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Everything posted by Macca
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Defining Success in 2020 - Is Just Making Finals Enough?
Macca replied to Rodney (Balls) Grinter's topic in Melbourne Demons
If those making projections had to pay a price if they got it wrong, I reckon you'd see any number of people taking a far more conservative approach on how we'll fare But there is never any price paid so grandiose predictions abound. Most footy fans are the same. Hope & faith rules ... that's how we're wired. Kinda gives us something to whinge about down the track. Been there, done that. But given how untrustworthy the club is we could win anywhere between 8 -14 games. So all things considered I'll take the middle ground of 11 wins and no finals. I won't be entirely happy with that as it's not my ambition but the club is too mentally weak for my liking The bookies have us as 6 - 4 to make the 8 (which is a bit skinny) and 6 -1 for top 4 (skinny as well) 6 - 4 also means that we've got a better than even money chance of missing the finals (according to the money men) After last year, I reckon deep down many will 'accept' 11 wins albeit begrudgingly contrary to their own ambition for the club. 11 wins can be viewed as a stepping stone too. I see making the finals as a bonus as we'll almost certainly get a few injuries to our better players and we don't have that many proven good players. But 2021 could deliver an entirely different outcome. By the way, we are mere onlookers so everything is in the club's hands. And I'd like to think that my view is neither pessimistic nor optimistic. Beige, boring - yep. Just keeping it real. That's how I see it. -
Weekend Special NFL Monday 7.00am Houston @ Kansas City Kansas City Win (1-13) $2.50
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We will count your last 3 picks Gorg I nearly forgot as well ... the Sunday games sneak up on you Titans looking real good here as well. If they maintain a 2 score lead at the half they could go on with it. Ravens are rusty which can happen if you get the bye.
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Vikings 21 @ 49ers 28 Titans 16 @ Ravens 28 Texans 17 @ Chiefs 31 Seattle 24 @ Packers 27
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As rjay said, we could make Gawn the sole captain and it wouldn't make a world of difference. All the players on the list need to get the best out of themselves and be self driven If they need someone to hold their hands then we're in for another year of pain. The players need to be able to think for themselves. That is the real issue ... the rest of it is just shuffling the deck chairs. I also believe that Jones & Viney were doing about as well as they can do so why change? If Jones has stepped down then fair enough but he's done nothing wrong in the role.
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Yep, and I reckon many have the same sort of variable outcome ... if they were being honest. If we get a rash of injuries or we don't regain form we could easily have another unproductive year re wins But if everything goes right we might eke out 13 or 14 wins But I have already said that previously ... there are a lot of variables in footy. For instance, after our rash of injuries and other issues early last year I revised my expectations right down ... but not all the way down to 17 losses. You should take all those who were predicting finals last year to account. Who the hell was predicting a 5 win season? I'd say no one. Make sense to you now? You reckon we're going to win the flag? You've been telling everyone that ad nauseum You should put your money where your mouth is and make sure it hurts your hip pocket. Good luck trying to get a collect. I would never bet against my own team so you'll have to find another bookie.
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And I noticed that 'Saty' has been copping it on the training thread for giving an honest appraisal of our 2019 season. Good on him I say. Must be the time to be all chipper and optimistic hey? The off season brings out the optimists but I hope they aren't disappointed (again) All things considered I reckon the team last year was a 10 win outfit that only won 5 games. And for whatever reason we fell away completely. Good clubs don't allow that to happen. It was as if we were in tank mode. Perhaps we were. 10 - 12 wins is my call for 2020 but if everything goes well we might get 1 or 2 more wins. But if we fall away again like we did last year 8 wins only is on the cards. Tricky start to the season too. I just don't rate the list that highly ... a lot of if's and but's and our game plan would want to improve greatly too. As you've pointed out rjay, the forward line remains the key for me. Our ball movement and leg speed is too slow too. Our disposal skills are often poor and we often choke in front of goal. Clean disposal from the stoppages is problematical and we desperately need May & Lever to be injury free. There are a few other issues but we've got a lot to overcome. I understand we've recruited to rectify needs but I want to see lots of positive signs before I buy-in. Every player needs to get the maximum out of themselves ... no hand-holding, if it is to be it is up to me (RDB) Happy to be proven wrong if we do really well and win a couple of finals.
