Adam The God

I still believe we told him to explore his options and didn't offer him a contract. We probably told him he'd be on the fringe and be on minimum dollars, playing some time at Casey and despite not wanting to leave, Frosty had no alternative but to explore his options. Hawthorn have probably said, yep, we'll take you on. We like your dash and we need some defensive reinforcement, and we'll back ourselves in to use your attributes for good.

Yep, you could well be right, mate, but he must have known he'd be asked about Langdon, Tomlinson and Elliott. The three guys we've clearly been linked to throughout this period. He'd have had mapped out responses to these questions and there's no reason for him to provide any information that we don't want out there. Say what you like about Mahoney (most of it completely uninformed), but he's a very well regarded figure in the industry. We had an unacceptable 2019, but he's earned my trust as a supporter by landing the two biggest traded recruits on the market, two years running. What's also notable is that in that time, the club hasn't leaked and has only come clean once Lever and May were clearly committed to us. Now perhaps there's further politicking at play in this situation (ie. an ulterior strategy for coming out and discussing the Elliott trade in any detail at all), but if not, I think there's a reason to be still optimistic about us landing Elliott.

Anything that enables you to [censored] on the club. Let's bookmark this shall we? Let's bet that Frost won't earn another contract at Hawthorn. They're desperately fishing and it says more about them than us to be honest.

I can't think of a single time Mahoney has come out and said anything about a player we've been targeting without them already being on board. We don't tend to release who we're going after, despite often going fishing (contrary to the seeming Demonland belief that we rarely have a crack at players). The fact we have mentioned Elliott this time, leads me to deduce that he's already committed to us. Clearly not contractually, but probably verbally. It doesn't look good if you come out and do a North and then not land the player. Of course that happens from time to time, but as Andy suggests, optics are important. To managers and to clubs. It could be wishful thinking, but it reminds me of Judd touring our facilities before he came back from the West. Was already signed, sealed and delivered by all reports, but he still went through the facade of touring the facilities, if for nothing else, ego. I'm not suggesting that Elliott's is necessarily about ego, but that could come into it. I reckon it's between Collingwood and Melbourne, and we're in the box seat unless they up their offer and he does a backflip. Yes, this is all compete speculation.

Please don't tell us how you know that, mate.

Thanks, Rock Spider.

Yuck. I hope not.

I reckon he decided on us a few weeks ago.

I completely agree that we didn't apply pressure in our forwardline. I think AVB and Hannan not being there were big reasons for this, as well as the obvious one, fitness.

Jones is far too slow to play the forward pressure role. Teams would set up rebounds off him every time. I think Jones' go since he's got another year, is playing the kicker role and setting up off half back. He's not a great kick, but at least he might be able to help Lever and May direct from the back a bit. Viney as the small forward, I can definitely get behind.

I like the idea of only replacing them with AFL level B or A grade talent. Until we can do that, we should be playing a forward system that is built around the B graders we have in McDonald, Melksham, Fritsch and on his day, Hannan. I'd hope that if we get all those guys working in tandem well, one or two might elevate to A grade levels over the course of a confidence-building season.

The OP is definitely implying both cases are the same, yet one is draft assistance and the other is FA compensation. It's not apples with apples.

I agree, but I probably also would have said the same thing about Tom McDonald forward.

Gobsmacked that Frosty has 48 pages on Demonland dedicated to mostly posters jumping up and down about losing the next saviour.

I know the FD have come out and allegedly said Oscar will play back next year, but I wonder if it's worth playing him forward. So it's Petty, Weideman and Oscar all playing for that forward spot. If we have injuries to our back half, they could all play for a spot back there too. It's all about system. Get the bloody forward system right and we'll be a much, much better side.

See, it's a bloody good 22. No need to complain.

Why don't you do us up a best 22 then mate? You don't have to include Oscar.

You have absolutely no idea what our club negotiated with the AFL Commission a few weeks ago. Be a little more logical and have a think about why we might have gone quiet RE: GCS' priority pick.

Eh? How is Newnes a fall back for Elliott?

And struggled on a forward flank or in a pocket early in his career. Was good off half back in his first year mind you. Don't get me wrong. I love Gus, but I'm wondering how we can diversify our engine room.

And just like Brayshaw I'm afraid. Which is exactly why I don't think we should be afraid of trading one or two of our mids until we get more balance and versitility. The only untradeable for me is Oliver, who is so clearly the best talent at Melbourne in 30+ years. If it's Viney, Oliver and Harmes, then Gus probably has to go. Harmes offers goals and accountability. Anyway, let's wait and see. It's pretty obvious the club won't try anything too bold like trading Jack or Gus regardless.

Gee, you can tell BP was doing his scouting based on Demonland. Scary.

Yep, this is the thing that worries me most about next year. I like that we've pulled the trigger on Richo though. Hopefully a different approach to the same message of work rate. Even simply changing a few coaches could get us a result, given that it may feel like a new approach and game style, despite it coming from essentially the same place (Goodwin). What else were they going to say? You didn't really expect the club to come out and say, 'nope, we're stuffed for this year and we won't turn it around. Oh and don't bother coming to games, members'. No club would say anything different. I do agree that Goodwin has a very short time to right this ship though. If we're thereabouts for 2020, he'll last the year and it'll be touch and go whether we look elsewhere for 2021. But we'd have to make finals and probably win one for Goodwin to be absolutely safe.

He'll come to us.

You'd think so, but without knowing the absolute in and out of it all, it's a bit futile to speculate.