Demon 16

because he can't sign a binding contract until fa period begins otherwise he (and whatever club) is in contravention of afl drafting rules

I meant, why would he wait until the end of the year to sign a contract with Melbourne.

Gone for all money - surely.

Why would he risk such big money either way, by waiting for the end of the year. There's no way he doesn't know what each club can offer him (or thereabouts).

Imagine he did a knee this week. All of a sudden he'd have no offers on the table other than a 2 year contract from Melbourne at about 350k per season.

You're welcome.

I just want to be clear there - those percentages are my personal opinion based on my understanding of where everything is at right now.

I don't want to provide false hope - but the club is definitely doing all the right things by Mitch, and mental illness is something that you can certainly recover from.

IF he gets fit enough, IF he recovers fully from his injury, IF he is mentally right, and IF he wants to return to AFL, does he not need to go through the draft?

IF the answer is yes, then how can anyone say where he will end up?

As the AFL seem reluctant to consider us for a priority pick, could they in their infinite wisdom just for once make up a "ruling" on the run and give him some sort of special dispensation to nominate MFC ?

Who knows. I don't.

Hi monoccular.

The answer is this;

Melbourne has severed its contract with Mitch Clark. We have no ability to re-sign him on an open market.

The circumstances around his 'retirement' means he is not a delisted free agent, and he could not nominate his club of choice. This rule was brought about because of the way Mal Michael 'retired' from Brisbane, then signed with Essendon the following season which was around 6 or 7 years ago I think.

However..

Mitch Clark can nominate for the pre-season draft (not the National Draft). Given his issues with mental illness, if he states his strong preference is to return to the MFC, it would be suicide by media for any other club to nominate him. In any case, the only clubs that may have a pick ahead of the Demons, are GWS, Brisbane and St Kilda.

GWS probably wouldn't want to stifle the development of their overflowing list of young forwards, and Mumford is one of the best rucks in the comp.

No way will Brisbane taking any 'go home' risks over the next few years, and considering Clark has already left them once.. I need not go on.

St Kilda have Billy Longer rucking, and will probably have one of Wright or McCartin in their forward line with Reiwoldt. A weaker argument perhaps, but I revert to the risk, and media [censored] that would occur if the Saints pulled him away from where his preference lay.

So, make no mistake - the MFC are staying very close to Mitch during his recovery, and the media are being very respectful during this period. I would currently give it a 50% chance that he will be back on Melbournes list in 2015, and if not, a 75% chance that he'll be back in the red and blue in 2016.

Cheers,

D16

Maybe Laverde although if we had 2 picks I think we are more likely to trade one.

Laverde would be a great fit for us, but I think we'd be more likely to take him with a later pick - so yeh, a similar deal to last year where we get a player and say pick 8 or whatever.

Brayshaw for sure.

We still have the shallowest midfield in the AFL and lack star power in there

if we draft Petracca an Brayshaw and can poach one of Treloar or Shiel from GWS we will be set up nicely in 2015 and beyond

I can't decide on Wrights value vs another mid to be honest. He is a bit of a 2 for 1 type in that he can ruck, and take marks/kick goals in the forward line.

There will be more mids in next years draft.

Terry Wallace did some minor re-jigging of his TAC FUTURE STARS Rolling Draft in today's programme:-

1. St. Kilda Patrick McCartin

2. Melbourne Christian Petracca

3. GWS Giants Peter Wright

4. Brisbane Angus Brayshaw

5. Western Bulldogs Sam Durdin

6. Carlton Paul Ahern

7. Richmond Liam Duggan

8. West Coast Jayden Laverde

9. Adelaide Caleb Marchbank

10. Gold Coast Jarrod Pickett

If it fell this way, and we get a compo pick for Frawley (pick 3), I wonder if we will go for Wright or Brayshaw?

Cal Twomey reckons Petracca is firming as #1 selection.

If Petracca goes before our first pick, I can definitely see us trading our first pick.

Can you imagine if her and Barrett procreated?

The offspring would be something halfway between an old jar of pickles and a prolapsed rectum.

??......

