if I were our head recruiter... I would use BigFooty as my reference for all decisions. It is obvious that all of us here know far more about recruitment than those mere mortals whose job it is to do so. Not sure why they bother paying someone when they could just create new forums on a discussion board whenever they needed to make a decision about doing something. This is especially true for those clubs where they finished top 4 in recent years. Imagine how many more premierships they would have won with the collective genius of BigFooty users behind them. It is fairly obvious by selectively picking out a few bad decisions that our recruiters are useless, they always make the wrong choices, and their ability to predict the future is terrible because we say it is so. Meanwhile us godlike BFers can openly speculate unconditionally without any fear of being held accountable because of the trusty "delete" button or "disable account". Why they haven't already delegated control of all AFL clubs to BigFooty community is beyond me, we'd clearly do a better job.
If You Were Our Head Recruiter
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What? You mean it isn't a place to either directly or indirectly take pot shots at the players and club officials at your own club from behind the safety of your own computer keyboard and without having to face the uncontrollables that are evident in the real world? And in particular this thread... Please do enlighten me as to what the point of this thread really is...?
Why are you reading the thread then if it doesn't interest you?
The forum is a place for discussion, insight and opinion (positive and negative) about the club. You don't have to agree with any of it but don't get annoyed at what it is, it's futile. Hate and call out the poster not the game.
And if you're smart enough you should be able to sift through the crap. There's lots of posters on here that will never be happy and subconsciously ignore our recent success in player management, player retention and drafting. And remember if we aren't the greatest and best then we are nothing...
The forum is a place for discussion, insight and opinion (positive and negative) about the club. You don't have to agree with any of it but don't get annoyed at what it is, it's futile. Hate and call out the poster not the game.
And if you're smart enough you should be able to sift through the crap. There's lots of posters on here that will never be happy and subconsciously ignore our recent success in player management, player retention and drafting. And remember if we aren't the greatest and best then we are nothing...
? I was calling out the poster not the game... Sorry if it wasn't obvious but I was sticking up for our club officials using sarcasm. Just having my opinion just like anyone else. Don't hate anyone, not getting annoyed, and am clearly interested in listening to other opinions as I am spending my time commenting. Just like defending those that probably aren't going to be spending their time on here to defend themselves.
couldhavebeen
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I appreciate that couldhavebeen
My query with your posts is simply that you've asked people to post up what they'd do, and want to use that as a yardstick to assess how Bondy and Lloyd have performed. In reality, none of us know our stuff, and are viewing the world through a fantasy lens. It makes it easy to be glib and say 'why didnt we land McCarthy, we should have drafted him at all costs', 'we should do what Hawthorn does', 'Sylvia was a failure' - which are all truths, but oversimplified scenarios.
As supporters, we're coming from a position of there being no constraints - a world where all teams are equally attractive, there are no geographical limits, they are equally resourced, players travel the same amount, are happy to play at any club, etc. It's easy to make broad assumptions on what we feel has failed and 'what we would do better' - but it all boils down to one single conclusion, talk is cheap.
I love that you've created conversation - I'm just amused, as the only outcome of the exercise is a confirmation bias on how much the club could learn from us
Great post especially the last bit .
Due diligence is what what we all ask of our recruiters and Club managers but supporters sometimes just have rose coloured glasses .
Bond and Lloyd have built a top 4 team that now needs some tweeking not wholesale changes .
- Aug 20, 2014
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hahah for someone discounting opinions you validate those opinions way more than they deserve. Positive or negative nothing we say on here matters one iota.What? You mean it isn't a place to either directly or indirectly take pot shots at the players and club officials at your own club from behind the safety of your own computer keyboard and without having to face the uncontrollables that are evident in the real world? And in particular this thread... Please do enlighten me as to what the point of this thread really is...?
ydraw
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Clayton Collard over Kurt Tippett, Justin Westhoff and Jesse White in 2006.