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But I am not focusing on one aspect ... just highlighting the most important aspect. Proven talent in a combination that can win big. All the rest of it can't work without the base product. e.g. Our 2012/13 list couldn't possibly win a premiership regardless of whether every other aspect of the club was firing on all cylinders. Is that clear enough for you? Or do you need 20 or 30 other years where we've clearly been a ordinary outfit? My original point stands ... we have not ever had a great list since the halcyon days and that is why we haven't won big since '64. What is your reasoning about our lack of success? Bad luck? The curse? The MCC involvement? Come on ... I've stuck my neck out, you do the same. Tell us all why we've been largely unsuccessful for more than half a century
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Very good point DJ. I reckon we got serious when RDB came back for 5 years but we were coming from a long way back and even Ron couldn't improve the list that much. But Ron did leave things in better shape for Northey. It's always amazed me how other clubs can often have an abundance of talent where as we've often struggled to even have half a dozen top performers. Year after year after year. Last year we had very few top performers. 5 & 17 as a result. The biggest failure has been with list building. We've had various coaches, captains & leadership groups yet as time goes on it still comes down to the levels of actual playing talent. So if the FD (re the recruitment team) can't do their job then those who ultimately make all the FD appointments are the next rung in the chain. And the various boards we've had who have overseen it all. Does it all stem from the top? I'd say yes. As a club we sit back. Again, list building and building premiership type lists has been our failure. My measurement has always been to compare our list to the best team's lists. And we've often fallen short often to quite a large degree. And it's no accident if the theme is consistent.
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Good riddance One more time waster gone
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Not really I don't understand much of what you say at all You are too argumentative ... you should let others have their say without constantly jumping at shadows However, I doubt you'll ever learn from your mistakes.
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No I don't I'm a realist and you are too much of an optimist. And you make far too many excuses I'm not sure you even understand how footy works ... you're too much of a dreamer and a group-thinker So were Hassa Mann, Alves, Wells, Flower, Ditterich, JMac and others all poor captains? By your silly way of measuring things they all failed. You are another one who doesn't understand drafting. You have been well and truly conned You make it personal, I make it personal. You don't like my views put me on ignore. Won't worry me one bit.
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And they got it horribly wrong Well done Champion data
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No ... I just don't overrate leadership roles like many others do Again, without an abundance of talent, it's hard to even win 1 flag in a 5 year period. Plenty of clubs have fallen short with excellent lists. Or just got the 1 flag with a top list In my time following the club we have never had a great list of players. Not even close It is possible to win big with a less than great list but you'd need the other clubs to be in the same boat Another outlier situation and not to be relied on
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When did we ever have the talent levels of a great team? A premiership type list that was better than all the other teams.
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No, not at all Drafting is flawed so I have often advocated swapping draft picks for proven talent There's my answer and if you want proof of what I have got to say on drafting do a search on my posts and topics on drafting. It is entirely possible to bring in lots of A grade talent without ever drafting those types of players. Leadership groups, captaincy & even coaching are overplayed and overrated in footy. And often the actual talent on a list is overrated to a point where we end up blaming the coaches, captains & leadership groups. Like a dog chasing its tail. It has happened here on this site a stack of times but my original point stands ... we have never gone close to having a great list in my time following the club. And that is why we don't win big.
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Talent isn't a top end draft pick number either Although you'd never know it on this site ... the buy-in and belief systems in drafting is astonishingly over the top No amount of great coaching from any number of great coaches would have turned Toumpas, Gysberts, Morton, Cook and a stack of others into decent players They along with numerous other top 20 picks were good under 18 players only And the facts and results bear that out.
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You and others overplay leadership & Captaincy And you are wrong on Paine ... he came into the team as the best keeper out of Shield cricket As for Brearley ... an outlier argument. By the way, I didn't say that captaincy or leadership isn't important. Just overrated.
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Leadership on the field is overrated as well See ball get ball, be highly skilled and play as a team. That goes for each and every player ... footy isn't rocket science. However, I'm a great believer that the club needs great leadership from the Board through to the FD. But the plan needs to be a great plan. Talk is cheap. Onfield success requires pure talent and lots of it. Without lots of pure talent the best onfield leaders and captains won't be successful at what they are doing. Our current list has it all in front of them ... and we have any number of weaknesses that need to be overcome. Time will tell. Sport works differently to how businesses and companies work. The same rules don't apply. I have owned and operated my own business more than once so I know what you're talking about ... but I see sport in a different way. Throughout my time supporting the team our biggest weakness has been that we've never been talented enough. Not even close in fact. A good example is the cricket test team ... when the team has 11 top players, we are hard to beat. But when it's down to just a half dozen or less, we struggle to win.
