bing181

You missed out on cures all known diseases and walks on water.

All we need to know, though stating the obvious.

- we were able to steady and turn the game around - the new-look backline improved as the game went on - Max's mark in the dying moments. A bit lost in focusing on the kick that followed, but was massive.

What part of "that's all we could get for him" isn't clear? We only had one (one) offer and had to take what we could get. If we only managed "near on nothing", then the place to look for the reason is with Watts himself.

Yes, because all injuries/pathologies follow exactly the same course, and all bodies respond to treatment in exactly the same way and because the club always knew exactly when Jack would be back but are keeping it from us.

Watts had a reputation? Yes, but not the one that you're talking about.

We have the real truth, you just don't want to hear it.

No it won't, because even if he performs well at PA, you can't assume that he would have done the same at Melbourne.

A 26 year old player of Watts' type wouldn't have performed at his peak in a Melbourne jumper this year. Any more than he did last year.

Tom McD had ankle operations, this is toe. How to see how they're related or how he "tried to come back a bit too soon". Given the load their bodies are under, coupled with it being a gruelling, contact sport, injuries and breakdowns are just going to happen. There aren't always going to be "reasons", much as we'd love to attribute them.

Perhaps, after 8 years, the penny has finally dropped with Jack. If so, good for him, though even if it has, it doesn't alter that the decision to move him on was the right one. On other subjects (though not unrelated), notice that Trengove didn't play - unless there's an injury, not a promising sign for him. Sad to see if that's the case.

Nothing. Other players are ahead of him. Main knock on Frost was his fitness - that other teams had worked out that they could run him around for 2 or 3 quarters and then run off him once he'd knocked himself out. Whether the reason he hasn't been included is (just) because of that, impossible to know. He's probably going to need one of Lever or Oscar Mac to go down to get a game.

The danger with that though is you start to normalise extremism. This false equivalence is what gave us "but the emails".

Calling out a player who may have (legitimate) mental health issues as "weak" and a "mummies (sic) boy" has nothing to do with politics. Hopefully Harley is getting better support and understanding from the club than he's getting from some here.

"Jesse will have some time away from the club, while his mother has also flown over from Perth to be with him."

Just not true (read his interview, many of his issues flowed on from being long-term injured), but even if it is, so what? It takes a lot more mental courage to be honest with yourself about what your emotional needs are than it does to just plow on regardless, toughing it out because "that's what real men do". This is the kind of BS that leads to the suicide rate amongst men being X3 that of women.

Yes, I know. A player's trade value is ultimately determined by what his football manager says in the press. Every club will know exactly what they're getting, and they'll have their own criteria for evaluating each player. The rest is just background noise.

You're right. MFC is for MFC. As it should be.

We will if a) there are multiple clubs in the running (which seems to the case) and b) we make it clear that it's second rounder or nothing (which seems to be the case).

Adelaide won't accept anything else than a first rounder plus something else (2nd round presumably). Nor would we, and nor would you expect us to.

Bernie was "let go" by the Crows and didn't have much say in it.

Phenomenal news on Lever if we can pull it off - which I'm sure we can, in spite of the huffing and puffing from Adelaide. He and Hibberd, the cornerstones of an AA backline.

Also older. Lever has his whole career ahead of him.

Trust the FD on this, especially as he trained with us as a junior. At the very least they must have all the inside info they need re fitness. Always a tricky one these kinds of trades. Is it a case of unrealised potential - for any number of reasons - or is it a case of what you see is what you get? He'd be a third rounder at max (I hope!), so are the risks high/lower than an equivalent pick in the draft on an untried 18 year old?

Guessing, or that's what you've heard from "sources close to the club"?