La Dee-vina Comedia

I can't believe nobody has pointed out that if the biting had involved dogs and a Collingwood player, the medicos would have given the dogs rabies shots to protect them from being infected by the player's bite.

You also need to include the management of draft positions as part of his job. Trading is inextricably linked with the draft via the positions in the draft that Lamb engineers for us by the trades he makes. Jason Taylor then gets to make choices from those positions. I would have thought for this part of his job, Lamb has been exceptional.

Surely you're not being serious? According to Demonland groupthink, because a Melbourne player is the victim, there is no way the miscreants will be suspended.

If that happens, you'll surely have to change your name to GawnOfTheLiving.

In what way is he "completely unaccountable"? I expect the club have some KPIs he needs to meet. Whether they're the same KPIs that you or I might choose is irrelevant. The point is, I'm sure he's held accountable internally.

With the season about to start, I'm interested in people's views of what's ahead of us. But let's not be boring. I want one outlandish prediction per poster. It could be about an individual, a team (could be ours, but not necessarily), footy media, footy politics or the AFL Commission. To enable me to stick to the rule of one outlandish prediction, I'll start with a prediction I'll call "round zero" which is that many posters will be unable to stick to just one outlandish prediction. My one, true outlandish prediction is that wunderkind Sam Darcy will not make the All-Australian squad.

What does this mean? That he's starting on the bench at Casey?

I'm not in favour of changing the name of Brunton Avenue...but if it is to be changed, Barassi is the right person to name it after. I would have preferred giving names to the various "roads" that wind through Yarra Park outside the MCG with Barassi Way being used for whatever is considered to be the most significant of those roads. Other roads could be named after other sporting luminaries associated with the area such as Bill Lawry, Jack Dyer and Betty Cuthbert.

"...their final practice match..." And their first if you subscribe to the idea that last week was a simulation and not a practice match.

Maybe so the umpires know to deduct those from players' total disposals (if they choose)

Am I the only one wondering why hot pink is not considered to be fluoro?

It's hard to mount an argument that N Daicos is not worthy of winning the Brownlow Medal. Having said that, how does giving umpires some statistics change the likelihood of a midfielder winning the Brownlow Medal? That's what it already is. And the coaches' award isn't much different.

Seems like a common sense decision from AFL administrators. And that's a rarity in itself.

For everyone complaining that Pickett isn't on the list...read the article. McClure makes clear that to be on his list of A-graders, you need to have performed at an A-grade level for at least two seasons. He notes that Pickett will be on the list next year if his 2026 is as good as his 2025.

As it's his first officially unofficial outing, can I ask what has probably been addressed elsewhere, but is Latrelle Pickett officially called "Pickett" or "Sumner-Pickett"?

I like the way Demonland's title for this thread optimistically converts a question "...is [Jeffo] ready to soar in 2026?" into a bold statement ("Jeffo Ready to Soar in 2026")

Add Liam Jurrah to the list of best players to watch. Robert Flower is still on the top of both my "best" and "best to watch" lists. And Max Gawn comes second on both.

My suspicion is that the AFL years ago promised Richmond and Carlton (and/or the free-to-air broadcaster) that they would play the first game of the first round. To avoid breaking that commitment, the AFL plays some games in a round that's not called the "first round" which immediately precedes what is called the "first round". If I'm right (and I've seen no evidence that says this is the reason) it's very slippery sophistry.

What is funny is asking AI to "show me the current time on an analogue clock"

Have you checked your mail since you got back to see if they've sent you a restraining order? 🙂

"20 minutes plus time on"? Why the time on? What does it add? Why not just make it three periods of 25 minutes each?

Maybe this belongs in the Lookalikes thread, but: Marlon Neocleous Draft Profile - Aussie Rules Rookie Me Central (formerly AFL Draft Central)

We might all be over-reacting. How can we be sure that Mitch Cleary got his facts right? Just maybe "People at Hawthorn say Al has become Sam Mitchell's new obsession" might actually mean Sam Mitchell is obsessed with his predecessor, Alistair Clarkson.

I think this is a really good point. Players like James Hird, Dustin Martin and Scott Pendlebury seem to have already worked out what they're going to do with the ball before they've got it.

Or maybe he wants to see what Zac Merrett looks like in all the different Hawthorn jumpers.