Demon Disciple

He'd also be a huge risk, with his knee still having a big '?' over it

Absolutely Hawthorn could afford it. Franklin leaving has left them with a massive amount of cap space.

What's brave of him is that he has actually made a decision. Whether or not it proves to be the correct one won't be known for a couple of years.

Only a fool would think Freo won't try and convince him to play for them in 2015. If that is the case, and it came to fruition, Freo should be made to give something of relative equivalent value for him. But i doubt Mitch would contemplate playing for another team in the near future.

If Frawley were to go, i'd be definitely trying to bring in a quality young KPD one way or the other. Now that Mitch has gone, we'll need another KPF.

The only thing Perth has over Melbourne is its beaches, but he can go over and enjoy those during his summer vacation!

Sure, lots of cap space, but just because we will have it, doesn't mean the likes of Chip should be getting $800k.

If Frawley really wanted to stay at Melbourne and really cared about our plight and strengthening our club, he'd take the minimum amount acceptable and reasonable, so that we could throw that extra money at trying to land another good player to help improve the team (not waste it on just trying to keep him). If $500,000 is his market value and a fair offer, he would want to accept it. Not be extremely selfish and try to bleed as much out of the club as possible. If he holds us to ransom and wants something way more than he is worth or has rightly earned, then we should have the balls to wish him the best of luck at another club without a second thought. Because it would be the best thing overall for the MFC. When i think of someone who gives his all for the MFC, my mind would go to Nathan Jones a million times before it would ever go to Frawley.

And if my team was in serious premiership contention for the next few years, but needed to fix up their backline a bit, i'd pay that for him too. The question is, how much are you willing to pay to win a premiership? I'd just about sell my soul, as we have been starved for even the smallest of successes for so long. It's just that we are so far off that stage, we cannot / should not pay that amount for him, because he alone will not fix our problems.

I agree, Frawley is playing Chicken with the MFC. Will we call his bluff? For the immediate future, if Frawley goes it would be worse than if he stayed. But if (massive if) we drafted/traded correctly, we could come out ahead in a couple of years time, than if he stays. I'd much rather take 1 step back now, if it meant taking 2 steps forward immediately after that step back (and we maintained that advantage). Not 1 step back followed by 2 steps forward then 2-3 steps back. But an overall gain, so long as it doesn't take ages to get here or that it never gets here at all. But that cannot be 100% guaranteed, even if you are a club that isn't as inept as one like ours. If losing Frawley means another top 2-3 pick, i'd take that every day of the week, because he simply doesn't do the basic things that he should be doing every game (none of our list does).

Have to agree with you Fat Tony. Frawley, as important to our backline as he is, is not worth the money he is commanding, and a top 5 pick, let alone the 2nd pick, would be overs for him. If we were to end up with a couple of very high drat picks and also a PP, which the AFL definitely owes us, we have to go about doing trades like the Dom Tyson one. I don't mind keeping one high pick, but we can't solely rely on the draft. We need to bring in as much young talent as we can. If that's swapping a high pick for a good player and a lower high pick, then i'm all for it. But i think 2009 alone shows that bringing in 100% of the new players' through the draft is as irresponsible as it is reckless. Especially given our draft record.

He's one of the few who might have decent currency on the trade table. Not only that, it would send a huge message to those who remain on the list after our much needed end of year cull, that no-one is safe, not even the captain.

I hope it means that the MFC won't tolerate sub-par performances for the next 3 years, guaranteed. PJ and PR should apply the blowtorch to the whole playing group and see who makes it out the other end.

Yep all mentally weak. At the first sign of adversity, they'd go to water. The good thing is they are off our list, the bad thing is, many more need to go. Give me players' that give a [censored] about the results rather than whether or not their bank payments made it through on time. Well given Demetriou gave the reason that our senior players that were injured would see us rise, and they haven't even got on the park yet, whilst also using that same excuse with our u18 selection in Hogan, who also hasn't got on the park. I feel that not only should they owe us last years PP (end of first round PP), they need to give us one for this year (before first round PP). That would leave us with picks 1(PP), 2, 22ish (PP - factoring in other compo picks) and pick 23 (2nd round pick). Fantastic isn't it, talking draft picks at April! Though i did predict this cycle of pre-season excitement followed by reality setting in again early, followed by months of talking draft and trade. Don't know the depth of this years draft, but do know the quality of talls might make some clubs desperate to trade for them. Would rather make similar Dom Tyson type trades like last year, as opposed to going down the all draft route (ala 2009). Bring in as much quality as we can for next year, not 2018ish (we might not be around then). Keep one of pick 1 or 2 for the draft, unless a really good deal comes up, then try and bring in quality young kids from other sides like we did with Tyson with the rest of our picks. No club is going to trade for our scraps.

You list these 3, yet not Wright. He can play both ruck and KPF, something we seem to need more depth in. That and he seems a possibility for being the #1 pick, which we seem to be firming rapidly for.

We can only hope that this will be the case. That our situation is so dire, if they leave before we really get our house in order, it will look like they are abandoning the ship and their reputations might take a hit.

Agree that one way or another, we need a definitive answer from Mitch about his future, sooner rather than later, so we are able to plan for our future either way. It's totally up to Mitch and i bear him no ill will no matter his decision and that's the way it should be. But no one person is bigger than the footy club, so if he no longer wants to be an AFL footballer, better to act on it now, rather than drag it out. As it would do more harm than good to not only the club, but Mitch as well.

