Go Ds

BTW it's going to be hilarious next year if Oliver or Tracc are still butchering the ball or blazing away at goal and the new teams are surprised even though this has all been hidden in plain sight. 😂

Melbourne didn't want him. The 17 other clubs didnt. In recent years he's probably better known for non-footy stuff - comments towards Melksham, Gawn and how we should have beaten Collingwood in 23. I'm sure he knows he's on notice. Maybe he'll pull his head in and sees what he can do with his second chance.

I also don't think it's complete coincidence that we got a forward, a backman and a midfielder. Even on the field and in training drills the new blood helps with the theme of "under new management". There'll be players amazed how despite being almost the same everything that the feel round the club and in matches will be so different. Oh, and clearly it made sense to add to the ruck stocks too.

19 was the number of the player with the second-most goals ever in Dunstall. Of course 23 is another higher number with a legacy. And how about our #31? If in alternative world Tracc retired after another 7 years with Melbourne and more flags and a Brownlow I could how handing #5 to the heir apparent would make sense. But, yeah, let Langford forge a legacy for #19.

Wow! It's like Oliver being pestered at the bottom of an escalator by a journo. 😂

It almost feels like the wonderful family dog got rabies and now we had to shoot them. I must say even if our drop off the cliff was 80% on them they deserve our respect and our gratitude. It's a great idea to rest their numbers for a while - Im not sure it'd even feel right watching even Langford with 5 or 13 on his back so soon. There are plenty of numbers out there (and I hope that both these former heroes don't make the 2031 Premiership Reunion be awkward or that Tracc or Clarry jnr would happy to wear the red and bluein 2 or 3 decades time.

My, Max Heath has been at the club less than a week and we're already s'posed to know his nickname is Moose?! 😂

Umm, let's see..... Who's we? The Bailey 'we'? Or Neeld's? Roos's? Goody's? Who exactly? Certainly we can't know if King loves finishing down the bottom. As for loving this maybe after 4 years of not wanting low finishes standards slipped. But even if for whatever reason things hadn't fallen apart for Oliver in 2023 and Petracca hadn't almost died maybe we would been top 10 the last 2 seasons (,and in 8 of yhe last 9). So, no, we probably don't like finishing near last. As for next year we do lose a lot of experience. It's certainly possible we go backwards. Then again we have a new coach, there could well ne more motivation and well, maybe Clarry or Tracc were causing tension and affecting team morale and now we gain more than we lose. Plus we have added a new forward, a new defender, a new midfielder and a new ruckman. Any or all of them may well help improve things on their part of the ground or subgroup. Anyway we should wait and be optimistic for next year. Surely there's no point fretting over summer.

What should we make of this list? Hibberd retired. Some were ruined by injuries. Some wanted to move interstate and some wanted better opportunities. Do we complain about bad luck? Do we blame the club for being the reason we lost two (former) superstars today? Or were they bad luck too? Even if there is incompetence in our coaches and staff we're going through a reset anyway - some can't be righted in a month. (BTW I reckon we've had a lot more bad luck post-flag than many care to admit.)

It really is the glass half empty/half full thing. We might as well have faith in King. He cant change everything all at once. But I'm happy to just wait and see whether he did right with Tracc, Clarry and May and what he does over summer with next year's gameplan. He probably won't be but the exciting thing is he could be an exceptional coach - Christ, he could be the best coach in decades. (No one can argue that it's not technically possible.) So far we have every reason to be excited about King and 2026 ( even if it's sad to lose premiership heroes). Roll on March.

#7,8 with field, field in a First Four in the next in Melbourne?(!)

The first rule of Tongue Club is we don't talk about Tongue Club. 🙄 (What did you mean to say?)

