Its Time for Another

I would be very very surprised if there is much debate about where the list is at overall and what is needed. Whether it be midfielders, outside runners, KPF's etc etc. I'm sure either of them would then rely on Jason Taylor and Co who spend years watching the kids coming through to pick either the best talent outright or the best players for needs. It seems pretty clear they traded hard to get pick 3, so you'd be pretty confident that whoever they get there will have been decided before they went chasing the pick. Roosy has done the transition before with Horse. He knows how to do it better than anyone. It's been his team for two years, he's not just in there for a few months like other interim coaches. He'll be guiding and leading as he sees is required. In his last couple of years at the Swans you'll recall he went down to the bench to coach individual players and left the overall coaching to Horse who stayed up in the box with all the line coaches. I'm sure we'll see more of that in 2016.

I have got to a stage over the past few years for the sake of my mental health and my relationship with my son and the safety of anything throwable around the tv that I record games and watch them once I know the outcome. At least that way I am mentally prepared to cope with another soul destroying performance. I live interstate so don't have the pleasure of going to many games live. For instance the last couple of games in Sydney against either Sydney or even worse GWS.

Dear Oh Dear! Same as me. Like the We're not that old OD sentiment.

Purely based on that footage, he looks like a much better natural forward than midfielder. He didn't seem to read the game nearly as well in the midfield and he doesn't have pace, something we're desperate for in the midfield. I could see him going in their in bursts like a Roughead but not as a starting midfielder. On the other hand he looks like a natural forward. Seems to read the ball well and know where to run. Would that be a fair assessment?

Agree with all of this. Having watched these highlights it reinforces how brilliantly Mahoney & Co performed in trade week. It was genious doing those deals to get 3. These highlights show Parish is the best pure midfielder in this draft. After that you have to probably go to Mathieson and you wouldn't call him an elite top 10 player. We wouldn't have got a top 10 quality midfielder at pick 6, that's for sure. IMO no way in the world would you use 3 on a decent half forward flanker like Curnow and not get the best midfielder. Essendon must have been spewing when we got 3. What a pleasure. Not sure why Curnow keeps being called a KPF. At 191 he's a flanker. Nowadays a KPF is 194+. Darlings the same height, is a great HFF, kicked 39 goals this year but he's not a KPF as was proven in the GF where he wasn't tall enough to win contested marks. You can see why this draft is rated as a weak one. Everyone other than the top 2 have issues. Parish short and slight compared to say Brayshaw who was the best pure midfielder last year. I really don't know who'll be available at 7 but have confidence Taylor & Co will pick the best available for our needs. Would be happy with Curnow and from what I've heard Weideman if either is still there. Fact is that pick is going to have an element of speculation no matter who it is, as there aren't any standout's after Parish.

OK, thanks

OK, I probably look stupid, I haven't seen him before. What no. is he. Bit difficult without commentary. I thought he might have been 42 but then I realised he is rucking.

That's my one fear about him. Sounds just like all the reports of the Toump as a junior. I remember seeing him sitting on the bench in the Darwin game year before last in tears. He just couldn't get into the game. Something didn't look right then. I reckon he was very hard on himself and destroyed his own confidence with pressure of being no. 4 pick and it's importance to MFC. He'll probably come good with that monkey off his back. That outstanding talent as a junior doesn't disappear. Anyway try again with Parish and hope he can bulk up enough to be competitive as a senior. I figure the fact he's got pace which we need so desperately will put him ahead of any others at 3.

He's got a great story. Best out of all those players in Year 7-8 but stopped growing while everyone kept going. Dropped out of footy because too small. Then in Year 11 grew a foot in less than a year and suddenly in Year 12 could compete again. Was a standout over the others in some of those Year 12 games. Explains why he has had back problems. Waiting for the frame to catch up to such a rapid growth spurt.

Given the crazy money that's starting to be thrown around for teams to trade in Key Forwards. Think Boyd & now Dixon, who is an ok but not outstanding player yet & the play for McCarthy you'd think if Weideman was there we'd probably take him to set us up for the future as at some point we're going to have to get another key forward.

Definitely not Dee's.

Terrible way to go.

No way Essendon would tell them who they are going to pick. So they would have made the decision on the range of 2-4 players that would still be there without knowing which one for sure.

