DeeSpencer

Lever’s unlucky, was the best interceptor this year. Moore just has a higher ceiling due to his size, athleticism and booming kick. The people wanted a balanced team so Dawson is the Brayshaw defensive big body winger. McClug is the forward running winger similar to Langdon, he plays as much on ball as wing now but he can do both. Happy to have 1 less than great backman. Daniel is a superb tackler and wins a lot of contests by getting to the ball first. He’ll occasionally get beat for size or gamble too much for position but he makes up for it by being the most creative kick in the comp.

FB: May Andrews Stewart HB: Salem Moore Daniel C: Dawson Bont McCluggage HF: Petracca Naughton Z. Bailey FF: C. Cameron McKay Greene Foll: Gawn Steele Oliver Int: Martin, Heeney, Walsh, Merrett S: Stringer

He was good, not great, against us the 2nd time round, and actually decent enough the first time too when he got a lot of the ball at half forward. The thing about rating Naughton against us is that Steve May clearly has his number for now. Most key defenders don't have the strength and ability to read the play to keep Naughton away from the drop of the ball nor do they have the closing speed and physicality to spoil him once he's flying for it. Naughton played well in his 3 other finals. When 16 other teams don't even get that far I don't think you can punish him too much for a quiet grand final.

My argument was simply that no one in his top 10’s from his October power rankings has made it outside 20 in the last 3 drafts, with most going top 10 and only a small number falling to 15 or so. His 19th ranked player went 23. I said nothing about his phantom drafts that by nature are going to have players all over the place as clubs play ducks and drakes. I disagree entirely that the bid system only changes things for us. If you know you won’t get a player then you can trade your right to bid as part of a trade. It’s likely GWS did that with Coll. Mac is a selection inside the top 20, not a bid, teams are far less likely to let him slide.

He's had a 48 goal season as an undersized full forward and when he went in to the midfield from Queens B'day on he went 32, 32, 29, 31, 25, 34, 27 and 23. All without ever doing a full preseason or committing to becoming super fit. In other words he's a more dangerous deep forward version of Petracca after 2019 but with a raft of off field concerns and 2 years older than Tracc too. If the penny really drops for him he'd be top 10, but there's every chance it doesn't as well.

McInnes was 19th in Twomey's October form guide. That's very accurate to where he end up going. Bids are very tricky to place because a lot can depend on other factors. Adelaide might've been very close to pulling the trigger at 11. But after that GWS had 3 picks between 11 and 18 and traded with the Pies for their future first, probably with part of that deal being a guarantee they wouldn't bid. Collingwood themselves had 2 picks. And Lachie Jones went to Port. That's 6 of the 11 picks taken care of. Add in us not being interested with our 2 picks and that's 8 of 11 spots in the drop. Mac being unrestricted in the top 20 makes him less dependent on which specific clubs have certain picks.

His best year was 2017 and he was so prolific and skillful then and his tackle and clearance numbers certainly stood up. His body hasn't been the same since and only in the second half of this year did start producing absolutely top quality midfield performances and with that I reckon his contested work was looking better. I'm willing to concede a little bit less physicality in a player if they bring exception run and skills. But it's definitely worth watching and there's been long stretches of his career where he's been getting by being a nice player without the full commitment to the contest. Although he's not nearly as bad as the other super skillful, highly drafted and thinly built Giant. Certainly Salem's toughness and contested work have been undervalued for years and it's what makes him a special player. It's just whether a really special half back can be better than a goal kicking on baller. If it's at all close I'm going with the midfielder who will be more involved in the game and can impact two ways more easily. I'd still love to see Salem get his chance as a midfielder at some stage. Or to be used as the hawks used Shaun Burgoyne where he'd play half back most of the time but if they needed some spark he'd suddenly go on ball and win a crucial clearance.

I'm pretty sure the Giants rookie drafted Sam Reid about 4 times in his career. We could see who is out there before redrafting Marty Hore as a rookie or having him train over summer to rest his recovery from injury. That doesn't seem all that strange at all. But at a minimum I think we'll explore all of the delisted free agents and get a better idea of how deep the draft is before making a final call on the rest of the list. Apart from Hibbo, if he's keen to go on then we should sign him up!

Can people please figure out it’s a list of players, he isn’t trying to pick a team. That said, I’d go for Darcy Moore, a fit and healthy Harris Andrews, Tommy Stewart and maybe May or Lever in the top 20 or so. All in the top 30 for sure. Dwayne going a little high on old Hawkins and Jez Cameron. He’s very loyal to the Cats. Buying high on Stringer, Heeney, De Goey, Fyfe and Dusty too. They’re the most valuable type of players in the game but I’m not sure I’d bet so big on any of them in 2022.

Agree on the birds that have flown but the only position I like for him is 3rd tall defender, similar to Tomlinson. Whilst he’s free is he going to sign with a club where he’s the back up to the back up? And from our point of view do we use a list spot on a player slightly better than other free alternatives but not where we need to be investing?

