DeeSpencer

It was already warming up when i got there at 10. Lever and Jones doing runs. Melk and Baker together. Gus doing rehab as well I think Unsighted: Oliver, Viney, Stretch, Spargo, Walker, Vanders, Hannan, Maynard A variety of craft drills followed. Forwards with some goal kicking. Rucks working with Stafford. Some zoning drills. Then it was running time. Harmes, Trac, Jetta, Bull, Hunt, Oscar formed a rehab group and sat out As did Lewis, KK, JKH The rucks did some bullocking and then a sprint for a high ball. Preuss testing Gawn out. The lesser running group had: Keilty, Weid, Hore, May, Frost, Jeff. There wasn’t much drop off but Keilty looked strong. The bigger group was led by ANB with C Wagner pushing him. T Mc, J Smith up towards the front. Petty was in this group as was Hibberd who was blowing but keeping pace, that’s a good sign for him. The 5 young draftees keeping up in this group as well.

Colts 30 Chiefs 31 Cowboys 20 Rams 17 Chargers 21 Patriots 23 Eagles 13 Saints 34

Solid body and attacks his training, I expect he’ll play well at VFL level and get a go at some stage of the season. Likes to take guys on at training which has come with some mistakes. I think he’ll be similar to Harmes and have some ups and downs over the early years with decision making errors. If he really can be dangerous as a forward that will increase his chances of playing often early in his career

Colts 30 Houston 34 Seattle 24 Dallas 20 Chargers 25 Baltimore 23 Philadelphia 24 Chicago 20

Defender - nope. Skills not up to it and not strong in the contest tagger - sure, but we had Harmes wing - yes, he made us better as a wing when he came to the club. I think he could’ve had a go there instead of Tyson last year, but he’s still only a stop gap. Bugg’s fitness and vesatility are valuable for young sides but at the end of the day we’ve got 44 players on the list and aren’t a young side anymore. We should have better players in every spot Bugg could play.

Cheers @Macca I wouldn't have won without your generous weekly notifications. And to be honest working some Sunday evenings had me checking demonland late before bed and doing my tips as Shefty was announcing the injuries that worked in my favour. Loving the wild card match ups this year, seems a really strong group of teams. An early play off prediction - the AFC is underrated and the NFC is a bit overrated. An early hope - Colts win so they go play the Chiefs, and the Ravens win and get the Pats match up.

Eagles, Chargers, Colts

So 2 of the 3 clubs with Indigenous coaches have won the last 2 premierships. With Dan Rioli and Shane Edwards being vital for the Tigers, and a rejuvenated Lewis Jetta as well as Liam Ryan and Willie Rioli great for the Eagles. Too small a sample size to say it's more than just a coincidence for now but I've been told too many times by smart people that the best way to get Indigenous people involved in any thing - health, public safety, land management, business - is to have it community run with other Indigenous leaders. They see and fix the challenges that people like me don't see or don't understand. Richmond and the Eagles might be ahead of the curve hiring coaches who understand players differently to the rest, not to mention coaches who understand the game in different ways. If Davey could teach a few of our small forwards to stalk and run down defenders that would be great, if he could teach our mids how to create angles and laser in kicks that would be even better!

