Little Goffy

Not really a list to be taken seriously, but I did raise an eyebrow at the mention fo Fritsch being our leading goalkicker for five years. That includes 2020 when he was not a full time forward, and only played 16 games for a total of 22 goals. He just barely missed in 2019, behind Petracca and Jayden Hunt, which is weird. That got me thinking about our forward line and goalkickers for 2025. I can certainly picture van Rooyen kicking 40+ this season and being our first classic tall forward leading goal scorer since McDonald & Hogan went 1-2 in 2018 . It'll be very interesting to see how the game plan and personnel changes (Petty going back, more Disco time, Jefferson coming in, and don't underestimate Melksham's return with fitness) affect who is kicking the goals and who is giving the classic CHF and third tall connecting leads. Troy Chaplin, in his first season in charge of the forwards, has a really complex puzzle to work with and surely a comprehensive mandate to follow his own initiative. From a personal ambition point of view it much me thrilling - imagine being the defensive coach that crafted the 2021 Demon defence-first premiership, and the forward coach that powered the club's resurgence with a more aggressive style from 2025 onwards?

There's something strange and impressive about some of his tackles. It is like the opponent goes docile, just accepting 'yep, I'm tackled, oh well'. If footy doesn't work out he could earn just as much as a shearer with that skill... does he have quick hands?

Putting two things together Pickett appears to have a lot of respect for the Melbourne Football Club and also for the principle of signing a contract. He also doesn't seem distraught at the idea of being in Melbourne, but has clear reasons to want to move to WA. That he seems to be quite fixed on Fremantle is awkward, though West Coast could be entering a phase resembling Melbourne 2010s but with a lot more [redacted]. You can understand a young and exceptional player not wanting to burn away their career there. But, if Pickett respects the MFC and the principal of contracts, then his de facto nomination of Fremantle has basically put the onus on Fremantle to offer a respectable, appropriate trade. Pickett knows that if Freo don't ante up, Melbourne won't deal. So, honestly, I'm not too anxious. Either Pickett stays or we will get a reasonable exchange. I'll be sad to see him go but I won't be feeling betrayed and I don't think it'll wreck our prospects.

Am I the only one amused seeing 'C: Sharp'? If he consistently plays on the wing that must offer a nickname. Piano? It does look like that wing position is one we will have to develop over the season, giving a few players regular rotations through and seeing what works. I would have Jefferson in the firsts, probably at the expense of Billings who I just feel burned by - I would need to have evidence of a turnaround before I included him.

Yep, out your mouth and direct into your wallet! Works even better than the old 'Three Mars Bar and a hammer' method.

Haven't seen a thread for other team's practice games (uh, 'match simulations'?), so posting here. So, Naughton's hit on Redman, how many weeks? Went past the ball, and as you can see below the ball was behind him and below him before making contact. Obviously eyes off the ball unless he can literally see out his [censored]. Left the ground, tucked the shoulder and made contact to Redman's head with enough force to spin him a full 360 before he landed. So, will this be adjudicated according to the Maynard ruleset or the Pickett ruleset?

Seriously, even comparing the numbers for 23yr old Pickett and 26 year old Bolton last year, Bolton's 'lead' over Pickett per game works out to; 4 handballs, 1 mark, 1.5 clearances, 1.5 running bounces, and 50m gained. Oh, and also, an extra clanger and turnover per game. Reflecting a different role with a lot more space to work in, and in a different style of team (the entire Demon's side collectively take about 3 running bounces per game!), but certainly not reflecting any great difference in ability or impact. Having said that, I would've loved to add Bolton to our list as I think he provides the urgent movement we are in need of, but even then I would never have considered him for the trade price and likely salary cap expectation which Freo have given up. I also would have immediately rejected a straight swap for Pickett. So that sums that up, I guess. It would be fascinating to unpick Freo's salary cap structure, with Jackson, Bolton, and not forgetting Will Brodie was a salary cap dump trade for Gold Coast. The Sean Darcy contract to 2030 and the Hayden Young to 2033(!) could be very important for how things work out as they try to keep their little cluster of currently still very young stars. They could easily get stuck in the 'admirable but not quite' zone of Daniher's 2001-2006, without being able to gather any more talent to push the extra step. That would set 2022 'Flagmantle' as their 2000 Demons' season with the surge of youthful enthusiasm. The analogy holds!

I'm having flashbacks to a documentary I saw as a teenager on late-night SBS. It was about a 'hippie island' refuge in a German city, and was interviewing all kinds of strange people with their crystals and chakras and 'alternative medicine'. This is so long ago, yoga wasn't even a thing. I don't think I'll ever forget the 'anti-condom campaigner' who earnestly believed that the best way to prevent, treat, and even cure STDs (including HIV) was to, in effect, turn yourself upside down and 'gargle' a large dose of iodine in your [censored]. So, uh, yes, please use sunscreen. In the medically recommended manner.

That's just what big sunscreen wants you to think. Also, that's now the third post in this thread that made me think of Robocop. I think I'd better check out for a few days.

Do you ever feel like the kid who thinks it is their fault their parents are getting divorced?

Whispers are we're looking at Lt Col John Nagl. Would be a bigl get. Anyway, remember that you heard it here first.

On a completely separate note of idle human watching, I find it oddly satisfying that Kristine Brooks is a significant corporate leader in her own right. Also kind of sweet that you can easily piece a relationship story together because she was previously a senior figure at Zurich. "What's your meet-cute?" "Our eyes met across a crowded coterie and sponsor event, and it was love at first please-help-me-avoid-the-nuffies."

I found it outright exhilarating. Well, as much as one can be stimulated by a february article. It is quite an outlier for a couch to be able to say they reacted poorly to a crisis, with an unhelpful, negative mindset, and to even specifically and publicly name when that occurred and that it had real consequences for the club. Quiet reminder of just how important the context and overall state of mind can be when people are making tough decisions.

