La Dee-vina Comedia

Just as we're apparently paying part of Jack Watts salary, I wonder whether Balic's father will be paying part of his son's salary.

At the time we brought them in we weren't making AFL players out of good draft picks either. The only question that needs to be asked is this: With whatever pick(s) we have to part to get any player, is there a better option either available to trade for or in the draft for the same value? So, if we trade for Balic with, say, a 3rd round pick, is he a better chance of success than the alternative?

Unrelated. Different spelling of the surname.

Well written, Mazer. I still believe it's more incompetence than anything else, but I respect your view that with so many issues it becomes hard to tell the difference.

I wish we could combine his effort with Jack Watts' skill set. If the 179 cm height is correct, I suspect that makes him the shortest player to have nominated for a ruck contest in the centre circle all year. What was great about that (obviously due to a mix-up, none of our designated ruckmen were there) was that he took on the responsibility in a flash and did not shirk the contest.

I am grateful for Willmoy and ProperDee giving reasoned responses. I hope their love for the Dees can continue without the sport itself being damaged. As I've said many times before, though, I'm a firm believer that one should never assume conspiracy when incompetence will suffice.

I just don't understand why people who believe there is massive corruption and conspiracies involving the AFL are still watching it. What would be the point? If there are posters out there who genuinely believe the AFL is corrupt, can you please explain why you still (a) watch it and (b) participate in this forum? I'm not trying to be critical, I just don't understand.

Has Demonland shifted to the "dark web"? That's where I thought conspiracy theories like this resided.

Can someone please clarify...are the Mark of the Year and Goal of the Year chosen by the public? (I don't mean the weekly award - just the annual award taken from the weekly ones). If it is, Howe not winning MOTY is astounding as I would have thought the Collingwood masses would have been enough to get him over the line. And if it's not public voted...I still don't understand why he didn't win it.

While I agree with you, don't forget every player has an agent whispering in their ear who gets a percentage. I'm not saying agents are unreasonable but they are, by definition, conflicted in the advice they provide.

Check the date on that paper. It might be referring to James Kelly going to Essendon as a top-up player.

Well said.

I thought all those 50 metre penalties were correctly paid. But... 1. There were two to us that seemed identical which were not paid. I can't remember the details, but one was a marked ball punched away and the other was holding on too long after a mark. 2. The rules which require that a 50 metre penalty be paid might themselves need to be re-considered.

Strange bedfellows. Any affect they might have on the game probably cancels each other out.

Who knows? You've made one assumption. But there could be a myriad of other reasons (for which I have no supporting evidence) including: relieving salary cap pressure personality clashes preference for one other player out of a list of about 45 to be captain need to regenerate a list in an ordered fashion which means "removing" older players a couple at a time offering a player of Lewis' calibre at a "peppercorn" as a courtesy to the player as gratitude for contributing to 4 premierships if Lewis had stayed Hawthorn may have lost someone else of greater importance to their long-term plans...

Is it? It seems to me the AFL continues to be concerned about the opposite. Isn't that why we have incessant rule changes? I'm sure I've heard the AFL arguing that the rule changes are essential to "keep the game moving". Presumably that means the AFL thinks the game is being slowed down by flooding which leads to those ugly rolling mauls. I suspect the only people who keep complaining that the game is "speeding up every year" are older players who are slowing down.

OK, bad example. But the point I was trying to make was that if you have zero interest in trading a player, you don't need to know what he is worth. If, on the other hand, you operate on the principle that at the right price every player is tradeable, then go ahead and find out what he might be worth. Just don't argue that you'd like to know his value if there is no intention of trading him.

So, what would the point of that be? It's like finding out what your house is worth when you're not interested in selling it. That is, information of absolutely no value.

Lewis also brings nous. When Gawn was required to leave the ground because of the blood rule, Pedersen ran from deep in defence to take the ruck duties. Lewis looked around saw Pedersen moving and immediately ran back to bolster the defence. He was the only player to react in that way. It makes me wonder what might have happened if he wasn't out there. Would the rest of the team be waiting for an instruction from the runner leaving us one short in defence?

If I didn't think the umpiring was fair, I wouldn't be interested in watching the game. And I wonder why anyone who does think umpiring is biased or unfair is bothering to watch a game.

I'd say that. They may not be 100% correct, but I'm comfortable in my belief that they are 100% fair.

You can add Polly Perkins to your list. And Tommy Lahiff. Although perhaps those two only worked on radio.

"Never ascribe to malice that which is adequately explained by incompetence."

And hopefully it will be explained publicly so the rest of us can understand how a player standing still and being jumped into can be accused of shepherding in the ruck. As to the rest of the day's umpiring, I thought it was pretty good overall. And slightly off-topic, but I was impressed seeing Oliver going to Gawn and apparently telling him to pull himself together after one of those bizarre free kicks resulted in a St Kilda goal.

When I read this thread title my first thought was whether it was story about a Japanese agriculturalist who supported AFL.