Deeko2

Well said McQueen. I doubt many here have ever been in a position where astronomical amounts of cash was offered for you to return home and do exactly what you want. I have nothing against what Jackson decided and won't even boo him when we play them. He'll still always have a special place in my memory for his efforts in 2021. I also have no doubts he would have been feeling incredible amounts of anxiety around his team mates last year which would have effected his performance and still would be impacting it now which isn't fair for a kid still finding his feet at this level. Do I feel sorry for him however? Goodness no. He still made the decision. This is always the risk players take in signing huge contracts before they're really earnt. His manager and Freo are the ones that need a good kick up the backside for filling his head with [censored].

They've clearly cut the list and cut it far too deep and will struggle to stem the bleeding now. I'm not sure why Sicily, Wingard & Impey etc would be keen on staying other than $$ in the short term. It will take them 4-5 years to rebound for another shot if they nail their drafting and development. That's a big risk to the remaining few senior players. I doubt the clubs administration/coaching departments would be worried about losing whilst getting excited by high end picks. Still, I'm not mentioning the T word yet as I agree that they desperately need to turn that list over as it really is in horrible shape. Its almost arousing how horrible it's become. If it's at the end of year and they throw an unco ruckman on the ball for a half, keep you're most dangerous forward on the bench for the second half of a close game or send your All-Australian backman up forward for the second half of a match after giving one of the best CHFs of our generation a bath for the first half and replacing him with a forward flanker who then copt a hiding then Yes, I'll mention the T word a lot more and be out for blood.

Barring injury, will play well over 300 games and most likely finish his career as our most decorated player ever (subject to a couple more flags). The thing that excites me about Clarry (and Trac) is that he's a wonderful contested mark and was a really good junior forward. I have no doubt when he gets a tad older, he'll be able to spend more time up forward and have a genuine impact there as well as the midfield.

I was feeling a bit gloomy still after our performance so I wandered over to a Freo forum to make myself feel better, feeding from their negativity..... I wasn't let down and wow did I get my fill. They're ready to burn the whole place down and start again and already wanting mass changes and the coach sacked. I never had much against the dockers as they've always been rather irrelevant but reading some of the arrogance coming from supporters and administration when they picked up Hogan and Jackson really left a foul taste in my mouth. So yes, I'm quite enjoying this whole 'death ride' experience and well and truly on board for season 2023. This will be the second time in my life cheering on the Eagles on Sunday. The first time ever was 2018 GF where I found myself watching as a completely neutral supporter until they kept showing Eddie pumping his fists and jumping out of his seat when the Pies got away early. It was then I remembered the hatred of the filth > dislike of the eagles. So let's go West Coast! Bring us home a top 5 pick!

We're in a little purple patch where focusing on the now is a lot more enjoyable over predicting the future. A hell of a lot can change within 24 months and the game will evolve again so who knows that the team will look like. It is nice however reviewing some peoples teams and seeing the quality and premiership talent on display. It wasn't long ago that everyone's future teams would have listed P1 starting rover and P5 on a flank with P18 on the bench. Ah.... the glory days of 2007+

Only one thing? I think the idea of getting games into the kids was more of a Bailey thing over Neeld anyway as the latter went for more experienced recruits continually rather than keep hitting the draft. You're spot on though with the core of right young players. You need that committed and talented group to build around.

Agree completely. I'm hopeful young Bill will come on and forge a decent career with us but he's clearly behind JJ who has at least show he can have an impact in the ones. I'm happy however young Bill got a bit of a taste so he's aware of the difference and where he needs to be at. He looked very good in the twos on the weekend. Hopefully he can maintain the rage and continually destroy it at that level.

