Nasher

I'm not going to continue this argument because we are clearly thinking on different planes of logic here and I think yours is completely irrational. I think you're just taking what you've seen recently and projecting that forward forever; my view is that history shows with this particular player that there's a much greater range of possibilities that should be considered before we all start throwing ourselves off the proverbial cliff.

The first two possibilities are rectifiable; the third one is just nonsense in the context of the question I posed. He's slower than last year because he's not as good as we'd hoped? Ok.

I agree with stuie - the cost would be low but so too would the probability of success. Aussie has proven unequivocally that he doesn't have the stomach for the workload required to play AFL nor the inclination to live in Melbourne. I loved Aussie and I hoped he'd make it, but this would be a complete waste of time and money.

Look, I'm a very open minded person and I'm just waiting for you to persuade me with a good argument. The "he's injured" explanation isn't perfect, but it's at least grounded in logic. Fact 1: He wasn't slow last year or the year before. Fact 2: He's slow this year. Something's changed between years 1 and 2 and year 3, so anyone who thinks logically will want to understand what's changed. Potential causes? I can't see any other than injury, body not yet up to the increased workload, et cetera et cetera. Your argument seems to be: "it's not injury, it's some other thing that I don't know what and anyone who can't see that sleeps with a teddy bear by their pillow". It doesn't stand up to the reasonability test. Unless you can give me something to go on, you can't expect any points for credibility from me, or anyone else wading through the pages of this thread just waiting to be convinced.

This is why nobody is taking you seriously in this thread. There's a very plausible reason why he's slow this year and wasn't in his first two years - injury - and you reject it without offering up your basis for doing so or any sensible alternative. Then you're all bemused because nobody can see where you're coming from?

Even if he didn't have the leap he'd still be a really good player, that's why I'm a fan. He's not a one trick pony. He's definitely been one of the top highlights of the year for mine.

A quick headcount says Jetta.

Me too. The pressure eased in the last 10 minutes or so and we started to make a lot of mistakes. Thought we were right in it until then.

The troll has been banned. Carry on.

You suck.

Experience? Neeld has been playing Dunn all year when I wouldn't have, so I dunno. Ask the coach. It says to me that we can't keep everyone and we've got a lot of delisting to do this year. You can't keep all three of Macdonald, Dunn and Davis and on this occasion I believe the coach will choose the young player for the bullet due to his obvious preference for developed players. Davis may develop in to a fine AFL player if given the chance, but I don't think any decision to cut his time short would ever come back to hurt us.

How does a player get to top level football with such poor ball drops? Seems amazing that some players still drop the ball from chest height. Even good players like Cameron Bruce had this issue. I wonder how "correctable" it is when you've probably been dropping the ball like that since under 8s. Seems weird that if it was fixable, it wouldn't have been picked up by someone and fixed.

I expect Davis will be delisted. I can't see where he fits in the big picture, especially with Tom McDonald coming on in leaps and bounds and the expectation that one of Joel Macdonald or Lynden Dunn will be kept as a full bodied defender.

Yes - he was "wetting himself about toughness" in your words and his username was "donut king". That was a bloody long time ago now, on the Aimoo site. Must've been late 2004, early 2005.

Don't start feeling too flattered, I just have an exceptional memory. I recently freaked a friend of a friend out by telling her I remembered her from when I'd been introduced to her once, for about 5 seconds, 11 years prior. If someone says something memorable, I'll remember it. Don't know what DA's excuse is though. Maybe he just loves you.

Thanks for the amazing clarification WYL.

When push comes to shove, that's the kind of footballer Magner is really. Like Godfrey - tough, works hard, face of an unloved trailer (I think that might've been an H-ism from many years ago), plenty of G&D, but not a top level footballer.

My money's on them winning by less than 110 points.

I'll preface this by saying I haven't read the book, but I was under the impression it was about Liam's life before the AFL and how he got here. In which case, what is premature about it? If it's an interesting story then it's an interesting story, so what if his career is only young? Also, what's any of that got to do with his current plight now?

Nathan Jones.

The old school members who were around during the 60s think we have a rivalry with Collingwood, but they couldn't give a toss about us: they're a big club and these days we are a little one. It had meaning 50 years ago when we would routinely meet them in finals, but these days it's less of a rivalry and more of a case of tall poppy syndrome.

I've always had the impression Brown has just been waiting around for some other club to offer up a huge bucket of cash so he can leave Brisbane. I can't quite work out why it still hasn't happened yet though.

Sigh. I was still holding on to the pipedream of a trial late this year, with a not guilty verdict that came just in time for him to get stuck in to pre-season training. It's hard to see how this can end any other way than as a bummer now from an MFC point of view. Sigh. Suppose we can just hope that the best thing happens for Liam and the people of Yuendumu now. I won't pretend to have a clue what that might be. Sigh.

I'd love to see Jamar line up in the development league purely for the novelty factor. Thanks for the update on Evans KC. Was really hoping he'd build up some steam at the end of the season, but not to be.

Yessssssss, Bate in! Can't wait to see how he goes. I am so, so bored with this season. Will watch this week out of respect for Green.