Earl Hood

Yes thanks BBO I have been very busy of late, still dealing with the after parties for the Commonwealth Games, there are so many royals and peers to meet and greet in my role as Cultural Attaché (gold coast) for the games.

Expansion teams not withstanding!

But our disposal skill is in the top 5 teams apparently in the stats but yes I don't know if that was the accuracy for the dozens of teams looking for problems.

Matthew Lloyd wrote an article in the Age on Saturday the looked at MFC's improvement under Roos. One stat that stood out was disposal efficiency this year was 5th best in the AFL! That surprised me but then I thought about it. Yes we are much improved in efficiency not so much because we have improved our kicking skills but more because of our changed game plan which is much about giaining possession, pass off with a kick, a mark and then hold the ball and reset before kicking forward. by then the opposition has flooded the backline and we have to work though congestion for a score. The mark and hold it is killing our offensive game but it does help our defensive game. We have it more often, so contested possesion is up and we now control it more but in the end we can't score. So yes Paul Roos we are a side waiting to get beaten but some of that is your problem I would think.

This is an interesting discussion. The industry spends ever more time and resources searching for certainty in the draft; crunching ever more test data, game day observations, physical tests and phychoanalysis of players in the hope that it can identify who can play and who can't. Yet as we see so far it is still largely a lottery! About all we can say is that the recruits rated as first round picks are on average more likely to be better players than those rated as second round but an elite player could pop up anywhere in the first 20 picks and maybe later. Then there are the other variables about big blokes taking longer to mature vs your stock standard mid who may be peaking at 18 and so on. Has drafting science improved? I am not sure, James Hird went at 76 many years ago, that wouldnt happen again would it? But then Tom Rotcliff was a rookey and is now tearing up the park. It is interesting that the draft order is a major plank in equalisation and is pointed to time and again as a reason other equalisation measures are not required yet there is no certainty that player 1 is going to be x% better than player 2 and so on, only that the odds are the top 10 should produce more good players than the next 10 etc. The major equalisation tool is still a lottery. About the only way I see to increase draft certainty would be to increase the draft age to 20 so all these 18 year old elites get to play 2 years with men in the VFL/SANFL/WAFL. It would boost the standard of those leagues to narrow the jump to AFL and we would maybe learn a lot more about each players potential.

I agree what is Roos doing? Does he want to draw the attention of the Gaming Commission onto us again for heavens sake. Forget 2009 that is a red herring, the scarring has occurred since 2011, 186 and the disastrous Neeld experiment.

I believe many of the players are scarred but not from "not tanking" 2009, remember we were on track in 2010 with 8 and a half wins and some close losses to the top sides. The rot started in 2011 with 186 and the real scarring has occurred in 2012 and 2013 floggings when we were the laughing stock of the AFL and we probably still are. There are a multitude of reasons for why we are here but "not tanking" in 2009 is not one of them in my opinion.

Hardtrack I say it again. All season the protection of the head has been about consequences, not about intensions. A player who goes the bump and goes high is gone depending on the medical report. I don't care what Merrets intentions were, he got Pedo high, it was reckless, high contact and I say high impact. That means points and possible suspension, not a clearance. A hip, forearm, a bump vs a forearm jolt what is the difference?

In retrospect all I can cling to is that if in the second and third quarters we had kicked 8 4 which was to be expected rather than 2 10 which was ridiculous , we probably win and then there is not so much heartburn. But yes the real problems would remain.

Thanks BBO the whisper is that I have the inside running for a move up the hierarchy sooner rather than later just have to wait for Australia Day I think for the announcement. Don't tell anyone else but it seems the more actions I take to line my own pockets, the more kudos I get in the peerage stakes. Funny that but keep it to yourself please. I don't want to dilute people's respect for their betters!

I am sure we got a 50 for that as the umpire reported Merrett at the time. I am sure I heard a discussion on SEN last week where they said the MRP has overturned nearly 100% of umpires reports this year to the point they asked why would umpires bother anymore. The tradition continues, the MRP spits in the umpires face, who would have seen this act for what it was, a late reckless hit. You can always pull out of those situations to minimise impact if you so choose.

