Toast Welcome to Freo Caleb Serong– Fremantle’s 2nd 2019 National Draft Pick [Pick #8]

Feb 11, 2011
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so according to my Baby Rays, turns out that Josh Carr had a chance meeting with Caleb's Mum in 2000 who 'consoled' him after Port suffered their significant R11 loss to his brother's Saints at Docklands.

Josh, finding out only recently and wanting to make up for lost time, offered his services to Bell on the priviso that they drafted young Caleb. Bell was going to draft Caleb anyways as he knew the undeniable ability and attitude of others with such vertical challenges so he agreed and Caleb was drafted shortly afterwards. Subsequently, Josh has been given the bonding opportunity to mentor his young Caleb Snow in the midfield. The rest, as they say, will be written in history.
Both are angry ants.
 

arsesmart

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Sep 25, 2018
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I get why the comparison thing happens, although, like imagining yourself getting furious with a scenario you've invented in your head, you don't want to take it too seriously. It's enticing, but there's zero substantial value in it.
 

wayToGo_

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Oct 24, 2015
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Don't get me Serong, I think Caleb is going to be a top half dozen in the comp player, which I think Neale is not; I'm not arguing out of desire to defend Lachie. I also had a look at the stats and the one thing I concluded was, even though I can't recall the details, is Neale can't have been playing inside mid in those first games in 2012, he only had 7 clearances for the year (it went up to 36 the following year from the same number of games). He must have been on the wing or something. I.E. They're not directly comparable.
Anyway irrespective of positions or whatever it's a stupid argument since Serong is going to win the rising star, whereas Neal only performed well in the sense he was a late third round pick who actually played games.
Yeah. I was really just wanting to disprove that Serong isn't accumulating as much as Neale was, like a couple of posters implied before me. What's he is achieving given he is yet to have a full pre-season and in amongst Covid craziness is exceptional.

Probably the biggest difference over Neale in his early years is Serong is also laying plenty of tackles as well as racking up similar/better disposals and clearances. Serong has had 42 tackles in 11 games. Neale's second year (12 games) when he was playing as a mid he had 20. And again that's with shortened game time this year.
 
I'm torn, everything I see in Serong tells me he's going to be as good or better than Neale. Neale is likely going to win a Brownlow this year, so that is clearly a very high bar I'm setting.

Also, rising star's often flop pretty soon after winning it but I just dont see how this happens with Serong. Everything I see with him from his attitude to leadership to footy IQ tells me he will be a superstar but the AFL is filled with stories of players who perform well early and drop off. I dont want to get hurt / hopes up but I'm all aboard this Serong superstar train and its going to take a bit to get me off it
 
Slightly off-topic but also on Neale, I've watched him closely this year, I drafted him in dreamteam, aside from the first probably 6-8 games, he's really pretty much gone back to the player he was when he left us. Elite player who racks up possessions but doesnt cause that much hurt with them. I dont think his improvement from leaving us is really due to anything other than getting to be the number 1 player every game and reaching his absolute playing peak.

Just something to note when people give us s**t for trading away a Brownlow medallist in a couple of weeks
 

Purple_Turtle

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I'm torn, everything I see in Serong tells me he's going to be as good or better than Neale. Neale is likely going to win a Brownlow this year, so that is clearly a very high bar I'm setting.

Also, rising star's often flop pretty soon after winning it but I just dont see how this happens with Serong. Everything I see with him from his attitude to leadership to footy IQ tells me he will be a superstar but the AFL is filled with stories of players who perform well early and drop off. I dont want to get hurt / hopes up but I'm all aboard this Serong superstar train and its going to take a bit to get me off it

Maybe what Chris25 said in his post right at the start of the thread that "he's as consistent as anyone in the draft, but I think others players may have higher ceilings" and "he doesn't really have any standout elite trait, he's just good at everything and is a proper footballer." Unless I've butchered that someone who will be a good player, but not necessarily someone who will be among the best in the league?

I'd be interested actually in whether Chris' view on Serong has changed since the draft.
 
May 2, 2017
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Maybe what Chris25 said in his post right at the start of the thread that "he's as consistent as anyone in the draft, but I think others players may have higher ceilings" and "he doesn't really have any standout elite trait, he's just good at everything and is a proper footballer." Unless I've butchered that someone who will be a good player, but not necessarily someone who will be among the best in the league?

I'd be interested actually in whether Chris' view on Serong has changed since the draft.
I think he has elite traits. His hands and vision in tight and clearance work in general is pretty damn good. Definitely got the IQ.

Doesn't have any physical elite traits but smart enough to not need them and also to maximise what he does have.
 

Paracleet

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Maybe what Chris25 said in his post right at the start of the thread that "he's as consistent as anyone in the draft, but I think others players may have higher ceilings" and "he doesn't really have any standout elite trait, he's just good at everything and is a proper footballer." Unless I've butchered that someone who will be a good player, but not necessarily someone who will be among the best in the league?

I'd be interested actually in whether Chris' view on Serong has changed since the draft.
There's no mystery. He was just wrong. The professionals get it wrong too. They just get it right a lot more than we would if we were magically parachuted into the job.
 
If he didn't perform any better than this his entire career, which is possible, would you be satisfied? I think so. He might start to get pressure if an accumulator with clean hands starts to get a couple more involvements a quarter.

As far as man-children instantly performing at AFL level he appears to fit the bill. Whether he has more to gain will be the question.

