Fat Tony

Chandler played well all season and will be an AFL player if he can get strong enough. Turner looks like he could take the next step, which could give us the option to play Petty forward. I though Smith was average yesterday but he has such great athleticism that I want to see him given the chance to take Hibberd's spot. Van Rooyen will be a very good AFL player. Howes had a very quiet grand final but I have seen a lot of the VFL this year and I reckon he is very classy. I would like to see him become stronger and it would be nice to see a bit more desperation at times. Woewodin looks classy but will need to be very strong to play AFL given his pace is average. Laurie does not show enough AFL traits for mine. He is a very clever and skilled player but lacks pace and size. I think Spargo will be better. Bedford was good, but I like Chandler more.

Anyone else dirty they WON seats in the ballot this year?

Yes agreed, but we don’t need to chew up $3.5m of future salary cap space.

Could it work? Sure. We would be a contender with Grundy and we would obviously be better placed with him on our list than without him. Does is it the best move to maximise our chances of winning flags? I doubt it. We certainly improve our ruck position for 25% of the game but our forward line becomes clunky for 60% of the game. I think we would be better off setting up defensively at stoppages when Gawn is resting and picking up a player like Gunston or Henry to boost our forward line.

It must be relatively tight though given our list and the Petracca and Oliver contracts.

Stuart McGill was one of the top 5 spinners Australia has ever produced but it rarely made sense to pick him in the test team alongside Warnie. We would be better off allocating our salary cap space elsewhere to improve our forward line.

North will get a swag of Priority Picks.

To be fair, RL, the Lions kids are Father Sons and not due to the academy system. And the lions did miss out on Marc Murphy. It is just the luck of the draw and at least they will pay 80 cents in the dollar unlike the Cats for Ablett, Hawkins and Scarlett.

It’s more about the salary cap space and the fit when both are on the field IMO than the draft picks. There’s no way Gawn or Grundy play in a 7 man defence. That would mean completely giving up on a forward half game.

He has kicked only 60 goals in 177 games. He’s a very good player - in the ruck. But he’s not a good forward. And we already have a great ruckman who is an average key forward. Grundy or Gawn will be in the forward line for 60% of the game.

A fit Grundy is probably a top 30 player in the competition but we are the one club in the afl that could add him to our list and not get any improvement to our best 22. Is a Gawn/Grundy pairing better than Gawn/TMac? Definitely better in the ruck but definitely worse resting forward.

Surely North would take him in the PSD.

He’s only going to get half the money as Harmes. He reminds me of Kamden McIntosh.

How did Chandler miss out?

I wonder why we aren’t interested in Blake Acres? I can’t see why Freo are willing to part with him. He had a good season and played well in finals on the wing.

It was a wasted year because we failed to win the flag. But I think it was particularly disappointing because we had few injuries and didn’t give ourselves the best chance. We tried to repeat last year too much and didn’t look to evolve and improve, believing we had the right blueprint. In a parallel universe we are favourites for the flag in the preliminary finals right now.

I think we would prefer to give up a much higher pick and keep the cap space. Cap space is more valuable than picks in the age of free agency.

My theories: Our list has a lot of ordinary kicks. We only have one true winger. Our forwards are either hopeless in the air (Spargo and ANB) or hopeless on the deck (Brown). The MCG favours players who are less one dimensional.

I expect Van Rooyen to play mostly in the AFL next year. But I just think it’s a tough ask for a developing tall to play key forward for a contender. The backline is much easier for young key position players. Neitz and TMac are examples of talls who started off in defence and built sufficient strength over the years to play at the other end. Petty to the forward line would lessen the backline, but it could be only marginally if Turner or Van Rooyen or Smith improve. I just think Petty might be a much better forward than Van Rooyen next season.

Ben Brown was ineffective with TMac in the side. We had 14 matches to throw Petty forward and it took until the last 3 minutes when the season was finished to try it. We clearly didn’t do enough experimentation.

Where do Grundy or Gawn play? (I’m not in favour of Grundy but it sounds likely.)

Why did you chop off the back end of my sentence. I said: If Petty moves forward, Turner, Smith or Van Rooyen will play back.

We might have beaten Sydney the week before if we had have done that!

If we get Grundy and TMac comes back in next year, there is one more spot left which goes to Ben Brown, Van Rooyen, Petty, Weideman or Cadman*. (I think TMac’s value has risen in his absence because he is good in the air and on the deck and not a pressure valve.) Personally, I think the case to at least try Petty forward is pretty good. If Petty moves forward, Turner, Smith or Van Rooyen will play back. Van Rooyen will still get benefits from this year even if we switch him back.

We were spoiled from midfield and centre clearance dominance in the finals last year. This led to hubris, with the coaches believing that the rest of the game plan was not vulnerable and so we did not evolve it. We needed to experiment with tactics and players prior to the last 3 minutes of the season.