8 Christmas Wishes. Feel free to critique or add your own. 1. Teach Clayton Oliver forward craft: Clarry was 3rd in the league with 166 total tackles last year and first in the league with 405 contested possessions. When you add those together plus preseason games and training you start to work out why he had both shoulders operated on in the offseason. He's only 21, we have to protect him if he's going to play well in the 30's. So that means improving his leading patterns, his marking and his crumbing as a forward so he can impact games from there. We should have plenty of options to role through the midfield especially if we are lucky to be leading games with big margins. So it's time to take the load from Clarry's shoulders (and back, hips, knees etc). 2. Make Gus Brayshaw's kicking up to scratch Gus got his head and body right and turned in to the elite ball winner we all hoped he could be last year but now it's time to get him hitting targets at a much higher rate. In a lot of ways the pressure is on to show he is a dangerous midfielder worthy of a 3rd place Brownlow finish. I hope he continues to embrace his kicking on both sides and works hard to really be decisive with his decision making and flatten out his kicks. 3. The club needs to get Jayden Hunt to play tennis I was up to the boring bit of my occasional West Wing rewatch when the great Leo McGarry had this to say It made me think about players who aren't performing as they could and what might be done about it. One thing that stuck out with me with Hunt at his best compared with Hunt this year is the quick little steps he'd take to get down to a ground ball then break free to space went missing. Obviously, he had some ankle issues that wouldn't have helped but I wonder if the best way to bring that movement back is to get him playing the sport he grew up playing. One that relies on quick feet. We have a couple of tennis coaches available to the club - Todd Viney and Nicole Bradtke, one of them should get Jayden playing some tennis! The AFL is full of junior basketball players lauded for their vision and movement but in the case of Hunt tennis might well have taught him how to move. 4. Fix Tracc's goalkicking I don't know what the plan should be but after excellent accuracy in 2017 Petracca's goal kicking went down the drain last season. Fix it. Fix the other 10 things wrong with his game as well but fix the goal kicking and he’ll play with confidence to do the rest. 5. Get Melksham and Tommy Mc tackling Both guys move like they have fused ankles when it comes to laying a tackle. Melksham 1.9 per game is not good enough for a half forward. T Mc 2.3 is better but for such a mobile key forward he should do more. I don't know if it's training drills or an unusual training method to get them more agile and reactive but something needs to change. Maybe they can play squash and get used to quick in tight movements and getting down low. Hopefully offseason surgery helps Melk out but even with healthy ankles he’s got improvement in him. 6. Oscar has to wrestle a bear Oscar has the skills, size and discipline to make it as a good key defender and we saw that at times in 2018, but as his confidence waned as the year went on he became indecisive. He was attempting to watch his man instead of backing himself to go to the ball and he was tentative in crashing packs. To keep his spot in the side with May coming in and to thrive as a player he has to get more physical. You can't be a good key defender unless you're tough and aggressive. As a child UFC fighter Khabib wrestled a bear. Sadly I doubt the club wants to risk the complaints of the RSPCA by bringing in an actual Russian baby bear. That said, we've got something simialr available. At North Braydon Preuss nearly snapped Andrew Swallow in half one day and he put recent GWS draftee Jye Caldwell out of the game in a North VFL v AFL academy match. He's a big angry man who doesn't take a backward step. There's no one better on our list for Oscar to make a statement against to show he's ready to take on big forwards. The coaches need to design a drill that has them go one on one, word both players up and then let the magic happen. 7. The Nibble needs to add some bite to his nibbling ANB is clearly our best forward pressure player and a great runner. His ability to go contest to contest and not give up a chase makes him a certain starter every week even when he’s doing very little good (or a lot of bad) with the ball. That said, chasing is good, laying the tackles really ups the turnovers and is what makes you great as a pressure player. ANB probably isn’t going to suddenly develop Rioli like instincts and movement or get any quicker, he’s just not that type of athlete, but he still catches plenty of defenders and can increase the damage he does once he catches them by mastering some sneaky tackling tips. The Cyril Rioli special was grabbing an arm and then turning a guy to spill the ball loose. Ain't no thing but a chicken wing. 8. Run Bayley Run When Fritsch was moved on to the wing for the 2nd half against the Bombers I thought the team took a huge leap forward. We finally had a guy with lovely skills, the ability to get out in to space and overhead ability to bail out a bad kick. A lot of our best ball movement came through Fritsch. Clearly he tired as the year went on and he wasn’t as natural when forced to play half back. So to take his game (and the team) to the next level he needs to run like a gun wingman. Every indication from training so far is he’s running really well so I hope it continues.

ANB and JKH according to 7. Looked like the knee that ANB had a few issues with dislocations with, but apparently he completed the session. JKH got a cheeky little push from Salem and looked like maybe an ankle in the footage but not reports of damage.

