DeeSpencer

Good counter. Maybe not as much as I think. Ball drop is definitely more important than where the arm goes. But I don’t think either Petracca or Nietschke were lining up 60m laser kicks in the pics above. Outside of goal kicking I think the 2 most important kicks in afl footy are being able to kick a good reliable 50+m kick to space and most importantly the 15-30m quick hit. You only need a handful of players who can do the 30-50m difficult kicks. From training last year and his highlights Nietschke knew how to get the ball but was Billy Stretch like slow at getting it moving because his kick is too slow and jerky.

Was just too fumbly, caught of position and ineffective when down back the last two years. If that’s the case he can’t play there. Forward and in short bursts on the wing I think. Desperately needs to be taught how to pressure and tackle effectively. Some of his high motor just keep chasing pressure was good but his overall forward pressure is bad for such a quick player. Lets see if a good preseason and some agility work can sharpen him up.

Today’s bugbear: Extravant balancing left arms waved above head high. See: Petracca and Nietschke. The pace of the game is too quick to waft your hand like an orchestra conductor. Extent it out for balance but at the same time keep it in tight and quick. Petracca’s high ball drop has hurt his kicking efficiency and Nietchske doesn’t look quick enough to be a good afl player unless he’s got very good skills. Sharpen it up lads.

Yeah I reckon adjusted for the rise of the salary cap in the last and next few years 625 pa is about equivalent to what we would've paid Melksham and Hibberd (both 2nd round trades). Or Jack Watts to Port (although we chipped it 50 or so). Completely reasonable amount of cash. Unfortunately what's unreasonable is the 2M in the first 2 years and that's Carlton's gain and the Suns loss.

We'd almost have to win the flag to ever get in the conversation for signing a gun tall as a free agent. They come around so rarely and usually go to the best clubs who have won flags. Lynch - Rich, Buddy - Syd even Frawley to Hawthorn. Trading for talls, sure, but May and Lever are also about as good as we've ever done there. Trading for depth rucks is easy, trading for a Grundy style game changing ruck isn't. The only reason Jackson is in the conversation for pick 3 is because they think he could be a game changing level of talent. If they really are confident in that assessment then they have to pick him.

Very harsh. Cal is only getting better with more experience and has produced some very good stuff this draft period. How much did Burgo even do on the draft? His Burgatron was fantastic reporting but clubs were far more open back then and there wasn't academies and live trading to work through. Phantom drafts were possible, now they are just about impossible. Twomey is across all the names and has done a good job sniffing out some very plausible picks and trade rumours. The thing the draft coverage badly misses is Emma Quayle at the Age and Brett Anderson at SEN/Inside footy.

Throw away line at the bottom of the May/Preuss article that doesn't even list an author.

You’ve got it the wrong way around. Fifty’s point was if we draft Young then there’s no need for Murray, if we draft Jackson then we don’t pick up Brown. Brown over Murray isn’t influencing who we draft but could be a tell on who we will draft. I think that could be correct. But I also think a mature depth tall makes more sense than Murray who has some speed but probably isn’t AFL standard skill wise or character wise.

I had more interest in Walker, the reality is this is a post draft kind of decision. Or even later in the summer. I have my reasons for doubting Brown on a no [censored] policy which I'll keep to myself as well as overall talent. But if he's desperate for one last go and we are suddenly in the position where depth matters then I could change my mind.

I think plan A will be Oscar but with a really simplified role for him defensively and far better midfield cover as well as Lever patrolling the CHB line and May the full back line meaning there's only so many opportunities for teams to get Oscar one on one. Plan B might be Lever as the 2nd tall. He has the height and should be functionally stronger this year, but I agree it's not ideal as he's never looked comfortable when isolated one on one. Petty the next choice, but the 2 I'd like to try are Weideman - I just think he has the physical tools and skills and it would be great for his footballing education. And Joel Smith, even if he lacks size he'll stick with a man and then it's up to the pressure being good enough to give Lever and May a chance to chop out. Full ground defensive system and maintaining possession are obviously big factors in making the tall defenders lives easier. Talent addition through the draft has to be a factor especially if we pick Young. Otherwise more of James Harmes on a HBF could be important. He's strong overhead and could make a difference in stopping the ball even getting to the big guys.