Top 2 pick! Who are we going to finish above? As for all those who say that Toumpas over Wines was the biggest mistake we made in years, come back to reality. A mistake, yeah probably. But had we drafted Wines over Toumpas, i'd dare say you'd be saying the same thing, just the other way around. Wines would be nothing like he is now, if he were drafted by the MFC. It's amazing how good a player develops when in a proper team, as opposed to a club that just sucks the life out of the young players'. Picking the right talent is half the battle, development is the other half. Development would be even greater (60/40) with picking the right talent, because a lot of players around pick 4 clearly have talent. It's how that talent is developed which results in their on-field status.

Totally agree. Talk is cheap, actions bring about results. PJ asked the many who were still to sign up to give the MFC another chance. Well the game against West Coast would have put a nail in that coffin. Our leaders need to stand up and lead from the front. Since we have none on the field, off-field is the only place where we can turn to. Our CEO and coach are going to be the one's who will need to push this sh!theap uphill for the foreseeable future. They continually say it is not going to be an easy and short fix. Well, lets start with locking in our leaders for the short-medium term, so the real heroes of our footy club (the members) are not alone in our fight to keep this club alive, then maybe one day thrive (maybe).

Sure Schwab and Connolly really did a number on us, but come on, the on-field performances need to be held accountable by those who can affect it. We have a whole new coaching group in place, the only other thing that can change is the one thing that seems to have been held blameless throughout this whole deplorable affair (the playing list). We need to seriously turnover a quarter of our list (bare minimum) at the end of this year, and do the same for the next 3-4 years. Drop Grimes and keep Trengove in the 2's until they earn a re-call after several consecutive good performances, and put it in no uncertain terms that their careers are on the line. If i was the coach, i would tell a good 10-15 players (who we all know should be de-listed) that come years end, their careers at the MFC are over unless they can prove otherwise. We have few untouchables, but we'd need to plead with them to sign contract extensions and pay above market value. The rest should be told that their future's at the MFC cannot be guaranteed, and those who want out will be put on the trade table, whilst those who may want to stay will still be shopped. I'm so f&$@ing sick and tired of our playing group as a whole, putting in less than their all just about every week. For too long, they have gotten away with it. Previous management were too busy trying to run their own personal agendas to give a [censored] about it. With competent management and coaching now in place (i hope), we need to get ruthless, not nurturing little boys. This is a man's game, time to step up or ship out. I'd rather 18 Jack Viney's over 18 Jack Watts's any day of the week, because then i'd know that each loss would not only hurt, but it would be unacceptable. And something might actually be done about it.

A pet hate of mine, is when a forward entry is too deep in to the forward line, allowing the back-men to easily force it through for a behind. Plonk the ball 25m out and watch the back-men [censored] themselves. Get a big body to crash the pack (Pederson, all he would be good for), then get the crumbers to rove the ball. Simple? absolutely. Will it be effective? more than what we have got going at the moment, and good enough until we get some forwards back in to the fray.

Forward line or none, every game we name 6 players to take the field in the forward line. Why don't we keep a couple of them there? Then maybe, just maybe, we might have options to kick to (tall or small). If tall we can risk a high kick in now and then, if small, well these are meant to be AFL players who are earning an AFL wage, let's see some skill for a change and have them hit targets (ain't that bloody hard, it's done in high school grade footy). No quality talls? That's ok. Put Pederson in the forward line, sure he's just about as good as a tree, but he's as big as one too. I don't expect him to mark the ball, but bring it to ground, where our smalls can crumb. Footy is not a hard sport to figure out, plus with our lot at the MFC it needs to be as simple as possible. I'd rather a quick kick to the forward line that results in a turnover, than trying to play keepings off and it resulting in a turnover in the midfield or most likely, the half back line. No point having a sh!tload of the ball, if you don't do anything with it.

Ahh, i remember reading this well. It wasn't Emma Quayle who said this (it might have been in her article). It was in fact a recruiter who didn't want his identity to be revealed who said explosions would happen. Don't know if that makes it better or worse. I also remember reading a poster say that he spoke to Neeld, some-time pre-draft, and that the MFC (coach and recruiting team i guess) didn't rate Wines in the top 4. WHOOPS.

i like what we did in the Tyson trade. We didn't bring in an absolute new kid, but one that had a couple of seasons under his belt, so he could go just about straight away.

Frawley will be 26 this year. Anyone who thinks we will be seriously contending in another 4 years is kidding themselves. So before we are even a real chance at hopefully winning a flag, he will be 30 years old, or entering the twilight of his career. This is not a "get good pick for him whilst we can" type thread, look where we ended up on that basis. Rather, it is more an optimistic viewpoint if he goes. Should he go, one would think that we would get band 1 compensation, or straight after our first round pick. We could look to the draft (one that is strong on talls) and replace him with a young KPD (maybe one with good disposal), or we could do a Dom Tyson type trade, and get a good player plus a high pick in return for him. My preference is for Frawley to stay, but he is also a too regular culprit of picking when to put in 100% and when not too. If he goes, we'll get over it (it may make us a better team in the long run...............i know, i know - long run), if he stays, we keep a good KPD, one who at the moment thinks he is better than what he is and who also needs a serious change in attitude. I guess, what i'm trying to say is, we should not break the bank in trying to keep him, because at the moment, just about everyone on our list is expendable. Maybe it's time the players' truly started to understand this.