It was Malthouse's wife wasn't it? Yeah she loved hearing that piece of news.

It was cringeworthy watching her try to bait Roosy on the dinner that precisely no-one but her gave a stuff about.

She is such a slimeball. An ugly human in every sense.

I'm still waiting for the day that she writes an article about either;

a) something positive

b) something to do with the actual on field game of football

Use pick 3 on Petracca

Trade pick 4 for Tomlinson and their second rounder

Roosy was impressive as always. Hutchy said at the end of the interview we could talk to you all night and I thought yeah, I would have happily sit here listening to Roosy for a few hours. Still hard to believe he's actually our coach.

As for the rest of the show, was the first time I've seen it and it was pretty bad. Four people with terrible opinions at a table arguing with each other. And Caro... What a horrible, spiteful person.

The only times Caro showed any genuine interest in anything for the entire show was firstly, when she tried to bait Paul Roos about not going to Gills dinner (to which he gave her absolutely nothing to work with which obviously irritated her), and secondly, when it was mentioned that someone's wife had an argument with Mark Robinson - her eyes just lit up like a fat kid in a candy store!

What happens if we don't find a successor before the start of next season? Do we go.with whoever we can get and give them less than 2 years to figure it all out?

I imagine we'll just get Neeld back in and take it from there.

Feel free to share it around!

Do you mind if I post that on the Dees board over on Bigfooty mate? The guys will love that - they are not impressed over there tonight and need a laugh like this too.

Feel free to share it around!

Do you mind if I post that on the Dees board over on Bigfooty mate? The guys will love that - they are not impressed over there tonight and need a laugh like this too.

Its also been floated that he may stay on in a footy operations type role after he hands over the coaching role.

But I think he just meant 'ask me/theclub/whoever is in charge' in 2 years time, as that's when he'd hope this side is able to start focusing on the opposition more so than ourselves.

Im more disappointed about losing Clarke than I am about our start to the year - so I think that's a good sign.

David Swallow would have been great, and a potentially realistic target last year - but he's started like he may breakout this year and will be off the table if he keeps up his form.

this is place is turning into demonology

if you come on here and pointlessly grind some personal axe with somebody post after post to the sheer annoyance of everyone else that uses the site, you should be banned - simple as that

shut up and talk footy, nobody cares about your little quarrels FFS }(

This is the exact reason I generally stick to bigfooty.

This place degenerates off topic, into a [censored]-fest within 2 pages of almost every single thread.

Sorry to say this, but this forum is very poorly moderated in this regard. Any posts that arent on topic or at least within the spirit, or very humorous - should be deleted so that when we want to read about an actual topic, we dont have to wade through such an incredible amount of unrelated, boring rubbish. A penalty system should apply to the continuous perpetrators.

I would love to be more active on a forum specifically for Dees supporters, but at the moment, I only come on here to read training reports and see if there is any inside info leaking about certain topics (such as how Mitch Clark is doing).

Sorry for the rant - but I hope it is considered constructive feedback.

Clark needs to be our power forward.

I wouldn't want to see him in the ruck very often at all.

I reckon Blease will play again.

interesting that our first 5 are against sides whose current placing in premiership odds are 9th,10th,13th,16th and 18th, it's a huge opportunity for a great start

..or a terrible start.

a lot of people are saying that Salem has put on a lot of size since he was drafted

He was only drafted just over 2 months ago, so not sure how he could have put on that much

I've been to a few training sessions before Christmas, and I noted how small bodied he was.

Apparently he lost 6kgs since starting preseason and it was noted as a concern.

After being medically assessed, he was found to have a thyroid issue which was rectified and the improved results were immediate.

Hence the dramatic improvement in body shape so quickly.

Harmes has looked very comfortable at the level when I've been to training. However he is young and we can keep him rookied for 2 years.

But I reckon Georgiou should be given first crack at it. We should be able to work out whether this guy deserves a senior spot within 12 months.

I reckon well approach these as practise matches.

A chance to practise the new game plans, and also for players to familiarise themselves with each other.

We won't be risking anyone with niggling soreness etc.