two sheds jackson

So you've gone out in Smith Street, on a Saturday night, on GF weekend, and the worst thing you've come across (vis a vis drunks and drug-f*cks) is a couple of guys stumbling onto the road while you're driving, and another guy accidentally walking into the girls toilet at Maccas. That's the WORST thing you saw. On a Saturday Night. On Grand Final weekend. In Smith Street. And somehow, you're genuinely shocked and outraged by all this? I'm not going to call you a toff, but if you're the regular Aussie bloke, and they're the scumbags, then I'd just about rather be a scumbag. At least I'd have some fun.

I hate Collingwood more than I hate Carlton, but I love to hate Collingwood, whereas Carlton just genuinely disgust me. There's no sweeter feeling than beating Collingwood. I love seeing them fail, and I love seeing their supporters talk up their prospects only to fall short every year. By the same token, I don't bare their supporters any genuine ill-will, except while a games being played. It's fun to propogate the myth that they're are a bunch of toothless welfare dependants, but obviously it has as much basis in reality as the idea that we're all sheltered, blue-ribbon private school toffs. As a club, I think they've gotten where they are due to foresight and astute management; more than any other club they have adapted brilliantly to the professionalisation and nationisation of the game. The way they've authoratively stamped their brand as the definitive "working class side" while simultaneously turning themselves into a ruthlessly efficient corporate machine is practically zen. They havn't really taken short-cuts, not moreso than any other club anyway, they've just done it better. If Collingwood folded tomorrow I would miss them, because they provide me with a Yin to Melbourne's Yang. I'd miss the banter with Collingwood supporters, I'd miss beating them on QB, I'd miss seeing their supporters cry when they get to another Prelim or Grand Final only to lose yet again, and I'd even miss the little moments like the other night, seeing Eddie McGuire's face when one of his boys got "boned" out of a Brownlow. I don't hate them for any practical reason; it's just that they're Collingwood, and hating Collingwood is in the bones. I find Carlton to be rotten to the core. While it's ridiculous to seriously make blanket statements about a club's supporters, nearly every time I've been to a game against Carlton their supporters have done something to leave a bad taste in my mouth; cheering when opposition players get injured, racist jibes at players, that sort of thing, in a way that goes beyond banter and becomes genuinely malicious. Again, I'm sure this is just my experience, and there'll be plenty here who've been to 50 games against Carlton and rarely had a problem. Still, while I know it's the actions of a handful of d'heads and doesnt represent Carlton fans as a whole, it has definitely left me predisposed to hate them as a club. Theres also the fact that they've cheated, stolen, and bought their way to success; to some extent Collingwood did this too, but Carlton continue to engage in the same sort of arrogant, born-to-rule behavior and continue to go unpunished for it. While Collingwood have increasingly expanded their brand as a prosperous club for battlers to support, I've always found Carlton to have no real identity; they basically are just a corrupt club built by white-collar crims who try to buy success at every turn, that's what defines them now (it might have been different prior to national expansion and the inner suburbs' gentrification, but I was a bit young to know). If they folded, I'd feel bad for the people I know who support them, but I wouldn't miss their presence in the competition. They are literally the only Victorian club I would say that about. Um, yeah, that turned out to be a bit of a rant. As far as the Brownlow thing goes, and why I was able to enjoy it: first and foremost, I love seeing Collingwood fail. Secondly, Judd's victory is not exactly a ringing endorsement for Carlton, as it would have been for Collingwood. "Pendlebury factor" notwithstanding, they had a guy who, on paper, was the best player of the year, and have still only just scraped into the 8, six years after the start of their rebuild. They should be further along than they are.

I can see your point and I agree that he has limited upside compared to, say, a Cale Morton, but I think you go too far in saying he has already peaked. Sure, he's not going to get much stronger, or quicker, and his disposal is already pretty near perfect, but there is absolutely no way he's going to play another 100 AFL games without learning anything, and without finding various ways to improve his game. If Brisbane are trying to trade Rich for pick 4, then the wheels must have really fallen off up there. Surely theres no way they'd be doing it unless he wants to go, which would mean that literally all of their best young prospects are clamoring to leave. I would absolutely love him in a Melbourne jumper, but I doubt we're in a position to make a play for him. Whatever we gave up for him would probably offset the benefit of getting him, since Brisbane would be looking for a gun kid in exchange.