Rhys Palmer over Harry Taylor, Alex Rance and Cale Hooker in 2007 (we had 2 picks before Hooker)
Joel Houghton over Sam Reid in 2009
Jayden Pitt and Viv Michie over Jack Darling and Tom McDonald in 2010.
Too early to really tell who the good talls from the drafts 2011- present will turn out to be. But it's completely false to say we have no opportunity to draft quality talls. We did, plenty of times, and went for the best mid instead. (Joel Houghton being the exception).
I said Darling and Mcgovern and a handful of others since we first started using a policy of best player, rather than best tall. You have listed the grand total of seven players who are decent key position types in a decade.(White is useless, Westhoff a tall flanker type) That is very close to being hardly any IMO.
Just for the record when we drafted Palmer we were in desperate need of midfield run I don't think you could call it mistake to not draft Rance, Hooker or Taylor considering our midfield was so appalling at the time. Yes, even then a key position player was a need, but the far greater need at the time was midfield run.
I don't have the slightest problem saying you have proved my point very well. My point is that our list would be an absolute ton worse if we had done what the original poster was talking about and gone for the best available tall, rather than the best available player. Fyfe, Mora, Neale, Sutcliffe instead of Black, Tunbridge, Panos and Butcher would have happened if we had done what the poster was saying. Our list looks exceptional moving forward IMO.
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ydraw
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I could list a lot more but it would mean listing draft picks which turned out ok for us. And in my experience that tends to really annoy people to suggest that we could have picked a tall instead of a player who is currently in our best 22.
There's 9 there and that's only going back 9 years. Any one of them would have made a big difference.
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If you think Jesse White would make a difference then I recommend watching him play or talking to a Collingwood supporter. If you think Westhoff is a key position player than I also recommend watching him play (particularly when Ibbo is playing on him) or talking to a Port supporter. Grasping at straws is the ultimate understatement in your argument. We have derailed this thread enough now. Please stop.
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pavslovechild
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I wouldn't put hooker as an easy identification of a tall as there was a surprise he even got drafted that year... Same cricket club... Bloody good cricketer too
I'm bumping this thread as there are quite a bit of discussion about our past recruiting strategy in the training report thread.
So, when Pav retires next season, it looks like his heir apparent is going to be Tabs. So, did Bond failed? Could we have drafted better talls a few seasons back before we got to this point?
So, when Pav retires next season, it looks like his heir apparent is going to be Tabs. So, did Bond failed? Could we have drafted better talls a few seasons back before we got to this point?
We have had a sustained period of relative success due to our recruiting. Everything is easy in hindsight. I can guarantee that pre draft ydraw would have picked Black over Fyfe. You can't nail everything and we have generally figured well going for best available. All we need to do is land someone like McCarthy or a Hurley develops then we have excellent bookends (with Pearce) for the next 10 years.
We already have an exceptional list of young midfielders by drafting best available. History shows drafting talls earlier is probably riskier than drafting midfielders as they still have a lot more development to go through before being AFL ready.
The fact that ydraw fails to grasps these basic concepts of recruiting is quite amazing. A lot of the Hawks key talls were recruited from other clubs (bar Roughead who was a top 5 pick). Clubs probably realise it is a lot riskier drafting talls and thus prefer trading or drafting mature agers.
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We already have an exceptional list of young midfielders by drafting best available. History shows drafting talls earlier is probably riskier than drafting midfielders as they still have a lot more development to go through before being AFL ready.
The fact that ydraw fails to grasps these basic concepts of recruiting is quite amazing. A lot of the Hawks key talls were recruited from other clubs (bar Roughead who was a top 5 pick). Clubs probably realise it is a lot riskier drafting talls and thus prefer trading or drafting mature agers.
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ydraw
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It's too early to say Bond failed because he didn't take over until 2008, and it's too early to really judge the 2011-present drafts in terms of tall talents (it's only been 5 years and talls are typically later to peak). What I think *was* a major failure was the trading away of Graham Polak, who was the most promising tall we have drafted since Pavlich. His career ended on a sad note but it's fair to say he probably wouldn't have been hit by a tram if he stayed in Perth. Polak is still only 31 and we basically traded him away for nothing (upgraded pick 13 to pick 8 which was ontraded to Collingwood in the Tarrant trade).
