Very Jaded

Josh > Nick

Maybe don’t leave Sidebottom alone. He’s a handy player.

Mason Cox is an embarrassing footballer

Houston lol

Adelaide need to calm down they’re panicking and their lack of experience is showing

The combined IQ of the crowd is running into the negatives

I don’t want to keep going around in circles, but there’s a reason we didn’t make Peatling’s short list and it’s not because we didn’t offer him excellent money and a long term contract. You can go back to this thread and read some of the comments about how into him we were from some well respected posters https://demonland.com/forums/topic/58889-james-peatling/page/2/#comments And you absolutely did condemn Trac’s behavior. A two second search shows you saying that you agree with Lewis about how poor it is for Trac to air his grievances in public.

How do you know we didn’t throw a lot of that capital and money at a key forward first and failed? How do you know that Gawn didn’t do a mountain of work to try and convince a quality tall forward to come across to us before we even spoke with Grundy? Surprise, sometimes best laid plans fail. Nobody ever denied Gawn has a big ego or that he has a lot of sway within the club. The suggestion that he’s damaging the club, or stopping us succeeding, or scaring away players because of that is utter garbage. We played Schache as a useless sub in a final because Grundy was already renting houses in Sydney while we were trying to win a flag. Perhaps some blame can fall on Grundy? Or maybe on the coaches who thought those two could magically turn into forwards?

Sorry I wasn’t clear enough. I thought the context of the post made it clear that player managers refused to talk to Tim Lamb about their clients coming to the club. I wasn’t trying to be deliberately confusing. And I told you if you want to have further discussions about this in private I’m happy to. I don’t air dirty laundry on this very public forum. I like Andy too much to do that to him, and I love the club too much to have grubs like Morris run with it (and yes many journalists read this forum). I’m also not someone to name drop or leave crumbs and then say nothing else. I feel like plenty of well informed posters have said the same as me multiple times over the past 12 months. There’s a lot of weight to this discussion. And I already told you about Peatling. We were very heavily into him. Offered him a very good deal. We also spoke with a number of potential suitors to see if we could make a deal with Trac work in our favour and none had interest in coming across. McKay (Harry) is one name I know of. Our reputation in the industry is poor. That is absolutely not all on Trac, it’s also on Clarry and Smith and our fall down the ladder, and our court room battles and our boardroom instability. But Trac poured gasoline on an open flame. I think you’re foolish to think otherwise. And if memory serves me right you were very strong on condemning his behavior last year. When many denied the noise, you were one who from the beginning said where’s there’s smoke there’s fire. And you were correct.

I think you’re being deliberately daft. You know exactly what I meant by player managers didn’t want to speak to us. Of course they spoke with us in relation to their clients currently employed by the club, but it was radio silence when it came to their other clients that we were pursuing. And just because the media didn’t report it, doesn’t mean it’s not true. No player manager is coming out publicly and saying that they don’t want to deal with certain clubs. Now that would be unprofessional. As @JJJ noted above, Tim Lamb brought a knife to a gun fight because of the situation the club found itself in, where a Norm Smith medallist and highly paid senior player was complaining about the club very publicly. Even his own management was telling him to stop because they saw the damage it was doing. Trac is not the first nor last excellent player who found themselves at a club that is underperforming. He had every right to feel aggrieved, and he had every right to express those feelings. He just needed to do it privately, the same way other senior players did.

Maybe he's saying it because he knows Selwyn is gone? Either way, he's the equivalent of Ed Langdon in front of a microphone. Zero pragmatism.

I can't say too much. If you want to have this conversation in private I'm happy to do so. I will just leave the below here, which was a direct response to something you asked on the topic. I think you can put 2 and 2 together.

You know I love and respect you as a poster, but Max did NOT want Grundy to come, and it still happened. And as alluded to above, neither holds any hard feelings towards the other because while both failed to make the partnership work, I think both acknowledge why it didn't work and have great respect for each other. Is there an element of Max running the show? Absolutely. But unfortunately when you expect one player to be the captain, the PR manager, the voice of reason, and everything else in between, this is the result. The club has relied far too much on Gawn to do everything, and nobody else has stepped up to help. Not within the playing group, and not within the FD. We have a footy manager who we rarely see front the media, much less when things go wrong. Goody did what he had to do in the media, but was canned for his lack of 'personality' in front of the camera. And since Gus left, we have not had a single senior player step up to the plate to take the burden off Max. So if Max feels like he runs the show, is that on Max or is that on a club that relies so heavily on him to do just that? I can't think of a single other club who relies so heavily on one player to represent them on every level... maybe Bont? And I don't know how much work Bont does behind the scenes at the Dogs, but I know how much Max does and IMO it is completely beyond the realms of what should be required of any player, even a captain. Again I know you are passing on what you hear in good faith, but I do wonder how much those who think "what Max wants Max gets", have done to help ease the burden he's carrying? Perhaps if they helped to run the place, things would be different. And this is not ignoring the fact that Max undoubtedly has a big ego and a big personality, and has happily taken on this role for many years because he enjoys being 'Top Dog'. And like every other player, and human, he has flaws and would rub people up the wrong way. Strong leaders often do.

