Little Goffy

I think its one of those areas where culture has to move, and no amount of 'law' will bring real change without it. "You're being traded to Brisbane" "But I hate Brisbane, and my family is in Melbourne" "Tough" Headline: VICTORIAN-BASED FOOTBALL CLUB ARE A PACK OF ****S, PLAYERS WANT OUT The only real way forward is a steady cultural change towards mutual respect and a new kind of 'loyalty' based on honest, fair dealing in good faith.

That would make it a 50/50 chance between Geelong and North, wouldn't it? Thank you everyone, you've been a great audience, try the beef I hear it's great, and don't forget to tip your waiters.

Jazza, I'm sure if you really want to mix pron and football you can rent a corporate box and bring your laptop. No need to involve poor old Dean Margetts in your entertainment. Jordan Bannister might be up for it though.

That, and the fact it is absolutely routine in soccer for top sides to take a 'soft' team to the field against weak opponents, to rest stars for more important games and leagues.

All initiatives hinge on the availability of enough financing to ensure that all clubs have enough resources that the competitive advantage of having more money than the rest is diminished. Beyond that, measures to push up the overall 'adequate standard' talent pool are very important. Deeper reserve grades / state leagues, including more money diverted from the top level (and the TV rights) to support development pathways, coaching and standards at the semi-professional levels. Speculatively, I also think there's a discussion to be had about introducing a maximum individual player salary. High, but not so crazy as some of the contracts that are floating around now. Again, this would be a move that would shift more money to the depth of lists and the maintenance of overall high quality.

There's actually a quiet revolution going on, 'riff-raff infiltration' to break apart the old clique. It's like the 'gay night' raids - hundreds of gay and lesbian people arrange to all turn up to have a perfectly ordinary pleasant night at some backwoods RSL or Rugby League club. To the horror of the old boys with the ties and blazers; "Oh dear me! There are working people in here! Geoffrey! Geoffrey, you must kindly escort them from the premises!"

Open up a stand at games and at the shop, where supporters can sign cards for junior members whose birthday is coming up.

On a side note, it seems like Melbourne have built up a pattern of not just doing well for themselves, but also offering genuine win-win deals that other clubs are quite pleased with. - The Tyson/Kelly scenario would have been a welcome one for GWS, no doubt on that. - The deal for Frost was sweetened with GWS' picks they were never going to use anyway, but which were a handy asset for us. - Carlton only used one of the picks we gave them for Garlett, but considering they were looking to offloading him, possibly just delist him, they'd be happy to have moved a pick a round up the order. - The Clark-Varcoe-Lumumbu circular trade probably made everyone happy. All three players, all three clubs, would have felt that was the best plausible result. - Adelaide might have been sad to lose Bernie Vince, but we gave the bona fide best offer without any dodgy 'only this club please' announcements. Let's just say they'd probably rather deal with us again than a few other clubs at the moment. - Fremantle got a pick for a player who was going to be moved on one way or another, with 54 for Michie. And it's not our fault they wanted Sylvia. So, in these last two trade periods, we've made a lot of astute trades without ever putting anyone in a position to hate us or mock us.

With my position being that our club needs to assemble a full 'best 22' of genuine AFL-capable players, before we worry about having any stars, I'm very, very pleased with how this worked out. Frost seems more than likely, ANB is a hardworking midfield trooper at worst, and Oscar McDonald is a credible prospect as well. In all the times I fiddled with the 2014 phantom drafts and tried to pick out players I liked, generally I felt like anything into the mid-late first round would get us someone very suitable. Laverde and Goddard slipped as far as 20 and 21, but by 23 the the options were getting very thin for players who looked like they would be a dramatic step up from later round selections.

Just responding to the snakes and rabbits critique; Have you seen what the snakes did to Guam? Now there's spiders everywhere too. Ugly feeds ugly.

I think a lot of the people who just look in, then move on, would be checking for any interesting fragments of information and training reports. But seriously, with the snarky, surly, personal tone that so many threads here degenerate into, it's not exactly a surprise that people think "Nah, I'm not going to get into that." I'd endorse a 'mod rule' that authorised a simple blanking/deleting of any comment that includes sniping lines like "Where you even at the same game? / You clearly have no idea about football / what would you know / only an idiot would" and so on. People would be perfectly welcome to repost their point, of course. In fact, a brief period of summertime enforcement would reset the tone quickly, ready to welcome passing strangers as the season gets closer. All that said, things do improve this time of year, everyone is in a better mood after the draft!

That our (negative) average margin shrank so dramatically is obviously the story of the season. That has been overshadowed a bit by the fact that we managed to go even lower with our own scoring. But it is a testament to the new game style, and real progress, that the average score against us was almost exactly the overall average for AFL. Teams wont come into games against us expecting to score freely. And in time, it means fans wont come into games against us talking about 'percentage boosters' every time.

Ahh, beautiful. And he really needs to shave those sideburns.

Yep, it surprised me but he did seem to find good form and play a good team role back there. I can't help comparing Howe to Andrew Walker at Carlton. Similar capabilities, similar issues with where to play. Despite many injury issues, Walker has become a very good AFL player who is occasionally great, and I'd have no issues if the comparison held out for a full 200+ game career. And if some seasons we need to turn Howe fullly to the forward line and he kicks 50 goals, that'd be ok too.

