DeeSpencer

There's at least one *more spot for a pressure player even including using the rotating mids. Hannan at his best is perfect for it and his pressure was great at the start of this year, then it just disappeared. Hunt's never been a great tackler or pressure player that's for sure. We certainly need to find at least 180+ and ideally more flanker sized mid/forward types.

So why Phillips and not 1 of the other 15 or so well paid players they have?

I look at it and think - what truly does impact us in Australia and what is us getting on our high horse because we see a country failing and like to feel superior. Gun control, health care, education, racial injustice...there's a lot that should change but at the end of the day, not my circus, not my monkeys. For decades the most important thing for us has been our military alliance with the Americans and US foreign policy. Sure they've dragged us in to some wars that they (and us) had no place in, but largely it's worked in our favour. And Trump's one man plan of Mutually Assured Destruction seems to be working for him and so far for us. But it's now abundantly clear that Climate Change is our biggest threat. The world has to put the same effort and spending in to fighting climate change as it has Covid 19. The US is in prime position with it's tech industry and with just enough manufacturing still around to really make a huge difference. Biden's far from perfect but the world can't afford to have climate deniers in the White House.

Any decent wingmen would, but that's not really the question. The questions are: 1. Does his limited skills and contested ability see those B+F results start to slide over the new few years - he wouldn't be the only hard running type of player to have peaked by 23 (see T. Bugg or A.N-B). 2. Is Isaac Smith (for free) better for a couple of years for free whilst we work on a long term replacement who we can draft with the pick we won't have to give up for Phillips I'm not so sure the Pies would be so keen to move Phillips on if they thought he had 100 solid games left in him. Chris Mayne's their other wingmen and he's just about done, they could find a way to hold on to the salary if they really wanted to. 2 years of Isaac Smith and allocate the draft resources towards finding longer term solutions - in particular guys who can kick would be my preferred result.

I'd say our pressure forwards rank: Pickett, Spargo (strong end to season), Hannan, ANB, Hunt, Bedford/Chandler. The aim should be to only have 2 of them in the side and get more pressure out of rotating mids, medium and talls but that hasn't been a strong point. Generally we've needed 3 strong pressure guys to play the game on our terms. Even though they are flaky the likes of Hannan and Hunt are important as they are the only two with any size. So Hannan probably is more important than some think and could easily be like Kent at St Kilda if not better where he gets a game any time he's fit and we wonder why we didn't keep him. But also like Kent I guess the issue isn't so much letting him go but failing to find a better and more consistent replacement.

The St Kilda runners can kick though. Paton, Clark, Billings, Sinclair, Hill, Butler can all hit targets. The Saints have his brother. Similar player. Elite tank and runs all day. He played 4 games for the year. We desperately needed a guy like Langdon to add some run, but given our inside mids aren't great kicks either do we really need to keep adding shoddy kickers for short term gain?

You don't remember when we recruited him to do just that and it was a disaster? Doesn't have the heart or desire to play down back. Or really anywhere I feel.

When he’s at his best he is super zippy and a good pressure player too. Unfortunately when he drops away he loses the defensive part of his game as well as the attack

Probably had the best month of his career when he came back in to the side this year but soon faded. Could he have one great summer and fix his body for good and find consistent form - maybe. But if the bulldogs are keener to find out than we are then we probably have to let him go.

If Hawkins, Lynch or Dixon were 24 I think those teams would be pretty happy going with them as the number 1 guy. And the Lions surely hope Daniher rediscovers the form he was in when he was 24! If we don’t bring in another tall forward I think plan A could easily be going small with just Jackson and Weid and hoping Melksham finds his form again. Plan B would be Petty, likely in Melksham’s spot, and I think there is a defensive upgrade there over Brown/Weid. Petty has very good agility, even without great pace he can make the quick changes of direction to cover an outlet. One of Brown or Weid up the ground just won’t cover off or make that crucial tackle

Some draft picks take a long time, others don't. That's all in the past, the question is the future. Ben Brown kicked 32 goals from 22 games when he was 22, then 41 goals the next year at 23. After that he was in his prime and reeled off three 60 goal seasons. The Weid turned 23 this season and kicked 19 goals from 13 shortened games, which works out to be 40 goals over 22 full length games. Who's to say he's not just about to enter his physical prime and start producing 50 goal seasons? His buildup has been slow and hardly linear, but there were a lot of good signs this year that his body is nearly ready and his confidence in his marking and goal kicking has progressed. I'd rather take a chance on Weid's prime years than Brown's twilight years.