Yes isn't it reckless, high contact and medium to high impact, not sure how they judge broken noses and buckets of blood versus mild concussion. The former is not a good look for the game. The real issue is that bumps have been judged all year on the consequences. Once the contact was high, you were in trouble and at the mercy of the medical report. Accidental or not didn't count, the head was sacrosanct at all times. If you choose to bump and go high you are in trouble but not if you clobber someone with your forearm? Hip, arm, forearm what is the difference?

I also noticed Watts making leads off half forward that were ignored mostly. On two occasions he moved to spaces that required a precision kick over the opposition, both passes were intercepted. He doesn't lead into the right spaces for our guys to deliver to.

ryay next week is not an assignment it is a suicide mission! Agree Blease just doesn't have it upstairs, all the speed and agility in the world but no vision or poise. Tappy was vomiting in the second quarter yesterday before he twisted his knee so maybe there is a reason for his performance but will probably be out injured anyway. I would limit the changes as next week will be ugly, best to keep some the young ones out of it.

Agree at the end of the day in the last, our midfield went missing, we stopped running hard enough and in numbers and that is exactly what the Lions were doing. I went to the game and have finally calmed down. The positives were Jetta, Tyson and Jones. Frawley good first half, Howe off the backline and some cameos from Kent, maybe Dawes and Watts but just not enough really. We won the contested possessions, total possessions and some other stats but our stop and hold style is killing us in the end in most matches. Take a mark but hold the ball looking for options is killing us, by the the time we pass it to a contest there are no options and we cough it up. Maybe now we have enough inside grunt but gee we need some outside runners with silky skills. Can we have 2 or 3 priority picks next year?

My opinions in life are mostly based on empirical data so thanks for all that data C&B. I feel ill contemplating the incompetence of it all since 2007 while paying out bloated salaries to all and sundry to those involved from assistant coaches, selectors, recruiters, managers of football and CEO's. $Millions forked out for Shyte output. The incompetence since 2007 is truly awesome to behold!

Back to your topic of course climate change needs to be a discussion and decision topic for the G20 this year. Maybe Tony could advocate a world "Green Army" of under paid, under aged people to fix global warming! Millions of kids planting trees and picking up papers could turn it all around!

I am not a LOR officianado but I have noticed Tony's comb over is becoming obvious; If that is what you mean?

Yes A low centre of gravity certainly helps, short, strong legs and strong core, but you still need heaps of skill, agility and controlled agression.

The scorpions must be due to stop running pretty soon!

I think you could call it class warfare! Purely vindictive legislation based on zero data by Bastards Incorporated. The work for the dole has some merit but the 40 applications a month is ridiculous and the six month wait for funds is just kicking young people while they are down.

Hold on DC haven't we been here before? I thought we had workshopped this infallible issue in an earlier post. I believe we established the following outcomes: The Pope is infallible and he coaches second base for the Cardinals!

DC please cut them some slack; As someone once said prediction is very difficult, especially about the future!

Fossil you need to study some macroeconomics 101 and Keynesian theory on how to avoid a depression! At the time the Pink batts program and school halls was about providing jobs, keeping jobs and providing stimulus here and now in the face of a serious economic downturn. The pink batts added to energy efficiency, the school halls were welcome infrastructure for public schools. Yes there may have been some overpricing but that was not the point at the time. It was about keeping the construction industry going to avoid lay offs, rising unemployment and mortgage defaults etc, etc, the spiral of events that occurred in the USA in 2008 and floored their economy.Yes we moved from surplus to deficit but where would we be if we stubbornly held onto a surplus and did nothing at the time? I suggest given the amount of debt people were holding in their house mortgages at the the time, a big rise in unemployment would have had dire consequences for our economy, unemployment, defaulting loans and stress on the banks. But hey maybe the GFC never happened. But I am sure you are with Joe Hanrahan Hockey who would be happy with a surplus even if the economy was in ruins! Oh and then Julia bought in the carbon tax! But the consequences of that for our economy is another fairy story we need to discuss one day.

And I think we got gold in the men's marathon? Where were the Kenyans?