speed demon

Great call in the opening post. The rebuild is happening and looks promising.

I'm a doctor with experience managing these injuries. I thought I'd make a few comments to quell speculation. SEN reported Petracca had surgery. That wouldn't be for a "small punctured lung" (that's treated with a tube inserted between the ribs to inflate the lung) or four fractured ribs, so I assume it was for the spleen. It's uncommon these days to need to operate on splenic injuries as our interventional radiology colleagues are excellent at performing a minimal invasive procedure (angioembolisation) to stop the bleeding. That Petracca needed surgery suggests this was nothing short of a life-threatening situation. Surgery in this case is usually via a long incision in the midline of the abdomen. That in itself takes a long time to recover from (eg no heavy lifting for six weeks). Then there is the time needed to re-again AFL-level fitness. As a young and fit person, I'm sure Petracca will be fine in time but it wouldn't surprise me if this was the end of his 2024 season.

Good post. Furthermore, if you do coach in the way you describe, fans will dislike you for not being engaging. You may improve the team but a thread will start on DL "Is BDA the right person for the job" and get thousands of posts. Sponsors will dislike you for not giving their brand more air time. You may make finals but dissatisfied sponsors means an unhappy board. Most significantly, the AFL and media will definitely dislike you for failing to produce content. You will no longer be afforded the privilege to stand or fall by your results and the forces that be will eventually affect the outcome they desire. If people don't like listening to "talk, talk, talk" I suggest you do what I do: don't listen to it. Don't criticise Goodwin for talking, like it or not, he's just performing a requirement of the head coaches role.

Anyone know why Kayo is showing a replay from the Neeld era?

My guess is a player well-conditioned to AFL football would be able to adequately recover after five days under optimal circumstances (eg in Melb likely better than in Adelaide). The bigger issue is, doing so requires a big reduction in training load between matches and, particularly when repeated, this has a negative impact on maintaining fitness. Of course, a short break one week usually means a longer break between games the next week and thus the opportunity to do extra training to partially offset previous reductions. I'm sure the high performance team have meticulous plans for all this load management. Getting it right for 20+ individual athletes would be a huge task. With the Carlton game likely being predicted to be a tough game a long way out, I'm guessing the players will be allowed to recover to optimise performance (perhaps if we were playing Nth Melbourne they may have pushed the training a little more).

Thx for clarifying @deanox. We can debate the merits or otherwise of the voting system but what it does is reward players who consistently play their role as assessed by the four people best positioned to understand each players role. We can infer from the result that Nibbler and Pickett both did a great job of playing their role this season. If that caused you to choke on your Cornflakes, maybe you have some reflecting to do. I thought Pickett's offensive output may have been a little down this season but his defensive work was better. Especially using his pace and agility to close down space and deny opposition ball movers freedom to run (eg Saad v Blues and Quaynor v Pies mid-year come to mind).

Thx @Timothy Reddan-A'Blew Kudos to the club for sticking with him. If he can stay injury free and do a full pre-season reasonable to hope for an even better 2024!

Agree with all this. I've no doubt we'll be galvanised and extremely motivated this Friday. My bigger concern is whether this can be balanced with being focussed and composed. I think we lost to the Pies due to lack of composure; didn't handle the Pies early intensity, blazed away going into F50 and some shanks on goal when the game was to be won. The emotion of the week needs to be channeled into playing the best football of their lives not just coming out breathing fire.

I accept Maynard may have not acted consciously in remodelling himself as a cannonball. In that case, he did so instinctively and that instinct needs to be re-trained by disincentivisation.

If Maynard is genuine in his apology to Brayshaw for carelessly making high contact leading to severe impact, I look forward to him pleading guilty! Apologies @ElDiablo14 missed your early post - hard to keep up with this thread!

In 2017, cardiothoracic surgeon Patrick Pritzwald-Stegmann was punched in the head by a patient at Boxhill Hospital. A month later he died of his injuries, leaving behind a wife and two young children as well as all the people that could have benefitted from his knowledge and skills over the remainder of his career. Violence towards healthcare workers was already on the increase but the response had been inadequate. Following the enormous publicity around Patrick’s death (as opposed to the non-existent publicity about daily episodes of violence with less extreme outcomes) the Victorian government invested an extra $20 million in security for public hospitals and initiated the “violence against health workers is never OK” (depressing that some people need to be informed of this message). Of course, the problem still persists. However, these changes had an immediate and lasting beneficial impact. Although, thankfully, the two cases are not on the same scale, there are parallels here to the Brayshaw/Maynard incident. This is perhaps the highest stakes concussion in AFL history. In the early stages of a final between Victoria’s best teams watched live by over 800,000 people, a reputed enforced cannonballs into the head of a helmeted player with a history of concussion. A player whose fiancé’s father died affected by CTE. A generous interpretation is this was an attempted smother performed carelessly. An alternative view is this was an intended hit masquerading as a smother. The outcome of the final was influenced, a player’s season is likely over, his career possibly ended prematurely and his long-term well-being jeopardised. The AFL, in the middle of a billion-dollar class action for compensation for the impact of concussion, is in a fierce spotlight. Lawyers watch with interest. Parents wonder about their children playing AFL if actions such as Maynard’s leading to outcomes such as Brayshaw’s are not disincentivised; “maybe soccer instead? Weren’t the Matilda’s great!” Will the AFL shrink away or take a stand? The recent appointment of Laura Kane, footballer, lawyer and advocate, as executive general manager of football is opportune. Like Patrick’s death, the Brayshaw/Maynard incident will be an inflection point in institutional responses to occupational violence. The tribunal’s finding – and the AFL’s response – will shape the conception of “duty of care” in football in Australia.

