La Dee-vina Comedia

6. Salem 5. Melksham 4. Harmes 3. Brayshaw 2.Oliver 1. Hibberd The first three deserve their votes; the last three I found extremely difficult to find. "Best of a bad lot" is the cliche that comes to mind.

Not necessarily. Plenty of industries have "non-compete" clauses which restrict a person after they cease working with one employer to prevent them working for another for a period of time. There is usually some form of financial compensation involved, although that is sometimes built-in to the contract rather than paid after exit. Having said that, I think the free agency for delisted players is fine as a concept.

As the off-season comes to a close I wanted to say thankyou to all who have been active on Demonland in the off season. As always, it's been informative, entertaining and sometimes maddening. And it's been a decent time-waster, too. Particular thanks to all those who posted training reports which helped us appreciate the work being done as we head into what we all hope will be a successful 2019. Similarly, thanks to the site administrators and moderators who keep this wonderful form of social media going. Go Dees.

Your post is missing a satire emoji.

If I was a Port supporter, I'd be worrying that Ken Hinkley hasn't realised this is Round 1 and is instead picking a team to help him win a game of Scrabble.

Practice match or for points?

Last night I stated that I wasn't ready for football and wondered whether others felt the same way. Clearly, I'm in a minority. The TV ratings have apparently shown that last night's audience was the biggest for the opening match in at least 6 years.

That's surprising. Essendon has an unparalleled recent history of fully understanding the health of all its players with complete confidence in everything the club doctor says.

I don't wish to sound harsh, but if he does "implode" (and I hope that doesn't happen) we may not want him back. We may not want him back anyway, either because we've adequately filled the gap he left behind or we are not interested in taking back a player who needs significant pastoral care which drains resources. I hope he succeeds to a level which makes him and Freo happy. I still doubt it will be enough for Freo to win a Premiership while Ross Lyon is coach, though. Lyon's game style seems to be primarily about not losing, rather than winning.That might get a team all the way to the finals, but the highly disciplined approach and lack of risk-taking which his game style requires will leave the team unable to respond when it really counts in a big game.

I know Rance has his detractors, but I admire him for this: Richmond has had an incredible run of good luck without injuries to key players in recent seasons. Should they lose one more of Martin, Cotchin or Reiwoldt for an extended period, they'll be in big trouble.

Is it just me? But I'm not ready for the season to start. I'll be ready tomorrow. I don't like Thursday night football at the best of times (except on the Thursday before a public holiday, such as Good Friday or ANZAC Day) but starting the season on a Thursday night just feels wrong. Insufficient build up, people having to go to work or school tomorrow, etc. I just think it's the wrong day of the week (irrespective of the teams playing).

I'm reasonably confident the middle one is Yoda.

I'm curious. If Smith were picked, who would miss out from the players I've listed?

He's got a 5 week old baby at home. I don't need to look any further for a reason.

An alternative might be to change the rule so that a ball hitting the post becomes irrelevant. if it bounces back into play, it's play on. If it goes through on the goal side of the goal post it's a goal and on the behind side of either the goal or point post, it's a minor score. Yes, it would be a major break with tradition. But does that really matter?

I agree with the sentiment that it seems poor management to have kept him on the field, but would most people have him in their Round 1 side if fit? I'm not sure if he gets in ahead of T Mac, Weideman, Melksham, Petracca, Spargo, ANB and Hunt. And I can't see us playing an eighth forward. The last three I've listed would be playing a different role, so the real question is whether he'd be playing instead of one of the first four named (I would have thought not) or whether one of those four plays elsewhere (possible, if Petracca plays more of a mid-field role). In short, I'm not convinced he would have been picked this week anyway. And I forgot about Fritsch. If he's playing forward, there's even less room for Smith (and probably Hunt)

I don't think you have to look far. Try Melbourne FC pretty much anywhere in the period 1964 to 2013. But if you want to limit it to 20 years, the 1994-2013 era, even with some highlights early on, will take some beating.

Without seeing what Ralph actually wrote (or hearing what he said), I'm not sure what to make of this statement. Was he saying that there were multiple claims of Hogan being seen all of which proved to be false (which, I think, would be a literal interpretation) or was he trying to say that Hogan had been seen as often as there were claims that Elvis had been seen. It's been a long time since Elvis has left the building and as far as I know, not once has an alleged sighting of Elvis been proven.

I don't know the reasons why Rioli and May ended up at Scotch and Melbourne Grammar respectively, but rather than "poaching talent" maybe those schools were giving scholarships to indigenous kids to give them a better chance of an improved education compared with what may otherwise have been their lot.

I'm impressed. I can't even understand the question, let alone answer it.

I've not been following his off season, but do we know whether his foot injury has fully and properly resolved?

As a matter of interest, do you think Harmes has become a better automon or is he one of the exceptions?

And to drill a bit deeper, I wonder if it's also a story, within those clubs, of two coaches? One who has recruited Andrew Lovett, Harley Bennell and Jesse Hogan. And one who hasn't.

Wrong Khan. Ghengis was a mongrel Mongol. I think the Khan who can be linked to "nice" was Kubla, with his "stately pleasure-dome". (From my favourite poem of all time, which, perhaps ironically given some of the content of this thread, was written following an "opium-influence dream".)

I don't understand this gratuitous comment. Are you saying Christian Salem, Jayden Hunt and (even though he's not ours) Josh Kelly have a similar mentality to Jack Watts?