ChaserJ

Thanks mate. Petrucelle definitely catches the eye. Reckon if he cleans up his ball use a little and has a few more high possession games in the back end of the season, he'll jump right up. Has some very exciting traits.

Thanks PSD, good stuff. AFL.com have profiled mature age prospects out of SA as well. A familiar name in Dom Barry makes an appearance: http://www.afl.com.au/news/2017-07-12/worth-a-look-sanfl-players-pushing-their-draft-case

Nice. Any thoughts on who might be around the mark just beyond the top 10? Someone like Matthew Ling maybe? I reckon there's currently a clear top 2 (Rayner & LDU) and then a group of around 7 or so players (Cerra and Sutherland could push up from that pack). Then throw a blanket over the next 10-15. Chook-lotto territory beyond that. I previously liked Garner or Coffield for our picks, but both are likely to be out of reach now.

Matt Balmer from AFL Draft Central with an update of his rankings post champs: https://www.afldraftcentral.com.au/2017/07/10/matt-balmers-2017-afl-draft-july-power-rankings/ And a little primer on possible mature age draftees who are running around in the WAFL. In a draft pool with shallow depth, we might see a few more from the state leagues getting the call. http://www.afl.com.au/news/2017-07-11/worth-a-look-wafl-stars-pushing-their-draft-case Any thoughts on these guys @Pennant St Dee?

A general analysis on where the pool sits after the Championships from Twomey: http://www.afl.com.au/news/2017-07-07/draft-analysis-whos-moving-up-who-needs-to-lift-no1

This article suggests that we've put forward a similar offer: http://www.afl.com.au/news/2017-07-06/jake-wants-to-be-at-the-club-we-want-jake

Looks like an attempt to recoup some cash for games where low attendance is anticipated. Isn't that the opposite of how it's supposed to be used? Smells like fanspoitation to me. #lawofunintendedconsequences

This probably isn't reality, but I'd also like to think that Melbourne are aware that supporters have been subjected to some pretty terrible viewing for the last 10 years. To jack up prices as soon as the team starts performing would be a fair slap for supporters that have stuck with the club in tough times.

This season’s taught us that looking too far ahead can be fraught, but the assumption would be that Hawthorn’s pick next year would be quite high, so you would have to offer a lot for them to do the deal. Similar situations with Brisbane and probably Fremantle I suppose. I’d be surprised if we threw in players that are genuinely rated highly enough to net us those sorts of picks in return (even when bundled with our pick this year, which looks like it’d be a pick around the fringes of pick 10). I’m not sure if the list management team is as pick focused these days and I suspect we are well into the phase of supplementing the core of our young team rather than targeting high draft picks. If we were chasing a high pick, we’d probably have to take a punt and bundle our first round picks from this year and next into a package for next year’s first from a team we’d don’t expect to go well. Would probably look a lot like what St Kilda achieved in their trade with Hawthorn, so maybe if Kelly decides to leave (and doesn’t come to Melbourne) we could do well as third party facilitators.

Similar thought crossed my mind post QB win. It can’t hurt to pull out those sorts of wins in big games in front of big crowds while there are players interstate working out which Victorian clubs they would be happy to move to. Especially when equivalent clubs in the market like, say, St Kilda or are Kangaroos aren’t quite performing. Would equally hope that Melbourne's management of player welfare (eg Jesse Hogan in difficult times) is noticed by managers out there too.

Put themselves under cap pressure after signing Ryder & Dixon. Think they locked away Wines last year, so no room for them to move prior to new CBA coming into effect. Hartlett was initially available last year and clubs are reportedly throwing cash at Pittard now. I'd like us to look at youngsters Aidyn Johnson and Todd Marshall. Johnson has great pace with some good tricks and would be cheap if he wanted to come back to Vic. Marshall was a reasonably high pick from Murray Bushrangers and is tall enough to play ruck/forward, but will have limited chances whilst Dixon and Westhoff are running around in the fwd line. Trengove may be a decent plan B to Lever pursuit.

Was good in close, but kicking lacked penetration from recollection. Also didn't show a lot of pace in his age 18 year and was hit by injury post champs (which led to him missing a fair amount of footy in his first year at the Dockers I believe). Very good overhead and a very good decision maker in tight, but feel that he would be more of a depth addition than anything else.

One of those contacts is his brother, Ben, who's been in the player management game for a fair while now. Jake's articles (when it comes to list management issues) have been pretty good over the journey and he has a solid understanding of that part of the game.