Yeah, I think Jones has proven his character well enough that the club could just about give him a career-long deal from this point. 5 years on good money, then a scheduled renegotiation at 31yrs old, with a guaranteed minimum salary and guaranteed performance rewards set out now to provide certainty. After that, as far as I'm concerned Jones can decide his own retirement time and keep getting senior games for as long as he can maintain the standard. No early retirements, no missing games to give opportunities to kids. The Melbourne football club needs to restore confidence that the fans can look to our top players without any hesitation or anxiety.

Only once in the 22-game era (as in, going back to the early 1970s) has a team kicked fewer goals in a season than Melbourne did in 2014. And that was GWS in their ridiculous debut year. So, personally, I'd be really hoping for some improvement on that.

If as expected Petracca plays the season mostly as a forward with occasional rotations through the midfield, a goal tally of 20+ isn't unreasonable. Menzel and Stringer both did it as non-KPF this year, and Bontempelli managed a goal a game as well. Jeremy Howe managed 18 goals from 13 games in his first season. Of course, for a really good rising star age goal tally you have to go back a few years, to a certain Jeff Garlett in 2010, with 40 goals.

Dom Tyson is on the verge of being an outright star. What really gets me excited is the patch of form at the end of the year - the 'usual' numbers didn't change much but his disposal efficiency climbed rapidly and stayed at a seriously elite level for several rounds going into the end of the season. Excited by Tyson, even more excited by the sheer volume of midfield options now available to ensure we keep a competent and competitive group out there each week.

Hmm, raw numbers are tricky because of the variation in possible number of games played as well. So let's assume 22 games for everyone, if you like you can turn it into an average per game. Main goalkickers - Hogan, Garlett, 30-40 each.. Other forwards - Dawes, Pederson, Petracca,Kenendy-Harris, 20-30 each. Goalkicking mids/utilities - Tyson, Howe, Watts, Salem, Kent, Vince, 10-20 each. Resting ruckmen - Jamar and Gawn - 10-20 each. There are of course a variety of other possibilities, like Frost playing forward, Fitzpatrick finding form. I'm also making some assumptions about the flexible utility roles of Watts and Howe. It should be interesting seeing how it pans out - whatever the details we are likely to have a very even spread of goalkickers and a particularly high proportion of goals from players in the midfield or rotating forward/midfield. We should, at least, make it past the miserable 8.6 goals a game we managed in 2014. [shudder]

Like Akum (above) I think there is a role to be played by Toumpas as the handball-receive runner delivering the ball forward with a bit of vision and poise. But I always keep the lesson of Stanton over at the Bombers in mind. You can't go direct to a specialisation like that when you aren't already a well-rounded midfielder. It is kind of like the curse of the goalsneak - if you aren't up and firing in that role almost every week, your contribution (and career) quickly comes into question. To throw in another analogy, I would imagine it is a bit like the 'man-child' key position players who arrive at AFL and are suddenly facing opponents just as big or bigger than them, for the first time. It takes a while to relearn and develop to the point that they can play that role again at the top level. Toumpas as a key link-up player may be a few years away, I'll be happy to see him deliver a solid, responsible and well-rounded midfield effort in the meantime.

With a top 5 pick you've got about a 50/50 chance of getting a 200+ game player who is regularly in contention for All-Australian selection. I'll take that, thanks. Interestingly, sveral of the 'failures' have been disappointing talls, often carrying injury issues. Grant, Watts, Hurley, Gumbleton, Kruezer. A smaller layer of the disappointing results have been from skinny types who didn't quite keep up with the intensity at the top level - "Picket Fence's nemesis" players. Balanced midfielders taken high have a very good 'hit' rate, though the major exceptions (Sylvia/McLean and Scully/Trengove) do also point to why there's a bit of pessimism about it on a Demon supporters' forum!

Not a ruckman mentioned, after a couple of years of limited new ruck intakes already. Competent full-time ruckmen could be the next 'shortage' player type, with ridiculous, long and overpriced contracts and top trade value. Also suggests that even a rough-and-tumble, slightly goofy ruckman could become a valuable asset overpowering scrawny young or part-time rucks filling the generational gap. Jake Spencer may yet get through to 100+ games.

On the bright side, Fremantle recruited him with a view to boosting their midfield strength and scoring power. Now he is just adding to the jam on their list and taking up a spot which could have been a youngster, on a list which I am told is right now the oldest team list in AFL/VFL history. I guess what I am saying is, like Tom Scully, he's not our problem and we did very well in the process of 'losing' him.

Can't help but feel there's a connection to be drawn between Sylvia's weaknesses and Koschitzke's, and with very similar career results right down to 'just one good preseason'. Lack of awareness, lack of a habit to fight to break even when beaten on the first movement, lack of quick thinking and cooperative instinct when things get messy. They grew up winning, and failed to cultivate their inner zen gardens. Or something.

Ahhhhh HA HA HA HA! Essendon are that desperate to find a way to quickly remove James Hird from the contest, of course they bring in Matthew Whelan. The board is just playing the tape of the hit, over and over, and hoping now everything will be ok.