Its Time for Another

Oh come on, according to the MRP that was a love tap not worthy of a suspension. Must have been something else.

Good point. They even used to smoke cigarettes while riding, especially in preparation for the mountain stages. The theory was smoking opened up your lungs and increased your lung capacity. There was a great full size photo in a bike shop in Sydney of four riders riding in le Tour sharing cigarettes.

Only in the context that together with either pick 2 or 3 it might have got us Dangerfield or another A grader which seemed to be the thinking behind the Trengove trade for pick 12. If it was just pick 7 in this draft I wouldn't be so excited. From what I have read we'd be better off with Howe than the players available at pick 7 this year. Evidently I rate Howe higher than a lot on here.

And yet someone, from memory Bernie Vince, when he arrived at the Club commented on how hard they trained and how fit they were and that there were more players who were running sub 10 minute 3Km time trials than at any other Club. We have had continuity with conditioning with Misson since the end of 2011. How is it that the fitness is so far off the mark. I don't buy it. I reckon it's more to do with psychological fatigue than physical fitness. But some key players dropped off badly which effected the whole team. Dawes was terrible by the end but that was off the back of missing nearly the whole pre season. Apparently that adds up towards the end of the season. I don't know what happened to Pedersen who dropped off so badly he was dropped. He didn't miss the pre season. So we were back to no effective forward line by the end of the season. Dom T had a limited pre season and was carrying an injury. There were a few more carrying injuries or suffering for interrupted pre seasons. We are in much better shape this pre season than last, for what it's worth.

I didn't realise that the result of this was so weak. So you would need to go back to the Festina scandal in 1998 when the entire team were banned. Bing181 you might find this article interesting. Someone has compiled what they call the 15 biggest doping scandals in cycling going back to the very first evidence of doping in 1886. I didn't realise that Tom Simpson who is so famous for dying in the middle of le Tour on Mount Ventoux in 1967 that there is a monument on the spot where he died, tested positive for amphetamines in his autopsy. Also didn't know that Eddy Merckx tested positive at the 1969 Giro and was banned. Here is the url to the article if you or anyone else is interested. http://www.totalprosports.com/2012/06/15/15-biggest-doping-scandals-in-cycling-history/#1

Actually that's not right. There was a much greater doping scandal in world cycling. The Operacion Puerto scandal which like the Essendon fiasco was caused by one person, Doctor Eufemiano Fuentes. Masses of riders from many different teams and even entire teams were suspended. It was way more massive than this case. Have a look at this from Wikipedia if you are interested http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operaci%C3%B3n_Puerto_doping_case

I read somewhere this week that the clock will start ticking from the date of the Infraction Notices. Ie Friday. They are supposedly banned from then. I would have thought that means they can't train withe the Club but haven't heard anything about that. I'm a bit confused about the likely penalty. Saad got 18mths although he didn't know the energy drink he had was only banned on match days the rest of the time it was ok. ASADA appealed and wanted 2yrs. No 12mth discount for ignorance, only 6mth for co operation. The Essendon players supposedly didn't know what they were taking so could get the 12mth discount but on the basis of what happened to Saad I'm not sure why they would get it. Maybe because the Club told the it was legal and they should be entitled to rely on the Club including Doc Reid. (How he is not charged here as well is a mystery to me. On that basis, if found guilty I can't see how they could get less than 12mths and if their reliance on the Club doesn't help them, on basis of Saad case, as they haven't co operated, it looks like 2yrs.

I don't agree. It has done wonders for my one pack.

Let me guess. Curling?

Dank has maintained in the past he will only appear before a Court. So he might refuse to attend the Tribunal hearing. I think it's likely he'll refuse to attend. The Tribunal will make an adverse finding against him and he'll appeal to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal and then The Court of Arbitration in Sport where he will get well and truly slammed out of the ball park. Interesting article in The Australian about the evidence ASADA are relying on. Witness Shane Charter promised no human use of peptide at Essendonhttp://www.theaustralian.com.au/sport/afl/witness-shane-charter-promised-no-human-use-of-peptide-at-essendon/story-fnca0u4y-1227107778849 Shows link between Chinese Thymosin Beta 4 supplier, Charters, Alavi, Dank and Essendon. None of this means the players will be successfully convicted. There is certainly enough evidence to compel ASADA etc to take these proceedings but it is only when they are forensically examined in the Tribunal and satisfy the burden of proof of "reasonable satisfaction" which is higher than the usual civil burden of "balance of probabilities" that the players will be convicted. That's not a sure thing when relying on circumstantial evidence and no direct evidence.

Very strange case to take on.

The players QC David Grace (incidentally a vocal anti doping advocate as the President of Athletics Australia) is probably the best sports lawyer in the country. He has obviously told them he's so confident of getting them off that they should forego the chance to get a 6mth reduction for co operating. He must be pretty convinced. It's a very big call on his behalf with the consequence being an extra 6mths of ban if he's wrong. Most of the world think they should go down because it was all so bodgy but that isn't enough in a proper tribunal. That decision will be based on how convincing the circumstantial paper trail is as there's no direct evidence. I don't understand why the onus is on ASADA and not on the players to prove what they took was illegal. The result would be that every dirty athlete in the world who doesn't fail a drug test just has to hide the evidence of what they took and they're free to dope.