Good luck working that out live on the night. They will obviously have a live draft board up for all to see as it constantly changes. The bidding psychology is an interesting one. Basically bidding teams in the top 10 know the Academy player teams will put up whatever they have to, to get the players, so they are really only bidding to force those teams to give up picks not to get the players. If as some have asked Carlton put up pick 1 for Mills, the question is would that be enough to make Sydney let them have him. Then they are screwed for getting the key position they so desperately need. I wonder where Mills would fit in the order if he was in the draft. I would have thought a better system than this bidding would be for an expert panel to make a call on what pick they would go in the draft and then everyone has some certainty. There usually seems to be broad agreement on ranking the top 10 to 20 by talent anyway. Different opinions on where they will go in the draft tends to be about opinions on what teams will pick to fit their needs rather than pure talent. Whereas this should be chosen on talent. It would take it away from teams doing bogus bids and give a true value to the players. The team can either chose to pay that or let them go in the draft. They should still get the 20% discount so they can take that into account making their decision.

Nope except all picks given up for Academy or FS players go out of the draft so everyone after them moves up the order. The draft order on the night will be a moving feast because these teams won't know how many picks they need to give up until they know who has bid for them and how high. So for instance if we bid for Callum Mills, Sydney will have to give up most of their picks and everyone else will move up. If no one decides to bother bidding for him because they realise it is a waste of time then they may have to use a lot less picks and so everyone including us won't get moved up as much. That applies to all teams with these type of players. It won't effect our picks 3 & 7 as no teams before either pick is likely to have to give up one of those picks. Brisbane have a couple of Academy players but should be able to have enough points for them without giving up pick 2. But GWS will almost certainly have to give up pick 10 and a lot of their other picks. This will all be further complicated because these players will be given an "imaginary" pick straight after the pick of the team that bid for them. So for instance if Carlton bid for Callum Mills, the AFL say pick 2 in the draft is Sydney taking Callum Mills. In reality no player will go at pick 2, so Brisbane's pick 2 will become pick 3 but it is actually the same as pick 2 was before this. So they'll get the same player. Really simple.

Looks like the aim was to bring in Bugg to take over from Cross which is why he was retired.

I'll never lose any sleep over Watts v Nic Nat. 4 possessions in a GF. Usually has about 6 possessions a game of which 1 or 2 are amazing. Much rather have Gawny and therefore Watts was always worth the pick. No one in the industry would have not picked one of those two. It is what it is. If you look at the top 20 of that draft there are a lot of ordinaries or busts.

Don't think it will make a difference in the end. Either pick would have been used for Bugg. We wouldn't have had either left over.

Of course the irony here is that those of us who were hoping the players got the book thrown at them will now be hoping they get a slap and are available for round 1. I can't get my head around how we seem to have paid full value for him and got no discount for the fact that he has a real risk of a 12 mth or 2yr ban.

Never heard of him . Can you tell us a bit about him?

They won't have to pay him if he is suspended. You would hope he's on a Provisional Suspension again this off season just like last off season. That adds up to 12mths Provisional Suspension. I reckon if they are found guilty there will be some consideration for the delay etc and minimal intention on players behalf. So 2yr's might be reduced to 18mths or possibly 12mths. If this were the case and they've already served 12mths Provisional then you might only be looking at worst case half a season to one season which you don't pay him for. Swans took Tippett with half a season penalty and moved on pretty quickly. Plenty of players are injured for 2 or more years. Even so taking all this into account why the hell you would give up a 2nd rounder for him is a mystery to me. Essendon seem to totally ignore the risk other teams are taking in solving their drug cheating problem for them. They should be accepting discounted return on players who's lives they have made a misery.

Probably waiting to see what we get for Toumpas and Howe. Won't know the total picture until all deals are done. Looks like we are after 3 players who will all command 2nd round picks. So we have to get at least that for Toumpas and Howe for all 3 to go through.

Although not Free Agency the Scully compo was a similar form of compo and we ended up with Hogan and Dawes. So all in all we have to learn to not get so hysterical when no. 1 picks or Free agents walk out on the Club because as you point out compo has so far improved the list. There won't be anymore pick 3's for players like Frawley that's for sure. It looks more and more like that was the AFL's way of giving us the equivalent of a Priority Pick without politically actually giving us one.

It's a mechanism for keeping the strong Clubs strong and the week Clubs week by more easily facilitating the automatic transfer of the best players in the weak Clubs to the strong Clubs without the inconvenience of having to give up anything. It has had the added benefit of trickling down the mentality to non Free Agents so that all players now want to leave the weak Clubs and go to the strong Clubs. Clubs that were weak before the Expansion teams and Free Agency will stay that way from now on and the Clubs that were strong before will stay that way.

Had expected the AFL to have announced they have fixed it by now but alas no. Even if they brought in a rule saying top 4 or even 6 can't get Free Agents, Cats could pick up this lot this year. The problem is Free Agency appears to have changed player's mentality so they now have a sense of entitlement to not care a stuff about the overall comp and just go to wherever they can play Finals. If the AFL don't fix this the Comp is over and the teams that were at the top b4 expansion teams and Free Agency will stay at the top and the one's that were down are going to stay down. Hard to get excited about the future.