Watson11

Read yesterday that Adelaide requested 6 home games against Melbourne teams (Richmond, Collingwood, Hawthorn, Geelong, Carlton, and Essendon). Surely they don’t want to play in Alice again!

I’m happy to argue it Hemingway. Not every investment pays off long term but if you don’t make them you end up broke. In Hogan’s case we got a good return while invested, but now sold that and invested it elsewhere. Jesse was drafted into the club when we were basket cases. Since he arrived we have gone from the basement to top 4. He made an impact as soon as he got on the ground and every year he was here the club improved and he was a part of it. Circumstances (Tmac becoming an elite forward, Weid stepping up at the end of the season), meant the FD were open to a trade. For every go home factor, or top draft getting a once in a lifetime offer, there are the Olivers and Brayshaws that if we didn’t invest in them we’d be back in the cellar soon enough.

Just a turn of phrase La Dee. Who kicks them with Hogan gone is what this thread is about. Point I was making is in big games goals are worth gold, and JH did not impact (9 goals in 8 games). I can see Max being a big weapon for us pushing forward more if Preuss plays. Max kicked 13.12 in 2018. Weid also can take pack marks in a way JH can't. 2 or 3 extra goals from contested marks in big games could be the difference between finishing 5th and 1st. If we keep improving hitting lead ups going inside 50 as well we'll be more dangerous next year than we were this year by far.

Gawns positioning helped but imo wasn’t the most important change. He couldn’t get back when we lost centre clearances. And when we were better at forward 50 pressure and slowing transition out of our forward 50 it allowed Gawn time to get back and bolster up our defence. Earlier in the season usain bolt wouldn’t have had time to get back. It’s evident the club wanted to further boost our defence, but also just as evident that players in our forward 50 who don’t work hard defensively are dropped or shown the door.

The stats you quote are for the entire season and we improved out of sight. Post St Kilda to the prelim we improved every single defensive stat and were the AFLs number 1 defensive team. Lowest points against, lowest points scored from turnovers (that came crashing down in the prelim), 4th lowest scores per oppo inside 50, 2nd best at forcing turnovers from oppo inside 50s (not sure of one on one stats but improved out of sight) etc etc. It was a stunning turnaround, and mainly because of forward 50 and midfield pressure, although Frost was good. Last 2 years when we keep oppo to less than 75 points we are 18 - 0. Average against in the post St Kilda to semi final period was 69 points. With Lever back and May in we will be beasts.... Best balanced team I can remember.

I’m one that doesn’t totally agree with you on defence but can understand your view. To me our defence starts in the forward 50 and mids. When we learnt to defend at the end of the season our defence was pretty good. Lever going down was a blessing in disguise because it was obvious that if our forwards and mids didn’t get the balance right then we’d struggle to make finals. But they worked it out just in time. But that said, I’m much happier to have Lever back and May to take the best forward. I think it clicked for the group at the end of the season. And 6-6-6 favours Melbourne more than any team (Number 1 centre clearance team). Think we’ll be impossible to beat next year if we get our defending in the forward 50 and mids right.

Agree. He takes contested pack marks which in big games and finals are gold. Few more kg and bigger tank and he’ll be a jet.

You may be right about how good he turns out and only time will tell. But my point was he is driven enough to be elite for a 2km time trial which at 100kg means he works damn hard, all while having significant off field issues. I don’t think we maximised his talent the way we kick inside 50. I don’t think Freo will either, but he’s good enough to be a consistent 40+ goal player for them. If their young mids thrive who knows. If he was at WC with Gaff, Hurn, Shuey, etc kicking to him he could have been a superstar. Glad that is not happening. The other thing about the trade for May, is next year May could have gone anywhere as an FA, and Mahoney etc knew we were the only team in play this year. If we waited, it’s possible May would have come on bigger $. So JM got the deal done and probably saved salary cap. I’m hoping his deal was front loaded, so that in years 3 onwards we have room to retain our current 20-23 year olds. I think it’s likely the FD have done it very well.

A bit unfair. After a tough 2017 he presented in 2018 at 100kg and ran a low 6min 2km time trial. You don’t do that by gorging on Pavlova over Christmas. As much as I was bullish on Hogan, I think we will be a better team overall in 2019 and don’t risk losing Weid now. I’m also happy he’s at Freo because at WC he has the attributes to be a lot better than Darling, but at Freo I suspect he’ll get more frustrated than he did at Melbourne...

I’m amazed Jesse still wanted to go there after the way Bell and Freo handled it last week (rumours about diligence and mental health, leaks about 8 year contracts etc). Freo must be really good liars. But let’s work on Brayshaw. Did anyone get a screenshot of him wearing a Melbourne scarf in the rooms after the semi-final. We need to get that shot out there.

We’ve lost 47 goals but I’m really only worried about adding to the 9 Jesse kicked in 8 games against the good teams last year. We’ll get more than that from Weid plus Max spending some time forward.

I’m happy with Mahoney. Maybe he could have ended up with pick 14-18 instead of 23. But he delivered Preuss, who will be hugely important in big games next year with Max able to spend time as a target forward. Max, Weid, Tmac can each take pack marks in high pressure games against top teams when there isn’t as much forward 50 space, and Jesse doesn’t have the elevation to do that. And trading to add pick 28 could be another Spargo/Fritsch if JT delivers again. We also saw in last 5 weeks how important forward 50 pressure is, and that is not improved when Jesse played. Can’t wait for round 1.

