DeeSpencer

The first rounders usually get the best available numbers, followed by the rest of the draft getting the high numbers no one wants. If Billings, McAdam and Fullarton took 14, 23 and 33 there wasn’t a lot left but I knew there had to be a reason for 39 rather than 27 or 34. That’s awesome that Koltyn chose 39 for Nev

Oh good, the answer to academies is more academies if the NGA switches back to inside 40. Apart from being a total disaster for fairness and draft equality if we slowly shift to a heavily ‘academised’ sport we’ll end up cooking a bunch of kids childhoods be making them semi pro sportsmen at the age of 14.

That was definitely Jetty

I thought I saw him on track but certainly wasn’t in any drills after 10:30, in fact I’d say it’s likely he was either in the tent or in aami

100m or so boundary timed jogs for the young boys. Longer, quicker runs for the main group up the middle of the ground. McAdam, Sestan, Gawn with the 2nd year talls in the slightly shorter distance group. KFW is leading them out well Laurie, Judd, Spargo, Bowser maybe some others and with some effort the Tracc are in the group doing the furthest by a few extra metres. Obviously many of the best runners aren’t on deck today. Everyone out there looks good tho

Cold tin just kicked a checkside over the fence and possibly in to the sun. It hasn’t helped, the weather is still foul. I’d have the trade request in by the end of the day if I didn’t think 40 degrees in November was far worse

New fellas joined in the second rotation of that set of drills. Koltyn seems to be pursuing a strategy of following Tracc everywhere. Kynan had a couple of inside 50 kicks that looked good. Windsor had some nice one touch gathers. Might be because he’s dressed like an 18 year old girl about to hit a wall King street nightclub but he seems to have really long arms From the new veterans for want of a better word: Shane Mc looks comfortable out of the square and snaps on both sides. Fullarton has a tan that won’t survive Melbourne winter

Neither are here, try new questions

Josef is here doing some individual drills that would roughly rhyme with soot jihad

thought I saw Petty but think it was fake Petty (Jed Adams). Adams, Verrall and Sestan have all made physical progress Might be nothing but in a handball, handball across half forward then kick to leading forwards inside 50 drill T Mc started as a defender. 3 new young guys watching with Choco now

Absent: 1, 7, 10, 12, 15, 18, 19, 20, 29, 30, 36, 37, 50 Edit; forgot 13 not here either, oops

Billings 14 Shane Mc 23 Fullarton 33 Windsor wearing a dress length 6 Hore 18 Kolt 39 McVee 4 K Brown 41

El Jefe ok! Got to buy him one of those shoulder posture devices but he’s bigger. Taj Woewodin whoa. He thick

Pats Jags Ravens really should’ve done my tips before thanksgiving!

Anyone got a time and place? Can we say Gosch’s with confidence?

Early returns suggest he’s not great at the whole football part of being a footballer but KFW is nailing the being tall and an imposing athlete part.

The AFL will want him to serve the 3 months rather than 1, plus a club games ban, to avoid the confusion around WADA v AFL issued suspensions for the likes of Elijah Hollands. As always managing the optics will take priority over getting a fair result for the individual. And of course the AFLPA will keep their heads in the sand as per usual. I hope Joel can be back at the club as soon as possible but I’m also fine with him getting a good club imposed ban when the time for it comes.

In terms of shocking haircuts when they arrive at the club he’s just following in his fathers footsteps

Oh good, flip the NGAs back to 20 and distort the draft more. All for what? Players who have local teams, elite junior rep teams and most of the time school programs but we pretend the AFL clubs have developed them? The admission criteria is rubbish. Kids born when their Australian parents were working overseas. Kids who came here when they were infants. Indigenous people who (no comment). Kids with one parent born overseas, why is that a thing? There’s surely ways to invest in Indigenous and migrant communities and have the rising tide lift all boats. It seems like a way to placate the 14 non Northern clubs but it will only distort things further. It’s only increasing the extent with which your zone matters and we saw how dangerous a recruiting zone based comp was towards the later decades of the VFL. There’s easy changes to the bidding process that would restrict the Northern Academies and Father Sons from massively distorting the draft which is much fairer than fighting academies with more academies.

Just thought of something on a completely different train of thought than the draft questions because I imagine JT is generally keen to only answer so many and give away so much on that topic. I'd like to know: What does JT and/or the recruiting team do to develop their scouting? Has he met with teams from some of the bigger leagues in the world? And a recommendation, if he's looking for inspiration he should go meet with the OKC Thunder who have absolutely crushed the NBA draft recently (aside from some recent concerning Josh Giddey rumours)

If we’re putting in requests then I thought Tarkyn O’Leary was unlucky to not be drafted and would be worth a look as an outside runner. As well as Sammy van Rooyen, who probably just stays at Claremont and goes through the grades but it would be nice to have him over here.

I think he will. And I’m not disappointed in him being on the list. Just a vagary of the system that you get to replace guys who are out for the year but you don’t get to cover guys who miss the first half or even more.

There’s either no such thing as the Long Term Injury list these days or if there is there’s no provision for it to impact list management by adding other players. The only provision for adding extra rookies is the Inactive List, which requires players to either retire or be ruled out for the season. In a cut throat world under these conditions we’d be better off not even having Melk on the list at all. Potentially drafting a different rookie, then redrafting Melk in the mid season draft if we get a vacancy to fill.

Couldn’t combine the picks to replace star with star, but used them on: - part of the upgrade to get Tholstrup who has some star potential - Jefferson who’s off to a slow start but has some rare skills - and mostly on Windsor who’s a very different type of player but could be really special if he’s developed correctly And in a year when there’s a strong midfield draft and at least some potential for the team to take a step back it’s probably good to keep our first rounder.

I mean, GWS were probably taking Windsor for need too! But if we had taken Curtin, Caddy or O’Sullivan it would’ve been labelled as for need as well! I do wonder if we had stayed at 14, which became 18 and taken Darcy Wilson, Charlie Edwards or Harry DeMattia and added the 2nd and 3rd rounders to our offer to Hawthorn could we have got them over the line to do 4 for 6? But I’d be even more nervous if we had taken Wizard Watson and whilst Sanders is a safe and solid option he might not be a big difference maker. At the end of the day we were the first side to move away from the elite junior performers or the quality talls (and Curtin fits both categories). If it wasn’t JT I think there’d be more questions asked.