Autopsy Round 7, 2021: Hawks refuse to take the field

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Maybloomer

Club Legend
Aug 18, 2008
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We need to find 3-4 senior players from the younger, fringe players and recruit another 3-4.

I think our KP forward prospects are fine for now.
DGB, Sicily and Frost should be a good set-up for next year in defence, but should be looked at if there are opportunities to improve.
Midfield, x-factor, speed and small/medium forwards are a huge deficit.

We need to recruit for leadership, toughness and character again.
We have no intimidation-factor whatsoever.

We have no intimidation-factor whatsoever.

That what stands out the most. When you play soft, you look soft. By playing soft, I don’t mean avoiding the hard ball but the dinky little handballs, the loopy handball and hopes, the keepings-off switches, always looking backward for the next give-off. It’s so similar to Collingwoods‘ game style and the results are showing. It’s predictable, easy to coach against, produces low scores and will damage our kids’ development. Sideways is soft. Slow is soft.

Why do we get excited about Jiath, Day, Wingard, Frost in full flight? Because they intimidate, they attack, they look for a target 30m forward rather than 2m backwards. It brings the forwards into play a lot sooner. You don’t always need pace, you need a mindset. Sure you need kicking skills but an errant kick is far less damaging when the opposition hasn’t had time to set up the wall. The 3-peat years was a fast and forward Hawthorn. Not speed fast, ball movement fast which equalled open space for Buddy, Rough and Cyril. Opposition teams scored from turnovers often but it didn’t matter, Hawthorn were miles in front.
 

Rev08

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Feb 12, 2008
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If my future self walked up to me in January, and they tell me that we take on the Saints at the Dome with no JOM, Day or Wingard, get smacked by 20 in the clearances and have a forward line consisting of a 6th gamer Kosi, a debuting Jeka, Lewis, and a returning Gunston doesn’t really get near it, I’m probably not surprised that we get a ten goal touch up as a result.

Its no surprise. It’s the reality of where we are at, and we knew it before the season started. We don’t have the class in the middle of the better sides, even at full strength, and it becomes a much bigger issue when we lose 1 or 2 in there.

Take JOM out of side, when he’s been a clear best mid, and put our group up against a side with more class and its back against the wall and we get the result we did last night.
How did we get here though? Would you agree it is via some horrendous list management decisions over the past 5 years?
 
I have the impression that teams can handle a season or two of getting thumped, and it is only when it happens year after year that you develop a losing culture that is hard to break.

For example back in 2004 we had these margins against us:
81
48
56
86
74
66
65
52
80
44
65

That's a LOT of heavy losses.

We did a little better in 2005 , but still had some heavy losses including:
63
46
117
55
41
48
54

Those two years of losses were largely involving players that went on to win a flag 3 years
later, and many went on to 3-peat.

The trick seems to be not spending too long at the bottom.
We also had a few massive losses in 06 and even 07.
 

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Oct 3, 2006
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Have had the feeling that ever since the end of 2016 the club has been trying to hold back the dam wall a la topping up with established players rather than go to the draft

Last night the damn wall well and truly burst to show where we are truly at as a team. I don’t think that this is necessarily a bad thing, rebuild starts now. Just feel for Mitchell, JOM and even Wingard, this isn’t what they signed up for but it is what it is.

Hope we put Sicily on the LTI injury list and take two picks in mid season drat. Wouldn’t mind taking a punt on another ruckman and midfielder
 

theiaofseed

Norm Smith Medallist
Jun 17, 2019
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How did we get here though? Would you agree it is via some horrendous list management decisions over the past 5 years?
No it's by playing 4 grand finals in a row and two top four finishes either side.

Only player Richmond have recruited since they won a flag of any note is Balta, it's like winning flags makes it really hard to draft elite talent or something.
 
Feb 6, 2004
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Frost in full flight
Keep a tall forward back in the 50m and tell Frosty to take on the game and then kick it as far as you can rather than try for a 20m target. And possibly the same for CJ, but he does have better disposal.

Best outcome mark and shot on goal, Indifferent outcome locked in the forward fifty, worst outcome turnover in the forward fifty rather than a turnover in the centre. Allows us to at least set-up rather than everyone caught out of position on the resulting forward entry for the oppo.
 

Milkshaker

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Got a rare trip to a corporate box today full of gobshite St Kilda supporters.

Drank their beer, but I wasn’t happy about it.
One of my rare trips was in the last throws of the Schwab era. North won by 100plus. The free beers and food only served as a bandaid on that day.

Feel your pain.
 
Apr 17, 2006
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How did we get here though? Would you agree it is via some horrendous list management decisions over the past 5 years?
We had 6-8 players all hit the cliff at the exact same time when realistically, most expected them to last a bit so they could be phased out and the next crop develop.
Recruiting Mitchell, JOM, and Wingard was the right move to stem the bleeding, but they needed to settle. Now they've settled we have had most of defence retire, our wings retire, and our forwards begin to hit their end.
 