I wouldn't read much into that. The last thing I want to do is try to make this a thread about me, but I can categorically tell you that chemo and radiotherapy will leave you looking that way for a little while afterwards. Also, he mentioned he was just coming off steroids to combat swelling, and that he'd had a bad reaction to it; in that case, you'd definitely expect a loss of appetite and skin tone. It'll come back. I know it's confronting, but you have to keep in mind that the vastly more likely scenario is that it's a temporary result from his treatment, and not a sign that the cancer is getting on top of him. I'm generally a bit cynical whenever these kinds of things are handled by Channel's 7 or 9, because they have a nasty habit of taking very real tragedies and reducing them to the kind of light entertainment you'd sit there and watch with a box of tissues in one hand and a bucket of popcorn in the other. From what they showed on TFS, this looks like being a very worthwhile exception.

Not sold on Jetta at this stage, but he's young, undeveloped and still finding a niche, the jury is out on how good he'll be. Davey is marginally better right now (theres not that much between them, though), but we know what we'll get from him, and it isn't much. Why swap Jetta, who might be a good player, for Alwyn Davey, who won't be?

I've got to admit to not having really looked at it, but I wouldn't have thought they'd have too many salary cap concerns? With their recent and upcoming departures (Bradshaw, Rischi, Brennan etc), and considering that their higher paid players in Black, Brown, Power could not be far off either retirement or the veterans list, I wouldn't think they're going to have alot of trouble paying people in the foreseeable future? Again, I could be way off on this, as I'm only taking an educated guess since Brisbanes contract situations obviously isn't a topic I'm well-versed on.

I'm not defending the way Brisbane have handled this, nor do I want to accuse Fevola of doing anything in particular (as people have said, this particarly incident smells fishy) but since this thread is about whether Melbourne should get him, I think it's worth wondering why Brisbane are clearly so desperate to get rid of him if his behavior up there really has been fine, as people are baselessly claiming. I'd be shocked if they only want to get rid of him because of his on-field performance. Injuries, and media fallouts from previous behavior while still in Melboune, have played a significant role in his indifferent 2010 season, and you'd expect at least the second factor to improve next year (assuming his behavior has been fine, there'll be nothing new for the press to report). In any case, you don't try to shirk your contractual obligations and risk confrontation with the AFLPA just so that you can sack a highly talented player, one year into his contract, after paying a hefty price to get him, unless you have some pretty serious concerns regarding that player.

Wow...

I tend to agree that their window is probably a bit longer. Judd should have at least a good 5 years left, and besides him, their best players are all at the start of their careers. It'll be interesting to see if they can build a well-rounded enough list to seriously challenge before Judd retires- at the moment it looks like their best half dozen or so players will compare favourably with most teams, but the quality really drops off after that. The midfields lookings good, and if Henderson comes on as expected then their forwardline suddenly looks alright. Their defense is still sketchy (hence their interest in Warnock/Tarrant) and they'll struggle to address it in the next two drafts. I think they'll improve next year with the return of Kruezer and the continued development of their young high end draft picks, and that they'll be tough to push out of the 8. I would love nothing better than to be proven wrong.

Unfortunately it happens to be the same guy who also believes -among other things- that it would be a very clever move to ask Carlton for Bryce Gibbs in a straight trade for Warnock. Having jaceybee support you on this forum is sort of like getting into a heated, public political argument, and then having someone run up wearing a clown suit, setting himself on fire, humping the other guys leg and saying that, incidentally, he agrees with your point about the taxes. I would be happy to keep Warnock, but again, I just can't see why people find it "worrying" that Carlton might be interested in him, when we have yet to even hear whats on offer for him. He's under contract, so it's not like we're going to get screwed. Are you really saying that Warnock's status as a handy backup defender makes him untouchable, and that no matter what Carlton (or anyone else) offer us, you don't want him traded? Dare I say it, not even for Bryce Gibbs?

Now I'm a bit confused on what your point is. If by "keep him until we see how our younger brigade developes", you mean that we should keep him to assist them in their development and provide some protection, then again, this is a valid point and will certainly be part of any cost/benefit analysis on the part of the football department when considering a trade. If by "keep him until we see how our younger brigade developes" you mean that we should keep him until we find out whether or not they'll end up being as good as Jones, then this is a terrible approach to list management. If our fancied younger midfielders are not significantly better than Jones, we will not win a flag regardless.

While you didn't use the word "insurance", you did say that to trade Jones "before we see the development of Bleese, Gysberts, Strauss etc would be a huge mistake". I took this to mean that it would be a mistake to trade Jones right now, because there is a chance that these players won't be as good as we hope, in which case you think we'll need him. It's starting to sound like that's not what you meant at all, and that you were actually saying that Jones is an important player for the next couple of years, because we need him to physically protect those guys as they're coming through, and teach them the ropes. My apologies.