Some of the behaviour is, absolutely. But of course not all. I imagine you don't know a whole lot about the impact of mental health or neurodivergence on impulse control, substance dependence or unstable behaviour. But unfortunately the impact is a significant one. That doesn't excuse poor behaviour, but it does explain some of it, especially during times of low moods. I wish Clarry would open up about his struggles the way Bailey Smith has, but of course everyone's journey is different.

I literally said above that both of these guys deserve a lot of credit for overcoming what they have. I am not holding a grudge against anyone. I just happen to have a great amount of sympathy and respect for what Clarry has been through, but I also completely recognise that Trac had a very traumatic injury, and while many here have been calling out his fear of body contact this year, I have defended him for it. I also defended him when he was being called out for not posting on his social media about the club, because I know he doesn't manage his own social media and it was unfair to accuse him of not caring about the club. I think you are being very unfair to suggest that I have cut Trac no slack. This is not a Trac vs Clarry debate, it shouldn't be. But somehow it always becomes one. They are two separate people who both made mistakes that I am sure they would take back if they could. I think that Clarry has been given very little leeway by some fans, and especially by the media, but the same can't be said for Trac. I've seen Clarry called out for everything from being fat, to ruining our club and culture, to screwing us with his contract on this site. And by the way, Clarry has always been the same. The club, the playing group and the fans were very happy to turn a blind eye to it when he was dominating the competition. If he returns to his best again, I bet nobody will discuss his indiscretions again, nor his contract. That's the nature of the beast isn't it? Peatling is another player who pulled out although we were very heavily into him. And player managers were flat out refusing to speak to Tim Lamb last year. That is not all on Trac of course, but the overall club perception that we were/are a mess.

I totally agree, but that's the benefit of hindsight isn't it? By the way we would have still got Langford, as he wouldn't have traded pick 6, but we would have definitely missed out on Lindsay. So thank god he went to waste the Pies' money instead. Lindsay will be a star. He isn't the only players who pulled out or flat out refused to talk to us last year tho. People have a go at Tim Lamb, but Tim Lamb can only do so much when nobody returns his calls.

I am not, that was not the point of my post. I was responding to the remark about one being a good guy and one being a bad guy. Neither are good or bad, both have had to deal with circumstances that were in part beyond their control. And both deserve grace and respect for overcoming some serious challenges, both physical and mental. But let's not pretend like what went on with Trac post season last year was not extremely damaging to the club. We had multiple players pull out of coming to the club as a result. Rightly or wrongly, it was very poorly handled by Trac/ his team.

Rowan Marshall too. Imagine English and Marshall making more than our selfish 'won't play with any other ruckman and only wants his AA jackets' captain 🙃

I understand this view, but likewise Clarry's mental health issues were no more in his control than Trac's post injury trauma. Clarry did silly things, so did Trac. The way Trac carried on last year was very damaging to the club, and the group. Clarry's behaviour was likewise very damaging. Both can and should take responsibility for their part as grown adults. But if we can cut Trac slack for his behaviour, why can't we do the same for Clarry? You think he chose to have mental health issues anymore than Trac chose to have that horrific injury? You only had to listen to Bailey Smith open up about his battles to understand that as fans few of us have any idea of what a player is truly going through. That doesn't mean Clarry shouldn't be held accountable for his mistakes, but likewise some grace wouldn't go astray. Clarry has never not admitted fault. He is acutely aware of what he's done, and where he's at. I am not so sure that Trac is there yet.

Pickett is on over a million with his new deal. And Trac and Clarry's deals are back ended, hence their salary has gone up as the cap has increased.

Sorry but what a load of absolute garbage. During Gawn's peak, he has only ever had 2 quality rucks on the list to 'compete with'. He won a flag with one, famously pushing Goody to leave Jackson in the ruck in the third quarter as we gained ascendancy. You think Jackson would want to come back to the club right now if he felt Gawn was not someone he could work with? And with Grundy it didn't work out, but it takes two to tango. Grundy was as much to blame, as was the club. We tried turning Grundy into Jackson, and Grundy was not having it. It made no sense to have two elite rucks on your list who both have no forward craft, and trying to turn them into forwards in their late 20s / early 30s. Let's stop talking absolute nonsense about our captain.

Buckley wants to win a flag. That won't happen with Tassie, unless he is keen to coach until he's 70.

The salary cap is less of an issue than having nothing to satisfy Freo with in a trade. Kosi was the ace, now he's staying put (thank god), you would need 3 first round picks, or 2 and a good quality player. If we trade say Trac to Hawthorn for their 1st round pick tied to Carlton, we would need to find another first round pick, or give up a future 1st and a good player, say McVee or Rivers. It seems very unlikely Freo will let Jackson go, unless he's telling them that he HAS to get back to Melbourne. He would need to really force their hand. Otherwise they'll tell him to jump, literally.

Anyone who thinks Clarry doesn’t want that more than anything, is crazy. Clarry has never intentionally done anything to hurt the club. He is very aware of how much the club has done for him. A new coach and another full pre season with hopefully no interruptions and I truly believe we will see the best of Oliver again. As the season went on and he got fitter you could see glimpses of his brilliance return. It would be heartbreaking to see Clarry dominate for another club. Even worse if we pay for him to do it.