Welcome to the Kennel Oskar Baker

Remove this Banner Ad

Former WG Gorilla junior. Last one from there was Mitch Hahn. Go well son.
 
Quick and hard at it. Seems like decent foot solider material, in the Roarke Smith mould. Dunkley and Hunter out necessitated adding some midfield depth. Hope he goes well.
This probably sums him up pretty accurately. The Melbourne board describes his pace and having a real crack. Also, several comments re dubious disposal and not being up to AFL standard. His VFL form is consistently very good however. On first look, he doesn't look best 23 for us but hopefully, if given more opportunities, he may give us a handy, much needed wing option.
 

Log in to remove this ad.

Worst case scenario he’s the new Will Hayes dominating a VFL wing and setting the standard at that level for the younger kids.
 
Worst case scenario he’s the new Will Hayes dominating a VFL wing and setting the standard at that level for the younger kids.
No, worst case fear among BF fans is that he gets selected in the seniors more often than he deserves because he was a "captain's pick" in the off-season. And because of being selected in the seniors like that he keeps a more deserving youngster (Bedendo? Cleary? Gallagher?) from gaining an earned spot and valuable seniors experience. Or denies a more mature player a spot and they go to another club (Lachie Young, Pat Lipinski, etc).

However I reckon this fear is a bit overstated. It started with people saying "Billy Gowers ... WTF?" and has grown as an article of faith ever since, even though an erratic Billy Gowers ended up being our leading goalkicker in his first year.

You can understand why the coach and MC would want to give a mature age pick their chance, once we've put him on our list. If they didn't, we'd instead be whingeing about why we got some cast-off onto our list and never gave him a game. "What a waste of a list spot!" They saw something in him and believe he can play a vital role, even if not becoming a star.

Eventually if it doesn't work out and they don't deliver ... they get delisted. Like Billy Gowers. Or Hayes.

These list acquisitions (Gowers, Scott, McComb, Hayes, Hannan, Gardner, McNeil, Sweet, etc) are low risk for potentially handy reward. Everyone is saying how Geelong has done so well with cast-offs and late picks so I think it's defensible that we too use a few spots for those sorts of players.

I'm not yet convinced on Baker but I'm happy to see how he goes and if MC see enough talent and form to select him I'll back him in ... at least until the time when his form in the senior side shows that he's not up to it. And when he does get a game let's hope he gets at least 2-3 games in a row to settle in, as we'd want for any debutant.
 
Last edited:
Given he was behind perhaps the best wing in the competition at Melbourne (Langdon) we can't mark him too hard on games played the last could of years.

That HB flanker who couldn't get a game at Sydney went well for us .... And that Hamling fella from Geelong
 
So ... we swapped an under-performing and troubled Hunter to Melbourne for another winger in Oskar Baker plus a future third.

Hunter (28 next week,173 games) has a premiership medallion and a Charles Sutton Medal.
Baker (24) has just been cut from the Demons list after 15 games (none in 2022).
Fair trade?

I reckon Melbourne will get some value from Hunter - he probably needed a change of scenery - so we need to see whether Baker will finally make the grade with us.

It would be great to see them line up against each other in Round 1.
We absolutely did the right thing by Hunter and hopefully he can sort himself out his issues run deep
 
Normally glass half full with recruits but just can't get enthused here.

Averaging 3 contested possessions and 1.6 tackles per game over 4 seasons of his AFL career and going backwards after an ok first year. For a bloke who's meant to be hard at it, yikes

I know raw numbers don't tell the full story and maybe there were circumstances, but he'd have to improve a long way to be in best 22 contention.

Hope I'm proven wrong.
Gave up nothing and paying nothing.
 
No, worst case fear among BF fans is that he gets selected in the seniors more often than he deserves because he was a "captain's pick" in the off-season. And because of being selected in the seniors like that he keeps a more deserving youngster (Bedendo? Cleary? Gallagher?) from gaining an earned spot and valuable seniors experience. Or denies a more mature player a spot and they go to another club (Lachie Young, Pat Lipinski, etc).

However I reckon this fear is a bit overstated. It started with people saying "Billy Gowers ... WTF?" and has grown as an article of faith ever since, even though an erratic Billy Gowers ended up being our leading goalkicker in his first year.

You can understand why the coach and MC would want to give a mature age pick their chance, once we've put him on our list. If they didn't, we'd instead be whingeing about why we got some cast-off onto our list and never gave him a game. "What a waste of a list spot!" They saw something in him and believe he can play a vital role, even if not becoming a star.

Eventually if it doesn't work out and they don't deliver ... they get delisted. Like Billy Gowers. Or Hayes.

These list acquisitions (Gowers, Scott, McComb, Hayes, Hannan, Gardner, McNeil, Sweet, etc) are low risk for potentially handy reward. Everyone is saying how Geelong has done so well with cast-offs and late picks so I think it's defensible that we too use a few spots for those sorts of players.

I'm not yet convinced on Baker but I'm happy to see how he goes and if MC see enough talent and form to select him I'll back him in ... at least until the time when his form in the senior side shows that he's not up to it. And when he does get a game let's hope he gets at least 2-3 games in a row to settle in, as we'd want for any debutant.
Copy and paste
 
Gave up nothing and paying nothing.
Gave up a list spot and presumably a base level salary contract (one year only).

That's not quite "nothing". But I agree he was pretty much a free hit apart from that.
 

(Log in to remove this ad.)

Would be an improvement on Robbie if he has pace and hard at it. Disposal could be no worse so would be an upgrade. I will reserve judgement but do hope he earns his consecutive games and not gifted them like the ones already mentioned.
 
Sure, McComb was horrendous and frustrates those know can pick a natural footballer, however, our recruitment of Tim O’Brien is looking quite pungent.

Any idea what we are paying this spud?
 
Given he was behind perhaps the best wing in the competition at Melbourne (Langdon) we can't mark him too hard on games played the last could of years.

That HB flanker who couldn't get a game at Sydney went well for us .... And that Hamling fella from Geelong
And that old bastard from the Hawks whose name sounds like a sloppy poo 🤣
 

Remove this Banner Ad

Back
Top