JJJ

I’d rather Waterman. King needs to be rebuilt. Schwarz is an awesome bloke and is a legend of the club but some of his observations aren’t the best.

I know an umpire too. It’s a tough gig. They are scrutinised very heavily internally and externally. Making decisions is harder than ever as there are way too many players around the ball and the rules are difficult to interpret. Very rarely, if ever, in the cold light of day can I point to umpiring as a deciding factor. The AFL on the other hand…. they are an entertainment company that is completely unaccountable to the game.

I think it’s more to do with the parents. I’ve not heard that it was/is a player(s). It’s probably pretty normal but there’s plenty of smoke around us at the moment.

The Bowey thing is interesting. Not from a StKilda perspective but there are a bunch of parents and families, particularly of the younger players, who are a bit unsettled re their respective son’s. It doesn’t mean anything will eventuate but Bowey is an example of a player who fits the above profile and his old man still supports the Saints.

They won’t. But I really wish they’d make Bowey come back via Casey. I feel we have stalled his development by rushing him back to the big league at all costs.

I watched a bit of Eagles vs Hawks. The Eagles pretty much packed their bags at half time and went home. They were pathetic. If we can’t run with those guys we should sack every HP coach we have.

I wonder if Goodwin feels pressure to go all in for the finals or is comfortable enough to continue to blood new players. Our list is in need of continued development to see what we have in the tool bag for 2025. We aren’t going to win it all this year, 2 of our top 3 players who are also 2 of the top 10 in the league have had their seasons compromised and our new game plan was not successful. Play some more youngsters in different positions (Bowey to mid/fwd, McVee to mid, Howes to mid/fwd), debut Jefferson and give the kids extended runs. This would necessitate loading the backline with senior players, something I am a-ok with. We can continue to tweak the style of play as we still have enough quality in our senior players to do so. Load up on 2025. Bank another top 10 draft pick. Throw the cheque book at somebody good.

He played ok but boy does he go to ground a lot. His balance and agility are very poor, which you’d expect from a player a lot older.

Liked the video. I’m oddly pretty excited about this Friday. AMW has a lot of traits that translate to AFL. Haven’t seen him live for a while though so won’t pretend to know how he is really going. I remember watching him at training during his 1st season participating in some tackling drills and thinking he was already one of the better tacklers at the club. He also has speed. 🤟🏼

Sounds like the Dogs will be ok with him leaving. Won’t impact the asking price but they know he’s super unhappy.

I think there was mention of Kolt playing in the news yesterday.

That’s the profile of the player we need in terms of age, exposure and cost out. Whilst I think we’ll have money to spend this offseason I think it might be better spent going for 2 younger players as we have holes everywhere. Our draft strategy is simple; if we still think we are competing for a flag, we will only use 2 picks and use other assets to make the picks as good as possible.

I think the whinging is ok from an opportunity cost perspective. We wasted time and resources recruiting a redundant player. We would’ve been off pushing for another up and coming mid or trading into the draft to get access to elite talls. Recruiting Grundy was a mistake at the time and potentially cost us 12 months is another JVR type. Also re Max. Whilst he may not have volunteered to drive Grundy to Sydney, he certainly wouldn’t have begged him to stay. Max’s memoirs will be an interesting read one day.

An epic fail, yes it’s a bit early. Based on his output in the VFL I think you could definitely say it won’t help us this year.

This is speculation but you could easily understand why the following may have impacted the psyche of some players: Brayshaw… Oliver…. Players held to different standards. EG Petty, McAdam, Bowey & Turner coming straight in without having to prove themselves at Casey. Confusion over the game plan. Finger pointing by players Failure to execute under pressure Mixed messages for younger players EG Woewodin getting dropped after Freo when senior players fundamentally are not following team instruction such as Fritsch Lack of development as players/ careers stalling Aside from JVR, no discernible targets up forward Petty. Mishandled. Came back early. Playing forward with zero result. And still wants to leave. As I said above this is speculation but in the pressure cooker of AFL life, you wouldn’t need too many issues like the ones above to lose focus. I think a lot of it comes from the coaches box which isn’t a direct shot at Goodwin but it’s a shot across the bow. I vaguely recall falling asleep last night listening to the Demonland podcast when someone mentioned we needed to clean house and bring in some new thought leadership. Not a bad idea.