I very much liked Pedersen but his mobility wasn't going to improve as he got older, time was up. Keilty now looks set to take that tall utility role. Someone went off with Bull Smith as the season went on last year, like he lost his confidence in his game. Previously good goal kicking became a horrible stretch of the yips. Otherwise, he was useful in the games he played at AFL level. His tackle pressure for a tall was excellent and he did the job in the ruck. He averaged 6 tackles a game and his games against the Blues and Crows - both big blow out wins - were excellent all round games. Even his Port game rated well. These ratings aren't always worth a lot but they can show players doing important things like applying pressure and tackles or halving contests.

Maybe they wanted someone with more qualifications. There's very little on his website about his qualifications or actual details around his program. I think he has an important story to tell and that there's little harm in telling that story or doing some peer group mentoring with young players or community sports teams. But AFL teams have doctors, sports psychologists and mentoring staff already. A team might've had professional advice that for a number of their players right now the last thing they needed was a talk on suicide. Anyway, the AFL and teams have made progress with a number of players - Franklin, Fasolo etc publicly coming out to express their struggles. The community needs the most change, some of the tweets I've seen today are horrendous and I don't really mean the jokes, I mean those who just don't get it. The AFL should've suspended Mark Robinson's credentials after he made a comment about Fasolo, that's the kind of steps I'd be taking.

Yarra Park hosted a music festival on Saturday called Petting Zoo. Typical drugged up singlet wearing idiots dancing in a big heap of mud to EDM. The idea that it's always a public park full of peaceful trees and people walking dogs is pretty false. It's a public space best used for public activities. A sporting oval available for the public would help a lot of those activities.

It's actually Chihuahua

SeaHawks Saints Packers

I was going to include something about this is my report today but forgot! I agree 1000%. What's the point of a dummy if it has no hands? These things seem to be designed for soccer walls and not for AFL footy. A simple redesign with some waving arms couldn't hurt!

5 minutes is a little overkill but a good panel, good tv interview and clever highlights can and should take 3-5 minutes per pick if done properly. If the AFL mandates 5 minutes then take all of the time just in case a late trade happens. Why not? The bottom clubs will do anything for PR. We should all know that, it wasn't long ago that we were doing that and you never know when it might happen to us again.

One more thing after a lead either Weid or Tommy doubled around and May stood them up with a big body check. Just a glimpse in to his physicality. He also tunneled through Preuss to set up the play that led to the Kolo goal against play. I would say it was a free kick but it’s still nice too see some grunt and pace defending a lead.

Lever jogging laps. Jack Viney on the footies for some snaps at goal. Big rehab group of Nev, Vanders, Baker, Oscar, Tracc, Oliver, Hunt, Stretch, Harmes, Bull kicking and marking. All moving well. Harmes did repeat sprints with the runner who Brendan Mc at least has dubbed ‘rabbit’. Hore welcomed in to the main group with plenty of applause for a drill before returning to rehab. In to some 2/3rd of the ground up and back match simulation. I call this one the 3 team tango with 3 little mini teams. Spargo a nice stand up tackle an early highlight. Sparrow got the ball on the wing and tried to take on the Prooster and probably regretted it, got dumped on his shoulder. My guess is Preuss injures someone at some stage this year, I hope it’s not a bad result! They split in to a couple of groups. The one at the punt road end with a ground ball in the pocket, hands hands to 45 out, then a short hit up kick quick handball and a shot on goal from 20m out 45 angle. Quite frankly this was the worst drill I’ve seen in years. Jeff and Preuss were about the only ones who could kick a simple goal. Weid dropped 3 sitters on the hit up kick. The hit up kicks were often awful. Bedford has no momentum in his kicking action so his snaps and hit ups were awful, smoothing out his kicking action has to be a priority. It was just a bad drill. Not sure why it wasn’t stopped. Anyway about that time Rdb rolled in on a golf cart in a dark suit. Looked like the Pope (redacted redacted). The players were doing a tackling/grappling drill. Not sure who the coach taking it was but he wasn’t suffering fools. It was down for push ups repeatedly. Jones giving them a rev up. Lewis’ push-ups were ridiculous. Pretty much like this: Kade Koko took running shots at goal in this time. Looking smooth. Rejoined the group later. The kids went off for some development work. The main group in to some match sim. Spargo a highlight with clean use. Steve May looked buggered after a rep, nice to see they made him work. Fritsch and Kolo clean on the outside. Kade Kolo the won a contest and ran in to goal for the defensive team which had them up and about. May very vocal and supportive. Anyway, that was about enough for me.

