binman

That's unfair. They are stick ons:

May is the Natural Hamstring Healing brand ambassador

'Sorry Liam, i'm not sure who natural hamstring healing is, but there is no way you can play this week with a grade three hamstring tear. And if i were you i'd be recommending you stop ingesting calf fetus. Despite what you've read, it won't help. At least it won't help your hammy - you might be protected against pagan demons

Agree with all three points. The other big difference to the 70s, 80s and 90s (and even into the 2000s) is back then key forwards rarely left the 50 metre arc. To a lesser extent the same is true for half forwards. Which meant that they rarely had to kicked whilst super fatigued or gassed. Sure the guns had good technique, but fatigue exposes suspect techniques - and even small flaws. Compare the kms brown runs in a game to say Dunstall. Chalk and cheese i suspect. The only real equivalent to the old stay at home forward these days is Hawkins, and perhaps to lesser extent Dixon. It is no coincidence he is so accurate Brown might follow the play all the way to the wing or even our defensive zone and 60 seconds later having a set shot at goal. The same is true for our small forwards. And generally we play a very aerobically taxing game so there is every chance any player kicking for goals will be sucking wind. Another difference to the 70s, 80s and 90s is back then forwards more often had open leading lanes straight up the ground, so their shots were much more likely to be on good angles than today as modern forwards have to contend with zones, blocking, tow on ones, intercept marking and players blocking leading lanes.

100% correct. And there is no doubt we can improve our accuracy from set shots. That said Fritter, after a shaky start to the season i the first 2-3 rounds, was incredibly accurate for the rest of the year. And as Growll notes a full season from Ben Brown will help the cause and Tmac is pretty reliable kick at goal too. So key will be players like Nibbler, Spargo, Kozzie (who def improved his accuracy after he dropped his prancing horse routine), Jackson, Langers and the mids improving their set shot percentages. Even an incremental improvement from those players will help over the course of a full season. As evidenced by the dogs missing out on top 4 by half a percent, or some such, even a statistically tiny improvement might be the difference between say finishing second and a home QF, or finishing 3rd and having to play interstate. As Fanatique Demon notes there will be a range of other things the club will look to improve. And no doubt Goody, without going crazy (because consistency and predictability is now a fundamental element of our model) will trial some new strategies and perhaps positional experiments. What we might look to improve is an interesting question actually. Goal kicking is one. Improving how we defending small and medium forwards might be another. And of course individual players, withy the support of the coaches, will always be looking to improve aspects of their game. On the latter point, we saw the benefit of players improving their game this year. So many examples of this. Nibbler is an obvious one, as is Tmac and Hunt. A less obvious one is Viney. Viney really improved his decision making and this improvement helped the team. He hit more targets, dumped kick into our forward line less often (the one in the 2nd q of the GF was an outlier) and stopped trying to take the tackler on all the time. If say, players like Sparrow, Jordon, Spargo all improve their game a bit (as is likely given natural improvement), as do fringe players like Laurie, Smith, Chandler etc etc then we will improve as team (assuming others don't go backwards). And then you have Kozzie, Rivers and Jacko who scarily for opposition teams still have several levels of improvement in them. And of course add our pick 17, Laurie and Rosman and Tomlinson to come back into contention for selection and things are looking pretty good on the improvement front.

No you're right, they def change the levels of the umps mics. And they could continue to so do, even if there was no feed from the commentary box

Nail on the head. It's the combination of excellent technique, spatial awareness and good decision making that marks out the best kicks (but it starts with technique). That skill is why they were so keen to get him in to the team. I watched the preseason game v the dogs a week or so back, and I'd forgotten he played. Same role and signs of that same package. They picked him with a clear plan in mind. He was a gun mid-forward as junior. The dees had other plans. The other thing I love about his game is he is aggressive in his positioning and attack on the ball. Looks to get territory.

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Pains me to say, because normally he's a [censored], but I have to agree. He was pretty good, in part because as you say he dialed things down and dropped the blokey blokey shctick. In fact I reckon he was the best caller. Including daisy, who I have to say annoys me more the more I listen to the game. She gets the third quarter so wrong in my humble. Rediscovered our dare? Please. Ironically BT was the closest to getting it right in the third when he said just before Daniel slung Max, something like the dees were just one goal away from going on a run. Though it was with no context, and we were yet to score that q, so he may have just said it as a random comment. No one responded to him.

