PIES Membership Tally 2015: 76,497

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I think one of the things that holds us back from being the best Mark, is the whinging whining, carping supporters we have.
If they ever got on board we would be unstoppable
Of course! Here's me blaming a shortage of quality players and a plague of injuries, when all the time it's me that's responsible for our lack of success. Thank you BJ for revealing the folly of my thought. I am as always impressed by the pearls of wisdom you bestow upon mere swine like myself and my fellow recalcitrant carpers.
 
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I think one of the things that holds us back from being the best Mark, is the whinging whining, carping supporters we have.
If they ever got on board we would be unstoppable
That is just fanciful and delusional. What has held us back for 50 years is acceptance of not winning premierships in spite of the best resouces by the largerst group of backslappers and excuse makers in Australian sport.

If we ever got demanding we'd be unstoppable.

If we could see the forest for the trees we would realise there isn't actually anything we are the best at as a club. We are among the better drafters with and developers of talent, probably with Hawthorn and Geelong, but that's it.
 

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That is just fanciful and delusional. What has held us back for 50 years is acceptance of not winning premierships in spite of the best resouces by the largerst group of backslappers and excuse makers in Australian sport.

If we ever got demanding we'd be unstoppable.

If we could see the forest for the trees we would realise there isn't actually anything we are the best at as a club. We are among the better drafters with and developers of talent, probably with Hawthorn and Geelong, but that's it.
See what I mean?
 
Also a rush of Christmas presents.

One year my parents in law were pestering me as to what to get me for Christmas. So I told them.

"A Collingwood membership"

They are rabid, died in the wool, kool-aid snorting Essenscum tragics. It was a thing of beauty picturing them handing over their hard earned for the betterment of the mighty Pies.

All the more sweeter because you already had a membership?
 
That is just fanciful and delusional. What has held us back for 50 years is acceptance of not winning premierships in spite of the best resouces by the largerst group of backslappers and excuse makers in Australian sport.

If we ever got demanding we'd be unstoppable.

If we could see the forest for the trees we would realise there isn't actually anything we are the best at as a club. We are among the better drafters with and developers of talent, probably with Hawthorn and Geelong, but that's it.

Very harsh summary. Since Ed became president we have been one of the most professionally run clubs. We have played in 10 finals series, 4 grand finals and won a flag. Whilst it is disappointing we only won one it is difficult to argue against that level of consistency. I think the club clearly demands success and from what I can see they are doing everything in their power to achieve that.
 
Couldn't give a **** if we have 8,000 members or 80,000 -if the Ponsford stand is half empty for most games, as it was this year. Open up the Ponsford stand to any walk-up member, rather than having it all reserved seating and then half don't turn up. If they want to pay for the privilege of not turning up, they should join the AFL Members or the MCC. I'd be happy with less members, but more supporters that turn up to games.

I think for a lot of people, AFL memberships are pretty cheap. I'm not talking about the average Joe. I'm talking about dual income $150K stuff. I think they can afford to buy the memberships and only attend a couple of games. When you think it costs $500 just to get a ticket to see the Rolling Stones or something like that, then it's easy to see why the memberships arent valued a little more. The problem is that it's easy money for the clubs ....and money that goes directly to them, rather than to the AFL.

The irony is that here in WA, you just can't walk up and go to the footy. It's even hard to buy a membership.
 
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That is just fanciful and delusional. What has held us back for 50 years is acceptance of not winning premierships in spite of the best resouces by the largerst group of backslappers and excuse makers in Australian sport.

If we ever got demanding we'd be unstoppable.

If we could see the forest for the trees we would realise there isn't actually anything we are the best at as a club. We are among the better drafters with and developers of talent, probably with Hawthorn and Geelong, but that's it.

Actually, I think division was the main problem with the club. There were a lot of different powerful groups in the club and they would spend their time undermining each other to get a position on the board. Disunity is always the killer. There were a ton of people trying to take charge over the 1960s 70s 80s but I dont think they would give money to the club unless they were running it...
 

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That is just fanciful and delusional. What has held us back for 50 years is acceptance of not winning premierships in spite of the best resouces by the largerst group of backslappers and excuse makers in Australian sport.

