Go Ds

Society are getting better dealing with mental illness and those struggling with it. I think nearly always people want no one taking their own lives or those at risk having diminished lives. It's not a bad starting point to work backwards from there by at least accepting or not stigmatising others for perceived flaws or strange, but harmless, behaviour. Being judgemental can only exacerbate things (regardless of whether that's towards a famous sportsman or a loner at the bus stop with sloppy clothes and a thousand-yard stare.)

That's an incredible and horrible claim to notoriety for a player to have forever. It'd be rare that you could attribute a player's retirement to another player's actions. There would be drivers who have to live with someone's death or maiming due to their vehicle being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Of course many would be completely innocent and free of blame. But the authorities would thoroughly review every detail of the accident and find anything the driver did wrong. There is no way a Collingwood player would have jumped in the air so recklessly at a training session. If he did and a star such as Daicos then missed months with injury no one would have forgiven the act. Sorry, but it still rankles me how the whole Brayshaw incident was handled and how the instigator got off completely scot-free.

I've been rethinking how much footy and footy media I bother with. When we had footy cancelled for months in 2020 it really reminded me how much I love having it there during winter. Even then with its return I didn't have to fanatically consume every minute of it or the 'analysis'. But thank God it exists. These days I'm trying to wind back more and more the amount I watch. There are other things I enjoy doing with my time and I'd be surprised if anyone reading this who don't also. We can't do much about the favouritism or witch hunts. But gradually I'm not just watching/listening to AFL stuff just cos it's there. Especially football media is there for the ratings and money (with some ethics tempering all that). We're engaging to be entertained and informed. Our goals and theirs arent necessarily the same. Honestly if we're really not getting enough enjoyment or (accurate) info from the daily footy media circus why not find other diversions, especially nowadays with so many things we can watch/do? Its really not going to matter if you miss some eps of Footy Classified, On the Couch or mornings with SEN

Marginally. Don't give the bird to a cop that's just given you a ticket; don't condone your 6yo giving Great Aunt Myrtle the bird. It's probably better players don't do the gesture. But it's low on the scale of misdemeanors.

I quite like most of that. But while we're hypothesizing the stats may well be long in whether one can get both heavier AND sprint faster.

It's amazing we talk about something being "life or death". It worse if it's literal. There are players and commentators and supporters I don't like. But never should anyone ever truly be suffering. Sport is entertainment NOT life and death .... EVER!

To be fair someone can change their mind when Oliver's break was announced.

What does the girl say in the taco ad? Why can't we have both? ("Dos" if you will.)

@sue there's so much gutrunning and interchanges I think even fresh players slow down after marks to help their team. @Diamond Jim you may be right. Long kicks can be spectacular and / or chaotic and help attacks. They also help win territory. That said 3 twenty metre kicks to a teammates is better than a bomb straight to the opposition CHB. Im sure even the worst teams are testing the water at all times to gain a tactical headstart. I think there's enough merit in long kicks that they'll resurface in AFL at some stage.

I reckon so much is micromanaged and tested these days. You see those graphics showing a player's scores through the goals and to the left and right when they take a set shot? I'm sure our team even has these kinds of stats for newbies like Henderson. If a player has fifty shots at goal after training maybe they're not tabulated. But I wouldn't be surprised if players tell the club statistician the next session that they kicked 31.14. Once a player sees the stats for what has worked for them I'm guessing then they trust the stats.

I do wonder whether some of the old stuff can get embraced again. I've mentioned before a few successful torps from 70 metres and that'd send the opposition scrambling and have an effect on the morale of both teams. Maybe a coach would consider leaving a forward no further than maybe 60 from goal. Yes, they can't provide tackling pressure watching a defender bolting into the centre square but that defender also knows that one mistake and suddenly that 'lazy' forward is an extra player in a dangerous position. Anyway I reckon coaching staff have pondered over a lot of strategies and may even be convinced now the non-chasing forward will never work as a tactic ever again. Certainly if that's so every forward needs more speed and stamina as opposed to a big [censored]. How much extra would a forward need to add to their weight anyway? Going from 80 to 82 kg is only a 2.5% increase. Would such marginal really change a player's marking ability or balance while kicking? Or are you thinking more a 6kg gain?

