Jaded No More

Yep. Ring the club on 9652 1111. Robbo will pick up the phone (don't get excited, it's a recorded message :D) and just follow the prompts.

An exciting pick, and for all your tall-obsessed supporters we got us another one to add to the list. I love smokies, especially Indigenous players who have clearly had to overcome difficult conditions to play. You just never know how much they are capable of until you put them in a professional environment and give them the time and attention they need to grow as footballers. Watching these sort of players develop is one of the biggest joys of being an AFL supporter.

What have we got to lose? The chances of getting anyone half decent with your last rookie pick are so slim. At least with Hughes the club knows a fair bit about him.

According to some, pleasure is pain

Come on people, another 1,000 before Christmas... we can do it! I guess the key really is getting new members on board, because only us die-hard fanatics buy memberships 2 months after our team finished 16th. We're all suckers for the pain, and we must inflict it on others :D

I hear it's a brain related back injury :D Seriously, just because someone pulls up tight from training, does not mean they have done a serious injury that will ruin their season. In fact, that he pulled up sore means he's actually working hard and doing something. The same goes for Petterd. Maybe he's just a bit sore from an earlier session, and they are giving him some time off. It's very normal that after weeks of hard training, players are feeling the strain.

How sad is it, that a group of amateurs (no offence) managed to win one game by a margin which exceeds the combined winning margin of our football team in 2008. Well done though, you're doing Demonland proud! :D

Riewoldt pretty much lives at the Thomas residency. That family is in love with him, and treat him like their long lost brother. Lets hope they don't get their claws into our Jack next. We don't need him getting any ideas about moving to the Saints! :angry:

I'm pretty sure Grant Thomas' kids are friends with Jack, as they all go to school in Brighton (it's very incestuous down here ).

Shoes... but never mind that; Cale- A steakhouse Jared- Replacement body parts McLean- Luck Meesen- A hope in hell Carlton- A suspicious fire which destroys the entire club and everyone in it

Good find. I particularly like this bit: And thank god for that. Nothing against Riewoldt, who is a fine player, but a little less crying and a little more premiership winning would certainly be nice :D

For all the inroads we've been making, I still can't see our club being brave enough to appoint McLean as captain next year. I really wouldn't be surprised if we went with the weak option of appointing Junior and Bruce as co-captains again. Doubt our players learnt anything after last year's leadership group disaster.

I have nothing against Ben's family and friends helping him through this, in fact, I think it is essential to his recovery that they do. But that is a completely different issue and has nothing to do with the fact that I don't want his problems and more importantly, his "friends", hanging around our very young and very vulnerable list. God knows we have more than enough [censored] to deal with as it is, and we are just not equipped to deal with someone like Cousins. If another club is, great, but we cannot and should not take him on. Besides, Ben still seems to have a hell of a lot of issues to resolve and IMO a return to football is not the way to go about it. It seems that football was indeed the fuel that kept the fire of his addiction burning, it gave him the financial resources and social environment in which to continue his drug habit, and stepping away from all that is probably a good idea. The reality is that all drug users eventually pay a very heavy price for their addiction, and Ben isn't any different. He had a lot going for him, but sadly blew (no pun intended) it all away on drugs, which is the nature of the beast really. A real shame, but hopefully not the end of the road for him, as he is still only very young and has a lot of living left to do while clean and sober.

If we get to halfway by Christmas (15,000), that would be a great achievement. So go buy anyone you know and love (or hate, depending on who they barrack for) a Melbourne membership for Christmas/Hannukah/New Year We desperately need to achieve 30,000 this year, and anything beyond that, especially given the current global economic crisis, will be a massive bonus.

IMO we need clearance players more than we need yet another speculative tall to clog up the list, and the club clearly agrees given they passed on quite a few talls on draft day. We have plenty of talls in development, but only one quality inside-mid in McLean. Additionally, the likelihood of finding a decent tall in the PSD are slim, but there could be a ball winning machine hiding in there just waiting for a chance.

I'm actually really excited about the NAB cup. I think we'll see most, if not all of our recruits from last year, and probably some of this year's draftees make an appearance. What a friggin disgrace it is that they stuck us in bloody Tasmania against the Hawks in the first round though!

The minute we start getting smashed and supporters start losing interest and the media starts writing that we should relocate, they'll pull out the big guns and debut Watts... so you know, Watts alone will probably end up play 20 games

Oh, thanks for making me watch that video! Forgot how amazing that game was. Still gives me goosebumps thinking about it, and it's also so nice to see Jared Rivers on a football field. One of the few highlights in a season of horrific darkness.

Unborn children probably make up our highest percentage of junior membership, because at that stage of their life they really don't know any better and have little choice but to be a Melbourne member

Haha. This has sour grapes written all over it. Besides, it is a complete disgrace that West Coast even finished the season in 15th position, given how many games they clearly tanked and how recently they were dominating the competition. They went into panic mode the minute their traitor captain abandoned ship and Benny went off in search of white powder. I guess money can't always buy you loyalty or a clean bill of health, can it now :D

How the hell can we know who did better. It's been what, 3 days since the draft? None of them have played a game, been arrested for drink driving or injured themselves. As it stands, we're on equal ground with the other 15 clubs. We had our reasons for not picking up Swift and Smith. Both are risks, and if they work out for West Coast that's great, but there is a higher percentage of success with Blease and Strauss than there is with those two. And the same goes for Naitanui, he could revolutionize the game or be just another player who can jump high. Watts is a hell of a lot more likely to dominate given his already solid grasp on the skills and attributes required to play this game. Naitanui has so much to learn, but he may not. If there is one thing you can't teach a player, is footy smarts. Naitanui doesn't seem to have an innate understanding of where the ball is going to go, and for a midfielder that is a big hurdle to overcome. At the end of the day we went into draft day with our targets in mind, and scored 5 out of 6 of those targets. We got what we wanted, and that can only be considered a victory. I really don't care how outsiders grade us on this draft, all I care about is what these 6 boys produce for our club and we won't know that for sure until at least 3 years down the track. I guess it will be interesting to see how people will rate this draft if Watts turns out to be a superstar, but the rest of our picks never make it, while Naitanui never delivers but West Coast's other picks do.

Great to hear that people are jumping on board early. It's never good to be doing those last-minute desperation campaigns to pull us over our target. Hopefully we can make it to 30,000 this year.

It's great to hear that our players are welcoming the new draftees. Jack Watts said that he got a call from Robbo on his way to the draft on Saturday as well. He'll be a brave boy to take on the number 9. Huge shoes to fill.

Buckley, Grimes and Morton all have decent disposal, but they are still unknown quantities. As it stands, our midfield is crap.

How many dodgy ruckman can one list sustain? We've got 4 ruckmen, and none of them are really that good. PJ has a chance to be a good footballer, but currently his rucking is weak. I'd rather get rid of a few before we add anymore to the list. Besides, a great midfield can manage without a top line ruckman.