Big Col

It's on Kayo. I just watched it.

Premier: Melbourne (for the first time ever it seems like an honest prediction) Runner-up: Essendon Wooden spoon: West Coast Moving up: Fremantle Set to fall: Geelong Brownlow Medal: Oliver Coleman Medal: BBB NAB AFL Rising Star: Horne-Francis Best new Demon: Van Royen Demon All Australian: Gawn, Petracca, Oliver, B Brown Demon B&F: Oliver Big call: Carlton to win their first three games (Rich, WB and Hawthorn) and have their supporters delirious only for them to go on a losing streak and finish bottom four below Gold Coast. Ladder prediction: 1. Melbourne 2. Essendon 3. Fremantle 4. GWS 5. Western Bulldogs 6. Richmond 7. Port 8. Brisbane

Carl 10-3-63 Mel 4-6-30 Goals: Fritta 2, Brown, McDonald Easy Dropped Marks: Fritta, Lever, Jordan, Brown, Viney, Hunt, Smith

That half was more of a stinking pile of sh*t than The Phantom Menace.

Finally Fritta hits the scoreboard. There's 9 minutes left in 2Q, so that's about 26-27 goals.

4 x 50m penalties as we slip to 29 points behind. How much of a lead are we giving them?

Another Carlton goal, 4:41 to go. Carl 4-1-25 Mel 2-2-14

FMD! Another 50m penalty. That's 3 in just 1 quarter.

Car 3-1-19 Mel 2-2-14 7mins to go 1Q

Tne commentators mentioned at the start of the game that the original intention had been to have 6 periods of 20 mins (no time on) but gastro, I think, and maybe other injuries had affected both teams so they agreed to play 4 x 25 mins. The Collingwood-Hawthorn game was six periods, for example. If the game had been 6 periods, I imagine we would have played every fit player by the end of the day. Players like Weeds, Bedford, Hunt et al as well as our new recruits would have all got a decent run in periods 5 and 6. I think this is we we should generally try to do for the first practice game - play the best team for 3-4 quarters and bring on all the fringe for the end. Then practice game 2 is best 23.

This all seems quite odd. This time of year we're all usually salivating about our new high draft picks and expecting/hoping * them to become stars because we might make it to a Prelim Final in 5 years if they're any good. It's about generating enthusiasm so we can sell memberships. And it's about praying that our few good players don't injure themselves. Now that we know we have the list - and most of them are young enough to be competing for years - pre-season becomes something different. I'm not sure what that is, but this all seems quite odd. MFCSS died in Perth last October. (random fact: those two words are just one word in Spanish - 'esperar' - and since knowing that, as a god-damn sh*te- as Spanish speaker - I now get retrospectively confused on occasions.)

You inspired me to check how much in royalties my band has made since we uploaded a few albums last year. I think I'm close to retiring on the USD$3.93 we've made. If you listened to one of our albums on 24/7 repeat for a year it'd only be about the same as having sold a CD.

David Shwartz (circa last half of 1994 season, before the knee injuries)

That was such a great read I took out a subscription!

You should if the question is "how many times has a team won after winning the year before?". - which is what the question really is (or should be).

When we start winning all the time they won't like us and that will be fine. I was rather sick of being everyone's 'second' team. If the rest of the AFL supporters don't hate us yet then we've got more to do.

The great run on Injuries - is that an obvious one?

I cried. Now I have closure on 2021 and I hope the way I feel is the same as the players. We HAVE to win in 2022 at the MCG. I'm not complete and satisfied until that happens.

Demonception

An improvement of 8 ladder places per year should see us at in negative 7th next year.

Nice work TMD. #5 is going to take a lot of work!

I used to think that Trade Week and the Draft were our Grand Final - the highlight of the year. I feel the same as you @La Dee-vina Comedia.

you can't include Casey when WCE, Freo, PA and ADL all have their seconds in a different competition.

"You're not watching the Grand Final again, are you?" says my 9 year old, bemused. "Yep" I say, a tear in my eye, as my youngest wanders off. Ah, the wistfulness of youth! As excited as I would have been had we won when I was a 9 year old back in 1977, I would have convinced myself that premierships for the Demons were part of the natural order. The wisdom of the years has made me want to savour every single drop of this performance because I don't know when or if it will ever happen again. But I'm hungry too. My Richmond friend said that premierships were like cocaine. While the first hit is probably the best, it leaves you with a burning desire for more. One premiership is not enough. But in the meantime I'll be watching the replay again.

The Dr McLelland Trophy is hardly a high profile award, but I think it may have been in the past. I have a proposal. Nowadays it's awarded to the minor premier, but in the past it was awarded to a club based on the performance of the u19s, Reserves and Seniors. First the u19s were abolished and then, later, the reserves was merged with VFA/VFL and the introduction of interstate teams made counting the 2nds performances redundant. Back in the 1970's you'd get 8pts for a senior win, 4 points for a Reserves win and 2 points for an u/19 win. The Dr Mclelland Trophy was the only thing we'd ever have a shot at winning! So, my proposal is to return the trophy as a recognition of the performance of a club, rather than just a team. With the introduction of 1 womens' team per club from 2023 we have the opportunity to return the Dr McLelland Trophy to a club trophy. I'm not going to propose a scoring system, except to say that the Mens and Womens should be weighted equally for the purposes of this trophy. Maybe nobody cares, but I thought it was good idea.