The 2007 and 2010 drafts were failures for us, I think everyone could agree on that. Players we could have drafted in those 2 years include:
2007
Harry Taylor
Alex Rance
Robbie Tarrant
Cale Hooker
2010
Jack Darling
Tom McDonald
And that's not to mention the option that we could have traded for a higher pick in any of the previous 8 drafts to secure a key position player that we have known for a fairly long time that we desperately needed.
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You raise a few good points Kenny. The problem that Freo has is that we can't seem to effectively trade in a quality KP Forward.
P.S. Great training updates thanks guys. Does anyone think that Collins will start Round 1 ?
In recent years, with the expansion clubs having most of the early picks, we tried trading/free agency for KPP. Just don't really have that much success.
Cloke just used us to bump up his value, Frawley didn't want to come even when we offered more, Gumbleton's back didn't work out, GWS refuse to budge on McCarthy.
I thought we went with the right strategy, to take the best available (hence better overall value), and trade for the talls we need. The first part went ok, as we do have a strong midfield. The second part, not so good...
But then again, I can't help but feel that we are just 1-2 players short. Let's say by some miracle we landed Hogan, suddenly we are a strong contender for the flag. We must still be doing something right.
Cloke just used us to bump up his value, Frawley didn't want to come even when we offered more, Gumbleton's back didn't work out, GWS refuse to budge on McCarthy.
I thought we went with the right strategy, to take the best available (hence better overall value), and trade for the talls we need. The first part went ok, as we do have a strong midfield. The second part, not so good...
But then again, I can't help but feel that we are just 1-2 players short. Let's say by some miracle we landed Hogan, suddenly we are a strong contender for the flag. We must still be doing something right.
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- Dec 26, 2010
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Fyfe was drafted as a forward, wasn't he?
ydraw
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I agree that there isn't a lot we could have done in the last few years (except as I noted before, trade for a higher draft pick), but the writing was on the wall way before that. As soon as we traded away Polak our cupboard was pretty much bare of talls and has been ever since.
ydraw
Norm Smith Medallist
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A winger/forward, he grew late.
We needed midfielders back in 2007 as all of our mids were retiring and we had Pavlich, Mcpharlin and Sandilands reaching their prime.
Rhys palmer was a great first pick and would have been an important part of our midfield if not for injury.
Hinkley at 24 was a fail however at this point Tarrant, Taylor and Rance were gone and Hooker would have been a huge reach at this point of the draft.
Mayne at 40 was a solid pickup and has helped by being our 2nd/3rd Tall due to Murphy being a fail, Hooker was taken the pick before us which we then wasted on Mark Johnson and lastly Keplar Bradley was a great pick at 69 and was a very solid 2nd tall/ruck and would have been huge in the 2013 GF (where we got smashed by Lake and not having height) if he was not injured.
I would hardly call 2007 a fail especially when it was at this point that we realised our topping up was not going to help and we moved to picking youth for a new generation of Dockers which was started in this and the 08 draft.
ydraw
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Going into 2007, Pavlich and McPharlin were both already 26, Sandilands 25, Longmuir 27 we had traded away Polak and had no talls coming up. That was the time to pull the trigger, and we could have had Harry Taylor AND Cale Hooker if we did.
At that point all those players had been on our list 7-9 years or more and we hadn't yet thought about who would succeed them. That was definitely a mistake.
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If we had of drafted talls instead of Fyfe,Neal,Hill,Sutcliffe,Balla,Walters ,Spurr,Barlow would we be in the top 4 position we are in now. Black,Butcher,Shaw all ,Lee all duds. We are in the best player position that we have ever been in because of drafting best available. Strong midfields and lots of them win premierships. Surely every thinking Freo supporter is sick to death of the get in a tall no matter how s**t he is.