So now the players have been placed on the register of findings, I understand Andrew Dillon at the AFL will decide if infraction notices should be issued which I assume is a formality and then it's off to the AFL Tribunal. I gather the players can get a 50% reduction if they can prove they didn't know they were taking a banned substance and a further 25% for co operation. However, Saad ended up with an 18mth ban even though he didn't know what he was taking and one of the Australian gymnasts got a hefty ban even though she didn't know that the pill she was given by her coach was banned.So I don't know how this applies. Apparently they are facing 2yr bans. This could have been reduced to 6mths if they had co operated and proven they didn't know what they were taking but by not co operating it would appear they will be facing a minumum of 12mth bans and possibly longer based on what happened to Saad. That is of course assuming the evidence ASADA has assembled is enough to establish guilt. Given it's all circumstantial I would say this isn't a given. Although having said that Justice Downing, the retired Federal Court judge reviewed it and was satisifed there was enough. As was the US guy who actually drafted the WADA Code. As did ASADA's QC and investigating officers etc etc. As I understand it all Essendon and Hird's case was about was suppressing the evidence from the player interviews. But all they could have said was that they were given injections but they didn't know what they were, so this evidence probably isn't critical anyway. I understand that the evidence ASADA will rely on is the paperwork showing the orders from Dank to the supplier for the illegal Beta 4; the supply from the Chinese supplier of Beta 4; the compounding chemist evidence and Danks evidence of the dossages to be given which didn't show the actual substance but were the dosses and regularity for Beta 4 not the legal substances. That evidence is what will be assessed at the Tribunal and probably the Admin Appeals Tribunal on appeal and then the Court of Arbitration for Sport on appeal from the AAT. It's going to be a long road.

Ok, call me stupid but can someone please explain the obsession with Lever over McCaitin. Everything I've read says he's a key back who could potentially play in the midfield although he never has. We just recruited Frost and our backline is the one area we don't have to worry about so why Lever. Why not Laverde for instance if you don't want a key forward

He has to get leave from the High Court to appeal. They won't grant it for this.

Reading through the submissions on the afl.com.au site. Hird's arguments look even worse on the appeal. Desperate technical arguments in vain hope to suppress the truth. Doing his reputation irreparable damage. Don't know who's driving these Court proceedings but the damage he's doing to himself no matter what the result makes this whole decision making process bizarre. Will eat my hat if this appeal gets up. Indications from the Bench don't look too promising either. Wouldn't think this decision is going to take very long.

Not entirely sure on this one. Using a couple of cycling cases that went to the CoAS. In Michael Rogers case he was suspended until his Appeal. His Appeal was successful so he was reinstated. However, I think the suspension was done by his team not ASADA. In the case of Contador, he appealed to the CoAS and was allowed to continue to compete up until the hearing. He lost the appeal and his results from the time the Notice was issued were stripped from him. I don't know about you but I don't see the Dons voluntarily suspending players, so I would assume they will keep playing.

Alas, this case is really only a side show. The real show will be the players action against the evidence ASADA presents against them. That could go on for another two years. The Anti Doping Rule Violation Panel hearing is still to occur. It must take place even without the players. It will review the ASADA notices and evidence and decide if the evidence is adequate to place the players on the Registry. Assuming that happens the next step will be for the AFL to convene an Anti Doping Tribunal where the players will argue against ASADA's evidence for the first time. I would be surprised if the AFL convenes both the Panel and Tribunal before the end of the year. So it's likely the Tribunal hearing won't start before the new year. Not really sure how long the Tribunal hearing will go against 34 players with 1000's of pages of evidence and over 100 pages of evidence per player. I would have thought at least a week if not two. I wouldn't have thought that an AFL tribunal has ever dealt with something as complex as this before. Anyone's guess how long it will take to make a decision after the hearings. It will be interesting to see if there are different results for different players. Either party can appeal the Tribunal hearing to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. I wouldn't have thought that would happen until mid next year at the earliest and then there would be some delay for the decision. Say possibly Sept next year. The appeal after that is to the Court of Arbitration for Sport. In the Contador case that took over a year. So could be September 2016 and then a delay for the decision. So end of 2016 or even some time into 2017. Essendon has gone from 34 players to 18 still on it's list after 18 mths. How many will be left by the end of all of that. Maybe none.

Nice one Benny!

So what happens to that 40% then. Do they turn up at other teams? With a few exceptions, such as Joey Kennedy, who is the classic example of what you're saying, I'd say no.

Found some interesting Champion Data stat's on number of games players play who were drafted. Obviously after the Bailey era we now know through painful experience that going to the draft isn't the holy grail. And from the Neeld era we learnt that trading in hacks past their use by date for leadership isn't the answer either. Looks like we are starting to get the blend right. We all bemoan the D's draft performance but how many know that Geelong and Hawthorn have the worst figure, 40%, for players never to have played a game. Here's some other interesting Champion Data draft facts on all 2179 players drafted since 1986. * 710 (or 32.5%) have never played a single game. * 932 (or 42.8%) have played between 1 and 49 games. So more than three-quarters of all draftees (75.3%) have not reached the milestone of 50 AFL games. * 292 (or 13.4%) have played more than 100 games; and * Only 74 (or 3.3%) reach the 200-game milestone. I wonder going forward, what impact free agency is going to have on the number of players being drafted. This year is going to be almost a record low. At this point, now that Newton has been picked up the D's only have to live draft picks, 2 & 3 and are using 42 for Stretch and probably 40 for upgrading Jetta unless they delist a contracted player to use pick 40 in the draft. I expect this to happen.

Why have you dropped Watts and Salem out of that. I've got my fingers crossed that the Toump will come good in 2015 I certainly haven't written him off. It's a major improvement on 2 yrs ago.

What, other players cover his weaknesses at the second best two way running team in the league. I think not. I think he's in for a rude surprise if he thought defensive running didn't suit his style of play and thinks that is going to be ok at the Cats. Sylvia says hello.

Ha! I was just about to write the same thing but you beat me to it.

Not yet, as far as I know. That's why I put in brackets, "...assuming we get him..." but his manager said they're negotiating with "a Club" and will be finalised mid week then it was mentioned in the press that we are the front runners. So I gather it is us they are finalising with but not done yet.