Little Goffy

Great site for checking records, the season summaries are especially clear - http://afltables.com/afl/afl_index.html I wonder if Hogan and Garlett are having any friendly competition about end of season tally? Right now they are tied on 32 - the last time we had a tie it was Neitz and Farmer on 30 apiece in 1997. I am very comfortable with Hogan/Garlett evoking thoughts of Neitz/Farmer! Now, who will be our modernised Robbo? [starts scouring phantom drafts]

Wow, it has really been that long. I have vivid memories of games against North many years ago, as far back as the Daniher years, where everything seemed to be in our favour but somehow we just couldn't win. A lot of the time it came down to their 'really tall talls', who on the day would just be able to clunk marks and kick straight. It troubles me a little that we are still a bit light-on for genuinely tall defenders (unless Fitzpatrick or Oscar comes along very quickly). That said, the last time we beat them Nathan Thompson kicked seven, put them in front but then had to drag himself to the bench for a chunk of the final quarter, exhausted. As much as we won that game in the final minutes, I'm hoping this time we have something better than "wait until their key forward has worn himself out from kicking so many goals".

There's an interesting element that most of the teams on our fixture (North, Footscray, Carlton, GWS) have been a bit up and down this season, even where they are clearly better performing overall. North are famously flaky this season. We beat the Doggies within a few weeks of them hammering Sydney at the SCG. The Giants are crazily up and down. A real roller-coaster ride for their fan. Carlton... vary between 'awful and disinterested' and 'awful, but making an effort'. Of course, all that really matters is if the version of Demons that beat Richmond, the Bulldogs, Geelong and Collingwood turns up. With that team on the field, I'd give us a chance of going 4 from 5! Realistically, two wins and a draw would give us enough to feel positive going into the pre-season and make 2015 our equal best season since 2006. I'd take that as our reasonable 'over-under' measure for satisfaction.

What few people realise is that when Jeff Garlett takes a mark and handballs it off, he is actually performing the traditional 'opening a laptop and reaching for the mouse' dance. I did the traditional dance of 'being gobsmacked' when I heard some idiot commentator describe it is an aeroplane dance. Maybe we need to get Bangarra Dance down to the club and help them present a quick primer for fans; a 'common symbolism in Aboriginal Dance' video. Could be fun. Better than Mr T.

P-Man, have you even been to a Swans game and heard the opposition crowd doing it? It is unprecedented. I've not heard booing that intense or sustained in my entire life, in any sport. Every time he so much as got a quick handball on the wing, the booing was like someone had just dived for a free, got a bonus 50 meter penalty and the shot on goal put the away team in front, in Perth. It is sick.

Sigh. I just... it gets so tedious. Let's try again. Dear Hypothetical Person at the heart of the campaign to direct a completely unprecedented sustained booing against double-brownlow winner, premiership captain and champion of the game Adam Goodes, - You boo Goodes for 'reasons'. Sure, they're trumped up hype-driven and in several aspects totally incorrect, but still 'reasons'. - Now make a list of players who meet all the same kinds of 'reasons' and have been even more pretentiously political. You don't boo any of them by half the measure. - The difference is that Goodes barked back at racist dogs and you are 'offended' by that because you're emotionally invested in a myth that Australia has no stain of genocide and that Aboriginal people weren't/aren't subject to sustained personal and practical harassment and discrimination. - So, you insist that Goodes is a 'sook' and is totally out of line to do such horrible things like suggest that 'Australia Day', the celebration of the British declaring possession of the continent, kind of means something awful to Indigenous Australians. I'm sure you have lots of Aboriginal friends etc etc blah blah. But would they still be your friends if they 'offended' you by daring to stand firm against your dismissals of stolen generations, genocide, invasion, disenfranchisement, relocation, harassment and discrimination? Would you call them 'sooks' and 'ungrateful for everything we gave you'? Would you tell them that their own lived experiences 'didn't really happen like that'? Do you think your kids have a right to abuse them at the football and not be asked to leave? In short, do Aboriginal people have to keep their mouth shut and put up with whatever you want to say about their own history and lives, in order for you to accept them? Yes, that's racist. A special kind of racism wrapped up in a kind of half-arsed patriotism and easily wounded ego. And now you are part of making a champion of the game the most booed player in the history of Australian Football, and the football community is facing at the prospect of seeing this rare and brilliant 300+ game player being the first player ever booed as they leave the field on retirement. You bring shame upon our game in a way that will be recorded as one of the most drearily disappointing moments in its history. Take a good hard look in the mirror and decide whether you want to be a part of that.