The question I want to know is who the hell is our forwards coach? If Chaplin takes the backs, Plapp and Mathews split the mids as they did last year and Richo takes a more wider role then we are still short a forwards coach.

Key forward 1: Tom McDonald. For half of 17 and 18 he looked like a top 8 key forward, if not higher. Stank last year until he got it together just before injury. Still think he can be a top 8 option, but right now I'd probably put him at 10/18. Key forward 2: Weideman or Petty. Both remain unknowns, but physically should be improved if they have big summers and have some skills. At a minimum they have the size to run and jump at the ball and create contests. Defensively not strong. Without counting up across the league I'd say they are 15/18. 2nd ruck: Preuss or one of the tall forwards ruck and we go smaller. Obviously a chance of a draft pick being used here. If it's Preuss when it comes to the forward line then until proven otherwise it's 16/18. Mid sized players: Fritsch, Melksham, Joel Smith, Petracca, Hunt, Hannan?. Fritsch's back end of the season as a marking tall was excellent. Melksham as a taller option was great in 17/18, a bit too much playing for free kicks and awful defensively last year. Petracca had an underrated season although should see more midfield time this year. Overall I'd say the depth and talent of this group is clearly the strength of our forward line. 6/18. Crumber: Chandler? Lockhart? Spargo? Hunt? No surprises we are monitoring the draft heavily here. 16/18 Flankers: ANB, Spargo, Lockhart, C Wagner, Nath Jones. Hard to get too excited here although I'd argue they aren't as bad as we probably think. Position wise we are mostly looking for the hard runner who gets to contests and out numbers. ANB still has potential to excel in this role with his tank but his skills/smarts are just too poor. Maybe 14/18 on the basis that we at least have a range of options.

I'm happy he's out there training and moving well, I don't care if he's still a long way from peak fitness as long as his base is good enough to get through the summer healthy, but geez our media team know how to make our players look bad.

Making the grand final is the reason they can afford to draft for need rather than best available, because Green will really have to be as good as Cripps to get a game over the next 3 years stuck behind Ward, Coniglio, Hopper, Taranto, Kelly, De Boer, Greene, Williams, Whitfield, Caldwell etc. And even then is he really making them better? If they don't match they'd have to be confident that whoever they take at 6 is super highly rated as well and if that's Young then there's your Heath Shaw replacement within a year or 2 and a major addition to the side. If it's Jackson then all of a sudden they've got a young ruck to play for a decade alongside the best midfield in the league.

It's really not. I think we'd be paying Ed Langdon something close to Martin's contract and there's still a gap between that and the deals for someone like Brad Hill that involve a top 10 pick. Any other club would've been forced to accept Carlton's offer of a future 2nd and 3rd round picks and would've gone to work making them in to something they like. The Suns have so many list concessions they chose to ignore the reality of the system.

I know you can't trade late round picks if you've traded a first but If we trade in a future first round pick can we trade out later round picks? Thought I'd saw that somewhere.

At what stage do the Giants think about winning a flag rather than assembling the best list of future talent. Ward, Coniglio, Kelly, Hopper, Taranto, Whitfield, Greene, Z Williams, De Boer plus Caldwell, Hately and others in reserve, it's a ridiculous collection of midfield talent. A lot of those guys are flexible but I'd argue if 3 of the less flexible inside mids in Ward, Hopper, De Boer and Coniglio are in the team then Green won't be for the first 2 years of his career. Meanwhile Mumford is done and being replaced by Jacobs who was done at the Crows and Heath Shaw remains best 22 as a backline distributor despite losing all pace. With Luke Jackson and Hayden Young sitting right there to fix holes it has to be mighty tempting. Especially with the way Richmond play with so much pressure and run it makes assembling a dominant clearance team not all that effective. I'm concerned Green would be wasted at Melbourne and we don't have nearly the midfield depth of the Giants.