Don’t get too worried about who’s on the rookie or main list. We can shuffle them after the drafts. Leaving cat B aside for now we can have 42 total players. 36 on the main list and 6 rookies is the way to go to save salary cap space. We have 37 signed up. 5 spots. 3 in limbo. 3 worthwhile draft picks. And if history is a guide we like to keep 1 likely train on spot, but that’s never a guarantee.

I doubt we make a decision on Hore or Declase until close to or even after the draft. I doubt we make a call on Hibbo until he finishes his partying! Or more accurately, until he’s had time to reflect on the season. I wouldn’t be surprised if he decided to go out on a high.

Sinclair has signed on to a new deal and Naismith is always injured. Ceglar is to replace Fort, Geelong won’t give anyone else up We’ll go in with the 3 rucks we had last year and attempt to find a good young ruck in the draft, spp or even next years mid-season draft. We didn’t even have Majak on the list at this time last year. The entire history of the Goodwin/Taylor list we’ve always gone lighter than heavier on rucks

Eventually free agency will expand with players eligible after 6 or even 4 years. Then the league can have a free agency window that opens in about mid or late October and kicks off with 72 hours of madness. Teams will be making trades then to facilitate signing other players. Then the actual trade deadline can be moved to February and lower level trades will occur on time lines that suit both parties up until the deadline. It will give the grand final some much deserved space, be fairer on players and will still be a big media event. With the benefit of some action rather than 2 weeks of covering the ruck roundabout

12 contested possessions, 15 uncontested. 70% efficiency. 6 clearances. 335m gained. He has a good balance to his game but I wouldn’t exactly call him outside polish and real class. The Hawks player to chase if we wanted to really go all in would be Wingard. He can go between forward and the midfield and offers a bigger point of difference to what we currently have. But without all the details I think sticking to who we have, taking care of our current players and keeping our future options open is probably the way to go.

They clearly liked Majak’s work at Casey and he should be a lot fitter doing a preseason this summer. Plenty of rucks out there but it’s hard to attract someone to be our 3rd ruck I’d imagine, most of the guys moving are to be the 2nd or 3rd string option in better circumstances for them. It would be even harder convince someone to be our 4th choice option.

A Majak Daw type perhaps?

I'm not saying they straight up tell him. He's a journalist, he uses his contacts of recruiters, parents, players, player managers, club staff to get an outline of who is interested in who. Plus he's attending a lot of the same games and can see which clubs are watching players closely. Take the example of Mac and the link to GWS. He might see a GWS recruiter at one of Mac's games. Then he might interview Mac and ask him which clubs have spoken to him the most. Then he might speak to Mac's manager who tells him the Giants have been asking a lot about him. If that happens enough times for teams with the top picks then you can get a sense of which players have the most interest. Then the final piece is the horse trading that goes on closer to the draft. Someone from the Giants might ring Twomey and see if he's got any info on who Sydney will take with pick 12, and in return might give up a bit about their players with pick 13. I doubt it's that specific but there's certain a lot of using the media around draft time to get information and spread disinformation.

If we thought Mac would fall outside 20 I reckon we would’ve kept more list spots open to allow us to do a bit more shuffling. Nothings ever a lock but Twomey’s late September form guide had him at 8. Quick looks at his 2018, 19 and 20 October updates show his top 10 guys go pretty much to plan with about the latest a guy falls out to being 15 or so. He also had Luke Jackson at 14 but was hearing rumours of top 10. Maybe he’s overreacting now with Mac but I sense he’s not. The draft picture becomes even clearer after the trade period but if Mac stays in the top 10 range at that stage then Twomey probably has serious mail.

There’s a case that Dusty was probably somewhere in the 40’s as he had 3-4 dominant Dusty games from his 16 or so, but there were a lot of games where he looked underdone and did very little defensively. 2.2 tackles, 66% efficiency, 5.3 turnovers from 23 touches, there’s some stats to point out he wasn’t anywhere near his best

He was the best clearance player in the league once he went in to the midfield full time and a semi regular goal kicker. He’s not a great kick but has excellent quick hands. And when it comes to kicking from the high volume inside mids it’s Bont and Merrett, daylight, Petracca’s risk/reward kicks, more daylight then everyone else. 12 might even be a bit low!

He’s a top 50 talent for sure, he could eventually get right up with Petracca but I sense more 50/50 forward mid than Tracc who’s best probably 70/30 mid forward. But he’s been hampered by so many injuries. The Swans wisely just let him settle as a flanker this year without much midfield or designated inside 50 target time. When Robbo does his preseason 50 in March or whenever it is he should definitely be included.

Packers, Pats, Titans

Fritsch is too high. He wasn’t better than the other 6 Dees this year. More like 40th, maybe the 5-6th best goal kicking forward Lever was better than May this year. Gawn not top 5 either. Somewhere between 10-20. He’s had better seasons. Paced himself this year.

Was good without being great this year, definitely not top 50