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Leaderboard Post Season Tipping Comp 2 - DemonDave, JV7, DeeSpencer, Dee Zephyr, Macca 1 - Go the Biff, Dappa Dan, Clintosaurus, Gorgoroth This week's games ... Sunday 8.35am Minnesota @ San Francisco (-7.0) Sunday 12.15pm Tennessee @ Baltimore (- 9.5) Monday 7.05am Houston @ Kansas City (-9.5) Monday 10.40am Seattle @ Green Bay (-4.0)
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About the same in my book Good to quite good levels of talent but never great. Both Northey & Daniher did about as well as they could have done Add 5 or 6 B+ or A grade players to each of the era's and we would have been in real contention for multiple premierships. Living proof that certain levels of talent will only get you so far. I thought we did very well to make 2 x GF's in those time periods.
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Captaincy is overrated anyway. Without real talent and lots of it, teams will rarely, if ever, win big. The best examples in any sport are the dynasty teams - lots of talent on an ongoing basis. And that is not us. Over a 26 year stretch we contested 13 GF's and won 10 Flags but that had everything to do with talent levels - we often had more talent than the other teams so therefore we won more often. Even Smith couldn't win big with an average list ('65 - '71 - Demons & Swans) 1 solitary finals appearance in that stretch. And Smith didn't suddenly lose the ability to coach. In fact, one of his greatest achievements might have been lifting the very average Swans into the finals in 1970. But they got smashed in a SF because of a lack of real talent. The same sort of argument could be used for the Hawks with regards to their success. Since our halcyon years we've never had a great list and I'd argue we've never gone close to having a great list. Therefore, we've lost a lot of games. When we have played finals, the list quality was quite good, but never great. I reckon all our captains have done about as well as they could have done. In the one time in the last 13 years where we managed to play finals and win 2 finals, Jones & Viney were the captains. Do we give them credit for that achievement? I haven't seen it here very often. Coaching is a whole other argument but the same above principles apply in most cases. As for our current list, we look ok on paper but being good on paper will never deliver a dynasty. You have to be great in order for that to be a possibility. So the answer lies with recruiting. And since the halcyon days, we've not been very good at recruiting. If we were good at recruiting, we should have been able to create a great list in the last 50+ years (As it was from the late '30's through to the mid '60's) Of course, the zones we were handed from the early '60's through to the late 80's weren't very fruitful but since the dawn of drafting, we've still fallen well short Again, nothing to do with whoever is captain. Going right back none of Hassa Mann, Frank Davis, Stan Alves, Greg Wells, Carl Ditterich were able to captain the team into the finals whilst Flower had 7 years at the helm with only 1 year where we played finals in that time ('87) By contrast Greg Healy captained for 3 years only but we played finals in each of those 3 years ('88 - '90)
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I've always been into 'Whatever Works' but to go back to the Ancient ways with regards to the managing of the land is not going to happen in a hurry so in the meantime, we can only put in as many preventative measures as possible and as many resources as possible. I am a supporter of as much clean energy as possible but we could have clean energy worldwide in a 100% way (which, again, is highly unlikely) and the bushfires would rage on indefinitely anyway. Unless there was less bush. A lot less. You fly from Melbourne to Sydney and look out the window and all you will see is thousands of square kilometers of thick bush with millions of trees. Dry and hot conditions with a lightning strike and it can always go up in smoke. Anytime from Sept through to April (depending on particular areas) ... but December though to February, it's a tinderbox. I once climbed Mt Kosciuszko and had a look out over Victoria & Southern NSW ... total thick bush for as long as the eye could see. And I'm not advocating the clearing of a large part of the bush either ... where would you stop? But that is what it is almost certainly needed. Do what the people native to this Country did. But as previously stated, as good as I think that above solution might be, it isn't a feasible answer in the current political climate.
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Perhaps the real answer to the ongoing bushfire issue lies elsewhere ... of course, that won't satisfy the rusted on types from all the sides of politics (the right, the left, the Greens etc) They just want their team to somehow win a non-winnable argument. Historical Role of Fire (in Australia) Bill Gammage: Prevent Bushfire the Aboriginal Way Long before the Anzac legend, our national character was forged in the flames of the bush So, can we turn the clock back? Probably not in the current political environment but down the track a more common sense and logical answer will be looked at. But don't hold your breath because we are decades away from going back to the ancient ways. In the meantime, the bushfire crises will go in indefinitely. We are a land of long droughts, fire & floods and low rainfall ... and the original inhabitants had that knowledge thousands of years ago. So they acted accordingly.
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You gotta feel for the people in the bush right now ... certainly puts any sort of sport into perspective. Hoping all involved stay safe. Buffalo 19 @ Houston 25 Tennessee 21 @ New England 26 Minnesota 18 @ New Orleans 33 Seattle 23 @ Philadelphia 21