'AFL Discretion'

So I think we're all just waiting for the nightmare that is 'Season 2012' to end now. However, there will be a reward at the season for our epic shitness: High picks in what is supposedly a very good draft.

We all know that the AFL scrapped the PP under the old system this year to stop the expansion clubs monopolising the top 4 picks over the next couple of years, and that PP's will now be handed out 'at the league's discretion'.

Our only winnable game for the rest of the season (barring possibly the Melbourne game) is GWS away. If we win this it takes us to 5 wins for the season (no PP under the old rules).

My question is, if this happens, are we in the mix for pick 1?

Factors the league must consider:

• Gold Coast finishing bottom could help us, as they've already had their draft and also acquired O'Meara.
• GWS have had their draft too, where we ended up with pick 6 after a 3 win season.
• Of our potential 5 wins this season, only 3 have come against established league sides.
• We've been completely uncompetitive now for 2 seasons, with little to no help from the draft system.

Thoughts?

We should on current form, but wont, one way or the other.

What hurts most is that without the expansion clubs and under the system that netted St Kilda Riewoldt/Koschitzke, Hawthorn Roughead/Franklin and Collingwood Thomas/Pendlebury we'd have had a return along the lines of Patton/Tyson from last year's abomination.

Instead we get the equivalent of an old 11th-place finish.

Lol we won't. Maybe i'm crazy but I think we have a change to snag a few more wins

We have to win against GWS, Melbourne and Brisbane at home. No excuses as these sides aren't any better than us. That gives us 7 wins so we miss out on our bonus picks. Bad luck.

We have to win those games no ifs or buts. If the AFL had given us those games in the first 10 games not last 10, we would have had a lot more confidence.

they should give a few extra top 10 picks because we bottomed out when gws and gc got all the kids. About 5 should do it.

Well, we managed to have the first (and most) extreme result of the revised tribunal system, so maybe we'll get the first, most extreme compensation under whatever bullshit rubbery figures AFL House have put together for giving out priority picks.

Dear Andy D, please save us!!

I suspect we will be given a first round pick or so in compensation for our last couple of years. Who knows though.

Lately Brisbane have beaten West Coast and flogged the bulldogs the week after they flogged us. Sure they've had a couple of 10 goal away losses to Sydney and Hawthorn but I'd take a 10 goal loss away to either of those at the moment. Definitely 50/50 at best.

Melbourne could beat us but shouldn't. If GWS did we would need to shut up shop permanently, as they are horrible.

Brisbane have improved but have lucked out a bit with a better draw that has helped them with building confidence. West Coast road trip to Brisvegas is always tough, but they just got over the top because WC didn't snuff them out, something we struggled with in those first 7 weeks. Had we got up in the last qtr in one of those 6 in a row lose games that we were close at 3/4 time, who knows how our season went. We have been reasonable except for a really bad quarter against Richmond and against the Bulldogs and the crows. But they have been bashed up in more games than us. 4 of their 6 wins have been against GWS+GC + Melbourne(2). We have only played GC once and won.

Remember when the AFL concocted a reason to give Fremantle pick #5 in 1999 as compensation for trading Jeff White two years before? Hilarious. They effectively got more for White than West Coast did for Judd.

If the AFL want to give us the pick, there is no rule or reason to stop them except not wanting to.

they wont give us shit!

If we win 7 games, playing the old spuds that we currently have in the side, it would be an absolute disaster. We NEED top-end talent. The Dees have their compo pick as well, so we will drop down another slot.

I would like to point out that whilst it may be 'admirable' to not tank, the best 2 teams in the league right now have elite players as a result of tanking. Winning the spoon is another story entirely though.

How it will go down is as follows.

If Boak leaves we'll get a good compensation pick for him and the AFL will justify this as between this and the 'natural' low picks for being near the foot of the ladder mean we will get no PP or a token one at the end of the first round (somewhere around pick 20 - 25 this year). Not enough to do jack shit short or long term.

If Boak doesn't go, then the AFL will say we were shit, but we've managed to keep all our good players and use this to justify no PP or a token one at the end of the first round.

The only way I see us getting a good PP is if we somehow get jack shit for Boak and lose other key players for inadequate compensation.

Under all scenarios the key thing is we aren't going to come out ahead greatly from where we otherwise would be without the PP or other list changes around the clubs ineptitude.

The only way I see us getting a decent PP pick that isn't tied to us being screwed elsewhere is if the AFL is really convinced it's a matter between survival of the club and not. Another SA based club is going to do no better and the AFL want two SA teams for the TV rights, so they don't want us to go under. They just don't want us to ever be successful. The club really needs to emphasis how badly we are doing and gloss over any good figures. Geniuses that we know them all to be, in the interests of padding their own resumes I'd hazard too many are doing the opposite.

They don't exactly have to come up with a creative reason to give Port a priority pick, but it'll probably apply to Brisbane and Melbourne too.

"These clubs have been particularly disadvantaged by the entry concessions of expansion clubs, and on this occasion it is deemed appropriate to allocate these three clubs compensation picks to account for their unusually challenging situations."

Who will argue with that? Maybe against the Melbourne one.

While every club could have a line-up like the Miami Heat if they'd picked differently and we assume developed the alternative pick exactly the same as that player has turned out in reality, in the 3 drafts before last when the Dees actually had a win by trading their first for Mitch Clark, they could've snagged:

2008: #1 Nic Naitanui/Hamish Hartlett/Michael Hurley, #17 Luke Shuey, #19 Hayden Ballantyne/Jackson Trengove/David Zaharakis/Dayne Beams/Jack Redden/Daniel Hannebery, #35 Matthew Broadbent/Steven Motlop/Mitch Robinson/Rory Sloane

2009: #1 Dustin Martin, #2 John Butcher, #11 Daniel Talia/Lewis Jetta, #18 Nathan Fyfe/Ryan Bastinac, #34 Sam Reid/Allen Christiansen

2010: #12 Seb Tape/Brodie Smith/Billie Smedts/Shaun Atley/Isaac Smith/Jack Darling

Their shitness is purely on them.

Exactly. They've had their turn.

Would it matter how many picks we get with the current level of intelligence at port we most likely mess that up too!

melb have had their priority picks.

i think us and bris should be given a priority pick. i dont believe anyone should get given pick#1 ever again.

a pick after all non-finalists have picked is about right. thats pick 11 ( would be more like 13/15 after compo picks).

that gets port and bris something to help them but doesnt hurt other non-finalists teams.

pick#1 pp should never-ever ever be given out again. was tremendously dumb to give them away in the first place.

If the GC get to top up THAT list with a number 1 pick, then we may as well fold. We already won't have enough to compete with what they have.

So yes, by all means, scrap it...after we've taken advantage of it