I agree with all of this, and I'm sure the club will take it into account when considering any possible trade. There are downsides to trading any decent player, and obviously in Jones' cases it will depend on what we can get in exchange for him, and whether or not it's worth the short term pain that trading him will probably cause. Apart from this, most of the arguments that have been expoused in this thread have been a bit ridiculous, particularly the notion that we must keep him for insurance in case our youngsters dont come through, and worse still, the idea that we should not trade our players until they are no longer in our best 22, out of some misguided sense of "loyalty". We can thank our lucky stars that the football department don't think this way, or we'd be in a right mess.

If this was our policy, we would never get anything decent for any player we ever traded. We would have waited until McLean and Johnstone were not in our best 22 anymore, and then traded them for late draft picks. Sometimes you have to bite the bullet and trade decent players while they're still in your best 22 and have market value, if you think they'll be superfluos to your needs in the near future. Also, it is folly to keep Jones as "insurance" in case Gysberts, Blease, Tapscott etc do not come on; if our young players dont make it, we are stuffed with or without Jones. I'm not dogmatically for or against trading Jones, but it might be that A] he wants to go, or B] by trading him, we can get a pick or a player who is worth more to us than Jones. We've got a handful of players I'd consider "untouchable", and Jones isn't one of them.

The problem is, we already have the core of our backline in place, and we want the players who comprise that core to play as many games together as possible, as quickly as possible. Tarrant -at 30- will only get in the way of that if he forges a regular place in the side. Which of our tall defenders in our current best 22 would you want to see him replace? Frawley is already better, and Garland and Rivers both offer more in the long-run, and possibly the short-term as well. He just isn't a good fit for us.

Not sure why people are so quick to pour cold water on a possible Warnock trade when we've yet to even hear what's on offer. If we could somehow swap Warnock for a player who is of similar quality, but suits our structural needs better (i.e. the kind of "big lump up forward" rfpc talked about), surely we'd have to take it?

You've really answered your own question; he has shown things this year that indicate he could be an absolutely sensational player, and if I were an Eagles supporter, I'd be excited. Jack Watts doesn't even remotely enter into the argument. At all. I agree with you about his placing in the B&F, but I think you're way off in saying his performance was below average for a second year ruckman. While he definitely has a long way to go, I would say that he has met (and probably slightly exceeded) any realistic expectation that could be placed on a second year ruckman who is relatively new to the game.

Absolutely. LeCras is being a bit modest in saying he's 'shocked' by the result; there was daylight between himself and everybody else. If I was an Eagles supporter I'd be excited by what I've seen from Naitanui this year, but he has (understandably) been wildly inconsistent, was invisible at times and faded as the season went on. When I read the OP and saw he'd made the top 5 I almost spat out my imaginary drink, but when you actually follow the link and read their top ten, there's really no one who finished behind him who glaringly stands out as having had a better year.

I think HT's point was that if we went to Carlton during trade week and actually mooted Gibbs for Warnock as a serious proposition, it would get the same kind of reaction from Carlton that asking for Judd would get. Which is to say, Carlton's people would be justifiably angry with our people for wasting their time by arranging a meeting with them, only to suggest trades that are absolutely preposterous. While alot of bartering surely goes on during trade week, it's not like they stuff each other around saying things like "give us Nick Reiwoldt for pick 65 and a duck?" just because it's "worth a try".

I just find it funny that the people saying Blease will struggle to make it, seem to be basing it entirely on the fact that "he broke his leg", and not on his apparent recovery progress thus far or on his actual prognosis. The fact that he has even come back and played football at a very high level this year and made an impact, influencing the odd game with his pace, is a pretty good sign.

Thanks, I finally have a signature now.

Yup.

What?

You're the one playing with words: the fact that he'll have to improve to make it -while semantically true- is a misleading statement, because it implies that his form this year suggests he may not. The reality is he is clearly making slow but steady progress in his recovery and is on track to do a full preseason. He is coming along about as well as you'd realistically expect at this stage.

You might as well point out that Max Gawn will have to "improve dramatically to make it", too. He is a slight, physically undeveloped kid, coming back from a monstrous injury setback. His form in the VFL has apparently been solid without being outstanding, with the occasional good game, like the one against the Gold Coast. To expect his output to even remotely measure up to what is required at AFL level is patently absurd, and so to point out that his performances have been a long way from AFL standard is absolutely pointless.