I'm fairly certain we didn't with the view to one of Max/Grundy would be lurking deep forward to release TMac/BBB (or both) higher up. We also picked up Schache who is fairly similar to the Weid and would be expecting JVR to play at a minimum a handful of matches this year. In my opinion, a C-grade forward is hardly worth burning cash on (admittedly it wouldn't be much anyways)

I probably should have made that part of my trip down memory lane a little bit clearer that he did have a young lad with that name. Thanks WJ 😅 And through the wonderful world of social media, here was dads grab

I can't recall exactly the zones growing up in Echuca in the late 80's early 90's but I remember a few Echuca lads having pictures in there Geelong uniforms on the wall. Paul Brown as one but can't recall the others. The only connection to the dees at this later stage was our coach, Simon Eishold. Obviously he wasn't every Melbourne supporters cup of tea after his VFL career finished but my goodness he was a good footballer in the GVFL. I played in Tongala's last year within the GVFL and played with a superstar undersized CHB Mark Reid. Ironically nicknamed Rowdy as he rarely said boo, he was probably the best contested grab of the pill I had ever seen. There is a photo of him in the club rooms standing on an opponents shoulders taking a one handed screamer. Ridiculous stuff. He would have only been 6ft and was always the man to lock down some very big lads running around in the GVFL in those days like Mark Porter & David Mensch yet agile to go with the elusive and also mercurial Saad Saad. Tongala had a handful of absolutely amazing footballers with a quite a few playing VFL/AFL but sadly the depth dropped away and they couldn't keep up and they went to the MFL I think in 2007(ish).

Very happy to see Kade get his go. Clearly a very hard worker who deserves his chance. I'm not 100% of him being a best 22 player however in a good team. He has some good tricks up forward (not great) and is a good midfielder in the twos but won't get a look in playing with the big boys. It could be because he reminds me of Ben Kennedy so much that I'm slightly scarred. Prove me wrong though Kade - hope he kills it.

I'll admit that I may have got this one wrong and was very happy for us to trade some decent picks for him. I remember a game against us in the wet three years back where he was super. Had some wonderful passages where he setup a couple goals for Freo and I think he jagged one or two himself. He looked like a future superstar. That game seduced me that he was a star. He definitely wasn't scared of the harder stuff at Freo. I'm wondering if he's got a new role that is taking time to adjust to but not sure. Pretty happy we didn't pick him up now but I wouldn't mind another couple young gun mids coming through.

I hope this is true as much as we all do, but how many times do we a similar story for injured players every draft year? It feels like such a common narrative when a player misses a couple matches and they end up sliding and **insert AFL club supporters** claim to have struck gold. The couple days after the AFL draft, every recruiter would be strutting around like a young Freddy Mercury after just killing it at the draft. Anyways, back on topic - From the 2 minutes of highlights I have seen of the kid, I like the look of him. Looks courageous in the air with good hands and aggressive intent. Basically, everything I like in a KP player. Not sold on his kicking action however. The dees would have to the best club for any key position defender to come to in the AFL when it comes to learning from two of the best in Lever & May. Imagine these two, teaching you positioning, blocking, structure etc. I think we'll be sound in the defensive unit for years with players continuing developing from the best. I've always thought a reason why we've always had great rucks is the knowledge passed from one to the other on top of their natural skill. Stynes develops White, he develops Jamar, he assists in developing Gawn and then so on. Hopefully young Adams gets similar treatment from the backs.

One of my good friends was heavily involved with Carlton years back and flicked me a message that Jack Watts had just done a medical with them after about his third season with us. I scurried so excitingly to demonland to drop the massive news thinking I was the first with a scoop only to be politely correct by the demonland faithful that Mr Watts was indeed having a few frothies on an overseas end of season trip with the lads and I was in fact a goose. I ended up giving my mate a call and just got the standard "lol" response which was deserved. A couple lads I know are working in similar circles now basically in their dream job. They're always giggling at these rumours and keep their cards very close to their chests. If they were ever to leak out info about targets/trades, then it would be game over for the career. So I always struggle to believe people when they're advised of these little scoops about contracted players or potential targets unless it comes from the target or there managers first. Loose lips sink ships..... and end careers. Why would you?

The dogs are going to get massively screwed with the Dunkley trade with the Lions. The bloke is a star and will end up going there for two picks around the 20's. One this year and one next. They have every right to be upset at losing a current B & F star for unders but it's comical when rumours come out of a footy club stating they're willing to let him walk to the draft to prove a point. Like us with Jackson, sometimes you just need to take your medicine and move on.