I've had similar thoughts. He clearly is profoundly calm and has terrific perception in complicated situations. He could become that priceless wing/half-forward who can put the ball in unexpected places even when the opposition defence in set up.

I am now more confused than I was before.

I'm thinking of a respectable nuggety red-head? Basically freckles sewn together into human-shaped form? Only other candidate I can think of is right at the other end of the 'conventional beauty' scale and given the spouse at the time the easiest way to identify the boy would be whether or not they are a clear biological advancement on regular mortals.

Yeesh, people getting pretty fired up here. Seems to me like both sides of the argument of 'how much should we expect from Jefferson in 2025' are actually making their points reasonably enough but then interpreting the other side as making the extreme argument. Nobody thinks Jefferson is a soft scrawny kid who'll never make it if he doesn't transform like a pokemon in 2025, and nobody thinks Jefferson is the second coming of Franklin. Personally, when it comes to talls I have a reference point of the 2000 draft. Koschitzke played 20 games in his first season, Reiwoldt played only 6. Tall forwards are strange beasts. Other top ten key position players just got on the [censored] at Carlton and were never heard from again.

As Clausewitz said, practice matches are an invaluable tool for individual players, collaborating portions of the team, and the overall planning of the team to get a grasp of how opponents will react to their methods and to learn to anticipate those reactions. Specifically, ol' grandpa Carl said, 'Warfare is not the action of one wilful agent against an inert mass, but of two dynamic bodies in collision with each other'. Well, close enough to that. It is too hot today to go digging through my notes.

The possum that fell out of the ceiling doesn't count as support staff.

Melbourne football club to 2015; 7 All-Australian selections. Max Gawn. 7 All-australians. Actually, that reminds me that I had a theory that our great problem for the 2000s run (before the wheels came off) was that our team had so many players who were on the edge of greatness but never quite put it together for various reasons. Can you imagine, for example, putting the best periods of Bruce, Green, Yze, Johnstone, Woewodin, Leoncelli, Moloney. Powell and McDonald out there at once as your midfield and mid-sized utility mix? If they had all peaked at the same time the result would have been liquid fire. Particularly frustrating because there would have been times they were all in the side together (except Moloney & Woewodin) and it just didn't quite catch. Two things linger with me; - this pattern of players having peaks and fading and coming back put a pretty serious strain on our salary cap. - if we had had proper facilities and an full support staff for conditioning and fitness and so forth, would these players have had not only slightly better performance, but more consistency over their career so that the magic overlap could have more chances to happen?

If Peter Dutton can get into property speculation in 1991 on a teenage butcher's apprentice salary, surely Bailey Smith can manage it on a professional AFL salary in 2025. Or has inflation been even worse than I thought?

https://www.realestate.com.au/property-residential+land-vic-bells+beach-203989064 Yep, 6ha will set you back $4m near Bells Beach. This may even be the property. So, just barely turned 24, played 100 games, has just missed an entire season, has some documented, uh, expensive habits. I mean, it can cost a lot to have someone regularly scrubbing your Wikipedia page of all sin. Presumably he didn't pay with cash up front, so it is viable. As an investment it'll be great too, because a little birdy* told me that there are some statutory planning changes coming that will make a sudden surprising difference to the accessibility of the property and from the property to the beach, and that there will be some softening of the restrictions on building, too. "Bailey Smith's Mixed Recreational Inn; guaranteed to not be visited by Geelong Police until at least 2032."

This thread has struck me in a weird way - I want to assemble some kind of 'team of the century so far' entirely of players who were never in the top echelon of the team they were in. The depth team of the century? No, that's not quite it. And I don't mean useless, overrated, or draft failures. Players who warrant respect but were definitely never stars. The kind of team captained by Nathan Brown. There's also a few who are in on the basis that if they'd had any kind of a run at it, or if their career hadn't been Neeld'd, they might have been that much more. So, here's a first sketch at it on a few minutes' effort; B: Troy Broadbridge Alistair Nicholson Neville Jetta (vc) HB: Clint Bizzell Adam Tomlinson Paul Wheatley C: Simon Godfrey Nathan Brown(c) Joel MacDonald, HF: Kyle Cheney Cameron Pederson Aaron Vandenberg F: Steven Armstrong Ben Holland Brad Miller FOLL: Paul Johnson Jack Trengove Jordie McKenzie INT: Clint Bartram Dean Kent Colin Garland Matthew Warnock Respectfully noting that Guy Rigoni misses out only because he was more a 90s player. And I just... looking at past player lists and remembering how promising and earnest Troy was, I had to include him. Jared Rivers was disqualified by winning the Rising Star award. Contradicting myself a bit, Trengove was included despite being a top pick because he was just so personally unlucky and this team was really in desperate need of mids. Note also that I support the case for Neville Jetta being in the 'other' team. The living embodiment of underrated. Of our current list I'd nominate Dan Turner, Taj Woewodin and Jake Bowey as very likely to force their way onto this team and to improve it significantly.

I wonder if there might be some benefit to a more multi-tasking friendly environment at games. You know, less of the relentless wall of idiotic noise at every pause in the game? It would be ironic if the AFL's desperate attention-seeking-from-the-inattentive strategy was actually driving the low-attention-span markets away by preventing them from being able to comfortably engage with their other flows of activity. I also wonder if better seating plans and the like would actually be appreciated by the multi-tasking youth just as much as it would be appreciated by the sore-butt elderly? For example, what if the MCG's capacity was 90k instead of 100k, and just that little bit more comfortable for the first 50k seats?

After the resounding success of the X league or whatever it was called, this is definitely a good call commercially.