Sestan was told a few weeks ago that he was close to selection and was given a couple of key items to work on in order to debut. I haven’t followed the Casey games closely but I think he is going ok, might be a smokey next week.

Maynard only goes hard when it on his terms. How many contested possessions for the hard man yesterday.

Free agency this year might get us a solid player but we need to be aggressively looking at “pre-agents” like LDU from North.

It’s a pretty sad state of affairs. A lot of Dees supporters have, quite vocally, called out the lack of adaptation of our game plan. Our lack of youth pushing through. Ive been at functions where footy dept types and board members, arrogant and dismissive, have pushed back on the above by stating that our game plan is fine and successful clubs can’t develop youth due to competing priorities. Now we find ourselves with an unbalanced list regarding age profile and position and a game plan that is considered legacy. If you move aside the top liners such as Lever, Petracca, Gawn etc and look at the list of U23 who have shown they have a future, it doesn’t read well. Backs: McVee Bowey Rivers Howes On ballers: Windsor and maybe Woewodin… Forwards: Pickett, Van Rooyen That might be the worst group in the AFL or at least the shallowest in terms of number. We still have a couple who are yet to play or haven’t had enough exposure. Backs: AMW, Turner, Adams Mids: K.Brown, Verrall, Laurie Forwards: Sestan, Tholstrup, Kentfield, Jefferson Again, not a great looking crop of talent. I heard the club is very high on Sestan, Tholstrup, K.Brown & Verrall so I’ll give them a pass when creating a team below: Howes, May, Bowey Rivers, Lever, Salem Windsor, Viney, Langdon Tholstrup, McDonald, Pickett Sestan, Van Rooyen, Fritsch Gawn, McVee, Oliver ANB, Tomlinson, Chandler, K. Brown Laurie, Jefferson, Sparrow, Woewodin, Turner, AMW Injured or requiring a reset: Petracca McAdam Petty The rationale is to choose players with upside for next year and need some time mixed with senior players who are proven and set the right example to the young guys. We should be rotating young players. We need depth next year otherwise in 2026 we’ll have no May, Gawn, Viney and nothing to show for it in 2025. (I put T-Mac up forward as it kills me ti see JVR playing without another senior tall to help him out. FFS, he is our only tall asset forward of centre, don’t kill him)

We need another potential A-grade mid with 70 games under their belt. But why would they choose us? Our trajectory is going the wrong way. If I were an up and coming player I’d look at Hawthorn before us.

Correct. It’s not personal. Putting aside his ill timed trade request, I put most of his form issues down to injury recovery and match committee. 1: He missed a large chunk of the preseason and was managed heavily. 2: The match committee persist with playing him forward. His perceived effort or interest level I can’t comment on but the above 2 factors are enough to slow down most AFL players. If he still wants to leave, and I believe this to be the case, then so be it. We will have to be ready for an underwhelming offer from Adelaide.

Flicked through the afl.com article about players pushing up in the hope that I had missed someone. Even the author couldn’t make a case for anyone… depressing.

The Rachele situation is potentially a watch and see I reckon. I heard that there are some Melbourne based clubs who think he would like to come home. Mind you, that was from a player agent who has nothing to do with Josh so I took it with a grain of salt. Some of those people talk out the side of their mouths. They also try to unsettle clubs and players by talking garbage. 🫠

Whilst I agree that his hands are poor, this is an argument that goes nowhere on DL. Believe me I’ve tried.

Pretty sure I said it wouldn’t bother me if we dropped Petty instead. One of the problems with Tomlinson is that he offers very little positional flexibility and since he did his ACL in 21, seems only capable of playing 1 good game in the seniors followed by a mare or two.