If we ever got demanding we'd be unstoppable.

If we could see the forest for the trees we would realise there isn't actually anything we are the best at as a club. We are among the better drafters with and developers of talent, probably with Hawthorn and Geelong, but that's it.

Yeah sorry, I have to disagree.

Having money does not equal having success. Only one club a year wins the flag, and you need a lot of things to go right to get there. Also, as much money as you want to throw at recruiting/front office/coaching and development - you can't predict how things are going to turn out, and often the guys who turn out to be great at something, do so after a period of difficulties. 10 years ago - no-one would've predicted that Clarkson and Bomber Thompson would turn out to be the 2 elite coaches over that time. (Similar to Pie's faithfuls opinions of Malthouse prior to 2010, many Geelong fans were calling for Bomber's head prior to their flag in 2007)... even in '09/'10 a lot of people were questioning Clarkson and the direction the Hawks were going, because they had used a very dubios game plan to win that first flag. And thats just looking at coaching - I'm not going to fathom all the other roles behind the scenes, because, honestly, I would have no way of being able to accurately judge them.
Also in the era of a salary cap (and now off-field cap), draft and prior to that zoning, having more money won't always give you the opportunity to have the best players to put on the park.

IMO, what having money is good for in sports (at least in general), is be a protective factor in preventing you from being "bad". It won't necesarily make you great, but it can provide the cushion to soften, or limit, those inevitible cycles that teams have at the bottom of the ladder... and I think the Pies have generally been able to do that. Other than a difficult time in the late-90's (which was followed by 2 GF appearances) we have been pretty good over this time. 2 Flags and 5 GF's in the AFL-era puts us in the top handful of clubs over that time. Not as good as Bris/Gee/Haw/WCE, but a better record than any other club over that time (on par with the Swans)... and each of those clubs has also had a tough run during that time as well. (Don't forget Hawthorn's "line in the sand" game, or Geelong's Whiskers affair). It's fair enough to look at those 3 losing GF's and mourn what could have been, but you also have to acknowledge that we were the 2nd best of 16-18 clubs in that years - not the best, but definitely not a sign of mediocrity.

Yes as a fan-base we should be demanding success, and demand that club does everything in their power to recruit the right people on and off field and expect the club to make the right decisions... but we also shouldn't assume that there is anything about our club that makes us inherently better, or more deserving of a flag, than the other 17 clubs in the competition. We are just 1 club in an 18 club league- not every club is going to be able to dominate every year.
 
Yeah sorry, I have to disagree.

Having money does not equal having success. Only one club a year wins the flag, and you need a lot of things to go right to get there. Also, as much money as you want to throw at recruiting/front office/coaching and development - you can't predict how things are going to turn out, and often the guys who turn out to be great at something, do so after a period of difficulties. 10 years ago - no-one would've predicted that Clarkson and Bomber Thompson would turn out to be the 2 elite coaches over that time. (Similar to Pie's faithfuls opinions of Malthouse prior to 2010, many Geelong fans were calling for Bomber's head prior to their flag in 2007)... even in '09/'10 a lot of people were questioning Clarkson and the direction the Hawks were going, because they had used a very dubios game plan to win that first flag. And thats just looking at coaching - I'm not going to fathom all the other roles behind the scenes, because, honestly, I would have no way of being able to accurately judge them.
Also in the era of a salary cap (and now off-field cap), draft and prior to that zoning, having more money won't always give you the opportunity to have the best players to put on the park.

IMO, what having money is good for in sports (at least in general), is be a protective factor in preventing you from being "bad". It won't necesarily make you great, but it can provide the cushion to soften, or limit, those inevitible cycles that teams have at the bottom of the ladder... and I think the Pies have generally been able to do that. Other than a difficult time in the late-90's (which was followed by 2 GF appearances) we have been pretty good over this time. 2 Flags and 5 GF's in the AFL-era puts us in the top handful of clubs over that time. Not as good as Bris/Gee/Haw/WCE, but a better record than any other club over that time (on par with the Swans)... and each of those clubs has also had a tough run during that time as well. (Don't forget Hawthorn's "line in the sand" game, or Geelong's Whiskers affair). It's fair enough to look at those 3 losing GF's and mourn what could have been, but you also have to acknowledge that we were the 2nd best of 16-18 clubs in that years - not the best, but definitely not a sign of mediocrity.

