Lucifers Hero

I was fairly upset about the change to NGA rules that prevents us matching an AM top 20 bid. Now that we are Premiers, I don't care about how the AFL manipulate the rules.

After trading out their round 2 picks for yet unknown later/future picks: Pies have picks – No.36, 46, 48, 55, 58, 78 and 79 Dogs have picks No. 43, 44, 45, 52, 93 We currently have 37, 49, 57 ie 952 draft points. Once Pies and Dogs use their picks for F/s our picks become 36, 43, 49 ie 1167 draft points. If Pies/Bulldogs bring in more picks below our #57 it will further improve the value of our picks. I don't usually put much store on draft points but this year Mac Andrew is in the mix. While there are many options for us, I wonder whether we might keep our powder dry until draft night. Use pick #17 and wait and see where MA is taken. If he is still on the board after pick 20 we can easily match the bid and have points left for another pick in the #45 - 50 range. If he isn't on the board we can then upgrade some picks or trade them into 2022. Footnote: Hope I have the arithmetic right on how our picks move up after Pies and Dogs match F/S.😬 The logic is sound but maybe folks check the calcs before relying on them...

Don't think so. He is WA based and so are most of his players, with quite a contingent from Freo so it is interesting that he called out Bell for breaking the 'cone of silence' re Lobb to GWS trade possibilities. Bell thought his comments amusing. Sounds like there may be history there.

This is a similar article moving-on-up-clubs-eye-pick-swaps-with-pies-dogs Both clubs have more picks than list spots, a 'loophole' the AFL closed a few years ago to stop clubs getting elite NGA, Academy and F/S talent for 'nothing' picks. It was relaxed last year due to covid impact on list sizes, altho I don't see a connection as it benefited only a few clubs in a highly compromised draft. From what I can find the AFL has allowed the 'loophole' to stay this year. Bulldogs are the really luck ones: JUH last year, Darcy this year! Once Dogs and Pies trade out their first pick; a 20'something, 2nd round pick, they will get 2 of the top 3 players this year for just 3rd and 4th round picks. Given the AFL stopped the matching of NGA bids in the top 20 this year they should have stopped the picks/list spots 'loophole' again.

A trivial observation: 'Josh(ua)' a popular name 18 years ago, especially in Victoria...🤔

Funny you should say that. Dangerfield may have his Brownlow and 8 AA's but he is no Mr September. any-danger-of-impacting-a-big-game "Let’s get to the crux of this article, which many will consider something akin to shooting Bambi: Patrick Dangerfield, as decorated and celebrated as he is, isn’t a clutch finals performer, nor has he proven himself over his career to be a big-game player". "...a glittering list of accolades that reflects his ability to be consistently excellent in home-and-away football. To argue against his excellence as a footballer is a fool’s errand and not the purpose here, but those awards don’t align with the idea that he can handle the pressure – the real pressure of finals footy – and he has never proven an ability to truly carry his side like champions do". Harsh? It is probably right. He has had a smattering of match winning performances but not when it counts and certainly not in finals. Lots of stats; not much impact. As an aside, I doubt any main stream AFL media would be prepared to write that article.

They probably don't. But Mitchell and co didn't give them and their managers much time to find other clubs. Next year might be a different story re finding new homes. Some will be OOC and some will still have a year left on contracts. Either way Mitchell and co will need to let them go for poor draft picks or keep them on good money.

The article says Clarkson has a 6 month contract by the Tassie government. So Clarkson gets nearly $1m from Jeff plus a tidy contract from the Hawks Home-Away-From-Home, hosts. Ouch, Jeff, Ouch!! I reckon Clarkson will take a lot more than members from the Hawks. Hawks can say bye bye to the millions they get from Tassie for the Home games they play there! They will become dependent on pokies and government handouts. Perform poorly for a few years and their Vic members won't go to games. Their mega Dingley base may never get off the ground. Clarkson will delight in bringing his nemesis down another peg or twenty!

Young is also Lobb's manager. The other day it seemed like Bobby was used as a trading chip to free up cap space so Lobb could get from Freo to GWS. GWS didn't like really entertain either deal. Young also didn't help Bobby's cause saying how distraught he was, how hard it would be to go back to GWS and he won't be signing another contract with them. Great way to devalue a possible trade next year. Meanwhile, Dodoro says: “My last conversation was with him at 5pm, I said, ‘Look, we tried our best, we wish you all the very best,’ and he was fine, he was getting a tattoo actually, so he was happy.” Time to change manager...

