higher ranked players, which is maybe why guns like Cripps, Fyfe, Grundy etc are more likely to slip down to lower picks.

I hope we draft Dylan Stephens. Impressive video mostly at senior level. The crows also need outside run and class so will surely pick him up at pick 4.

Put the B&F voting in perspective. If he had that season in 2018 he would have finished 13th one vote in front of ANB. About where his season was imo. I hope he bulks back up to return to the scary beast that he can be, ala 2018 when fit as per photo, as opposed to the skinny easily tackled runs out of energy version of 2019.

I reckon Elliot would have been a lock-in for us but after spending a bit of time on demonland he’s having second thoughts.

I liked Oscar until 2019. But he went backwards in 2019 more than any other young player ever. 19-23 year olds should be making big improvements year on year, especially 195cm ones. But here’s a theory. Viney was on his fat burning muscle wasting diet this year and was so convinced by it that he did the article at the end of April, and surely he influenced other Melbourne players. Viney’s another story but I want the angry beast from last September back, not the slimmed down version from this year. Photo from 2018 below. If Omac copied, it explains why he was pulled mid June and ordered back in the gym. Muscle wastage. Just a theory, but look at Omac from the clubs March 2018 Facebook post. Looks completely different to this years ineffective version. Just wonder how many players copied Viney. Looking forward to what Burgess does. Probably the easiest job he has ever had.

The reviewer must have been an ex Collingwood player!

Loss of power may not be from his foot, but the time restricted eating thing he was doing https://m.afl.com.au/news/2019-04-20/why-you-cant-meet-jack-viney-for-breakfast TRE works as the body uses all its glycogen stores by around 8-12 hours so for the last 4-8 hours it burns fat. Several articles state do moderate exercise only after fasting to accelerate fat burning, but never do high intensity exercise.. If you do intense exercise your body can’t burn fat quickly enough to supply energy, and it starts burning and destroying muscle. Last I looked, the morning preseason training sessions that Viney did powered by nothing but black coffee were pretty intense.

Or like Carlton with Bolton. But to be fair 6 assistants have coached 6 different afl clubs with 3 bringing in a premiership (Richmond, bulldogs, west coast). Fagan is doing ok as well.

49 points out of 70. Story of most of the season. Frustrating that when we turn it over there is no desperation to get the ball back.

I’d like to see him thrown in and stay in the midfield for extended periods. He is our best stoppage player as he absorbs tackles and that allows us to get players to the outside. Trac won’t be able to run out games but he needs more responsibility thrown at him.

You missed the most important - When the game is on the line stand up and lead. We are lacking that from all our leaders at the moment, Max included. Max needs to get a bit of Lebron James into him and want to be the match winner. He should be wanting to clunk a few in front and want to kick them, especially in last quarters. He is more than capable.

For the total buy in I actually think the club needs an independent review before next season. Two reasons. One to support the path that got set 5 years ago which I don’t buy was wrong or is wrong. 6-6-6 has not had that big an impact but has had some. It would be a disaster to throw out the contested style. It stands up in finals, but can also fall apart if you have poor structures as we saw in last years prelim. It just needs refinement. Two, to get player feedback without fear of recriminations. Understand exactly what the players are thinking after this years disaster and then address it as a group and get total buy in on how to play. If that doesn’t happen then I fear for next year as well.

Most sensible post I’ve seen on demonland in 12 months. For all the “experts” on this site that are slamming the game plan, to me it looks like almost every team plays a similar game plan in wanting to win contested possession and clearances, get it forward and then score. Pretty simple. Richmond seem to be the exception in that they concede they are battlers in the ruck and so don’t mind losing contested possession and clearances as long as they pressure like mad and intercept. It can come undone spectacularly though as it did in the prelim last year. The second part of a game plan is how to lock it in and there are only minor differences between teams but it makes a huge difference. Geelong and Richmond are the best at it. They always have a full back and almost never get scored against out the back. We give up way too many easy goals out the back. Frustrates me no end when we turn it over in our forward 50, it is obvious we are caught out and everyone runs forward to stop the first kick to an open player and it pops over the top all the way to a goal. What’s wrong with conceding one or two easy kicks to the wing but ensuring there are no easy kicks forward of centre like Geelong and Richmond do, and definitely making sure we always have Jake Lever or similar goal side to stop the easy out the back. Forward half turnovers are the major score source for all teams, so I suspect our coaching group are so obsessed with creating turnovers in our forward half that they can’t see the woods for the trees. The other part of a game plan is what teams do when the ball goes into your defensive 50 and you intercept or kick in from a point. Two distinct game plans are control it carefully to get it down the other end again, or move it quickly to get it out and score on the counter. All teams mix it up but the balance changes. We prefer the quick movement, but last week it was obvious we were trying the control method as first preference and it was our worst performance in 2 years. We made 50 defensive 50 intercepts which was the highest we have had in 2 years, and did not score a single point from them, our worst performance in 2 years. Last year and through a part of this year we were 1st or 2nd for goals from defensive 50 intercepts. Against the saints we failed to score, and gave up 13.4 by coughing it up. Bad skills yes. But it looked like we were trying something new. I would much rather Goodwin stick to his guns and attack hard after the intercept when the opposition are out of position. It suits our list. But probably doesn’t suit our current fitness levels. The other part is our stoppages and forward line. The last 2 weeks we have been down on clearances. Once again it looks like we are trying something new. The mids who have been drilled to hunt the ball look like they are trying to keep better structure and get cleaner exits which is fine. But we gave up too many the other way so didn’t get it right. It may take time. However, when we did get clearances the quality was much better. As a result, we scored a season high from stoppages against the saints and eagles, but at the expense of only 39 and 41 inside 50s the last 2 weeks. Our season average i50 was 57. However, the last 2 weeks, we have scored from over 50% of inside 50’s against a season average of just over 30%. Stoppages helped, as did using more of the i50 space. That’s something new and we need to keep at it, not revert. I don’t buy the we don’t have the cattle rubbish. You can always improve a list, but we have the list to be pushing for top 4. It just seems that poor fitness, some poor structures, drop in confidence and now a bit of confusion over new structures is combining for an annus horribillus. It’s stating the obvious but it will be a huge preseason to sort these issues out and get fit. My view is we are 2 or 3% off in each of fitness, stoppage structures, and defensive structures. Adding some good outside speed and skills is another 1or 2%. All adds up to being 10% off. The comp is so close that just being 3% off makes all the difference and the combination of all the above is why we are 17th.