The overall deal doesn't matter in terms of getting pick 9 from the Giants. We can't say to them we plan on further trading this pick so please give it to us for less now. Here's another one, in 2015 the Dogs and Blues traded Pick 11 and a future 3rd FOR Picks 20 and 21. Slice it and dice it any way you want I just don't see how pick 9 goes to pick 23 without something very juicy included. And I'm not counting big juicy Preussy.

You’re talking about the Freo deal that’s irrelevant. Im talking about the North deal that got pick 8 to begin with. To get that pick from North we had to offer a future first that easily could’ve been top 5 if things went badly and throw in a second and third. Now you’re saying GWS would part with 9 for pick 23 and a journeyman ruck. It doesn’t add up.

Last year: Pick 8 —— Future first, 26, 50 This year: Pick 9 —— 23, Preuss. You’re valuing Preuss as the same value as a future first, or at least an early second. That’s far too high.

Ahhhh the old load up a bunch of nothing and come out with a top 10 pick trade. Not going to happen in a million years.

NFL teams do sneaky things like change the ownership of parking and food and beverages at the stadiums to different companies. It’s useful to set a benchmark but big Nicho would have to be clever to make sure he put protections in. Not easy to do given the mess cricket fine themselves in.

Apart from the ‘wheel’ error is there any chance they could revise where Egan says ‘VFL’ to say scratch matches. There was no VFL and might never be again

Do mids get the ball to wingers much these days? Rarely at centre bounces. Maybe less so at around the ground stoppages where the winger often covers the back. Backlines that win the ball get it to wingers folding back. May had an instant connection with Langdon. And forwards that create pressure so hack kicks go to the waiting wingmen too. The biggest appeal to Smith could be that second scenario. Langdon either marked or had the ball running inside 50 enough times to kick 10+ goals this year. He finished with 2 goals 8.

Freo had very little bargaining power and they knew it. He wasn't going back. Apart from maybe a cursory meeting with the bombers Langdon only ever had interest in joining us and it was pretty clear why, we backed the truck up to get him. Still 200k cheaper than Brad Hill.

Langdon and Tomlinson rumoured to be 700k and 500k, that's your big fish. We shouldn't be pushed up against the cap but we should be planning to try to move salary out to allow us the freedom to make good early offers to our players before their contracts run out. Otherwise if we bring too many expensive players in we end up under the pump to sign our own guys who then become more expensive.

It is a serious problem though. We've never been able to play 2 rucks and even in a number of games gone in with just 1 key forward because the coaches have been so keep to get defensive pressure on. No other team plays 2 big non tackling forwards with any success, why would we be any different? There's a good chance the solution would see one of them dropped to the 2's. The other question is whether Brown is in his prime any more. It's hard to be entirely confident one way or another. He's been close to 3 goals a game in his career at Docklands, but average 2 a game at the MCG.

Because the vast majority of player movements are organised well ahead of time and then haggled over during the trade period. 14 teams are done for the year and there's already 40+ names lined up https://www.afl.com.au/news/515946/trade-period-state-of-play-who-s-going-who-s-undecided

Anything inside 40 would be huge, an upgrade from a pick 60 in to the 45-50 range seems more likely to me. If we were to get a player out of GWS we probably would've heard about it by now.

His game sense/craft certainly needs work, he gets a little lost and isn't the best at the contest, but you'd take those flaws for someone with natural ability to run the ball and a penetrating kick. The biggest flaw in his game is he's an outside runner without a good tank. It's a fundamental problem. It seems he was working hard at it last summer but ended up with groin issues. So a step backwards rather than a step forward. This is the summer to show he can take a big step forward. If he's not running at least with the experienced midfield types by the end of summer he won't make it.

Will be interesting to see what comes of the revenue sharing model. If 7 are successful at pulling out of the broadcast agreement then the players could lose a huge chunk of shared revenue if they are guaranteed a percentage not a set amount. My guess is big Nicho heads to the safer waters of steady business rather than sport