Little Goffy

Well, now, if Darcy decides he'd like to come to Melbourne I'd be willing to offer a pretty good four-year contract.

Okay Adem, we see you!

https://www.afl.com.au/news/1051386/western-bulldogs-secure-pick-no4-from-gold-coast-suns-in-first-trade The Suns will now listen to offers for pick No.10 – with Adelaide and Melbourne both interested in the selection – as they look to accrue more points to match bids

If McAdam is a spare Neal-Bullen and Duursma is a spare Hunter... Well, actually, I don't know how I feel about either! I have been thinking that Hunter going closer to goals would mitigate the downside and get the most of his debatable habit of looking for trick-shot ways to keep the ball moving. Close to goal a bit of unpredictability and keeping the ball alive is more useful, and the damage from turnovers and counter-attacks is less instant compared to wing turnovers which should have been stoppages. Duursma is at least young and has shown good signs prior to a string of injury interruptions. - insert your fresh start and clean run at it cliches here - Of course, one thing we all know is that if he goes to Essendon he'll never make any progress. Is it our responsibility to save him?

10 and 17 are of interest if Gold Coast had them from the Dogs for 4. Same basic scenario, though not quite such a premium pick. Would a future first and a collection of our points-effective second-rounders do the job?

That [censored] me off so much I'm on the edge of making a drink-driving joke. It would not be funny.

What are the chances that we can get Hibberd to hang around a bit and be a mentor to the likes of Rivers and McVee? Sigh, just got a little tweak of sadness; dropped by footywire and it was the first time I'd opened our list and Hibberd wasn't on it.

Mackin really is fast. Lots of intense hunting right from the start of the 4th quarter. Interesting seeing Harris and Goldrick having a chat before the bounce and then both getting right into the pursuit. Bit of leadership.

Adelaide have got a really effective mix of hammers and knives out there. We're not going to beat them unless we can force them out of their structure and make them do the jobs they aren't set up to do.

It is conceivable I'm having actual Bryce Gibbs hallucinations when watching Sam Walsh and that is taking a tiny slice off how highly I rate him. 🤪 I think it is a very fine margin between the two, but I feel like Rozee just has that little bit more influence on games.

Fair call to say each of them would be in 'arguably the best' range. Personally I'd say Rozee (pick 5) has edged past Walsh now, though Walsh was an amazing early gun and remains elite. Weitering has to compete with Oliver (4) and C Curnow (12), which might never be splittable given the totally different positions. Hodge v Judd is an enduring debate, of course. But that 2001 draft produced multiple club champions, Brownlow and Norm Smith medallists - including the talent surge that turned Geelong from mediocre to decade-long dynasty. The trades being talked about for Reid are greater than Geelong's entire 2001 draft hand! Edit: Gary Ablett Jr was also in 2001, so the Hodge v Judd debate is slightly moot.

The talk of burning multiple first round and even top-5 picks to get Pick 1 deeply scares me. For all the hype, you have to go back to Nick Riewoldt to find a no.1 pick who was the best player in their draft. Maybe Brendan Goddard in that season's overall pretty weak draft. Less than 1 in 20 isn't a good enough strike rate to give up multiple picks which have almost as good (or in the case of picks 4 and 5, better) strike rates! Please could everyone spare a thought for my nerves and stop chasing only the shiniest stone?

No worries. You can't mozz a goat. Miyamoto Mushashi < Demons AFLW 2023.

I do wonder - the last four drafts have been 60 or so kids. Before that it was around 75-85 for most of the last 20 years except for a couple of blowouts with more than 100 picks used. That's essentially every club taking one fewer new player in each draft. Lists overall have been getting older, with mature players more likely to be retained as depth. Even in weaker clubs now you're less likely to see mobs of kids dumped onto the field to see how they go. Except North, who will burn forever as a result. Part of me wonders if the competition as a whole experienced a cultural shift in reaction to the Gold Coast, GWS and, yes, Melbourne failures after each of those clubs went too hard on the turnover and rebuild or simply thought that pumping through the high draft picks would equal success. It's a more mature competition overall, as well as more mature lists in simple age terms.

Lol. That last highlight of Hibberd with the chase down - I swear he was doing the Naruto run for extra speed.

He clearly knows hot to get involved in moving the ball constructively. With every passing day I'm thinking that the real draft jackpot this season could be a bundle of late first/early second round role players who have done fine at under-18s without catching a lot of attention.

I think it says a lot that you can name three major British comedy series and there's more diversity in that set of three than just about the entire range of US comedies. Also far more memorable scenes of building a joke up to a crescendo, and far more quotable one-liners. It's rapid turnaround consumables versus generation-defining art. And if you want an epic reach of a metaphor - the extreme variety of British comedy versus the persistent sameness of US comedy is a tangible example of what happens when you manage your audience based on repeatedly hitting the 'largest aggregate target' (US model currently employed by the AFL) versus the 'nurture each niche in the market and enjoy the wondrous variety' (UK model / all-clubs-engaged football). Everything is about football in the end

Pick 39 is respectable in the circumstances. Valuable enough to lubricate other deals, or maybe hang onto it for that last targeted player that all the other clubs miss in the second round. Maybe just gets cashed for points for the Kynan Brown bid. Who knows? Not me! Jordon should do fine at Sydney and I wish him all the second-best. :D

It isn't a trade rumour but does fit the broad topic of 'pre-draft shenanigans' Looks like Riak Andrew will be falling outside the pick 40 range and eligible as an NGA selection for us. Skinny, 192cm. I've seen him listed as both forward and defender. Does anyone have more info? Does this mean we'll want to keep a pick 80 in reserve to grab him? Speaking of NGA, is there any possibility that Gold Coast will decide they've done enough with Walter and Rogers, and might not match a bit for Ethan Read, this drafts designated 'ruck who competes at ground level' type?

Interesting times when a player can be 200cm and not in the tallest half-dozen at their club! Certainly the exact right 'type' that we need and won't got a lot to acquire. We'll see how he develops, I guess. Potential range of expectations; Works his way into the team to be a regular filling the role of genuinely tall tall target. to Is sub for a semi-final and actually gets subbed on.

I have a theory that picks in the early 20s are going to be very useful this draft given the number of 'type' selections available from about 20 to 30, so personally I'd be pretty happy with a pick swap moving our current 33 to Sydney's current 23. Maybe throw in one of their picks in the 40s. If you compare this draft to an imaginary draft that is perfectly incremental in what is available as you go down the order, I'd say the sweet spots for value are the 4-8 range and the 18-25 range. (counting before concessions go in).

Wut? I genuinely don't understand what the 'this' could possibly be that makes it something that doesn't happen at any other club. A player having a slip in professional standards due to unhappy changes in their personal life and/or their first major injury recovery process? A club mobilising their support resources and leadership to get them back in line? Speculation that a player & club in such a situation might be open to a trade on the principle of a fresh start?

"Struggled in finals" and "Bombers showning interest" right there next to each other. I believe the kids these days call it 'found object art'.

So, the obvious speculation is, do we try for both? Would Yasmin be willing to move back to Melbourne for our AFLW team, so we can get the full XYZ Duursma?

Whoever it is who has been leaking gossip from Melbourne needs to be shown the door. I suspect it is a relatively junior person given how vague and second-hand sounding the leaks are, but still entirely unacceptable. Either that or it is a certain ex-pres with an axe to grind. Or Bec Judd. Just because she's awful.