Big Col

Firstly, this returns to the original concept of the Trophy - as in it's a club rather than team competition. Someone smart i know (actually it was me) suggested this on this forum 18 months ago. The introduction of a monetary prize was unexpected, but IMHO a huge addition. The money will help establish the award, it's prestige, and help promote the 'club' concept rather than just the 'team'. We're in a great spot as a club to score $1m this year. The trophy in its original format (1951-90) awarded points per win for the three tiers - seniors, reserves and u/19s on an 8,4,2 point/win format. Counting wins is closer to the original format than counting final ladder position or the like. However, I think a simple system of counting ladder position after finals, would be easier and fairer given the vagaries of fixturing. 18 points for premier, 17 for runner-up etc with the club with the most points winning. You could possibly give bonus points for winning the premiership (eg 20 for 1st and 18 for 2nd, then 16,15 etc) or just use premierships as a tie breaker (ie if 2 teams on the same points, then if one team has won a premiership and the other not, the team with the premiership wins). Personally, I prefer 18, 17, 16 etc with no tie breaker and dual winners.

Good to see the AFL is listening to me ... although the $1m prize was a bit more than I asked for. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-03-09/afl-aflw-champion-club-mcclelland-trophy-million-dollar-prize/102076130

Wow. Brodie 2 goals. I'm liking the look of this.

But why? I think your post is spot on otherwise but I don't understand your conclusion.

The last game of footy I went to with my mum was against Hawthorn. It was 2014 late in the season and she died a week after the Grand Final. My mum never swore but she did turn to me that day and say something like "We have to smash those [censored] one day. I hope you get to see it". Ever since, I've had a special tingle when we beat Hawthorn. F**k them.

1/Totally agree re Ruck contests 2/ If they stopped the clock after a mark / free kick when going for goal until the ball hits foot or hand, then you’d eliminate this type of time wasting.

FWIW King has been on the Demons bandwagon for 18+ months. Mid season 2021 he compared the Demons to the emergence of the Cats in 2007. We won 1 flag. Let's hope we can win at least 3/5.

If we lost both Gawn and Grundy I think we'd probably go with Schache/McDonald combo before Verall. He's just a project player ATM. I'm still trying to get my head around having the best two ruckman in the AFL in the same team. It will make it difficult for a prospective ruck to get a game, but maybe Verall is far enough away that he only just comes right as Maxy retires.

DAISY!!!!

Let's just call it the Harry Potter round

On a fairness level, the Showdown should be held that round so that no team is disadvantaged playing against ADL or PtA. But instead, I'm sure they'll try to maximise crowds and have ADL and PtA headlining separate 'blockbuster' double headers, so eg GWS v Freo is the curtain raiser to PtA vs Syd. I guess, as long as they rotate this round each season, the advantages will even out (in theory)?

We've got to be a good shot at taking out next year's AFL basketball 3x3 comp. J Smith / Petracca / Farris-White seems a pretty handy side.

Interesting ideas DS. I like the general gist of adding restrictions early and loosening them later. It would become very difficult and probably unlikely to see movement of star young players. Do you have any thoughts on mature-age recruits? ie is a 21yo recruit treated the same as an 18yo (year 1) or come in at year 4? Do you have any thoughts on clubs trading players involuntarily? As an aside, I've long supported the raising of the draft age to 19yo or even 20yo. I might start another thread re that but helping protect teams from losing high draft pick kids was one of the reasons I support it.

This guy seems pretty handy. Where is expected to land in the Draft?

Exactly. If we ended up re-signing LJ then we wouldn't want to sign Grundy. f we were to sign up Grundy and the LJ trade with Freo (or WCE) fell over we'd end up having to give LJ away. There is a lot of pain for everyone if a deal doesn't happen.

Travis Johnstone was unbelievably good in that 3rd quarter. It was a crazy game for emotions. At the end of the game I walked home from the MCG all the way to Brunswick, randomly swearing and kicking things.

If you watch a highlight reel of Robbie, you'll notice how many goals he kicked on his left foot. He was a right footer but when it was appropriate to use the left he did so. And his non-preferred left foot was better than most peoples preferred. None of this awkward shifting to get on the preferred side that so many (most?) footballers today do. When watching youtube clips, I remembered another thing about Robbie. It was his state-of-origin games in the 1970's that announced him as a superstar. In the 1970's, the Demons were a lowly team for the most part and never got their games played on the Sat night replay (typically the last Qtrs of two games would be played, and a highlights of a third) so non-MFC fans never got to see him. When SOO games were played EVERYBODY got to seem him. As a little kid, I was very proud of him at the time - circa 1977.

Sam Walsh

Demonland voters have once again picked the same winner as the Club - and in this instance have the same Top 6, albeit slightly different order.

Add 150 more games, maybe a Brownlow, another 2 B&F and another 3xAA (excluding all his Premiership medals) and much as I hate to say it...move over Robbie Flower. That Gawn and Petracca are in the same team at the same time is nuts. We have to win at least one more premiership and hopefully 2-3 more with these guys in our team.

and Clayton will win more. I am sure he will be considered amongst the best 3 Demons ever, and possibly the best, once his career is over.

That we managed to pick up Petty in that draft makes it a superb trade in hindsight.

AFL is very hard to predict Only 3 out of 10 people predicted Geelong to even make the finals and the highest spot was 7th. They were also the most predicted as 'set to fall' All 10 had GWS in the finals and most of those were in top 4 or GF. Nobody saw Collingwood's rise. Most people got sucked in by the Bomber propaganda Me? My best 'outsider' result was probably picking Freo as an improver.

Games off or reduced playing time? 4 managed rest games, in addition to the bye, might be hard to swallow if it's perceived that resting a 6x AA player would have tipped the result in any game he's 'managed'. 1 'managed' game and lots of 50-60% game times (shared with Grundy) might be better.

Wasn't that Fritz? But heh, I've only watched it 500 times and I may have got confused ...