Its Time Again

Yep. Absolutely clueless. Again just to clarify, Lamb is the List Manager, not the recruiter. Do you think he sits around all day at football grounds watching players. No, that's the recruiters job. He identifies with the FD and the recruiters what holes there are in the "list"and then it's the recruiters job to go and find them. It's not his fault if we don't have the salary cap space they are demanding, it's not his fault if they want to live on the Surf Coast, it's not his fault if their Club is demanding too much for a trade. Of course it's undeniable that our trading since Langdon has been a bust. Except Hunter who was ok last year and injured this year. Every player we have recruited in that time has filled in exactly the holes that have been identified. Obviously there haven't been key forwards out there. You have to turn over at least 6 list places a season. So what do you do experts suggest? Not recruit anyone because there's no one good enough or get someone in who can fill the role and get the FD's advice on whether they think they can work wth them to get the job done. It's so easy to run around on keyboards demanding people get sacked when they are probably excellent at what they do and some things aren't their fault. Graham Wright might have done a lot worse job. Who knows. As for your individual examples. McAdam was exactly what we needed and has shown he is extremely talented and plays small and tall. He was injured the entire pre season and over half of the season. It's way too early to make a judgment on recruiting him. Fullarton evidently has been a massive fail. But again he plays exactly the role we needed which was Lamb's job. It was the recruiters who found him and the FD who thought they could work with him. Billings had 3 brilliant seasons at the Saints and has been injured every season since. He was theoretically exactly what we needed a skilled deliverer i50. There was an expectation by many that he would be back to his best which is very good and just what we needed. It didn't work out that way. I wouldn't be sacking Lamb over these. Your point 2 is a bit ridiculous. Did we have enough depth when Brayshaw went down. If we knew Brayshaw was going down the list management would have been different. Plus Sparrow has IMO been the most disappointing player on the team this season. He was expected to step up into a full time midfield/onball role and went badly backwards. Your point 3. You don't seem to know your own team. Sparrow has spent a lot of time playing half forward not mifdield. .He was meant to step up this season on ball but was a bust a lot of the time . Tell me an instinctive key forward out there we've missed out on that wanted to come to the club. We tried to get Meek but no decent ruck is going to want to come to MFC and play at Casey. It wasn't for lack of trying. I spoke to Goody about Laurie and he is very confident he is going to make it as a good player. Don't think you should sack Lamb over that one either.

Mate put up or shut up. Go through the positions that had to be filled in the past 3 years and show me the players we could have got that we didn't. That means the players that would have come to us that we missed. Players who didn't prefer the advantages Geelong has over every other club in terms of cheap cost of living, it means the money in the salary cap that could be thrown at players at a young list like Hawthorn. That means ruckmen who knew they'd be playing a Casey instead of Gawn in the firsts. Take your five minutes and show them and don't mention any we couldn't get or wouldn't get.

I think it's fair to say looking at the comments on this thread that most people are absolutely clueless on what a List Manager does. He is not a recruiter. He doesn't spend his time scouting junior talent and talent at other clubs. He has to make an ongoing assessment of where the list is in relation to the Premiership window which is probably the single most important judgement he has to make. On the basis of that assessment you decide whether to draft or trade. He has to work out the demographics of the list. He has to manage the salary cap. He has to sit down withe football department to work out under their guidance what players are required in what positions and then finding them is handed over the the recruiters. Yes there have been a series of dud trades in the past couple of years. He doesn't pick the players the recruiters do. He picks what type of players are needed and everyone of the players picked in the last few years have been for very specific list purposes. They would have been best available and with the limited cap space we would have had at the time. To blame Tim Lamb for those choices is plain wrong. There's a lot of hindsight calls going on about players who left. Bedford was given 6 games in his last year. He was good for the first two and horrendous for the rest. Swatted off the ball like a mosquito. Chandler was way ahead of him at that stage. I've watched a couple of his games at GWS he's been just ok. His speed is a huge asset but his decision making and football IQ are not high. Jordan wasn't given games because he was very ordinary last year and there were players ahead of him. Bit rich to blame Lamb or Goodwin for that. I'm obviously seriously in the minority here but I think Lamb's done an excellent list management job. He has kept turning over the list and going to the draft and getting young talent every year. We're not going to drop off a cliff like a few teams like Hawks, Eagles, Pies are heading for a massive one. The list management is in step with the Club's strategic plan to remain competitive long term. There are a lot of reasons why that didn't happen this year. Mainly injuries but to call for the list manager to go because of this year is misplaced.

Steven Smith has decided not to nominate for the Board. Needs a break after just retiring from his legal career. May consider it in 12 months.

I'm hoping McVee will be another one to add to that mix. You can't make a player like Windsor they're born that way. What an outstanding pick by the Guru, Mr Taylor. Wasn't in the top 10 discussion a month before the draft. His skill and more importantly his decision making and vision is very very special. I don't know if you agree @binman but if you look at it so often it's a teams top 3-6 players who do the critical damage. Everyone else is important for executing their roles but that echelon of players in every team seem to be critical. Not entirely different to junior footy. By the way I wasn't commenting on anything you said or didn't say about skill. That was just a separate observation of mine. I will add on a slightly different note that I got to go to the game. It was unbelievable. The atmosphere right from the first bounce was like nothing I've ever experienced before at the SCG. The noise was unbelievable. Heeney said the same thing after the game.

I totally agree with this overview however the skills of their extractors particularly Heeney and Warner is a real point of difference to ours. Goal kicking onballers are becoming a significant point of difference the top teams and we don’t have them. Petracca to a lesser extent.

Anyone know how effective he is when the ball is continuously kicked over his head when he's on the lead or otherwise indiscriminately bombed into the forward line. If he's good at that then pay whatever it takes. Otherwise. Nah.