Add James Frawley, of course. I'll never like when players leave the club, but so far we've done pretty well out of it overall. Just wish we'd been able to trade Moloney and Rivers (even to the same destination) instead of the ignominious walk-outs.

Was an interesting one. Barely a second of it... but enough to get the Collingwood cheer squad booing him. Then again, the Collingwood cheer squad were booing the outrageous free kick disparity... 15-8 in their favour at one point.

Nicely done. Also... Ha ha ha ha ha ha! Eat it, Magpies, you're not playing any finals this year. SEASON. OVER.

Gee, seems like Watts was thrown back to help stem a crisis and his calmness is probably the reason we;re still in front at 3/4 time. I doubt I'm alone in being troubled by our consistent pattern of fading late in quarters. Makes me nervous about the final quarter, but, we are in front and coulda/shoulda been further in front. Gotta take our chances, have to attack with confidence when we're up. Its a bit of a test of the coaches as well as the players.

The AFL website "Inquirer" ran an article this week about the biggest movers in terms of individual and team statistics. http://www.afl.com.au/news/2015-07-31/the-inquirer-drop-offs-and-turnarounds What it confirmed about Melbourne is something that we all know - our center clearances have become a disaster. We've gone from a highly respectable ranking of 6th best to being outright last in 18th. This to me is pointing to our lack of potency among our best midfielders, and is actually starting to make me turn towards believing that recruiting a true 'top level' midfielder may be the way to go, despite my general preference for assembling at least a competitive best 22 first. I was wondering what other people thought, especially since I haven't had many chances to watch games properly lately. - Where is the deficiency coming from? Is it just form? Tactics? Simple inadequacy? - What should be done to correct this pretty decisive problem?

Collingwood are on their longest losing streak since they tanked, in 2005. I have every confidence that we can pull off a 'miraculous' win just like the Kangaroos did back then. It was incredible! The 'Roos managed to kick seven goals in the final quarter after just 8 total for the rest of the game, to win by just one goal! More materially, if Collingwood lose to us, it just about ends their finals chances. They would need to pick up at least one win on ALL THREE of North, Geelong and Western Sydney. North play Carlton and Geelong play Brisbane, so expect Collingwood to be two wins behind two teams by the end of the round. So if we win, I will laugh and laugh and laugh, because even in the darkest times we would have ended Collingwood's season.

Sigh. You're calling Goodes untouchable and a protected species because people are objecting to the fact he has been singled out for mass harassment? I wonder how many ways this can be explained... Booing Goodes isn't racist. Not booing about a hundred other players who meet all the same 'valid reasons' people claim to have for booing Goodes... that is racist. Let's see how it goes if a bunch of people get together and start booing Gary Ablett Jn every time he touches the ball, on account of the string of 'Jesus made me special and loves me' articles that have come out, the pre-game prayer sessions posted on social media, going on the Footy Show making a special point of talking about his religion, and anything else anyone cares to find annoying. Maybe we should start a thread of nominations for equal-opportunity booing?

Controversial and divisive figure? I think you're looking for a line from the old "Priest's playbook"; "There's no need to cause a fuss. Why don't you just make this easier on us all?"

Looking forward to all the people saying they are booing JKH "because he was in that annoying transport safety ad". etc. Eventually people will run out of excuses. I'm really glad our club is joining the push back.

For those upset that they can't boo a player they don't like, remember that it is the racists who took it away from you. What was once your own private booing habit has been taken over by racists and turned into a symbol of racial disdain. It sucks, but make sure you are angry at the right people.

