Lutz

Sorry adsy, but you're wrong. Read the fine print. If a pick has not been activated but is traded to another team, that team can then activate it for the upcoming draft. The team that already held it cannot. I guess this could open up the possibility of tanking so you have a more valuable pick to trade, but you can't use it yourself. It also gives the pick more value at the trade table if you have an unexpectedly poor season. And a compensation pick just received this year can still be activated for the 2011 draft, but any 1st round picks will come after the 1st round is complete so as not to interfere with the building of GWS' list.

Fair enough bush demon. There is a bit of "cut your nose off to spite your face" in the way the AFL has gone about pushing further into NRL territory. But it's still in the best interests of the game and the AFL, and therefore MFC, for GWS to thrive. Just not too much.

How? PSD? You really think he'd last til our pick? Or have you misunderstood the free agency rules?

I'm not interested in acquiring him. I don't think he's particularly impressive. I am interested in his situation however. Ok, fine, he wants to come home to Victoria. I get that. Fine. What I don't get is that he seems to think he can dictate which team he is traded to? Surely, if he demands to be traded to Victoria, then the crows just deal with whichever Victorian team will give them the best return? Why on earth would they bow to his wishes, limit their options and probably get a lesser return? What makes him think they will do this? I understand that you'd want to be compassionate and help him go back to Victoria, but why should he be able to choose his exact destination? Surely he doesn't have the upper hand in this. Anybody?

Considering his injury during preseason, I think his season was phenomenal. Seriously underrated across the league. People will sit up and take notice once the rest of the team around him becomes more capable. Virtually never beaten and always has superior strength in the contest. Becoming better and better at rebounding out of defense. Our Scarlett.

Will be a star, in the sense that James Kelly and Andrew Mackie are stars. Will probably never be an elite player in the competition, but will be very very good in a great team.

Sorry, but I think that's a stupid sentiment. I don't want GWS to win a flag any time we're contending for it, but I hope the clubs succeeds and becomes popular in west Sydney. I can't understand the thinking of wanting them to fail. That would hurt the game and the AFL, and that hurts MFC.

Give me Strauss over Joel MacDonald any day. Thinking about it, Joel may be saved if we end up making "too much" space on the list in the year of a bad draft. By that I mean trading players and picks for kids that can't come onto our list for another year. But I still think he's one of the 1st to go.

Yeah, but it's not THAT good. It's like most teams - a couple of stars, and bunch of good players and then the rest made up of filler. By the time their kids are old enough to have a real impact, all the poached guns will be ready for retirement age.

I seriously doubt the potential of that trade proposal. Collingwood would want an ageing ruckman to extend their window? Wouldn't trading their best young midfielder close that window on them? Swan, Thomas and Ball are all great, but Pendlebury is clearly best of the lot in my eyes.

Still not finalised yet. Compo picks from this year can be activated, as can compo picks from last year received by another team in a trade. It's in the fine print.

I wouldn't hold out too much hope of trading with Adelaide. They've lost too many players going home interstate lately, for them to keep doing it. Otherwise it sets an ugly precedent of caving whenever a player says they want out. And Bailey intimately knows our list - what is trash & what is treasure. We're unlikely to get a bargain anywhere, unless they underrate one of their own.

I'm pretty sure that's been rumoured in a HeraldSun article too. I've read it somewhere, at least. Wouldn't surprise me. He reminds me of Hahn actually, but worse overhead.

Really? Garland had a hot spot / stress fracture. Can't remember him having any other injuries. He's actually quite resilient. But we also have Tom McDonald and Troy Davis. Not to mention Fitzpatrick, Lucas Cook and Stef Martin being able to play back there.

Not sure I agree with that. Neeld is coach and has control over how the team is coached. He'll control game day. He'll control what, when and where in regards to training. He will set the gamestyle, tactics and gameplan, and instill that within the playing group. But Misson says when the players can and can't train and how much. He ensures they are fit and firing to follow Neeld's instructions. And Viney will manage the personal development of players, especially the younger ones at Casey. He'll tell them what to work on to become better players. None of these blokes so much as answer to Craig, rather they are guided by him. That way they can individually completely focus on diving headfirst into their own role, and he will ensure everybody is on the same page. It enables Neeld to focus on what he wants, rather than having to oversee the other departments, which makes his workload too great and his performance would suffer. This is not an adversarial system - it is designed for them all engage collaboratively to work towards success. In the end it's all about preventing the coach from being too stretched.

Funnily enough I was meant to be in there earlier today for something, but it's been put off and I probably won't go now. I'll see if I can get someone else to do it for me.

Ah, right. I just don't understand why he'd single us out. Maybe if we said we'd take him a lot earlier than he was picked, then I could understand. Pick 4 still doesn't seem right though. We wouldn't tell him we'd take him there if we obviously rated at least 4 players above him (assuming we had Kruezer & Cotchin ahead of him too).

Incorrect. If we delist him, then they can take him in the ND, PSD or rookie draft.

Just wanted to share this old article about Neil Craig that I had saved. http://www.theage.com.au/news/rfnews/craig-is-about-more-than-milestones/2009/04/17/1239475064807.html I've always thought a great deal of him as a coach and person. We should all be very pleased to have him at the club (and I think we are).

Well, a pie chart would be nice...

I was wondering about his contract status. According to this article he is out of contract and still waiting for an offer. http://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/afl/geelong-assistant-coach-matthew-egan-on-western-bulldogs-wish-list/story-fn69a32t-1226157588606 I don't really take any joy in this, as Joel has busted his gut for the club since coming here, but I think his time as an AFL footballer is up. We need to give opportunities to the kids that play in the same spot as him. And they are earning them too. I doubt another club would really want him. Maybe GWS, but I don't think so.

Right......... Anyway, so if you're going to quote an article, at least put some quotation marks around it, or leave some sort clue that it's a quote.

Now all we need is Graeme Yeats or Dale Amos as backline development coach.

Well that's just silly -- we already have pick 12.

This is correct (that he was mature age). Makes a lot more sense too, why he'd refer to it as a silver lining. Not getting drafted one year meant he was drafted later to the cats.