DeeSpencer

Do we need players? Or did we only want players when they were better options than the picks? Come on, it’s Melbourne. We’ll give up at least 2 of the picks! Just hope it’s not 24 and 28

Wardlaw* misses a lot of games and Sheezel gets moved around. No shame not being ahead of those 3 but there’s a problem that he isn’t 4th or 5th

Take your pick from older than our preferred age range, expensive contract, prohibitive trade price and not good enough to play in North’s midfield

If Carlton wanted him he’d be in the Curnow deal without being told to look around. Sydney can’t ask for more than pick 40 I’d imagine, less if his contract is big and they don’t trim it down to value. He’s a bit positionless since he lost a step of pace. Doesn’t defend well enough for a back pocket, doesn’t bounce it out like a back flank. A bit of experienced depth could help us down back but if it’s a rebuild we probably shouldn’t bother.

Mould exposure!!!

Ben King would be interesting, somewhat surprised there’s not more talk of him given he’s a pre agent. But I suspect he holds out until his free agency. Mac Andrew, Jed Walter, Ethan Read of course. A wildcard - Will Graham is a beauty. Not for Tracc straight up but certainly as part of a deal.

Because Melbourne comms! But also because they announced the Casey coach via the Casey account

61 was the 3rd round swap from Brisbane we threw in to the Sharp trade last year. Now it’s off to Collingwood. It could’ve been 47. 47 might be in range of a useful pick and/or used with Oliver or Tracc to boost our return there as it has points value. Instead, it’s gone

61 for 71 is meaningless until it isn’t. Which is kind of the Tim Lamb special. Just giving a little bit more than he needs in every deal until it adds up over time and the list is shot

A fair result - we pay 3 million: 1M, 1M, 333 x 3. GWS pay the rest. We get a pick in the 30’s or one of the GWS small forwards of equivalent value.

Yet there’s only 2 players who self destructed their careers and I’m not sure the club had any role in it. It’s disappointing for sure, but I think a lot of people at the club will be relieved it’s over (besides the wage bill).

Welcome Moose, may you combine the marking ability of Max Gawn with the gritty determination of Shelley Heath.

2025 - 1861 (10th) 2024 - 1952 (14th) 2023 - 1697 (4th) 2022 - 1714 (6th) Not really that bad a run considering their lack of consistency around Weitering, lots of turning in the 2nd and 3rd talls especially and lackluster forward pressure to help the backline out. My bigger concern than defending tho is Carlton are in the same boat as us as a team that doesn't use the ball aggressively from the backline. Backline at the Saints. He likely beats out Hamill for that role with us. Backline - Rivers Mids - Jones Forwards - Chappy Development - Whitford Scarlo and Hawk as part time key back/key forward mentors. Hopefully room for one more, either a senior assistant, or a VFL coach/development 2IC

Because he's terrible one on one and with Disco, Lever and Petty we have that role covered not to mention we have Adams, May and McDonald as key backs. St Kilda were reportedly offering 700k a year. Let's not blow that cash. We need to bank some up and chase mid/flanker talent and/or a quality tall who really improves us when the time is right.

Adams is in a contact year and also the right age to be physically ready to compete. I don’t think he’s much chop but he needs minimum 15 games to play through some mistakes and find out. Otherwise his development will stagnate and/or he’ll head to another club. Disco is a lock. Lever, Petty, T Mc and maybe even May for the remaining spot. I liked Wade because he could play both ends but Mihocek is the guy to structure around up forward and we’ve got 3 young guys, big AJ, Melksham, maybe some Petty. So it’s covered. Time to start churning the list with some high upside youth.

We lost interest in Derksen either due to his contract, injury or the new coach simply not valuing him. He’s yet to find a new suitor. There’s no indication trade price was the issue. Heath apparently has a contract locked in. The trade is largely a formality and if it doesn’t happen we’ll get him anyway.

Worse case scenario for Heath is PSD or DFA. It can’t be snagged. He’s not good enough for a snag

They’re sitting on over 5000 points and are going to shuffle all their picks back and collect points in every deal aside from what they send us. If they gave us 7 and 8 for Tracc we’d throw in at least 2 if not all 3 of our 20’s and 40’s to counter the points loss of one of those picks. They’d still have 3500+ points. More likely they’ll do a deal for one of those picks to West Coast for 13, picks worth more points and a non bid for Uwland. 8 for 13, 34 and 38 and Uwland doesn’t go until pick 3. That banks 300 more points and slashes their bill. They give us 13 but we give back 28 and 42, they only lose the 300 points they gained with shuffling 8 to 13. Then same with their picks in the teens that they’ll auction for more points. 15 to north for 25 and 26. That’s 200 more points. Plus Fiorini and Answorth both fetching a little something. Either way. They can pay a fair price for Tracc and still have the 4000 points they need without giving up a quality player.

I’m yet to see any reporting from last year that the cats offered a future first rounder and even if they did I don’t think it came with any significant cap relief. Ie. We’d have been paying the 500-700k pa that we’d pay this year. The only reporting on an actual deal was Jake Niall I think said the cats would offer a pick or cap relief but not both and were light on details. Geelong’s first rounder that will blow out to around pick 28 might be better than GWS although I hope we get 34 or 37 (which becomes 40-45). But I’m still totally fine with us giving it the one more year to see if we could turn Clarry around. The best thing for us would’ve been Clarry rediscovering his form and massively increasing his value. Instead he was kind of ok and we haven’t really lost much. Same thing for Tracc. He had no offers last year due to his health and reluctance to move interstate. 12 months later we should still get value for him.

We can pretend but it’s simply not true.

They’ve committed to making a fair offer for Tracc, they have plenty of picks to do that. The only way they trade Humphrey is if they think it’s untenable not to and so far Humphrey doesn’t have the leverage to really blow this up.

Saints have: 50 and 65 We have: 42, 61 and 66 If the Saints are open to 61 for 65 then we’ve got a deal. Otherwise no harm keeping as many balls in the air as possible to get what we can from GWS as well as GC.

Early days but of the open pool players seems like it’s: Duursma, CDT and maybe Robey then a gap to Sharp, Taylor plus another 5-8 guys. If Richmond trades out its almost certainly going to be pick 4 and I’m not sure there’s a blue chip talent worth going up for

Paying his salary for just gets him to his actual salary worth. 700k is Jamie Elliott money, that’s what he should he earning (at most). Whilst he has upside he also has significant downside if he continues as a non damaging accumulator with poor defensive running. I couldn’t value him above McVee for instance. Not on 700k for 5 years.

Collingwood don’t have one and GWS won’t give one up. A pick in the 30’s seems fair. But we should try to nab a GWS player too. They’re linked to Tom Berry, that would make 100 small forwards on their list, one should be ours