Go Ds

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.

I'm reminded of the story of a few blind men touching an elephant at different spots and all being convinced they've worked out what an elephant is. The players mentioned here are probably part of the problem but probably many other theories DL people have are also (partially) true. Unfortunately the only people who can either see the whole elephant or (stretching the analogy too far) improve it are the club. But so far even they don't know how ..... It's hard enough being a Melbourne supporter. Imagine how much harder it is right now for people at the club genuinely invested turning our fortunes round.

Were they Backstreet Boys?

It would be worse if no one bothered to gee the team up. Also as long as they don't get too heated arguments even happen among members of a team. Obviously it wasn't heated and such it's probably better this happened than not.

Demonland, PLEASE take this back to the 2021 format! 🙂

Maybe he should have said nothing. But I get the feeling no matter what he does he'll get criticised. Apparently the club remains silent too much but now.... If you were tasked to write this what would you say? Not write a formulaic (AI) letter? Not mention anything positive? Just regurgitate the most Chicken-Little stuff Melbourne fans are posting on social media? What exactly?

Sure. Why not? 😂

Umm, that rule was introduced in 2019. It's not hard to check these things.

I hafta agree that if the pregnancy was testing it may have affected Bailey's form. I certainly thought the argument that he was playing badly because he wants to be traded was ridiculous.

If he ever has a girl will he call her Mini?

Maybe it would help to play back some of those struggling players' actions in slomo and have some expert see if techniques have worsened. But certainly 'soccer-gate' is a beat-up. Oh and when the Footy Show had their Grand Final episodes each 'also-ran' team had teammates learning dance routines. There may well be some players back then who bonded over the Macarena.

Going back to the future, hey? Plenty around for most of my life even early this century like the Roccas. Some things like drop kicks get phased out completely but others might come back. Those successful torps are such a morale and momentum changer. I know coaches feel that they're too hit and miss. But if a player gets some easy marks 65m out because the defenders have pushed back and suddenly two goals are scored for a while after the flooding is lessened , creating possible gaps, and a team is less predictable. I think it's a good idea.

This wasn't meant to be double-entendre-y. We've been alluding to s Pink Floyd song

The brain stores all this information. That doesn't mean people have pinpoint accuracy. But players through trial and error have a good idea what they can do, including how far they can kick, and they can factor in the breeze, tired legs, a waterlogged or slippery ball etc. I think a little experimentation in sport is invaluable. For all we know the next big change - the next headstart for a team - is taking place at an AFL team.

Umm, that was a combination of my phone and the new Demonland format mucking up. I don't know enough about training sessions - how many more kicks of a Sherrin would each player have had if Goodwin etc decided instead to do more kicking drills? Is it many? Maybe if the coaches listened to some of us on DL something useful would rub off. I'm just hoping we're talking about professionals genuinely doing their best. Still I wonder how much practising kicks and handballs players have as second nature improves much anymore than someone walking an hour a day is improving their walking action. IMHO a lot of the big disposal errors are due to complacency, jadedness, pressure or fitness. Those won't be fixed by robotically kicking for an extra half hour. (At least a soccer game lifts spirits, gets players moving and for anyone sick of seeing a Sherrin get misused or going past them to the opposition goal they're getting some respite while still training.)