DeeSpencer

Things that King had to deal with last night: Stewart going off, meaning Clark came on and they had to decide where to use him Weddle going forward to stretch the Cats backline. O’Connor follows him back spitting Logan Humphries to a wing Ginnivan moves to the wing to add more skill Dangerfield has to just about play full time mid to give the Cats the grunt after getting smacked in there early Holmes isn’t getting a kick on ball, so he moves to the wing and plays a wing/back role to get involved in the game Wizard is suddenly on ball and whether Hoisin Mullin tags him or stays back? A chain reaction of how they manage Impey forward and looking super dangerous. Then Sicily forward late. Weddle in the ruck etc The balancing act to save the game vs kick another goal and end it when the Hawks made their late charge in the last quarter

Think you’re in the minority. It’s an imperfect system but the real answer is to not appoint coaches prior to the end of the year. King’s worked for 12 months to get Geelong to a grand final, let him see it out. Remember it’s a 2 way street. Geelong likely gave us their blessing for their best 2 assistants to present in lengthy interviews on Monday. King also was introduced on Friday, went to Brisbane for the weekend rather than Adelaide to watch the Hawks (likely family related) and came back for the presser and full day with the footy department. I kind of disagree on this tho. The best coaches lean in to the members support and healthy traditions of a club. When King is fully on board as of Monday next week I expect he’ll embrace red and blue. It’s not a regular work place

Our list management team can’t afford Kayo.

Simpkin can’t kick, but what he does bring is run which we need and could swap between mid and forward. He’d replace Tracc and give us more run with less ball winning and different forms of bad kicking. Tracc more hot and cold, Simpkin more meh. But we can’t be giving up a good draft pick or stuffing our salary cap for Simpkin.

Plenty of ways to manipulate the list but so far we are: -7: Spargo, Billings, Fullarton, Verrall, Sestan, Brown, Hore +2: Henderson, Culley Strongly linked with 2 more: Heath, Derksen Probably drafting 2 more: White, Sinnema Hopefully anyone of quality that we trade brings in quality picks and/or players, but I’d have Woey competing for that last spot in Feb (if he wants it)

Mentha might be playing for Casey but he’s not a consistent performer nor does he have an afl tank, so he’s not really available for the senior side (which is fine, he’s a kid). Sharp can have all the availability in the world, he can’t pick the ball up under any pressure and can’t handball. Maybe a new coach can fix him but I’m so skeptical on players who are just awful at the basics.

I’m ok with signing Henderson now and a guy who gave himself a chronic groin injury doesn’t need to train any harder. But I 100% agree we need to leave list spots open for train on players and keep a spot for the mid season draft whilst we’re projected to pick early in that draft too. We didn’t have a spot for Culley or Henderson last year, couldn’t even invite Hendo to train with us given he was signed at Werribee, nor did we have a spot for mid season when we could’ve got a handy pick up.

Would be nice if we had some clarity about his form at Casey and injury. Spargo is gone. He’s ahead of Sharp and Mentha. Langdon and Sparrow aren’t world beaters (or even perfectly suited for the position) and Kolt has to make the leap to afl standard. Someone has to play half forward and it can’t just be Chandler. If King can get the team making faster and easier decisions he has the right attributes to contribute across half forward.

Remove all the BS from the draft. Publish salary caps with earnings for anyone over 500k and a total for how much each club spends under 500k. If you don’t want your earnings to be public ask your club to cap your wage at 500k. Those 2 things would quickly balance things up.

They’ve done very well, but the ability to add Impey, Scrimshaw and Karl Amon (who signed with them when they were rubbish over us when we’d won a flag) reset their backline. Along with Sicily it gave them a platform to take off once the rest of the side hit competence. Then 1 good year and Barrass and Battle lob in. Midfield they really built up from a lot of home grown players. Newcombe is an incredible find but they also got the benefit of covid keeping him hidden and the benefit of Box Hill’s decades of attracting quality. North VFL unearthed a good player in Cooper Lord who is at Carlton, they finally hid one away with Cooper Trembath. Forwards they’ve found some gems. Still, I’m not sure even Ginnivan and Chol level players sign at North, that’s how limited North’s ability to land talent has been until recently. I guess North tried a Ginnivan with Jaidyn Stephenson. They managed to keep making additions to some level even when they were in a position that looked kind of no where when Mitchell took over. Josh Battle also made some interesting comments when admitting he took less at Hawthorn than the Saints offer, something along the lines of the Hawks having access to investment portfolios to grow wealth. Extra earnings in business, marketing, property (cough Geelong cough) is what I’m suspicious about.