"I like big butts and I cannot lie..... "

I'd be more worried if they can't break GW's tackles.

Umm, why do you keep harping on about home deck? Every double-chance team plays in their home state and apart from Geelong and a couple of Marvel-based teams EVERY team gets 2 games on their home deck. And no matter how you dress it up it's better to win 15 plus h&a games rather than 12 or less. Unfortunately/fortunately it's harder to guarantee a win in one or two games - luck and form fluctuates and sometimes it just so happens the better team loses. There are so many chances for a team to right itself and manage to finish where they deserve to be the end of the season despite a few off games and bad luck. This is quite different to one or two final where a few unlucky bounces or a concussion or a couple of flukey opposition goals can see the underdog win. Anyway we're going round in circles .its a good effort to finish the season with the double chance. Sometimes **** happens and teams lose unloseable finals. Hawthorn were probably a much better team than our premiership one. And Goodwin was still the right coach after 2023. (If the rest of the season is unjustifiably bad or there are deafening rumours that Goodwin had lost the players then I too will join the Time To Go camp.)

This is such a depressing thread. I'm not Pollyanna; I too saw the defects during the North game. But I also know after many decades that even what happens in July is not necessarily guaranteeing success or failure come September! I don't believe pound for pound we match the teams that have managed three flags in five years or less this century. Off the top of my head I'd say Brisbane had Black, Voss, Akermanis win Brownlows and maybe Jonathon Brown win the Coleman. Then for Geelong Bartel and Hawkins won those awards. Then Hawthorn had Mitchell and Roughead. Lastly Richmond had Dusty and Riewoldt. What have we had? I'm not going to go through All Australian squads but as I've said even after Buddy left Hawthorn's last GF team had 6 to 7 more All Australians than our last grand final and last final had. I can't hate on our players while it's impressive to win bronze at the Commonwealth Games or get into Mensa it's not the same as doing what Thorpey or Stephen Hawking did. As for Goodwin two things: are we still in the premiership window? Does Goody still have the support of the players? Not many coaches win a flag and they should be valued like rare diamonds. It's already been said that it will cost us a s***load to sack him at least for many months. But who's to know whether our next coach turns out to be good - premiership-winning-level good - and/or be able to recapture the magic they had winning a flag with another team. If we muck this up we could watch our team languish a lot longer down the bottom of the ladder .... and this will be even more tragic if we're still in the premiership window or come, say, next year we manage to draft a superstar like Cripps or Fyfe who haven't been enough to get a flag. Anyway by now the only people on this thread are the poor sods who read everything or the people who make Murphy look like an optimist. 🙄

NO, we crashed and burned after 2023 and there's still a slight chance it's been more a bingle and overheated radiator. Yes, Hawthorn had some great recruiting. Admittedly Fremantle made one of the worst trade mistakes ever trading pick #1 for Croad and Hawthorn benefited from no team drafting Mitchell the year before and still in the 'Croad' draft having every team let Hawthorn pick him at 36. Admittedly these picks have nothing to do with Clarkson who wasn't coach yet. Similarly we can't really go at Goodwin for draft picks before 2016 - players now round their prime at 26 to maybe 29 as well as some older campaigners. You're still missing the point that Goodwin had a very good team while Clarkson had a champion team so arguably this is more why other teams overtook us rather than coaching mistakes. And if you really think it's better to miss finals altogether or only lose elimination finals why would any team bother finishing higher than 7th? It makes no sense. Yes, straight set exits are painful but nearly every year making the top 4 on the ladder is like getting a golden ticket.