It will be interesting to see what the other 3-5 ruckman on the table get trade for. Suspect it will be nothing like our future 1st round pick Port is posturing for.

LOL at Dodoro lessons! We are saying the same thing about Cats not playing Clark then demanding the highly valuable pick #19

Its a bit rich for Port and Cats to demand 1st round picks for players on their lists for several years that they hardly ever play. I hope Freo hold off on pick # 19 which is a lot more valuable than it sounds as it is the first pick after draft day 1 and can demand a premium in a pick trade on that night. And the cheek of Port on Ladhams: weazel-word a 'he is available to trade but we are happy to keep him' message then demand pick #18 from Sydney. Hope Sydney hold firm, having just been worked over by the Crows for Dawson. Valuing Dawson and a 2nd ruckman (Ladhams) at the same pick makes a mockery of the whole system. I get that it is all posturing but I really hope Freo and Sydney don't give in.

I remember that. I think it was after he kicked his brilliant 'soccer' goal. As he walked back to the middle he was snarling! Lab playfulness + Doberman snarl = lethal combo!

This is the first year Hawks haven't had Graham Wright heading their recruitment so they have a rookie Recruiting Manager and a Rookie Coach. To a large extent Wright kept Clarkson under control, well to the best anyone possibly could but it seems Mitchell is off the leash. It is bizzare that Mitchell has gone rogue and personally shopped his players to other clubs. Not only is that divisive and disheartening for the players it also is for the Football Department. Not even the most experienced and most revered coaches behave like that. Selfish, lack of respect and lack of trust; all are culture killers. Recent history hasn't been kind to favourite sons/brownlow medallists coaching their club without getting much experience first: Voss, Rattan, Hird, Buckley. Mitchell is acting as 'he knows best' and is blowing up his honeymoon period before it even starts. I wonder how many years he will have before getting his marching orders. Can't see them winning a flag with him at the helm.

There is that something about him that he will. It is a frightening prospect for the competition. Great for us! I like the 'big labrador' comparison. He started as a lovable puppy; all playful and boistrous and now has grown up a little but is still lovable and boistrous. Great energy for the team.

There will never be a better time to sell a covid health/hospital management plan. There is enough fear of illness and lockdown frustration, especially in Victoria for people to accept almost anything. Afterall, Victoria added a 'Fire Levy' to home insurance policies about 15 years ago which iirc was supposed to be temporary and it has never been lifted (now lost in 'general revenue'). Something similar but health related? Divert monies form some low priority/non productive ventures....

You two need to 'Get a Room'!! 😐

I know, hence my comment about having had 18 months to prepare. But it is what it is. It is where we go to from here that is the question. Because, open up we will; domestically and internationally, ready or not. On resources, I read recently that we are fast tracking the recruitment of thousands of international medical staff to cope with the covid case surge when we open up. The question is how we best use those people and the equipment and people that are currently in the covid units in our hospitals. Can't help but think those units are currently taking valuable resources from other in-house units, are competing with other hospitals for the same scarce resources and that there is a fair amount of covid related duplication of equipment and people across the health and hospital system. We need hospitals to get back to pre covid levels of treatment. We can't if they are trying to deliver and cope with a surge in covid services. So my idea is use this time to set up a dedicated facility. It is a better use of new and existing resources and reduces the risk of a hospital covid outbreak closing the other services that hospital offers. My idea isn't radical or new. We had the Fairfield Infectious Diseases Hospital until 25 years ago. It dealt with a variety of epidemics/infectious diseases during its 90 years, including the Spanish Fly, Polio, Aids etc. When closed its departments were sent to different hospitals around Melbourne. As you mentioned, covid is here to stay. We need to deal with that in a health and economically effective way.

But will the use stay at 10% when we open up? When we open up there will be a lot more demand on hospitals and icu from the usual life events. I was referring to a dedicated facility for all covid cases not just icu.

I wonder which came first. Roffey saying to Goodwin 'you are a good man, the players love you, be yourself' Or using the 'This is Me' song at the club. Either way it is a beautiful and powerful song. I can imagine a lot of motivational work for players was combined with hearing that song during the year. Perhaps each player finding something different and unique within themselves to draw on. During the finals several times Goodwin was asked what advice he had given players. Response: 'Be yourself' It seemed odd at the time but it now makes sense. Almost as if it was code for the each player to draw on what they had found within.