Do you know that for a fact. Players can elect to require an 18mth contract. Especially likely for someone relocating from WA. Quite likely here. Just read on Zero Hanger that it's a 6mth contract.

Unfortunately Australian lacrosse players aren't fairing too well atm. RiP.

I dream of getting my body fat down to 27%.

Hope he's got night lenses for his shades.

He only needs one decision and intention. Kick em through the middle of the big sticks

Funnily enough I listen to the Pod for the bits between the ums. My son is in advertising and he watches TV programs for the ads. Each to his own.

Going to be a very interesting end of year this year. We are potentially going to be overflowing with cap space and there are no obvious key forwards available to trade in. Players creating cap space are obviously Brayshaw, likely BBB, probably T Mac and Tomlinson. There's going to be a lot of scope to throw a big contract at him, very heavily front ended for next season. If not there's still a real argument IMO to hold him to his contract next season while we are so much in the window and forego the difference between what Crows would offer this year in a trade and what we'd get for compo next season if he leaves as a free agent. Or maybe there will be a bidding war over there with Port and we'll get fair picks anyway.

Last year's Gather Round was a disaster. Flew back from Perth and then to Adelaide and proceeded to lose to Essendon 🤮 Clearly applying the learnings from that debacle.

Tell me they aren't his mother, girlfriend and best mate.

Incredible training innovation by the Dees. Leaving no blade of grass unturned to get an edge.

Wonderful news to hear McAdam is finally back in the main squad. Wonder if we'll finally see a return date in the injury reports instead of TBC. Also Melk although he will still be a while away you'd think. And Turner and Hunter back in. Injury list disappearing at the right end of the season. NO MAY!!! Bloody wimp. Take it like a man and get out there. Can't believe he didn't turn up. Ok Ok I'm not saying that to him at Florent. Well anywhere actually. Great news to hear it's only cracked ribs and not broken and no internal damage. Broken are a whole other ball game. Cracked are a shocker if you've ever been through it. Can't see them rushing him back for Crows but it is Steven May so who knows. Would be a great bonus if he's back by Lions game. And great news on Lever. But he's pretty heavily strapped.

I have a similar memory of him from a couple of years after that at the Western Oval. He kicked out from the dead centre of the ground, I don’t think there was even a centre circle in those days little own a centre square, it went through at post height. Longest kick I’ve ever seen. Of course it went through the points.

Doesn't make sense for this week however my guess is this is a long term view over the next three weeks. Next week's game against Port is now an 8 pointer. Then only a five day break to what becomes another danger game v Crows. You'd rather manage Petty's reintroduction against one of the bottom teams where any issues with subs should be manageable rather than leave it to the following week in such an important game against Port and then the Crows.

I was there too. 1987 Night Grand Final. It was a bloody miserable and freezing wet night. Robbie was injured and couldn't play and Essendon had their best team in. I was invited out by a friend who's bank manager had invited him to a box. I went out there expecting a loss but a free feed in heated luxury. We had to wear a suit and tie. We got out there and it wasn't a box it was just an area where the seats had a little divider around them. It was right next to the siren. It virtually parted your hair every time it went off. Absolutely froze to death and got soaked and it was bloody glorious. Also the first silver wear I ever saw. Ran onto the ground after the win for the presentation. Robbie was carried to the stage on the players shoulders to accept the trophy as Captain even though he hadn't played.

I also watched it from behind the goals at the opposite end to Buckenara's goal. Watched all those misses at that end coming towards me. Eishold, Tony Campbell who just had to handball to Robbie standing on his own in the goal square and instead blazed and missed, and someone else, maybe Yeates. Still a heart breaker.

Agree with you that the purpose of the northern academy's was to find players who wouldn't otherwise play AFL. Heeney is the poster boy for the success for this. Blakey and Mills who already played AFL in a junior club are not. But how you police that I don't know. Don't agree with you at all on COLA. I live in Sydney and there is a very clearly identifiable difference in COL up here compared to any other city in Australia. Especially compared to somewhere like Geelong who get a massive COL advantage. The whole COLA outrage and the Buddy deal was a scurrilous beat up by Eddie Everywhere. The COLA component of the salary cap was audited by the AFL every year. It was allocated per rata to each player on the list. There was no pooling of the money and giving it to just one player, Buddy. Swans and GWS will always run with a substantial disadvantage at. attracting players because of this disparity. It has had a significant effect on their trading since it was taken away.

Many memories seared into the brain from that place. The long long trip out on public transport. Especially as a kid. You could never ever find your car in the car park after a game. It took forever to leave once you found it. Went to the first ever World Series Cricket game out there. Me and I believe officially 172 other people including the mate I went with. The '87 Prelim is seared in the memory. Watched the ball in slow motion from the kickout to Buckenara's free kick which Robbie always maintained should never have been paid as the siren went before it got to him. Jimmy walking over the mark and the most heartbreaking moment of my life when Buckenara's kick went through the middle. The only time we were behind in the game was minutes after the final siren. It was unknowingly built in a rain belt so was nearly permanently wet out there when it was dry everywhere else.

I also saw a lot of Robbie including his first and last games and a lot in between. He definitely has some traits that remind me of Robbie. There's a certain drive and swivel from the hips, running style and the same ballet dancer poise and movement especially evading tacklers, burst of pace leaving contests, decision making and skills. There's plenty of Robbie there. He's taller and already quite a bit heavier not that it would be hard to be heavier than Robbie's 68kg. He l already looks to be a better defensive player than Robbie. Time will tell. If he gets to have a career half as good as Robbie's we have a star on our hands. Early signs are very promising.