sylvinator

i heard it as well... it is very clear to me now that we MUST pick up Watts. At draft camp he was an absolute superstar. The quickest KPP in the history of draft camp and the 3rd quickest out of 1500 kidz tested in 15 years. He is agile, tall and fast. In the reaction time exersizes and the tests on peripheral vision, decision making he was the best at the camp. In terms of finding targets inside 50, making clever decisions with the football and general skills he was also a huge standout. All this and he is the Larke Medalist for best playing of the National Championships (playing on the best yougnsters in the country) and he is only 17 and in year 11... do people realize how young that it?!?!?! Get him now--- Forward line: Sylvia, Miller, Bate Maric, Watts, Davey ---- with Wonaeamirri, Newton, PJ and others rotating through it is actually scary how much talent is it that forward line!

confident Green will resign rather... Bulldogs officially forced to use pick 14 on Ayce Cordy

Ryce Shaw- not on the trade table Hawks- officially interested in ROK Daniel Harris- officially on the table Demons- confident demons will resign and are looking to improve draft position

YM ppl try to ignore your posts as much as they can, coz they are always rubbish, but is it really necessary to post how much you like Naitanui more than Watts every 2 days? Watts is definitely a key forward, and played as such for most of the championships. The fact he can play on the wing or on a flank is a bonus and is necessary in modern football (flexibility that is). Watts will be a star no doubt. 14 of 16 afl club recruiters apparently rate him number 1 pick from what i've been told. Naitanui on the other hand, could be a star. His tap work is awesome, as is his tackling. However he averages about 8-10 possies a game this season... that's really not good enough for a top pick. Their are huge question marks whether this area of his game will improve at afl level. perhaps it will, but still too huge a risk to take. Watts or Rich for me thanks. Either nab ourselves a star mid or a star forward.

When looking at our young up-n-comers, a talented tall forward is definitely the most important position that needs filling. Remember last year we picked up Morton and Grimes and there will probably still be 2 gun midfielders at pick 17 and pick19. Defensive talent--- Talls: Frawley (19yo)- is no doubt touted as a 10 yr player for us. Needs to fill out to play on the big forwards, but has pace. 194cm. S.Martin (20yo)- 198cm, quick as lightning, big frame and strong as well. Very agile, his basketball background attributing to this. Huge promise Garland (19yo)- Probably the best tall young defender in the afl. good mark, good punch, quick and agile. Flankers: Buckley (20yo)- Love his dash and attack on the game Pettard (20yo)- very talented if can get back out on the park Midfielders: Morton (19yo)- our most talented best young prospect at the club. will be a gun no doubt Grimes (19yo)- in the words of Bailey "will play atleast 100games for the club". Club rates him hugley so must have some serious talent Mclean (22yo)- Our best player. N. Jones (20yo)- will be great in-n-under if he's our 4th or 5th best midfielder. Sewelesk. Dunn (21yo)- Stagnated this year, but atleast showed he could be a good run-with player pick 17 pick 19 Forward talent---- Talls: Watts (17yo)- Number 1 pick, looks like a champion CHF Newton (21yo)- i dont rate him, but who knows. Flankers: Maric (19yo)- Looks awesome. great user of the ball. hasn't shown us his goalkicking ability yet, but apparently its awesome. Sylvia (22yo)- broke out this year. i love the kid, hope he continues to improve Bate (21yo)- top 3 in bnf last season, not as good this year, but the kid has huge talent. Wonaeamirri (19yo)- i dont think he'll become a star, but a clever lil player. Analysing our young list (all players mentioned were drafted in the past 4 years), a key forward is clearly the missing ingredient. Watts= obvious answer. Flankers and tall defenders look pretty good. I'd look to draft 2 midfielders with pick 17 and pick 19. A ruckman with a later pick should also be a priority

Although Lewis has turned into a gun, at the time he was drafted he was no way rated at pick 7... more likely a late first round or 2nd rounder. He was picked up pick 7 because the hawks saw him as the epitome of the tough, hard midfielder with good kicking skills they needed to implement their game-plan. Perhaps that is an example of choosing needs before best available?

