drdrake

No we wouldn't but that is a totally different senerio, What pick was Rohan, how many first round picks did Sydney have that year? The facts are we have 3 first round picks and a Father son rated in the top 10, there is no way GWS and GC want the MFC to get 4 players that will be rated in the top 15 in this years draft.

Doesn't Flash go onto the VL in 2013, I remember when he signed that his contract could have been back loaded due to that fact.

It depends on who we replace them with, I dare to say we have enough room in our cap next year to lure a very good player with a big front loaded 4 year deal. You are right Davey, Moloney and Green would represent approx 1.2-1.5mil per year

I've heard the same, the club wants to keep Rivers and it is Rivers that may be considering his option, I believe he will stay. On the flip side Gysberts wants out and the club is happy to look for a trade, hopefully we will get a pick inside 30 for him.

I have heard Mark Neeld speak a couple of times, one thing the players will get from him is pure honesty and unfortunately over the past 4 years our early picks and senior players have been told how good they are and they believed our club was in the ideal position. To be told after 4 years that you are miles off and you have no idea of what is required to be a good team upset a number of players, some have responsed like Blease and full credit to him and some haven't, those that haven't will not be at our club in 2013.

The MFC would do the same if we were in GC or GWS position, it makes sense for them to bid for Viney, we have 3 first round picks, 2 in the top 4 with a Father son that is considered a top 10 pick which gives us 4 players inside would is considered the top 13. The only way they don't bid is if the MFC offer a deal, like pick 3 or 4 for Hogan and pick 13 for Caddy or Toy or Both, GWS will be thinking if we can get pick 4 from Melbourne and pick 6 from Bulldogs it gives them a strong hand in this draft, if they bid for Viney there is no chance we will give up pick 4.

Unless your have no value or want to leave the club you are at, most clubs will hold players until trading month is concluded.

Good luck to Brent. We have to remember for the past 14 years our club hasn't had a defensive mindset, under Danners and Bailey it was an attack at all cost game plan, we will win games by kicking 16 plus goals a game, the issue was we played teams that had defensive midsets and they stopped us scoring and we gave up often experiencing heavy defeats. Moloney is an example of old school attacking footy, leave him alone and he will get the footy, he will look great but so will his direct opponent. The club this year has asked all players to be defensively accountable, Brent hasn't been able to adapt and in a midfield where he can be the 3rd or 4th midfielder he will be a very good footballer for the next few years, but not at Melbourne he is a senior player that can't do what was required, getting the footy alone isn't enough anymore. Hopefully we can get a second band compensation for him giving us a second round pick.

Just a point on Gysberts, his kicking is poor his endurance even poorer. To watch pre-season last year and to have a slow midfielder running in ther last group, alarm bells would have been ringing. We have no idea what goes on in the club, but I know all players would have certain targets they would have to acheive, Gys has been in good enough form at Casey to get a game over the past 2 months, for him not to be getting games has to be about him not hitting his targets. As mentioned watching him at pre-season I reckon his targets would be based around endurance.

Here is what I think we need Strauss Frawley Garland Nicholson McDonald **** Blease Sylvia Trengove Watts ***** Howe **** Clark ***** Jamar Jones Grimes We need another tall forward, small forwards, an attacking HBF that can run with the footy and hit targets, Viney, some outside speed with skill. Big priority is getting ball winners in our midfield, our base looks ok with Jones, Sylvia, Grimes, Trengove and Blease, add Viney and some more ball carriers. We need to start winning more inside 50m counts, no point stocking the forward line if we can't get it in there enough.

Moloney goes, and we get no other free agents, what do we expect to receive? To me a pick after our second round pick would be a win for the club, on the trade market we wouldn't get pick 23-25 for Moloney, but free agency we might.

At the end of 2011 you look at the players on our list and assess the holes in our list. One thing we had covered was at the time mid sized forwards, fast forward 12 months Green, Jurrah and look like Petterd gone, Bate will be gone, Dunn is playing down back, Sylvia is playing in the midfield and Howe spending time in the middle. The year before we thought we had the small forward role covered with Aussie, Maric, Davey, Bennell, Tapscott. Add to this the 2 tall forwards we took with first round picks Watts playing of HBF and Cook looking like he is gone, what I considered to be the strongest part of our list at the end of 2011 now looks lean.

