Fat Tony

I reckon we were lucky Schache didn't get a free in the third quarter of the GF when Brayshaw steamrolled him.

We were never going to win this trade. Jackson is a star and Freo had no incentive to offer more than 70 cents in the dollar.

I have a Bulldog's friend who is an excellent judge of football and Hunter is his whipping boy for his kicking. I hope if we get Hunter that we play our wingers so they on their preferred side towards the boundary. Langdon kicks a lot out on the full on his left side. Hunter is not a defensive wingman, so we would need to adjust our game plan to be more willing to attack along both wings.

Funny, I think he is quicker than you suggest and a bit of a butcher by foot. That said, he is true winger and left footer, which helps. He is also pretty tough.

Could it be a swap for Tomlinson to reduce pressure off the salary cap?

Fitness dependent, I could see us being interested. He’s a true winger and a left sided one at that.

Bruce usually kicks a bag when Melbourne are playing so hopefully that pattern holds.

#13 & #27 for Grundy & #16 would sound reasonable. It will be linked to how much of Grundy's contract we agree to pay, which is the key thing in my mind. And we would be a good chance to get the same player at #16 or #13 anyway. (We are unlikely to get a gun KFP there anyway in this draft.) We will obviously do the sums and put a value on picks versus cap space. We might get a future pick back as well.

Crossley looks about 120kgs in the VFL.

Isn’t Henry out of contract?

There was a false rumour floated by Clarry's management two years ago that he wanted to go to Carlton. This was purely a negotiating tool in order to boost Oliver's future contract. This could be a similar situation here with Pickett.

It’s a fake Twitter account rumour.

Thomas looked like he could be Shaun Burgoyne 2.0 in 2021 and kicked 24.17 and averaged 18 possessions. This year he was hopeless and looked mentally all over the shop. He definitely has the potential be a good pick up and suites our needs well.

Weideman kicked 13 goals from 10 games (including one in the ruck against Adelaide and two as second ruck against Hawthorn and Brisbane) and was similarly effective to Brown in terms of scoring as a forward. Weideman is considered hopeless on Demonland while Brown is hailed as a champion. Both these players need to average 2.5 goals per game to be accretive because they are both hopeless on the deck and offer little pressure.

Ben Brown did not CARRY our forward line. 30 goals from 19 goals from a full forward in a team that averaged 56.4 inside 50s per game (3rd in the comp) is ordinary at best. Personally, I think Melksham did an excellent job keeping his man out of the contest when we only had one tall (plus Jackson/Gawn). The delivery and ball movement needs to be changed next year, but IMO Brown is just not strong enough and I doubt he plays more than 10 more games for MFC. Games Average Goals Bayley Fritsch 2.29 Kysaiah Pickett 1.78 Tom McDonald 1.67 Ben Brown 1.58 Sam Weideman 1.3 Jake Melksham 1.09 Christian Petracca 0.79 Max Gawn 0.59 Ed Langdon 0.57 James Harmes 0.57 Toby Bedford 0.56 Luke Jackson 0.5 Charlie Spargo 0.42 Alex Neal-Bullen 0.39 Jack Viney 0.36 James Jordon 0.32 Tom Sparrow 0.3 Clayton Oliver 0.22 Jake Bowey 0.12 Trent Rivers 0.11 Angus Brayshaw 0.08 Christian Salem 0.08 Harrison Petty 0.06 Jake Lever 0.05

I expect Hunt will be a similar player in 3 years. He is only 27. It is not a huge risk IMO. I like Hunt more than others around here.

I think Jackson is worth more than #1, but given we will only get 80 cents on the dollar here, I would have the Lachie Neale to Lions as the benchmark for the trade. The Lions gave up picks #6, #19 and #55 while receiving Neale and #30. This valued Neale at #3 in points. Freo's 2x first rounders is about worth roughly #3-4 in points. I would prefer we went for #14, North's pick #20 (for Logue), F2 & F3.

Just taking this marriage one week at a time!

Rivers definitely has the speed required. I think if the bench goes to 5 next year, we could potentially play him on a wing for 60% of game time. (The average would be 78%.)

I wonder if Rivers has the right attributes to move onto the wing? Endurance would be the big issue I think.

Is there a club out there looking for a forward/second ruck?

Great post. I would also add that I expect our salary cap must already be tight. And secondly, Geelong and Melbourne have shown that you don’t need high picks to find talent in the draft. Pick 7 might get us the player ranked 5 on our draft board, while pick 32 might net us the player ranked 15. Lastly, the value of picks is not as important as salary cap space. We picked the best player in the 2019 draft and are about to lose him well before his prime for less than we paid for him.

I think the player he is most like is Jacob Weitering.

Bowey should do a preseason as a forward to learn the running patterns of Spargo and ANB. He’s clever enough to go back to half back if required.

Our small forwards are ordinary apart from Kossie. We definitely could improve that part of our list. Another winger would also be desirable.