The draft is the most likely way to equalise. Of course some teams develop and recruit talent better but teams are still more likely to improve getting top 5 picks rather than pick 15-19 each year. Give the long-term non- premiers priority picks; so something like after the first 6 picks (and the early priority ones) give St Kilda #7, Freo 8, Carlton 9, North 10. Try it once. I doubt suddenly any of these teams would win the following flag just cos one of these picks. But the AFL could test the water slowly. Maybe in the following draft instead have the 4 teams longest outside of the finals (and maybe the year after the 4 longest without a prelim appearance.) The thing is we can see all sorts of things give teams an advantage. Whatever it is in time as it turns into flags and finals the teams in a holding pattern keep getting a leg up. (And at the same time players can benefit still from free agency and teams and fans can be excited about Kalani White etc.) It wont happen. But it could work.

Come on , guys. Every young man is a Phil Collins fan..🤣

I think our fans are sick of us splashing (,and the slide)

Even if it is plenty of teams get up into prelims, maybe even lose a GF, and then after those 5 or 6 years of lesser draft picks snd stars ageing drop off a cliff. I'd rather back Suns to make the next 4 or 5 finals; theyre reliable stock. But Melbourne could be an exciting stock - King may do nothing but also a lot of the really good coaches win a flag within 3 or 4 years and right now King is an unknown quantity. And Hardwicke isnt (and a premiership coach doesn't necessarily win a flag with a second team). There are good reasons to choose either of these teams (and arguably King may be more likely to get BH to the holy grail.). Time will tell.

You mean he told a few people his opinion and then these [censored] posted stuff online? Honestly do we really know what happened?

Leave Humphrey alone?

All the waiting is frustrating. We have days yet until Petracca's fate is decided. Then we have to wait to about next June to really know where our team really are and then another 12 months on top of that to really know how good King has been.

I just wish the AFL used the draft to better boost the struggling clubs. They may well not be that concerned about that ( and Melbourne as a recent premier isnt among the most struggling) but surely they could try harder. Maybe stop the draft after the bottom four or six teams get their picks and then slide in a priority pick for the four or six sides waiting the longest for a premiership. Do this even just once and see what it does. Cos currently trades tend to see players wanting to go to (more) successful clubs and often the best father/son picks are sons of players from longtime successful teams. Even the salary cap looks like it can be manipulated. The best chance of equalising is the draft. What is the AFL doing about it?

Hey, given each trade is both between both the new club and the player (more player's agent ) AND new club and old club how does that actually work? Obviously these two arrangements can clash. So looking at now if in the last hour of the trade period there's a standoff between Gold Coast and Melbourne can Tracc agree to reduce his salary with GC as a final enticement for them to agree with Melbourne's terms? And what about if a GC player is thrown into a deal late? Does this player have any say? Could he suddenly be offloaded to Melbourne and minutes after the trades finish all he knows he's a Demon .... but no talk re his new salary? Its fascinating how trades rely on both arrangements of player and club AND club and club.

Umm most of the time the Brownlow is won by a player with superstars in his team and often such teams bank a lot of wins helping the player get a few more votes. We just saw Rowell win despite Anderson stealing votes. On top of that if Anderson missed most of the year and Gold Coast win 4 less games he might have lost 7 votes and gained 7 his teammate 'stole'. Honestly if Trac had been more accurate a game here or there with 2 more shots from 40 going through in a year where he came second 3 extra votes get him on the podium.

Did we actually bottom out after 2006? After making week 2 of that year's finals i reckon nearly everyone thought we could reach the finals in 2007. Instead we kept losing close games and after a tiny recovery (similar to us beating Lions and Sydney in a fortnight this year) we were maybe 2-11 and Daniher left. The nect two years we were 1-10. Again i doubt we were bottoming out as a tactic - our cupboard was just bare. I get the feeling that if somehow we did what Hawthorn did 2 seasons ago and wnet from 1-6 to 14-9 or so we would've embraced it. Im sure some coaches (hello, Ross Lyon) keep persisting with older stars too long leaving the next generation underdeveloped . I'm just not sure clubs have deliberately ruined their teams for 'magical' draft picks. Otherwise i agree with your post

Yep! That gypsy said Gawn's gonna marry Katy Perry.

An unlocked window? Maybe we could open it with a Lever.