I was at the Hawthorn/Sydney game up in Sydney the other week. To hear a whole segment of the crowd booing in full voice when nothing particularly interesting was happening (I actually asked "Huh, what did I miss? An interchange penalty?")... it was chilling. It was really chilling. And then it just kept happening all game. Stephen Milne wasn't booed this much, whether for being a general pest or while pending a court appearance over an alleged rape of a teenager. Jason Akermanis never got booed this much, despite being a full time [censored]. Spider Everitt wasn't booed this much even while in the act of grinding his forearm into Simon Godfrey's throat. James bloody Hird hasn't been booed even close to this much, not even by Essendon fans. The core group pushing the booing of Goodes is, unambiguously, racist. Whatever you're personal feelings about any other merits or flaws of his, it's time to just say "Nup, I can't be in on this." If you like, you can take a moment to get angry at the racist mob who have taken the fun out of booing a player you don't like. This is how racism makes absolutely everything worse for absolutely everyone.

St Kilda haven't even finished declining yet, so its a bit early to be comparing rebuilds. That said... we are not tracking well. We are still four players short of a 22, over-relying on some 'stalwarts' who are not exceptional players, and the game style is simply not designed to win. Not unless you've got the likes of peak-career Goodes and Hall running around breaking games open. We'll never get anywhere unless we set out to be a threat.

Suddenly all I can think of is Ocean Grove.

The game desperately needs a much, much stronger second-tier competition and development pathway. The ultimate equalisation measure AND the ultimate 'attractiveness' measure is to have enough quality players coming through that every club can play a game based on skill and initiative. It would also greatly strengthen the pool of capable, skilled assistant coaches and specialist coaches, reducing the advantage gained by being able to pay top dollar for the top staff. I don't mean token gestures - I'm saying tens of millions of dollars more should be going into the state leagues each year.

I don't think he has said these exact words in an interview, but I think the best thing Clarkson ever 'said' was; "Kick well, follow team rules, work hard, or you're out". Also, somewhat less edifying, probably in his initial recruitment interview at Hawthorn; "Yeah, I'm ok with tanking. I'll use the time to experiment with game plans. Just get the bloody draft picks right, ok?".

Bertrand Russel's Teapot comes to sports analysis! "If you can't see it, that's because you haven't looked hard enough." For what its worth, I grew up in league-land and never saw AFL goalposts until my late teens. The most basic problem with League is that it has the entry prerequisite of having a stocky, fat-necked enough body shape to cope with the repetitive frontal collisions. That excludes a large proportion of potential players. It would be like having an AFL league with only people over 195cm able to compete. Suddenly Jake Spencer is one of your most skilful players. Also, the nauseating macho posturing culture on and off the field does a fair job of cutting the potential talent pool.

Ugh. Can you imagine being consistently bad at league? 'Equalisation' should be easy in that game. Limited skills, limited fitness or athleticism, limited tactics or teamwork. The idea that a team cold be 'non-competitive' is just weird - the margin between best and worst should not be so great.

Sit with the Demons and make sure all the 'little' things are good. I.e. Bring plenty of brownies. Through baked sweets we can make this club great again.

A price bidding system for timeslots for home games. Bear with me... Every club can either bid to acquire the top timeslots for exposure/commerce, or choose instead to reserve money for other club development activities. E.g. "We're utter gobshite this year, not much point paying premium for top exposure, let's keep some of the cash and use it to strengthen our footy dept and to build our connection with the core fans who will still show up". Given that the supply of premium slots is limited, the prices for those top slots will be pushed up by the handful of clubs targeting top exposure, resulting in a price curve kind of like for top players - 2 or even three 'good' players/fixtures would cost about the same as one 'top' player. You might end up with just a few clubs dominating the absolute best slots, but then the price curve will be dramatic, making decent exposure (e.g. the saturday afternoon slot) affordable. This has the effect of making the richest clubs compete with eachother directly, on financial terms at least, while the poorer clubs can still afford to 'eat' well because there are plenty of the good slots still available. It also allows clubs to maximise their exposure when performing well. Y'know, like Carlton did this year! The AFL can be happy with it because it is also a mechanism for maximising attendance. Each club is making choices designed to maximise its own exposure at the right times. The fans can be comfortable enough with it because it restores a sense of control back to clubs and actually makes valid the idea that 'when we improve, we'll get our run at exposure', which at the moment is just a tragic legacy of a past lie. Yes, there are a lot of problems an residual inequalities in this model, BUT, it gets them out in the open and removes one aspect of the "cash and prizes for political connections" which is the proverbial drop of arsenic in football's teapot.