If you only ever use people who have done it before you’d eventually run out of options when they’re all senile!! One thing in Watson’s favour he had 5 different coaches, most of them with big weaknesses. We also had Green, Smith, Richo on the committee. So it had a lot of different football voices. I’m sure Ponissi would’ve been a great help, if you’re criticising that you’re just making up arguments.

He’s a shoddy ball user but he does work hard and offer a bit more versatility than some of our mid/forward types. If it’s Tracc out and no Flanders/Windhager in I’d consider it but 3rd round and his salary for years 3 and 4 better be reworked down to a role players number. Happy to spend some cap space up front but no point getting stuck with the back end years.

I don’t know why Scott didn’t overrule him but ultimately Scarlett and Clark both left Geelong. Clark down plays the riff but confirms he was moved to the midfield when he’s clearly a natural attacking half back. “My personal relationship with Matthew Scarlett, there’s no animosity between us two. We can easily have a conversation and get a long really well,” he told SEN Afternoons. “Like I’ve said many times, he’s a really good coach and was a really good player at a very successful club. “He runs a pretty tight ship back there and I had to go away and work on a few things in my game. He was one that was really honest with me at times. “In the end, I moved up into the midfield and played a different role. I couldn’t quite break into the midfield at that time.

Attempted to ruin Jordan Clark’s career by refusing to play him and didn’t get on with the other coaches. The next year Scott implemented a team first policy among his assistants and won the flag. He’s a local footy coach with a champion players resume.

Seems like the Pies will replace him with Jack Buller, ascending 24 year old with the size to ruck. The kind of player we should be targeting if we had a competent list management team.

Backline: May, Disco, Petty, Lever, Derksen, (Adams) Forwards: Mihocek, JVR, Melk (Jeffo, Kentfield) I guess one of May or Lever goes.

I think we’d be willing to pay a chunk of Tracc’s salary for more draft capital. It might be a weak draft but still better than no draft. If for instance we could get 6 and Flanders for Tracc and 23 I’d be happy with that.

Just a lazy 3 more years of Jack and 5 of Clarry to work around, but I feel like King has been hired to coach Pickett, Langford, Lindsay, Windsor. Geelong's game plan doesn't rely on great kicking either. Clean hands and great running make the kicks far easier to hit.

I do like him as depth. Speed, aggression, good overhead. Could impact at both ends. Reminds me of Ben Long. But any more than that is overrating his games and projecting on a decent preseason (before - knee blow up)

The problem is you lose a 22 yo with 65 games unless you spin that in to a trade for a similar level player you’re off to the draft where a really good outcome is a similar player. The likely outcome is a worse player. AMW was a borderline afl player before his knee blew up. Non afl level tank. Very poor decision maker with average skills. He’s fun. He’s aggressive. 2 attributes we do need. But that alone doesn’t make you afl standard.

He said he drives to Geelong every day, Casey a couple of times a week will be a breeze by comparison. Anyone who’s done the Geelong trip repeatedly with all the west gate tunnel works knows it’s hell on earth.

Maybe it’s the shaved head, big work ethic and talk about coding a game but he actually reminds me a lot of Goody except he doesn’t have the baggage of 5 years of being hounded by the media and the baggage with our players. He seems self assured and a good team player. Played a nice straight bat when it came to changes with the playing list and team staff which is sensible. But you can’t expect to play Geelong style footy with this Melbourne list and every coach wants their guys as assistants, whether it’s this year or next he’ll start to reshape the club.

Not sure about that. If they’re after Curnow they’ll need to shed salary and get picks, doesn’t mean they have to go direct to Carlton.

Unless the club has completely lost it they’d do a thorough medical but it’s hard for even a thorough medical to get a full picture. If it’s a clear pass or fail that’s easy, but back injuries are often murky.

Hardwick's comments about him having a back injury so bad that he probably shouldn't have played at times this year are very interesting. Is that truly the reason why he's fallen behind Alex fricken Davies? With a clean preseason will he start running and playing with more power? Maybe the Suns are worried about the injury and are keen to sell now whilst he has value despite Dimma's claims that he's a valued player?