I still find myself swapping from Rich to Naitanui to Watts for number 1.... Naitanui: I personally have crossed Naitanui off the list. He could be anything, but that's the point. He consistently has gotten less than 10 possies a game all year and has not had a breakout game showcasing his true potential to dominate the afl. His snippets are truely exciting, but to me he is too much of a risk. We cannot afford to stuff up this pick. it is possibly the most imporatnt pick in our history Rich: For a long time i was leaning towards him. He is a sure-fire gun midfielder. If he's as good as Gibbs, Cooney, Murphy and other no1 pick midfielders then we'd be stoked. and Rich is better than Murphy and Gibbs at the same age, possibly not Cooney. WCE and Geelong have shown that premierships come from star midfields. The prospect of Rich, Mclean, Grimes, Morton, Jones, Buckley is just awesome. Watts: Now let's get real. Not often do you get your hands on the outstanding KPP in the draft. this guy is clearly a special talent. then comes the fact that we are truely stuffed up forward...... Watts is an answer we could be looking for. imagine if we managed to nab ourselves a Nick Riewoldt type! So.... Pick 1: Watts Pick 17 and 19 a few guyz who i think might slip. Nick Suban: If this guy is still around at 17 (i think he might be) then we should take him! He is twice all australian HBF. Our half backs, espcially Wheatley, consistently get 30 possies with our new game plan. clearly half backs are important to our new style. we have used Whelan, C.Johnson and McDonald across half back alot this year and all 3 probably won't be on the list in 2 years time. Suban will be an awesome, hard, skilled half back flanker. Once again, he has the scores on the board and is a sure-fire bet to become a v good afl player. Aaron Cornelius: We probabaly need to draft 2 KP forwards this draft. Atm we have one- Miller (Newton=dump). He could be a gun forward this slips a bit. v talented. Mitch Brown- Similar to Cornelius- could slip through Tom Swift: if he lasts to 19, this could be a clever risk after 2 safe bets at 1 and 17. Could become the best player in the draft.... Zaharakis- doubt he'll last but i can hope

It's misleading to say we are getting screwed because we are getting ess money from the council and state governments. Stkilda are starting from scratch. there is nothing there. In Casey there is already an AFL size oval, a gym, admin space, changerooms etc. It all already exists. All that we are doing is putting money into turning them from vfl standard into afl standard. Most importantly however, Casey is a growing community who already loves their footy (evidenced by the fact they have had a vfl team Casey Scorpians). So, the community relationship is probably the best thing that will come out of this relationship over a long period of time.

source? please don't say bigfooty, speculation or your imagination

If Sydney want to top up their list to bridge the gap between them and the top teams, aren't they the perfect team to try to trade Bruce or Green to? Bruce would strengthen their midfield immensly and provide versatility. Pick 11 for Bruce and White? Where do i sign?

Just a thought... if we go for Rich in this years draft, we are picking up the closest thing to a certain a-grader as it gets. He is a better midfield prospect at the same age as both Gibbs AND Murphy. and wouldn't we love either of those 2 running around for us. Perhaps this midfield could be a up-n-coming midfield...? Midfield---- starting 5 Rich- the all round package Mclean- the workhorse accumulater Morton- the versatile, tall, fast, hard-running and untaggable Grimes, Jones- the tough extracters with great leadership Rotating through----- Sylvia, Maric, Davey, Buckley, Blease---- all have their own sort of flair and speed Midfields wins premierships... What we lack in a big way is a standout midfielder. If Rich becomes the a-grader we are looking for, and Morton continues his development, imagine how awesome Mclean and Jones would be as the 3rd and 4th best midfielder.

The reason why we'v done so badly last year or 2 and will continue next year is because our 24yr and older players never turned into the players we hoped they would be. We all hoped Bruce, Green, Johnstone and even White and Yze would become stars. None of them could ever for more than a very breif period of time be counted in the top 20-30 players in the afl. At this point in time, we would struggle to find a player in the top 60 players in the afl. Every top club who has ever had a premiership has developed players who are in the top few players in the afl. These stars were crucial to premiership and the lack of a 'star' player in what left us 5th-8th position from 2004-2007, instead of 1st-4th. If we are going to vie for a premiership then we must find a player who develops into a star. That is why last draft, this years draft and next years draft are so hugely important to our future. One of these players needs to develop themselves in the op echolon of players in the afl. 2006- Pettard, Frawley, Garland 2007- Morton, Grimes, Maric and Martin 2008- Pick 1, pick 17, pick 19 2009- probably... pick 1, pick 2 and pick 18. That's 13 players. All highly talented, all highly rated and most of them top 20 draft picks! Not all 13 of them need to become superstars, only 1 or 2. If this happens, the other 11 will be great players and go along for the ride. Add to those 13 players guys like N.Jones, M.Bate, A.Davey, C.Johnson, J.Rivers, S.Buckley, M.Warnock etc and we will have a list that could POTENTIALLY make top 4. It's about time MFC learned how to turn a player into a superstar. If one of our players develops like this, in 4 years we could pushing for a tilt at the flag. If all those 13 guyz mentioned become solid, o.k. players (ala Johnstone, Green, Bruce, Wheatley) then we are destined for more pain.

People should not get caught up in the 'Naitanui has no footy brain.' He is developing just fine in this regard and once in the afl season he will only improve. He has the best athletacism and best leap of anyone currently playing in the afl. but what really sets him apart is his aggression, his tackling and his willingness to do the 1%ers. He also is quite a clever and effective handballer. his kicking skills are decent as well. Only thing i'd say against him is that he doesn't get enough possessions around the ground. He will be an excitment machine even if he never learns how to pick up cheap possies around the ground. If he does learn this, he will be a once-in-a-generation player who will reinvent how football is played.