Thx @layzie Well written article on the broader significance of this issue and the varying perspectives different stakeholders take. However, what’s with the final paragraph? “Crying shame if Maynard gets rubbed out”?!!! Did Cornes hack the Guradian?

Gawn is not rucking solo for four weeks and TMac is not playing as the only tall forward so Grundy comes in. When Grundy is in the forward line, what about cutting our loses and having him tag Weitering? At least Grundy will get led to the ball and he should be effective at neutralising the aerial contest. May give our other forwards better opportunity to score.

Interesting selections by both clubs. I suspect the loser may rue their decisions. Looking forward to the following headline: "Pies lose due to impotent wet Cox"

Always enjoy seeing this gif while eating breakfast...

Nathan Jones almost teared up referring to Melksham as one of his best friends (twice, during the Dees v Lions broadcast). Hard to top that for a character reference.

Well the “Goodwin is too conservative at selection” club haven’t had much to bond over lately.

@binman, I like your system and enjoy reading your assessments. I'm not much of a punter - the last bet I placed prior to backing the Dees for the flag at $7 after the Saints win was Michael Shelley to win the Gold Coast marathon at the Commonwealth Games in 2018 at $35 - but I do like probability. I have two critiques to offer. First, this is a great system for assessing a teams probability of winning the flag isolation. I think it is particularly useful mid-season when there is a reasonable sample of exposed form. However, a limitation of this system is the lack of consideration for a team's key flag rivals (e.g. how they match up, home ground advantage) and for a team's likely path through the finals. At this time of year, this a particularly important factor to consider. For example, if Collingwood finish first and we finish fourth, as seems likely, we are set up for an excellent run through the finals. I would say we are favourites. In contrast, if Brisbane finish first and we finish fourth, we have a harder assignment and I would argue our probability of winning the flag decreases and Brisbane's increases. As an aside, If Brisbane finish top two, I would say they have the greatest probability of making the grand final (given their two home finals). Second, you are offering generous odds! The sum of the the implied probability for Melbourne, Brisbane, Collingwood, Port Adelaide and Carlton equals ~85%. This would imply that there is a 15% probability of St Kilda, Sydney, GWS or Bulldogs winning, which I think is too high. I would have Brisbane at $4.25 instead of $5.50 (implied probability of 23.5% cf 18%). Though if you're offering $5.50 for Brisbane, I would be happy to layoff... Thanks for your post!

So, for the following teams to be guaranteed a home qualifying final: Brisbane: need to win Port: need to win AND Brisbane lose Melbourne: need to...lose We got this (yes, yes, I know other possibilities exist)

I didn’t love Tomo’s game - gave his opponent too much space - but I did love Lever’s. Tomo’s presence facilitated Lever’s performance. I’d stick with him.

Ugottobekidding He's our leading goal kicker with 33

I see the Gawndry experiment as a partial success. It's clearly not a complete success as neither Gawn nor Grundy adequately performed as forwards. Likewise, it's not a complete failure as Grundy was available for selection every week, played 17 AFL games (solo ruck for 4), rucked very well and all this has delivered Gawn to the finals fit and in form. I have no issue with the club being bold and attempting the Gawndry experiment, especially when Goodwin has shown the courage to act when it's not working. $650K/pa for an AA ruck is good value. Sure, it's a luxury for a back up ruck. However, a second rate ruck/forward would probably cost $450K/pa (if we could acquired one), so it's not a big difference. Moreover, Grundy salary has been a better return on investment than the ~$500K/pa for Harmes, TMac and BBB this year. I would like to keep Grundy (especially if there is the possibility of changing to 5 on the bench). Play him off the bench in the ruck to keep Gawn fresh, for specific match ups and as insurance in case of injury (I also like quarantining him from premiership rivals). Droppable for big matches / finals. However, I doubt Grundy would be keen on this. He might have had the humility to accept being co-ruck but I doubt he has such lack of ambition to accept playing VFL come finals. If he wants a trade, I would grant it. Would be bad for morale to keep Grundy against his wishes. It's one thing if the player is being given every opportunity to excel, another if they are intended to be under-utilised. If we win the premiership this year - even with Grundy sitting in the grandstand - he will have played a role and I'll be grateful.

I thought whether we played JJ, Harmes, Spargo or Woewodin was a moot point. Shame JJ has not seized his opportunities in the second half of this season. Excited for Laurie and adds further interest to the game. Good luck to him.

I also love that he's NOT in anyone else's team. All our premiership rivals would be better with Grundy.

Finishing 2nd opens up our preferred run through the finals: home qualifying final against interstate team (likely win), home preliminary final possibly against another interstate team (another likely win) and GF against Collingwood (who’ve shown no signs they can best out game plan from KB). If we win our next two, there’s a reasonable chance of Brisbane & Port each dropping a game and we better their %. Thus, while I’ve been all for ‘experimenting with personnel’, ‘squad mentality’, ‘horses for courses’ and ‘resting/managing players’, the time has come for best 23. Gawn can go solo for 5 games in 7 weeks. Play Tomlinson for the season. Accept his flaws in the interest of supporting his confidence and boosting defensive cohesion. Play Smith forward and keep him at least in the 23 when Fritsch returns.