Chook

I'm aboard the "Top 2" bandwagon. I was just answering a question.

West Coast are looking like not much chop so far without their key players Gaff Kennedy and NicNat. We're a massive chance over there next week.

A quick ladder predictor says yes. We can make it with 12 wins as long as Sydney and Geelong only win 1 (Sydney can win 2 if you include the game against us).

Geelong has played 6 games this year decided by 2 goals or less. They've lost 4 of them and won 2. Any guess who the 2 they've won were played against?

Makes us have to win 2

I look at Derm a bit differently. He's like an alien species that you just know you could learn from if only you could decipher his cryptic language.

They've been a good club for 40 years. At a certain point it's not luck.

If Jack Riewoldt is kicking bags against you, it's because there's zero pressure up the ground.

Reason 1: He's a good like-for-like with Smith, which minimises disruption to existing (winning) team structure Reason 2: Gawn might be a bit sore, which means he's in-game insurance Reason 3: We might want to throw him forward to stretch the Swans in offense Reason 4: Who knows? Neither of us…but probably Goodwin does

He's played defence in the VFL for months. Obviously you know better than the coaches on that point. I like him because he's a very flexible player, which gives us plenty of options through the ruck, backline, and up forward. Gawn and McDonald, complemented by Pedersen, makes for a very flexible ruck/back/forward array of options. But I may be wrong about why he's in. Pedersen may just be the best like-for-like replacement for the injured Smith. We'll see on Sunday. Not much more to say about it.

Well Pedo's the team regardless, so I guess we'll see who's right by Sunday afternoon. Smith has a broken collarbone, so I'd back Pedersen to beat him for pace at this stage. With Gawn possibly not as mobile this week, we need a mobile tall who can ruck if needed. Who's better for that than Pedo?

Pretty sure he loves it up at Brisbane. Slightly more than a snowflake's chance of leaving.

Haven't lost there since.

We played a terrible MCG team that game as well. Frost wasn't in the side, Garlett, Hunt, Hannan, all those pacey players the Tigers have shown you need to play the MCG. We'd smash them by 10 goals if we played again tomorrow. Goodwin learned a lot about what you need to do to win at the G from that game.

I'll take Danny DeVito if you want to be Arnie. DeVito is hilarious. Action heroes are dime a dozen.

One of the most mobile big men in the AFL.

It was a free kick downfield and advantage to Essendon, who scored a behind.

If he got him in the head, then it's 4-5 weeks. I don't think he did get him in the head.

That wasn't within 5 metres. Clearly the ball was gone from the contest. Perfect bump, just a second or more too late. 1 week, maybe 2.

Tigers entire gameplan revolves around scragging off the ball. Evidently you give away a lot of free kicks but you also get to manhandle your opponent constantly so it still works out in your favour. Tigers should get way more frees payed against them than they do.

Pedersen's very quick for his size, and Jayden Hunt's one of the quickest in the AFL.

More than that, we've learned through many MCG losses this year that you cannot field a slow list on the MCG.

This is the week the footy world discovers that Frost…actually not that bad at footy.

Hope you haven't bought a ticket to Sydney.

Everyone's talking about worst-case scenarios, making the eight, top four, even getting to second…but I'll go you one better. For your consideration, I humbly present… The Dream Ladder (Melbourne wins every game, and every underdog wins)