BLWNBA

Sure, but the club didn’t want to retain either player for this season. I’m not sure I’d say it was necessarily ‘mutual’ per se, but let’s not pretend that Petracca and Oliver ‘walked out’ to the dismay of the current coaching panel and administration. The fact that we let Oliver go for a third rounder should tell you all you need to know. I don’t think anyone is under any illusions as to where and how competitive we’ll be. Personally I don’t really subscribe to the whole ‘MFC vendetta’ thing that gets peddled on here constantly (not necessarily saying you do either), but overall the bulk of reporting on us has been pretty complementary. Even if we are uncompetitive, I would expect a fair bit of latitude especially with a new coach; I think it’s pretty well accepted we could be bottom 4 - 6.

I couldn’t even get the app to load on my iPhone. Gave up in the end. No issue all day, but had problems at the same time as you.

If Petracca and Oliver were at Melbourne this year, we’d be going even further back. The side was well and truly past the performances of 2021 and our issues would only be compounded by the introduction of Tasmania.

I've posted on his brother before, the below is from November 2025: "[A]t this stage he’s a bit of a unicorn. He’ll be in Year 11 next year and he’s already measuring in at 200cm, he’s grown around 4 - 5 cms this season and he’s been playing as a winger and mid. He’s a raw talent, but exceptionally athletically gifted, though he’ll need to work on his craft over the next couple of seasons. That being said, I’ve heard him first-handedly described as “elite for his age” and that “he’ll play AFL” (verbatim) by a couple of people who work in the Haileybury footy department."

Yes, it is. Overly sensitive fanboys who want to put their head in the sand.

That's very fair and I agree, I'm not trying to dismiss that either. Appreciate that is likely not clear from my post.

Agree, it was and still is a pretty perplexing move at the time, IMO. I'm a pretty big believer in Taylor but I still don't understand the need to reach for Tholstrup like we did. From memory we moved Pick 18 (I stand to be corrected on that - memory could be off on that one) into Pick 13 for a player that was widely tipped to still be there at our original pick. On top of that, Tholstrup's output and lack of development is a concern. I don't think he exhibits anything of note and he's lacking in many areas. His kicking is relatively poor and he really struggles to insert himself to games. I also find it staggering that we extended his contract out to the end of 2028; personally I don't see him being on any AFL list post expiration of his current contract with us. There's many people on here who don't agree with this assessment, I definitely expect to receive some contrary replies to this but I just don't see anything in him - even with a player such as Jefferson, I've seen a few things to suggest that there's something to work with, but sadly I've essentially written Kolt off.

I agree to a point and I'll openly say I'm not as negative as some about the potential role that Steele will play for us. But I would say I think we're in big trouble if Viney is still in our weekly best 23 at the end of this season.

@picket fence this is the content I come to DL for.

Inboxed.

If we're looking to show incremental improvement and use next season as a building block for success, Viney shouldn't be a walk up start by the end of next year. It would be somewhat disappointing if some of the younger brigade haven't pushed him out of the side.

The Club was never going to come out initially and say that Petracca and Oliver wouldn't be at the club, but common sense long pointed to both players being moved on. Contextually, no reasonable person would take this types of claim seriously. Sure it may be a form of puffery, a 'smokescreen' if you will, but to the common punter this is hardly deceptive or overpromising; it's potentially an exaggerated opinion in the face of impending trades but that's merely a convention in the AFL landscape. I'm not adverse to criticising the board and I think there have been severe and ongoing failures, but this specific line of reasoning is just childish.

It doesn’t take much to see that resigning for what it was; a puerile attempt from a desperate club trying to the move the needle.

When Freo Recruit Made the Call to Leave the Dees (SEN) “Then, in my final year in 2025 I got halfway through the year and decided to pack up and come home. … Freo presented very well to me, I saw the opportunity and thought I’d definitely take it.”

I was being facetious, you know he hasn’t been brought in as a key position defender though, yeah? That’s not the role he’ll be playing.

Multitude of reasoning can go into it, but there are list management benefits including being able to be placed on a one year contract and the payments being significantly lower for a rookie listed player. We're in a pretty precarious position regarding financials, so that may have been a partial consideration given Kalani was tipped by most to be a rookie selection and he's probably more of a 'project' at the moment, or at least a selection based on potential rather than a hard baseline of performance (i.e., think the majority of first and second round selections). I would definitely temper expectations; I think a few on here may have gotten ahead of themselves and some of it is due to the romance of the White name that's synonymous with Jeff.

From footage I've seen it's pretty spectacular, but I'd contextualise this against the backdrop of it occurring against other schoolboys, so it can be hard to get a good read. From memory he was a state combine attendee, I'd be interested to see his results against others (may have a quick Google later).

Pleased we've been able to get him, but I think he's the most speculative and long-term of our additions this year. I'll definitely be interested to see where he slots in during training and what line-group he's seemingly training with. I'm agnostic at this stage on whether he'll become a success story like Jack Viney, or if he'll be relegated to the Kynan Brown and Taj Woewodin pile. He's got some great attributes but we'll need to be patient with this one, though I think for Kalani's sake he's come in at an ideal time to learn and develop.

In terms of the Dovaston / Pickett debate, from Melbourne's perspective it was always going to be Pickett over Dovaston.

Taylor/Pickett would've been highly likely, I think.

I too, will give myself a shameless re-post, inspired by @rpfc and @JJJ

This is completely fair, he was well and truly in the sights of both North and GWS by all reports, with picks that were merely 3 and 4 picks later than our Pick 12. It's a pretty big overreaction by some to say he wasn't worthy of Pick 12.

I haven't paid a heap of attention to the whole draft class this year, at least outside of the individuals I've been interested in so my views are likely somewhat limited. But I agree with most of your comments on Ludowyke; you'd be selecting him on potential, but I don't really have any qualms on that and realistically, that's what we've taken L Pickett on too. Sometimes you can become a benefactor of circumstance and while it's unlucky for Ludowyke that he was injured and slid, it could really put us in a good place, especially given there are questions on the development of Jefferson and Kenterfield is still unproven. Hibbins-Hargreaves is a player I've liked all the way through. Similar to Ludowyke, he's a bit of a pick on potential, but his versatility and class is something that could really add to the Melbourne team. I think he could become a strong distributor for us into the forward 50, and he's also able to hit the scoreboard. Ideally, he could become the ANB replacement we're really missing and his conversion rate on shots at goal went at 82% this year, another area we've struggled in. Greeves looks good on paper and he clearly has a nice pedigree to him, but I'm a bit reticent as I think the game is moving past those traditional big-bodied mids. Yes, you still need an extractor at the ball, but look how we struggled with spread and transition since 2022 with Oliver, Viney and Petracca all in the side. Some of the knocks on Greeves also relate to his two way running, general running capacity, defensive spread and attitude towards defensive work rate have been questioned. I agree with your point about next years draft too, it's a good opportunity to pick up two mids. We're still going to be hunting Humphrey next year too, so lets not discount that as a potential acquisition which will require some clever maneuvering capital wise, if we're successful.