I think you should remove the points from pick 50, because even if it comes in a few picks it's likely to be outside the range of quality picks that Jason Taylor wants (he mentioned 35 or so draftable players on RTD). It's points value is drastically more than it's real value in this draft. That would make it a future first (planned to be at least in the 10-15 range) and pick 26 for pick 8. So we could then swap it back to becoming a pick from 10-15 and a pick around 20 and come out ahead. Gold Coast have the pick 11 priority pick next year as well, if they offered that up along with pick 15 and 20 for something back the other way then it's looking like a better deal even if we have to wait a year for that pick to convey. If we play finals next year and have upgraded from our pick to pick 11 that would be even better! It all comes down to how we rate the players and if there's a lock selection at pick 8. I think that's where the intangible factor becomes more tangible if you're drafting a kid with special skills and the right make up. Where's the cut off in this draft crop for truly elite prospects? Rowell, Anderson, Green*, Young, Henry*?, Flanders?, Jackson?, Serong?, Robertson? Kemp?

I only saw the running at the end but 4 of 5 are clearly in full training. Sparrow is an impressive physical specimen and was solid in the repeat sprints. You'd have to think he'll be in contention as a contest to contest half forward and some midfield rotations. I actually think Bedford is a little miscast as a small forward, I liked his work around clearances a junior and he's another who looked to be handling the running. Still skinny but doesn't look out of place out there. Same goes for Chandler. I was trying to think of players who have bulked up from year 1 to 2 as much as Jordon. Josh Tynan was one, that didn't end well. Chip Frawley another on a positive note. Considering he's pretty much the same age as a lot of the guys about to be drafted it's interesting to see the physical development. In the season review stuff they said they saw his future as an inside mid and he certainly has more of that build than the skinny flanker that we drafted.

As far as I'm concerned either don't advertise that there's a training on or do it at the right time. I know the club has much bigger things to worry about but it's a multi-million dollar business with a truckload of employees, one of them can update the website.

He doesn’t want a million a year, probably more realistically 600-700 and no doubt performance bonuses. But he can and likely has structured the deal with 1Mil for the first year. Exactly what everyone predicted. That number would force us to back end a lot of money and harm our chances of retaining Oliver and Petracca on good deals and then likely cost us player/s down the road.

Turned up at 10:45, 15 minutes after the advertised start time. Training finished after a minutes silence at 11. My report: it was sunny.

Assuming the talent levels are similar I think the big difference is that talented juniors from the Kimberley have a pathway through Perth and WAFL/WA juniors and things like schools and programs like Clontarf. AFL clubs and academies are likely the benefit of years of hard work. Again, not claiming to be an expert but what's the pathway for a kid from the Alice region? Is Alice Spring's still a troubling town that you want to keep kids away from? Is the NT program working (recent draft results say no)? The solution might be getting the most talented kids in schools in Adelaide.

That's interesting, and shows the media is slowly warming to it. There's absolutely an appetite from fans to know more. A slow process but in time the commentators who suggest a team needs to 'work harder' or 'win more contested ball' will be edged out by people who can actually say something interesting about the game. Then the coaches won't get away with such easy cliches either.

Pete Roberts was our head of football technology who’s also moving on. No doubt Burgess who have some of his own guys who come from a GPS/fitness analysis background. Not sure that’s entirely the same as someone crunching the numbers on stats for the coaches and recruiters. Ideally everyone works together across areas though. Amazing that clubs must have so much data but there’s so little out there for the public to understand. Then coaches get away with post game press conferences talking about junk like not winning the contested ball or playing our brand.