I've heard about Richmond and Collingwood having interest (Collingwood usually linked with everybody), hadn't heard about Carlton, but it would make sense for their list. Schache wouldn't come cheap and not sure he'd fit alongside Hogan and Weideman.

The kid from Brisbane is Connor Ballenden. Looks a very good kp prospect, would be top 5 in an open draft. Think your source's thoughts are consistent with what I've seen so far. The top end looks extremely good, but depth isn't quite there at the moment.

And it's done. Effective immediately. http://www.afl.com.au/news/2017-03-20/giants-lose-access-to-top-talent-in-academy-overhaul

It seems that the AFL will (at last)! GWS Giants lose Murray region as AFL re-shapes northern academy system Not only will Albury be stripped from the zone (Spargo and Brander will be released into the pool), but the already mentioned restrictions on players ranked inside the top 20 (subject to ladder positioning) will also come into effect immediately. Excellent.

There are some questions on whether either will be GWS bound next year. Brander may be ruled ineligible due to his parents farm being outside of the GWS zone, and AFL look like removing Albury from the zone, which would put Spargo back into the pool. Add the possible 2017 draft penalties from the Whitfield affair and it looks like they might get fewer free kicks next year. Horse has bolted, but speculation is that AFL are now worried about the optics around the generous start up concessions GWS have been granted. Jack Powell from GWS Academy also looks a player. On a side note, how is there only one player from WA in the AFL academy? I know there have been issues over there, but there has to be more WA talent around.

FWIW here's Langdon's draft profile from AFL.com. Think what he has shown so far for Freo reflects what his strengths and weaknesses were as a junior. I'd be ok with acquiring if we parted ways with JKH (through trade) at years end, otherwise I'd be looking elsewhere.

It's quite extraordinary, isn't it? The last time we tried to build through the draft (ultimately unsuccessfully) and go down the youth path, and the only point where it vaguely looked like we were on the road back was 2010. The peak of that rebuild was arguably the big Rd 17 win against Sydney. Our age profile from then was: Average Attributes Melbourne Attribute Sydney 186.8cm Height 186.6cm 84.2kg Weight 87.2kg 23yr 4mth Age 25yr 10mth 68.8 Games 104.1 Total Players By Games Melbourne Games Sydney 3 Less than 50 1 4 50 to 99 1 5 100 to 149 5 10 150 or more 15 Our development program is so far ahead of what he had in place then it's not even funny, and the growth left in this team is scary. All things being equal, we're only seeing the earliest signs of what this team could do on a regular basis. Exciting stuff.

From an article in the Age last year on Hawthorn’s list management: Hawthorn's list management team have taken advantage of an interesting quirk in the market for AFL players – the fact that a player's value is relative to their team, rather than static. As mentioned, an AFL player will peak in performance from 23 and 25. However, they will only peak in value if their team overall is peaking in performance during that time. A player playing well in a bad team is of far less value - if the aim is to win a premiership - than a player playing well in a good team. Hence, if a player is reaching peak performance but a team is not, the player is of far more value on the market than he is to the team. Therefore he can be sold for over-market value. The caveat on that last point would be that if the player(s) is one who can protect the younger group on the field or drives standards on field and off, he may of greater value to the group. Also recall reading that St Kilda’s list build strategy was to accrue extra draft picks inside the first 3 rounds so they would have assembled a core of 18 players (taken in the first 3 rounds) within a span of 4 years. Their plan was to focus on picks and ignore free agency until 2016, when they felt they would have most structural areas covered. I think (and the club probably thinks) that we’re roughly a year ahead of St Kilda, which would explain why we rolled the dice and traded out of the 2016 draft. We must be confident the group is together and it’s now down to development and supplementing through trade and potentially free agency. Hope that’s correct.

Interesting to note these profiles from last Saturday Night's game: Carlton Attribute Western Bulldogs 188.0cm Height 186.8cm 87.6kg Weight 85.3kg 24yr 7mth Age 24yr 6mth 72.9 Games 77.9

Would be pretty close, and they were a year and 30 games per player more experienced than we were. The key is picking the age grouping of your elite talent and supporting/supplementing it, in the knowledge that their peak production will likely be between the ages of 23-29. Depending on which grouping of players you focus on, we’re probably 3 years away from the bulk of our talent hitting peak production, however players like Watts, Gawn and McDonald will still be within their window of peak production.

With Neale it might be similar to the Aish situation in him wanting to play in a footy town with more than 2 teams. Never said Neale's potential departure was a go home type situation.

Certainly a bit of chatter that Neale is looking to come to Victoria. Can see the Dockers putting him forward as part of a trade package. Less substantiated chatter that Gaff may be looking to head home.