I became a huge Mark Neeld fan at his post match press conference after his first match against Brisbane. With in that match Mark Neeld realised what needed to be done and he went about doing it. The press conference he went off and followed through. It was a very bad year, the fall out over the next few weeks will be interesting, a number of players that have been around for a while will find themselves playing elsewhere.

When and who was the last elite Star the MFC had. A bloke that dominated the game and on his day no body could stop him.

We are due with some luck in adding a young star to our list.

We must be the greatest off season team ever. If we dig hard enough we will find this same topic post after the last game for the last 6 years. We cling to the hoped that the next 6 months will firstly add high quality players through drafting and trading, secondly the players have the hardest pre-season ever and thirdly we come out the other side a much better team. You would want to hope that in 2013 we come out a better side if we get any worse or even stay the same another spoon will be headingh our way.

October is going to be a long month, the best thing for our club is the F/S bidding starts the trading period at least the what do we give up for Viney will be a dead topic by October 8.

Start to play better footy and we push up to 45,000 members, unfortunately we had a drop of this year, I think it was about 7,500 members from last year didn't re-sign, you would expect on our performances that number would be around the same, our pre-season form and early season form needs to be extremely good to even maintain our current total.

Neitz still played the key post against some of the best forwards in the game, Jack Watts is being pushed of the ball by a 2 foot 2 19yo. If Jack went back to play on key forwards and it was for his education great, to me we put him back there to get a kick.

They will be very good AFL footballers next year, to me a star is someone that performs at an extremely high level over a number of seasons not one our two. Watts will be B grade at tops, I hope I'm wrong to be A grade/elite you need to be a game breaker, I just don't see any signs of that in Jack. I'd rather Jack Watts be kicking the football to Mitch Clark inside our forward 50m arc not getting clearing kicks deep inside our defensive 50m arc. We need Jack Watts to have the footy in his hands forward of the centre suppling our forwards, my main concern with Jack last year he attacked his leads presented gave a good option, this year his leading was half hearted, to me taking him to Half Back hasn't taught him about work rate, he never spent time on the hard working lead up forwards.

We don't give up on him, we have to accept that as a number 1 pick he will be just a little above average footballer, to add to our list of average AFl footballers, where as Hurley and Nic Nat will be stars of the competition over the next 5 years. By the way his best value to the team isn't of Half Back, he isn't really that attacking Half Back Flanker, most of his disposals are deep in defense, more trying to rebound rather than real attacking running of half back and kicking to our forwards. To me we seem to be happy that he is getting 20+ touches per game, with most of these in the last line of defense, he should be the bloke that working hard off half forward to supply a hit up target, you don't need strength to work hard leading and providing an option coming out of defense.

In two years Hurley will have his body right and be one of the best power forwards in the game. To me Watts will be a half forward flank pushing into our midfield. What Hurley has that I dont' think Watts will ever get is the desire for body contact, Hurley wants to crash packs and attack the footy, he has a 55m kick, I'm a big fan of Hurley he is everything we wanted Watts to be.

Freo will hope Geelong Lose and then they try to smash us to get the percentage to get above Geelong. Geelong can slip to eighth which could result in Freo hosting North and most likely West Coast Hosting Geelong. Even if Geelong win Freo would give themselves half a chance V Geelong most likely at Etihad. Freo will smash us

I don't know how you can say we have turned the corner, Sellar was Ok this year and we heve no idea about Tynon and Taggart. Mitch Clark was a good trade, Magner started OK but struggled since mid year. The only player that we drafted over the past 2 years to play regularly in McDonald. On Watts he is a mile behind Nic Nat, Nic Nat impacts games Watts doesn't and is showing no signs of being able to do this. If we had that draft again knowing Nic Nat will go home you would have Hurley over Watts, Hurley injuries aside is also miles ahead of Watts. SOmeone will pull up Stats and prove by the stats Watts is better than Hurley but Stats don't mean a great deal these days and playing in Melbournes backline you are bound to get a lot of the footy its always down there.

I have been in Jack Watts corner but to me he has been extremely disappointing this year. To play Watts of Half Back just shows how far this guy has gone backwards. He was a better player last year and had a run of games up forward that still IMO are the best games he has played at the club. Moving him to the back half would have been good if he was to play on tall forwards, he played mainly on smalls and zoned off. We drafted a key forward that is 4 years in the system and still doesn't have enough body strength to compete. Nic Nat has Jack Watts covered by a country mile, the way he hunts to ball and attacks the contest is amazing, Watts has a lot more talent but Nic Nat wants the contest, he wants the footy he wants body contact.