Carlton have NO depth. This is proven by the fact that Thornton had a crap season and still got top 10 in bnf. Their best 18 might be highly paid but after that no player would command any kind of pay packet. I still think they'll struggle with salary cap in a couple of years when Gibbs and Murphy command big salaries.

we can't afford to waste any of our top 20 picks. they all need to be successful. therefore we should NOT take a ruckman. they take 4 yrs to develop and are a big risk they will turn into nothing! quality ruckman can be found late in the draft and in the rookie draft---- see Cox (rookie), Sandilands (Rookie), Warnock (pick42), Griffin (rookie), Jamar (rookie) etcetcetc.

promising article. In particular i like the bit about AFL level people getting involves in our business plan and going in to bat for us. They wouldn't be doing this if they wanted us to die... I also like the idea of having Casey Fields as a training facility in the summer, as well as community involvement, while having the admin at bubble dome in olympic preccinct. This sounds awesome. Caro made a mistake i think with the debt figures. She heard we have $5million in debt, so calculated $3.1 (debt demolision)+$1 (special assistance) - $3.2 Loss. However, in actual fact. we started the season $3m in debt. so our debt has been cut by about half.... This has been confirmed by Stynes... so our debt in about $2.5m

yes you are.... WCE want Naitanui and with all likelihood will take him with pick 2. By upgrading from pick 3 to pick 1 Freo get the opportunity to take Naita before WCE do. Nonetheless this trade shouldn't happen. If Rich or Naita is genuinely the best player in the draft we should take him. Last year, Kruiser was the 2nd,3rd or perhpas even 4th best player to be drafted. Carlton really need a ruck so they took him at pick 1. i'm not sure if i rate this highly... if Cotchin turns out to be a brownlow winner and Kruiser turns into a decent ruckman, how will carlton look???? I don't want to same thing to happen with Watts

trolls aren't welcome. goodbye

Obviously everyone realizes that Godemons has simply made this story up completely. If it were true he would have provided a source. there is no source. But Godemons is obviously trying to make a point, and it possibly is a valid one. Warnock's value is being increased through a bidding war between MFC, Blues and Richmond. This all for a guy who's played 16 career games and not dominated in even 1 senior game. Should we really be paying 300k for that? Is it possible we are getting dooped for a developing ruckman who hasn't made it yet---- Meesan anybody? If we get Warnock imo it would be a great get. However i would only take him for free in the PSD or with a 3rd round pick (to save the PSD pick for something else.) I would also not like to give him a huge pay packet either.

Correct. Absolutely silly. Was Judd a worse playing because he had only played under18 level before being drafted? What about Xavier Elllis? you can only play against the league ur in, and Watts has excelled. Show me the proof that playing in WAFL means you're more likely to succeed at afl level!

bitter much? cranbourne is not a particularly long drive away at all. this is the start of a very successful partnership. Casey will provide us with top level training facilities over the summer. with a growing young community, melbourne players will be running footy camps and this will lead to an increase in membership. MFC has never had a relationship with a community. developing one with a young and exciting community can only be for our benefit. Even if that aspect doesn't go as planned, we'll have great facilities

If we managed to get a pick 10-25 for green or bruce i'd take it. althing worse than that then just keep them. imagine having 4 top 20 picks- 2008 3 top 20 picks- 2007 (Morton, Maric and Grimes) and probably another 3 top 20 picks in 2009 That would set us up for a complete rebuild!!!

If a was a recruiter, i would trade for R.Warncok (3rd rounder) so that we could still use the PSD pick. players we could look to seduce into the PSD: - B.Dowler/M.Thorp/Boyle--- these are 3 KP forwards, all behind Roughy,Franklin. surely one of them would be looking for a team with more opportunities? MFC could offer any of these 3 a guerenteed forward position. My preference would be Thorp. - Prismall---- sure he's playing the first final, but if he gets dropped for the granny, then surely he will leave for more opporunities elsewhere. He is the 22nd best player at Geelong but would probably be our best player. Could be: Pick 1- Rich/Naitnaui/Watts pick 17- Blease pick 19- Lewis Johnson pick 51- Quick midfielder or small defender pick1PSD- Thorp trade- R.Warnock. That would be rediculous....

In this draft you could throw a blanket over players form pick 8-25... we wouldn't get a top 8 pick for pick17 and 19, and therefore we should just keep them and pick good players

unless you know barry prendergast personally, and he then proceeded to tell you that he's going to pick Watts pick 1 (before draft camp mind you)... then NO you CANNOT prety much guarantee it's been finalized