We've had 18 months to prepare covid ready hospital facilities but so far has much happened? Early last year wasn't there a 'covid surge health plan' to convert Jeff's Shed to a covid hospital with high levels of ICU capacity? To me a dedicated covid facility makes the most sense as it would concentrate covid health resources in the one place, allow existing hospitals to continue as pre-covid and greatly minimise the risk of covid escaping to staff, patients and visitors to those hospitals. The buildings to create a dedicated covid facility are there. It is a matter of converting and resourcing them. Let's not burden an existing stretched hospital system with more resource intensive cases; covid.

Did Roos' see Oliver's tapes first? My impression was he poured over lots. Not sure that he actually stopped looking at others as at the time (July 2015) we didn't have pick 3 and there were others considered for our first 'natural' pick that year. Oliver wasn't thought to go that high. JT and others thought he could go anywhere from the high teens to the 50's!! I think our first 'natural' pick was #9 so Oliver wasn't in the reckoning for it in July 2015. Look at the dates of the articles I quoted one of which was April 2017, when Oliver had played only a dozen games. At that time there was no history for Roos to rewrite. What he has said since and reported since supports comments back then. Recruiters don't work in a vacuum or in isolation. They build a list that maximises a coach's game plan. From the first Roos' was committed to building an elite mid-field and have 10-12 on-ballers. Methinks you are short selling Roos' role in Oliver's recruitment and other premiership players recruited while Roos was coach. TBH, I have been really impressed that the likes of Roos, Jackson, Macca, Bartlett and many others that were involved in the rebuild of our club and our team, haven't tried to step into the limelight of a premiership. They have humbly stayed in the background. Anyway, we are diverting from pick #17.

GWS seem prepared to let Hill go if they get a small forward back, specifically Chad Wingard. He won't go there They were prepared to give Hawthorn pick #13 for Wingard if Hawks paid some of his salary. So what happens next? Essendon offered 2 picks between 50 - 60 or in a pinch their future 2nd round pick 30+). Collingwood have put their hat in the ring but they they may not the trade currency to get a deal done. But HIll wants to go to Essendon. Makes one wonder about his true motives for coming to Vic if he won't consider other clubs. He said he wants to play in the Dreamtime game and ANZAC Day game... From what I'm reading I don't think Hill's attitude is a good fit for us (but that could be worked on) so not canvassing for him. But I do think it is a shame that one of our small forwards: Bedford, Chandler, Smith could not form a trade with GWS having just extended their contracts. It wouldn't be pick #13 as Lobb staying means they wouldn't need to offload Wingard's salary but a three club deal could have been done. While being contracted doesn't make our players untradeable it would be very strange for that to happen now. We aren't that sort of club. Perhaps we extended their contracts a bit early as the trade period was still open. We have a lot of, a surplus even, of depth in the small forward department. Every chance Hill stays at GWS. Or if Wingard is prepared to go to another Vic club a deal might get done.

Here are several articles that talk about Roos and his early viewing of Oliver vision: olivers-twist-how-the-dees-smoothed-rough-diamond "But as he kept poring over the vision, Roos was drawn to Oliver’s clean hands, his strength and power at stoppages, his sharp decision making in tight and the 187cm midfielder's physical presence. The redhead was raw, but the veteran coach knew he was watching a natural footballer who would complement the previous year's top draftees Christian Petracca and Angus Brayshaw nicely". (April 2017) from-a-parma-and-chips-to-an-afl-star "Five months earlier, Melbourne coach Paul Roos strolled out of his office and asked Jason Taylor if he could take a look at the 2015 draft crop. Essendon had just defeated Melbourne by nine points at the MCG in James Harmes’ debut. It left Roos’ men with just four wins after 15 rounds. It was time to look ahead to 2016. By mid-July, Jacob Weitering and Josh Schache had separated themselves at the top of the pile of soon-to-be-drafted teenagers. Callum Mills was not far behind and almost certain to go to Sydney. Behind the trio was a glut of players including Darcy Parish, Jacob Hopper, Sam Weiderman and Charlie Curnow. "Roos sat back in his AAMI Park office chair and began to flick through various clips of footage. His job was not to recruit, but to offer an unbiased eye...One player stood out above all others...Roos, who had already committed for the 2016 season, walked back out and ask a senior recruiter where Oliver would go in the draft. The response was lukewarm. He was expected to be taken in the late teens or early 20s at best. Perhaps he could even slip to the 40s or 50s. (June 2018). iirc it was later in 2015 that a Demon recruiting team (which I think included Goodwin) went to interview him and meet his family etc. They laid down some goals for Oliver to reach to be drafted by us. He reached them. And so the Footy Legend of Clayton Oliver was born.

Lets hope we keep picks 37, 49 and 57 (or get picks with equivalent points) so that we have enough to match, if he slides into the low 20's.