nutbean

personally, I found Linda Lovelace's opinions hard to swallow

Jogged straight through the 10 metre exclusion zone - it had no impact but it was dumb - the rule is what the rule is - It was a 100% correct decision.

As an aside - I was half listening to whosiwatsis Luff and David King and that Luff bloke said our improvement in attacking/scoring from last year to this year is the biggest improvement of all time ( not sure if he said all time or since detailed stats were kept - but either way, it is pretty impressive.)

Can you dislocate a rib ?

my screen in not wide enough. His legs would poke out the side.

I must be missing something... I actually don't understand the argument on Hall, Lynch,Hunter, Dawes and Cloke. If anything they actually prove you point ( excepting Dawes and Hunter). Hall in his premiership year (2005) took a massive 206 marks and kicked 80 goals ! He was AA, and AFLCA player of the year (2nd in their B&F) Lynch in his premiership year (2006) took 143 marks and kicked 65 goals ( 7th in their B&F) Cloke took a whopping 171 marks in his premiership year of 2010 and kicked 38 goals but also kicked 40 behinds Hunter still kicked 29 goals in their premiership year but was a swingman at both ends of the ground Dawes was second fiddle to Cloke and he still kicked 30 goals for the year. Big power forwards like Hall, Lynch, Jono Brown, Franklin, Roughead and Hawkins have been instrumental in getting their teams premierships.

I just read the post you responded to....hmmmm...deciphering it is proving a little difficult...

He is such a gun he is going to play in both. games.

Yup - and in the season proper last year he was horrible. To me we need to put work into the likes of Libba, Wallis, McCrae, Bontempelli and Stringer - if we can keep those five under control we are a long way to winning the game.

I was a bit mystified by this - which game in particular made you both jump to this conclusion. He has played against us twice - both last year. First game he had 9 touches and in the second game he had 14 touches. Not that I draw too much from supercoach but he was rated 2nd worst on ground in his first outing and 5th worst on ground in his second).

I did the school boy giggle every time i heard the head of WADA's name mentioned - Dick Pound

My mate calls me two-diks as he is adamant that I couldn't be that stupid with just one.

Same them last time around - they were great - played for almost 3 hours - ( Robert Smith has never worn shorts nor has ever felt sand between his toes). I am going to an interesting gig on Saturday night - The Brewster Brothers ( Angels ) are doing a introspective, talking about their journey and in particular the journey of the Angels , interspersed with film clips and some documentary stuff and a little bit of live acoustic music from them. Should be great.

Interesting article in the Herald Sun this morning - Scott Cummings and Glenn Jakovich stating that the constant travel took a year or two off their careers. Jakovivch talked about a couple of players who started at the same time as him getting two extra years through not travelling as much as they were Melbourne based. Both said that the travel burden was less than ideal on their bodies and the article referenced Jesse's back stress fractures. Scott Cummings suggested that if Jesse was to move he would need to have a "business class" travel clause in his contract.

All the conjecture had a huge impact on Dangerfield last year.......

okay - I can't help myself. We can have varying opinions on him staying or going. - but to dismiss Hogan with he can just be "replaced and won't win us a flag" - seriously.......

I went to Mt Scopus and I can fondly remember Peter Knights playing against our school team ( my dodgy memory tells me he went to Camberwell high ?). He was play school footy at the same time as his first year at Hawthorn. He kicked 12 goals against our firsts from Centre Half Back and took 16 marks - 14 were uncontested after the first two marks he took were standing on our ruckmans head - after that no one went near him for fear of getting bootstuds in the back of the head

and that makes a grand total of one.... Now Spencer may become a late bloomer ( very very late) but to date, he doesn't take enough marks, he doesn't kick enough goals, he doesn't impact enough contests - what he does ok is contest in the ruck. At this stage I think a Gawn/Pedersen combo offers much more than Gawn/Spencer. As others have said , he is purely insurance.

We are at a stage now where nearly every game we play will be won or lost above the shoulders. Two out of our three losses were lost "above the shoulders". The only game where we were legitimately beaten by a better side ( and still could have won) was North. ( and further to your point - I think the Bulldogs are a team that wins because of "above the shoulders" - I am not convinced that they are more talented than Geelong, Hawthorn or Sydney - but they have A plus mindset)

So........ a 20 year old 202cm ruckman forward needs to pull his finger out ?

Roos said on the day he signed - he didn't know if finals was on the horizon during his time but his brief was to leave the club in significantly better shape than when he arrived. Big tick in my opinion. His legacy will be the culture and structures he has built and the emphasis and spotlight he has put on our club developing and teaching players that arrive.

I think we just need to recognise that the human body is weird and wonderful thing (especially mine) so what we are told about a players length of time on the sidelines compared to the actuality is not a reflection on the doctors/surgeons/fitness staff but merely an acceptance that the body will heal to its own timetable not necessarily one that is published on a club's website

I wonder if posters would be happier with Geelongs approach to injuries. I just watched their injury report and they divide injuries into three lists - short term injuries, medium term injuries, long term injuries - they do not specify "weeks". It is safer and it recognises that the human body is not a machine that you can be definitive about exact times recoveries take. I have no problem with our club listing weeks and by the same token I don't have issues if they say 2 weeks for injury and when it doesn't respond as it should, it ends up taking 4 weeks.

really ? Firstly - a big disclaimer - the below only applies to a FIT Dawes - which we haven't seen A more attacking quick game plan would suit Dawes. Dawes is not a good contested but is a good hit up option and does get on his bike and keep leading and was a key to Collingwood's success in their premiership year. He absolutely led to the flanks under Neeld and also when he has played under Roos because simply that is the game plan we were following - he runs patterns that he is told to run. The switch to being more corridor-centric is a recent phenomena this year. I am not sure he can't play second ruck or he doesn't want to. He would probably be a slight downgrade on Pedersen in the ruck ( who is no world beater in the ruck either). As to not applying forward pressure - I am happy to acknowledge that Dawes weakness is he drops too many marks but his strength is his forward pressure - his contesting, his tackling, his blocking, his second efforts. Irrespective - unless Dawes can get fit and recapture 2010 form he, like Pedersen and Frost (playing up forward) are all just keeping the seat warm until either the Weed or Hulett hopefully step up.