Oh definitely! There weren’t many for them who didn’t pull there weight. I understand what you’re saying around around not getting to obsessed with picks but it definitely seems more likely to jag superstars earlier than later in the draft.

The top end talent is still always the nucleus if any good team along with some decent role players. Petracca, Jackson, Brayshaw, Oliver and Salem were all in our best players on the day and along with Fritsch, this crew won us the game.

I think the Hawks will pry from their clammy grip to be honest. Ignoring the Clarko mess for a second - North are well ahead of the Hawks as they have already bottomed out, have the talent in the squad with high draft picks this year straight into the system. The Hawks are still 12 months from bottoming out to access that talent. They won't start rising up until 2025 imo. They'll be VFL level like in 2023 & 2024 and my god it will be beautiful to watch!!

Some excellent memes here with the Shac/Weed comparisons. Good for a late night chuckle. I feel there is no improvement/decline here however we’ll likely get Shache as a delisted free agent where as Weed nets us a third rounder. That may assist us somewhere in the grand scheme of things

I'm so intrigued how this is going to work structure wise. Say both play 80% game time, obviously one would be in the ruck and the other spending time up forward. Thats fine. I'm just thinking of how teams this year cut us up by going through the centre of the ground instead of down the line where we'd own the skies. Does one of the Grawndy then setup behind the play as an intercept marker down the line with maybe May/Lever to go more in the centre as another interceptor? Grundy I remember is a great clearance player with good skills and grunt. I can't remember many big, contested marks like what Maxy does. So I'm thinking Grundy will be our main ruck with Gawn basically plugging a role down back when things are tight or having the ball bombed on that magnificent scone of his.

Agree 100%. Will stay back in defence but have the little moments where he goes forward when we need to roll the dice. With Grundy now in, it's fairly like that either he or Gawn will be resting/rotating forward for 50-75% of matches. This would clearly see the best defender most likely go deep on one of these two and allow us to play the best two in form out of TMac, BBB and JVR. On the classic team sheet look, I'm thinking we'll start off as follows: HF: Fritsch McDonald Sparrow/Melk/Harmes/Spargo/ANB FF: Kozzi Gawn JVR The depth for the talls is from BBB, Tomlinson and then Petty. There is plenty of depth for the small/medium forwards with Laurie also hopefully coming on. I think Petty the defender is more valuable than Petty the forward. But him drifting forward is a wonderful ace to have up our sleeve.

Jeepers, the Lions are really having a crack this off-season. Other than the final when we were clearly cooked, our midfield has bullied them for quite a while. Adding in Dunkley and Ashcroft will see a massive lift here and Gunston adds some further fire power. They are going to be very good in 2023. I'm a big fan of Big Red's post above around having a crack at Whitfield. Bringing him offsets our 'B Grade' forward line with TMac, BBB and a young JVR as the ball movement and delivery will significantly improve.

A lot of players (and their partners) on rural properties there seem to be gifted a new Toyota Landcruiser every few months as well. Sadly, nothing will ever be done, and they'll remain a very successful club for a long time.

We desperately need Salem back to his best to free up Brayshaw on the ball. Then the improvements needs to come from the bottom 6. With Hunt gone (presumably), we need Bowie back and improved and Laurie to come on and show us the goods as to why we rated him a first rounder. I saw one game of his early this year and was very impressed but needs more consistency. Hoping a big preseason for these two will get them going for a big year. Laurie has far better ball use than ANB, just needs to get the miles in his legs to complete the k’s that nibbler does. Furthermore, JVR in from Rd 1. Jordan and Sparrow hopefully have another level as well.

I'm a big fan of Jayden and believe he's got enough flexibility in his game to have an impact up forward, on a wing, lock down small defender or a rebounding one. Trouble is, he doesn't really play any of these roles that a high enough level to demand a spot in the 22 but still, he'd be in my team every week. We do need to rejuvenate the list a little and bring in some more youth and hopefully unearth a couple gems. Players like Hibbo and Melk will get us nothing and we'd be paying them scraps (no offence to them) where Jayden might snag us a 3rd rounder and save us $300k +/- to assist in the future. It's a ruthless call offering peanuts to players and force there hand to go I can see why we're doing it.