Jan 17, 2008
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Hopefully they do because I can't be bothered heading into the G Sunday for another non competitive display. Why do you think the club lists them as managed as opposed to just being truthful and stating what the injuries actually are ?
Clarko stated if it was a final they would have played. Stop building a myth they lied. It was marginal case and they erred on the side of caution.
 

Mrzohs

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Oct 9, 2014
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That was one of the most insipid performances I have ever seen live I would have to go back to 2005. I could hang half the side on there performance but it all goes back to leadership they dropped there heads.
Half a dozen blokes are not up to the afl standards but we need change asap starting with the skipper down.
 

LMGjr

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Jul 25, 2020
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Clarko stated if it was a final they would have played. Stop building a myth they lied. It was marginal case and they erred on the side of caution.
Can't win mate - if they play we're robbing youngster of game time - when they don't it's a lie - if we win we're robbing our draft hand - if we lose our coach is s**t - all you can do is laugh, but some posters be good hedging to always be right.
 

Simon Crawshay

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Jun 4, 2016
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What is striking to me is that 4 out of the top 6 players on the ground with the highest AFL fantasy ranking points yesterday were Hawks players (Mitchell, Worpel, Shiels and Scrimmers)

They are racking up big numbers of possessions (Mitchell had 38 for instance) but we end up kicking under 59 points and get 128 kicked against us!

This tells me our game style is fundamentally broken.

We are currently the equivalent of a basketball team who spends the entire shot clock passing the ball between each other in the back-court instead of actually attacking the basket to you know, actually score some points?

Honestly we would be such an easy team to coach against at the moment. Our game-plan is so predictable (slow movement of the ball from the backline followed by a long kick down the wing to a pack followed by another long bomb to the forward line).

That is why Gawn dominates us so often, he knows what our players have been instructed to do (long bomb down the wing to a pack after slow buildup) so he has plenty of time to find his position a kick behind the play and wait for the inevitable roost.

This is not an observation based soley on yesterday either, we have been playing this style for the better part of 3 years now and I really struggle to understand the thinking behind it.
 

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Apr 17, 2006
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Also, one thing from the first quarter which really got to me, obrien slipped over behind his man (his opponent marked and goaled)
On the way back to the middle, mcevoy got Round all the defenders, telling them to keep their heads up, etc - apart from obrien. It was a death stare and kept walking.

Not good leadership
 
Also, one thing from the first quarter which really got to me, obrien slipped over behind his man (his opponent marked and goaled)
On the way back to the middle, mcevoy got Round all the defenders, telling them to keep their heads up, etc - apart from obrien. It was a death stare and kept walking.

Not good leadership
You just made this up, didn’t you?
 
Feb 6, 2004
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What is striking to me is that 4 out of the top 6 players on the ground with the highest AFL fantasy ranking points yesterday were Hawks players (Mitchell, Worpel, Shiels and Scrimmers)

They are racking up big numbers of possessions (Mitchell had 38 for instance) but we end up kicking under 59 points and get 128 kicked against us!

This tells me our game style is fundamentally broken.

We are currently the equivalent of a basketball team who spends the entire shot clock passing the ball between each other in the back-court instead of actually attacking the basket to you know, actually score some points?

Honestly we would be such an easy team to coach against at the moment. Our game-plan is so predictable (slow movement of the ball from the backline followed by a long kick down the wing to a pack followed by another long bomb to the forward line).

That is why Gawn dominates us so often, he knows what our players have been instructed to do (long bomb down the wing to a pack after slow buildup) so he has plenty of time to find his position a kick behind the play and wait for the inevitable roost.

This is not an observation based soley on yesterday either, we have been playing this style for the better part of 3 years now and I really struggle to understand the thinking behind it.
Have to agree with you. It was so frustrating to watch us go sideways/backwards and allow the opposition to set-up. We just don't look at the centre at all and when we do (Frost/CJ going for a run) they don't have the options in the right place for it.
 

LMGjr

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Jul 25, 2020
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Also, one thing from the first quarter which really got to me, obrien slipped over behind his man (his opponent marked and goaled)
On the way back to the middle, mcevoy got Round all the defenders, telling them to keep their heads up, etc - apart from obrien. It was a death stare and kept walking.

Not good leadership

 
I wish I did. I pointed it out to the bloke sitting beside me at the game.
Haven't watched the replay to see if there's vision of it though
So you read his lips from the stands?
 
How did we get here though? Would you agree it is via some horrendous list management decisions over the past 5 years?
I think this has been covered a lot here. We tried topping up for an additional flag with the understanding 2-3 elite free agents had committed, along with not knowing Cyril would retire, Roughy cancer, a number of players dramatically heading south. With the cards at play at the time, we would have been negligent not to take the swing. We are now paying for it not working though.
 
May 10, 2007
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Don't like the fact Clarko is spinning s**t in his presser about how inexperienced we were compared to the Saints

Saints average age off 22 was 25 years and 0 months, ours was 24 years and 11 months

Average games Saints 83.1 Hawks 86.9.

Talk about actual facts clarko rather than making up myths.
 
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