Yes as a fan-base we should be demanding success, and demand that club does everything in their power to recruit the right people on and off field and expect the club to make the right decisions... but we also shouldn't assume that there is anything about our club that makes us inherently better, or more deserving of a flag, than the other 17 clubs in the competition. We are just 1 club in an 18 club league- not every club is going to be able to dominate every year.

I think the thing that pisses a lot of Collingwood supporters off is that when we finally found some stability and success we changed it when there was no need.
 
I think the thing that pisses a lot of Collingwood supporters off is that when we finally found some stability and success we changed it when there was no need.
Yes and then the vast majority of our massive membership base refuse to make any demands on the club/board for any degree of accountability. That's what I mean by not being a demanding supporter base we are loyal which is a fine quality but we are blind as bats in cave and frankly treated as such.
 
Yes and then the vast majority of our massive membership base refuse to make any demands on the club/board for any degree of accountability. That's what I mean by not being a demanding supporter base we are loyal which is a fine quality but we are blind as bats in cave and frankly treated as such.
Or the overwhelming majority of members/supporters are extremely happy with the direction of the club and therefore find no need to "make any demands on the club/board" and it is only a very small but vocal group of malcontents that whinge about everything and anything and by some God given right assume they have some great insights into what is wrong while all us "dummies" just can't see it.

And if my memory serves me correctly you and the other malcontents were whinging all throughout 2010
 
Or the overwhelming majority of members/supporters are extremely happy with the direction of the club
Yes you are correct. Happy or ignorant - either way that's actually my point.

Bottom line is the bottom line. 1 flag since 1990. 2 flags since 1958. The results are the arbiter. You can look for reasons or be in the majority and blame over half a century of external factors in spite of probability.

Not sure what I whinged about in 2010 though. 2013 I'll give you.
 
Yes you are correct. Happy or ignorant - either way that's actually my point.

Bottom line is the bottom line. 1 flag since 1990. 2 flags since 1958. The results are the arbiter. You can look for reasons or be in the majority and blame over half a century of external factors in spite of probability.

Not sure what I whinged about in 2010 though. 2013 I'll give you.
The overwhelming majority are not ignorant though, it is the very small insignificant whinging group that are: And that's actually my point.
 
Yes you are correct. Happy or ignorant - either way that's actually my point.

Bottom line is the bottom line. 1 flag since 1990. 2 flags since 1958. The results are the arbiter. You can look for reasons or be in the majority and blame over half a century of external factors in spite of probability.

Not sure what I whinged about in 2010 though. 2013 I'll give you.

Great way to skew the numbers to suit your point.

I could easily change that to:
1 Flag in the last 5 years. (Only one club has more in that time, and 2 other clubs have 1 flag) - we are ranked 2nd-4th over that time.
2 Flags in the last 25 years. (4 clubs have more, 4 others also have 2). Our rank 5th-9th over that time. (at minimum, top half of the comp)
We have 15 flags in the history of the AFL - ranked 3rd.

Yes our overall run over the last 50 years hasnt been particularly good in terms of flags, and we do seem to have ended up 2nd best on too many occasions... but there a number of clubs who would love to have had our record.
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I find it incredibly condescending that you presume that everyone who doesn't agree with your opinion is "ignorant".
It is not ignorant to try and look at the big picture, use some logic and that power of understanding that we all have to recognise that we are just one of 18 clubs and that life (and football) is not perfect and doesn't always work out the way you want it to, but to also have try and have a bit of optimism to see the direction the club is taking.
I think if you polled members, most wouldn't necessarily be "happy" with where the club is right now, but would hopefully have some optimism with the direction it is going, and try to understand all the different factors that have been at play since the 2010 flag... rather than just taking the simple "blame Bucks(/MM before him), blame Ed, get rid of the lot of them" type of approach that a small, but loud, minority have been throwing around for as long as I can remember.
 

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