NO, that's my point! Are you seriously arguing two straight set exits is worse than the even rarer embarassment of missing the finals after the flag in '08 plus a 'comfortable' elimination final loss the year after? That's what happened to Clarkson. Thank God, Kennet and co didn't let a subsequent threepeat coach go. And how about Beveridge? After his flag his Dogs came 10th and 13th. He's still coach and now some (not stupidly) would happily have him coach us. As someone said above maybe people have overreacted to the straight set losses. (As for comparing the Hawks and Dees one did win three flags in a row, had luck in the prelim where Port kicked like they were in red and blue jumpers and arguably got Sydney and WC on bad days while the other had things like their Norm Smith medallist collide with Buddy plus lost Brayshaw for as good as the whole '23 finals. BTW do you know that Hawthorn's 2015 GF team in hindsight had 12 All Australians plus future Norm Smith winner Isaac Smith compared to 5 All Australians currently in our last final?)

Why the hell would you sack a coach two years after breaking a huge drought?!!!!! 😯😯😯 Get rid of a recent premiership coach to get a less recent premiership/ preliminary final coach? Huh?! Sorry, most of your last post I agree with but that sentence is a real headscratcher. Add to that you mentioned a team who won a flag then missed the finals altogether and then followed up with an elimination final loss. Be honest were you also suggesting at the time Clarkson should be sacked too? What a waste if he had been! Imagine 5 years later if Hawthorn had spent that period languishing in the middle of the ladder while Clarkson had just turned a no-hoper team into back to back premiers. We should always make sure we're comparing apples with apples. But I'm amazed people are so desperately wanting to sack Goodwin (and yes, I saw it even earlier than September '23)

Sorry, that's too simplistic. If that 16 excludes the best 6 players that's gonna make a much bigger dent than if 4 of the best 22 missed a GF and now only 27th to 30th plus the 19th and 20th player have moved on. Of course age and injury have a bearing too. Is it true that preseasons accumulate and missing one means a full subsequent preseason still has a player playing catch-up? If so Oliver, after psychological issues and an almost missed pre-preseason can't yet be the 21/22 version of himself. Add to that Petracca almost dying, losing fitness, and possibly trust in his body and on-field safety and he too maybe can't be expected to be the player he had been at least for now. Honestly if 2 of our best 3 players are only 85% for now and we've lost the likes of Luke Jackson and Brayshaw and maybe some others are also 85%of their old selves with age it's more acceptable Melbourne's drop-off. That doesn't mean players can be excused for not trying or very sloppy skills. But might explain something.

Perhaps. But isn't almost every one is thinking about every possible scenario , good or bad, for the Dees for the rest of the year? Even just with neutral games this weekend expectations kind of just jump into my head of what will happen.

Just imagine shudder if Bulldogs had got the next goal or two and we had lost that GF and everything ever since was the same. Admittedly itd be so much easier now to ditch Goodwin. But I'm sure most Melbourne supporters, including me, would be so much angrier and despondent now.

One or two years?! Umm, we've made 3 grand finals and appeared in 16 final series in that half-century. I hope you're not being literal. If you can't even raise a smile for a year we're in the Granny for your own sake you probably should find a new interest.

True. I really can't fault Goody's quote here. It would also be ludicrous to deny the last quarter stats. The one thing is establishing a lead by the fourth quarter can inspire players to push through the late-game pain and conversely can slow down the opponents. The only game I really thought we could win come Q4 was vs the Giants (and I think was the only one where we were leading). I dont think it's coincidence that was our best last quarter.

Of course we do have promising young players. Then there is that amazing thing called hope. This applies to every club but there is chance plus unseen factors that make possible look miraculous. I'm not sure I'd want to look into a crystal ball right now but for all we know by year's end (or in 12 months time) we're looking like a good side again and so many players or coaches once again have proved us wrong. It's a good idea to hold onto some hope. There are plenty of times where sides are like Sydney in the early nineties, Richmond for the nineties and noughties, us after 2006, Lions with a despondent Leppitsch and all got out of their funks. Add the surprises where Cripps, Hird, Chris Grant, Clarkson, Hardwicke come unheralded and now are legends. Another one is Beveridge. Didnt he keep telling his 2016 players "why not us?" Well.... why not us? Not this year but why after so much bad luck over many decades can't we be a team which has some amazing fortune? Like Ghostwriter said each game starts at 0.0.00 each. So does each year and there's no rational reason why we can't be the team that has their turn being incredibly lucky.