To me, I think he will improve with more running in his tank, getting out in space to take a mark, general transition play and then further building his tank so he doesn't sit on the bench and offers a rotation forward.

+0.5 goals a game and +5 to 10 touches a game from marks.

Factoring in an extra 20% more game time next season (pretending a large part of that won't be taken up with kick/mark possession football to kill time as the side is exhausted) with those stat improvements have him at:

27 touches, 8 marks, 0.75 goals a game.

That's a fine output.
 

SHill Shall

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Aug 22, 2009
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Serongs possessions have a lot of speed & intent.
Neale used to have a hell of a lot of nothingness movement.
Sideways & backward junk passes

He still does a lot of that for Brisbane imo. Sure there are clearance and CP wins, but also a whole lot of soft, stat padding stuff as well.
 
Maybe what Chris25 said in his post right at the start of the thread that "he's as consistent as anyone in the draft, but I think others players may have higher ceilings" and "he doesn't really have any standout elite trait, he's just good at everything and is a proper footballer." Unless I've butchered that someone who will be a good player, but not necessarily someone who will be among the best in the league?

I'd be interested actually in whether Chris' view on Serong has changed since the draft.
I think he's said already that his views have changed. His biggest concern was composure through pressure and and under the pack but from his output this year, that concern is gone, his composure for his age is insane.

I still go back to something I mentioned earlier in the year. Serong made the wrong choice going into the forwardline from a centre clearance twice in a game. It was clearly the wrong choice and a coach singled it out later in an interview later. He has not made that mistake once since then. I tell the grads at my work, I dont care if you make a mistake, its if you do it after you've been shown what to do that i"ll start to care. I love that he seems to make it a mission not to repeat mistakes
 
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The funny thing about serong and brayshaw you can see there ceilings.(Btw i think serong will be similar to luke parker, brayshaw will be similar to cotchin) The mystery is still cerra not serong.

Let me ask you all a question, at cerra's peak what will be his stats, ave disposal, goals, inside fifties...etc.
Cerra in the first half of his first year played in the forward off no preseason and really impressed me. (cerra has legit forward of centre capabilites that are yet to be properly explored).
cerra is yet to play as an inside mid. (thats yet to be explored what will the bump in stats be...etc.)
Because of his injuries as a junior i think his running capacity (short and long distance) is far better than we thought. (proof is hes playing wing this year).
Cerra is far tougher than we thought.
Point is he's still a very raw unfinished product far more than serong and brayshaw, which we are only just realising some of his potential and there is still a lot to be explored.

wow I went a bit off track on that one started with wanting to tell everyone that i reckon serong was gonna be luke parker realistically.
 
Oct 30, 2007
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I think he's said already that his views have changed. His biggest concern was composure through pressure and and under the pack but from his output this year, that concern is gone, his composure for his age is insane.

Yep. Based on what he showed as a junior, I didn't think his composure with ball in hand in close (particularly his kicking) would be good enough to make the jump to elite midfielder. That's the difference between being a 200 game player and a 200 game All Australian. It improved during his draft year, but still had some way to go.

And I've never been more happy to be wrong.
 

Dockeroo

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Yep. Based on what he showed as a junior, I didn't think his composure with ball in hand in close (particularly his kicking) would be good enough to make the jump to elite midfielder. That's the difference between being a 200 game player and a 200 game All Australian. It improved during his draft year, but still had some way to go.

And I've never been more happy to be wrong.
If Serong was in the 2020 draft pool Chris25 where would you have him on your board?0
 

Wally Walpamur

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Tell me if I'm wrong ...

After the draft, Young was being talked up as the gem and Serong ( not as polished ) would be an astute 2nd Freo pick.

Well I think Serong has shown he has polish, god only knows how much polish a fully fit Young will add !!!.

Please remind me who Lachlan Neil was ?.
If I recall, Young was touted all year as going number 3 in the draft but Jackson had an outstanding 18’s and performed very well at East Freo. Green was always going to GWS. I think there was a blanket over the next rated lot (Ash, Serong, Flanders).
 

wayToGo_

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If I recall, Young was touted all year as going number 3 in the draft but Jackson had an outstanding 18’s and performed very well at East Freo. Green was always going to GWS. I think there was a blanket over the next rated lot (Ash, Serong, Flanders).
Twomey had Serong @ #3 and Young @ #4 from July (post u18s) through September. In October he had them @ #4 and #5 respectively. And then late November pre draft he declared we'd take Young and then Serong at our picks based on whispers.
 

Madas

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Tell me if I'm wrong ...

After the draft, Young was being talked up as the gem and Serong ( not as polished ) would be an astute 2nd Freo pick.

Well I think Serong has shown he has polish, god only knows how much polish a fully fit Young will add !!!.

Please remind me who Lachlan Neil was ?.
I honestly never rated Neale as much of a tackler
Great on the outside and his handballs are like lightning
Serong seems to have more mongrel but I don't really compare them as players
I hope with all this talk we don't jinx the kid 🤞
I'm touching wood
 
Oct 30, 2007
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If Serong was in the 2020 draft pool Chris25 where would you have him on your board?0

It's always hard to do that, because we've already seen what Serong can do at the top level. Based on his U18 play, I'd probably have him around 9 or 10 - behind Hollands, Phillips, Campbell and Davies as the 5th best mid. I always underrate inside mids though, I get sucked into the flashy players because I don't have a job on the line.
 
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