Yeah come to think of it I think he said something like he'd seen him play for NSW in the under 18's. Probably the same for Josh Wagner and QLD 18's. This is just a guess but I'd imagine in any draft year they look at something like 300+ maybe even 500+ kids who come through various pathways and then keep track of where they end up. It's a little arbitrary but the guys who come out of juniors and end up at Casey I see a bit differently and I include Corey Wagner in that because he went straight from AFL to Casey and back.

There's a few distinct categories here. 1. The Category B rookies: J. Smith, Maynard, Walker Really anything from this group is a bonus. It's not easy finding Irish, American or non footy players. Who knows with Walker, seems athletic and a nice enough kick, but Maynard should be decent depth and J Smith I'm still very hopeful for. 2. The guys we tracked from 18: Fritsch, Hore, Keilty, C. Wagner Jason Taylor confirmed recently Fritsch was on their radar years earlier but they didn't take the gamble with injuries. Hore was someone they looked at when he was 18. Surely Keilty to go to Casey was on the draft radar. Corey Wagner as well. I see these guys as more where AFL recruiting is going, getting guys to your VFL side or monitoring guys who go in or out of the AFL system. 3.Regulation mature age picks: Vanders, Hannan, T. Smith, J Wagner Would be interesting to know how far back some of these guys were looked at. Vanders had a dominant NEAFL season. Hannan a very good VFL year after a strong Ammos year. Not sure how the Bull got to Casey. Josh Wagner rose through the ranks in Queensland to get himself looked at. Interesting they are all guys who had or have had a fair bit of upside, they weren't plodding midfielders or lumbering rucks. Vanders and Hannan particularly are guys who can really turn games. Bull is a bit workman like but that's to be expected for a key forward. Josh Wagner a little more vanilla but the hope was his kicking and smarts could be valuable, who knows, it might still be.

Kupp is a massive loss and Cook never got the chance to stretch the field. That means it's also going to be tight throws or short stuff. More than anything though it seemed like the Rams O line just had a stinker, that can happen on the road. Fix the O line, the run gets going, Cook becomes a factor and things open up for Goff. Handing off to Gurley when he's going nowhere isn't necessarily smart given the Bears defensive line were monstering, but I was shocked he couldn't get the ball in space. Roquan Smith is a good rookie linebacker but Gurley is even faster than he is and way more powerful. Gurley only 3 completions on 7 targets but a 10 yard average. I'd be dropping it off to him on tosses, screens and short passes all day if he's not getting the yards up the middle. The shock of the game that tilted it in the Bears favour was the Bears being able to run the ball after failing to do so all year. I don't know what Wade is doing with Suh and Donald there shouldn't be anywhere to go!

I think the players get 3 weeks over Christmas break now. Whether they take the 3rd week now or in early Jan I'm not sure. My guess is they spend at least part of next week training either in closed sessions at Gosch's or at another more private location or they hold something beginning with c that rhymes with damp.

He’s too good an athlete not to be given a lot of chances, you don’t want to waste that upside. That said, he trained with the forwards the other day, is that still the go? His agility and repeat speed could be a huge forward pressure weapon. Also wouldn’t mind seeing him in the ruck for teams that don’t have a proper back up. As for down back I think Hore is the immediate 3rd tall cover. Hopefully he’s in full training soon. KK if the wing role doesn’t work. Get Hunt back to his best. Or play Frost and Oscar, use May as a back pocket, slide Hibberd up the ground.

Pats, Saints, Rams