The feed would be exactly the same as it currently is - sans commentary That's to say you currently hear the crowd and the umpire mics. All they'd need to do is not include the feed from the commentary box. Dead easy. And almost cost free. They might end up saving money when they realise lots of people might prefer the no commentary option and thst tbey are wasting money on blokes who can't string words together coherently, let alone do their job of calling games.

As a paid up member of the Dad jokes guild I give him points for trying. But if that joke was on his guild application it would be stamped DO NOT ALLOW TO JOIN - EVER. A Dad joke does not have to be funny to others (just to the teller). But it at the very least has to make some sort of sense! I mean, 'the last time Melbourne fans experienced. 5.9 was the earthquake"? Huh?

What i really want is an option to listen to a watch a game with with no commentator feed, but still have the crowd noise and umpires mics feed. That would be perfect - and i assume easy enough to do given they are just different feeds into mixer. it's not even radical idea. It would be much more like going to the footy, where i can't imagine listening to a radio call while watching live.

You couldn't write this stuff. Unless you are the herald sun. Just jumped from this thread to the Hun ans read this headline https://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/afl/top-50-afl-media-performers-see-who-made-the-2021-list/news-story/7bcc9f26b878586a94d361d21a360d4d

What about his the 'dees need two of tbe next 3 goals' WTF

In all seriousness, one of the unintended, really positive, consequences of having to play the GF at Optus is that for this group of players heading across to play the Eagles and Freo will be a complete joy and a trip they will look forward to, not far. Imagine the vibe and the buzz of playing on the ground where you had beaten West Coast late in the season, trounced the Cats in a prelim then experienced the ultimate football dream in winning a grand final. Bliss And the booing? Well for one, that may well feel juts like a curio to players now - bring it on. And two we might well have more dees fans in WA now - even if it is freo fans supporting us against the Eagles and vice versa.

That worries me. When we win the flag next year it will always have an asterix given only 16 teams played.

One million percent. I said before his first game in for Tomlinson that we would lose nothing with petty, and perhaps might even be better off. And predicted he will be a future AA defender. Nothing I saw since replacing has led me to doubt those predictions. Not sure where that leaves Tomlinson. But an advantage he has is his versatility

I have heard from a reliable source they are not reviewing the 2021 prelim either

And Darcy will be the MC

It has binman written on it?

Me too actually. Not a huge fan of night games. Hard to get a park around the G! And public transport is a touch more feral at 11:30pm on a Friday night than Sunday lunchtime

Swings and roundabouts

What no more mid winter 3:15pm starts at a frigid MCG? What will I do with myself? Maybe watch the replay of our prime time game.

Agree. I rewatched the hell and back 5 part video series the other day/ its almost series about Burgo as it's key focus is preseason training. The thing that jumped out is the psychological component - being the fittest list is the goal (and you'd have to say a goal met), but just as important, perhaps more so, is that the players BELIEVE they are the fittest list. Since that time, including before the GF and after it, i have heard coaches, players, the CEO - and even fans - reiterate that we are the fittest ream, or variations on this theme - eg we were confident we would be fresher in the second half, we finish strongly, we've done the work etc etc. The other thing about Burgo is how much the players love and trust him. And i can see why. He is all in. The Hell and back videos commence in 2019 at the start of the 2020 preseason, which is when Burgo came on board. Right from the get go his language is all we and us - even when talking about previous years. Total buy in and collective goal setting. Inspirational. The other thing i reckon is relevant about Burgo is i don't think it is any coincidence the coaching staff (and even perty) look super, super fit. All in.

I'll add a couple. Two of his first three kicks were turnovers. The first went straight to Salem. The resulting chain of possessions ended in a goal. Later in the first, he played on from a kick out and under no pressure missed a 20 metre kick to bailey. Tracc swooped and they were very lucky not concede a goal. With 5 mins to go in the second, he turned another kick over on the 50 metre arc and was very fortunate nibbler just missed the resulting shot at goal. And forget his second half.