To add there is no ill feeling from Melbourne to Jesse either. However, I can’t say the same about MFC, Hogan, Hogan’s manager, Steven May, Gold Coast, Lobbe, GWS, Kelly, and Kelly’s manager toward Peter Bell and Fremantle.

2016 - circus with Dustin Martin 2017 - circus with Andrew Gaff 2018 - circus with Jesse Hogan I like where this is going.....

I don’t think you should read that much into it. It’s like anyone being headhunted for a job where they are offered a lot more than they currently get. Anyone would look at it seriously just like Jesse has done. I personally think Jesse would have been a bit torn by the decision. Shot at premierships with us or big $ and go home factor. Hopefully he’ll have a big point to prove to everyone next year.

Well yes. Too much unfortunately courtesy of a GC supporting friend, and this year had a special interest in May. He was not an elite ball user this year from what I saw and turns it over a lot. Champion data has him at almost 4 changers and turnovers a game, almost 25% of the time he gets it. Not worth a high draft pick. There is not a defender even at Carlton at that level.

I'm OK with that! There seems to be a lot of obsession to get Steven May but he is not pick 7 material, and miles away from Jesse. With May you know exactly what you'll get, a lock down defender with plenty of positives, but one huge negative, he turns it over more than almost every defender in the league. In todays game where turnovers are the major source of scoring (anyone remember the prelim first half), I just don't see why we would consider giving up a high first round pick this year for May. He turns it over more than Sam Frost who at least balances his clangers with line breaking score assists. May had almost 4 clangers a game last year - only two MFC players had more being Oliver and Brayshaw who average 2x possessions and are inside mids where it is hot. Regardless of what happens with JH, if we on trade a high first round pick, imo time will show it as one of the worst trades we have ever done.

WC were probably better with Sheed instead of Gaff. All season WC were poor at contested footy. Sheed plus Shuey coming good were the main reason they turned that stat around. But point is our list needs to go deep. We were probably 28 or 29 in 2018. 3 if that gone for sure and maybe another 2 or 3 to go. The other 4 or 5 are not relevant. So we probably need 5 afl ready players trade or drafted in. If we trade Dyson out then we would improve if we got a true outside mid back.

I’m Jessie’s biggest fan and think he’ll be a superstar. Our forward line can function well with 3 key forwards just like Adelaide’s did last year. Makes the 3rd matchup really hard. But to just throw another issue in the mix, Preuss wouldn’t be coming to play VFL and if we get Preuss I can see Max playing less ruck time next year. 85% ruck time this year was too much. With Preuss could change to 60% ruck time, 30% forward, 10% rest.

I was keen on Gaff but aren’t sure whether bringing in “superstars” on giant money works. Buddy was a success commercially and individually but for Sydney an overall fail football wise. Sydney have given up some critical talent the last 5 years. I actually hope Richmond get Lynch as I think it will weaken their culture and if it does they’ll be mediocre. I’d rather back JT to draft some elite outside speed via the draft and continue to retain and develop our current list.

I’ve seen enough games where his leads are ignored. The Port game was the worst. And if the instruction was to get the ball 0-30m and central then that would explain why he stays home too much and ends up competing for pack marks which is not his game (unless one on one).

I can't remember which thread it was on but our forward structure and entries according to the poster was based on statistics on goalkicking etc, and that the goalkicking efficiency was really good from 0-30m and central, but statistically drops off further out and on the angles. The implication was that the players had been coached to aim to get the ball to players in a better position, hence were probably ignoring the leads that were further out so as to kick to the hot spot, not taking shots from 45-50m and trying to pass off quickly etc. This seems to have been fixed and modified the last couple of weeks. Kind of like basketball, it's like Goodwin etc was always trying to get the high percentage layup, whereas now we are hitting the leads and making some 3 pointers which makes the layups harder to defend as well. I'm really confident that if we continue to play how we have the last 2 weeks with our inside 50s we will be really hard to beat. So onto Hogan with the more recent game style, we will be even better if we have really quick players in our forward 50 who can get 5m on a lead. Hogan is ideally made for this style because of his speed, endurance, strength etc I wouldn't trade him for mids, draft picks etc and am really keen to see us use him better next year.

That is true but we have also been good at lowering the eyes for the last 2 weeks. If we had done that all season we would have finished top of the ladder.

I thought he was in our top 3, not fastest in the afl. But either way he is super quick and unique in the afl being 100kg, good one on one, good skills (very few changers). I’ll say it again that we don’t use his speed yet. The number of times he has 5m on his direct opponent and we kick long was embarrassing for most of this year. Probably leads to his frustration at times that he needs to work on. I wouldn’t trade him even for Cerra and 2 first round picks unless he wants to go.

OK. Reminds me of Riewoldt in attitude at the same age and Josh Kennedy in kicking style. Out of Hogan, Riewoldt, and Kennedy who would have the best accuracy stats? ... Hogan 65.2%, Kennedy 64.7%, Riewoldt 62.8%