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

[Bruno Oresar]

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.

Cmon seed. The recruiting of the last five has been proven diabolically bad. You don’t have to fall of a cliff once your side passes it’s premiership window. Look at Cats and Swans. We are poo.

 

[HODGEYROAD]

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.

Risking players for a final is something Clarko won't have to worry about for some time.

 

[Spursfan]

Cmon seed. The recruiting of the last five has been proven diabolically bad. You don’t have to fall of a cliff once your side passes it’s premiership window. Look at Cats and Swans. We are poo.

Yeah it's not like the swans have a had a leg up drafting wise or anything.

 

[daniel23]

Don't like the fact Clarko is spinning sh*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.

That is incorrect saints average age yesterday was 24 years and 5 months and we were 24 and 4 months.

 

[On Topic]

Saints had an overlap run time and time again in the front half. Most of their marks along the half forward end up being handballed to a running player who would then kick to space inside 50. Their ball use was very clean too. They played well.

We struggled to transition the ball down the corridor and resulted us in kicking down the line. Our kicking skills were bad and resulted in turnovers or putting a teammate under pressure. When we could kick it inside 50, instead of kicking it a leading target or out to space like the saints were doing, most of our kicks sat on our heads which is very easy to spoil. We had effort in the game but Saints were just a significantly better team.

That was pretty much the game for 4 quarters.

Some positives:
- It was good to have Gunston back. His output will improve as the weeks go on.
- Kozi presenting and backing up his performance last week. He only kicked two goals but it was a still a solid performance
- Rough debut for Jeka but his mark early was really nice. It would have been awesome if he nailed his opportunity early.
- Worpel's efforts and zip around the contest were back yesterday. He butchered the footy a bit but he literally had nothing to go to. He was running around the contest like a headless chicken waiting for a teammate to present and was left hanging a bit.
- Maginness's best work is in the contest. It wasn't a great performance but I saw something in him today.
- Cousins and Scrimshaw both got career high possession numbers. They didn't use the ball superbly but weren't alone. Gotta get the ball first before you can use it well so I still see this as a positive.

 

[HODGEYROAD]

That is incorrect saints average age yesterday was 24 years and 5 months

Oh * even worse then, so the saints were younger than us ? point still stands it's nonsense Clarko mentioned how inexperienced we were compared to the Saints.

 

[Strapping Young Lad]

Don't like the fact Clarko is spinning sh*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.

He's not spinning s**t though.

Moore, CJ, Cousins, Jeka, Maginness, Kosi, Scrimshaw have all played less than 30 games from memory, and a fair chunk of them have barely played together at all at senior level. That's almost a third of our 22, which is probably more kids than we've ever played over the last 10 years.

 

[theiaofseed]

Cmon seed. The recruiting of the last five has been proven diabolically bad. You don’t have to fall of a cliff once your side passes it’s premiership window. Look at Cats and Swans. We are poo.

The cats that have only managed few finals wins and have list about to fall off a cliff? The same Swans that are hand gifted top talent through their Academy?? Those are the examples you're going with?


2016: Mitchell, O'Meara, Lewis, Morrison, Hanrahan and Cousins
2017: Impey, Worpel, Moore
2018: Wingard, Scrimshaw, Koschitzke and Greaves
2019: Frost, Day, Maginness and Jeka
2020: GDB, Downie, Brockman

How has our last 5 years been bad?

 

[rei154]

He's not spinning sh*t though.

Moore, CJ, Cousins, Jeka, Maginness, Kosi, Scrimshaw have all played less than 30 games from memory, and a fair chunk of them have barely played together at all at senior level. That's almost a third of our 22, which is probably more kids than we've ever played over the last 10 years.

Games played is a much better measure than average age, and the distribution of games is also super important. For example, someone like Hartigan having almost 120 games played will bring our average up, even though he's taken over 10 years in the system to get to that number.

 

[Strapping Young Lad]

Games played is a much better measure than average age, and the distribution of games is also super important. For example, someone like Hartigan having almost 120 games played will bring our average up, even though he's taken over 10 years in the system to get to that number.

Exactamundo

 

[HODGEYROAD]

He's not spinning sh*t though.

Moore, CJ, Cousins, Jeka, Maginness, Kosi, Scrimshaw have all played less than 30 games from memory, and a fair chunk of them have barely played together at all at senior level. That's almost a third of our 22, which is probably more kids than we've ever played over the last 10 years.

Yes he is, because it's false we were way more inexperienced than St. Kilda. the data says it was much of a muchness.

 

[HODGEYROAD]

Games played is a much better measure than average age, and the distribution of games is also super important. For example, someone like Hartigan having almost 120 games played will bring our average up, even though he's taken over 10 years in the system to get to that number.

That's fine.

St.Kilda 83
Hawthorn 87

 

[theiaofseed]

Games played is a much better measure than average age, and the distribution of games is also super important. For example, someone like Hartigan having almost 120 games played will bring our average up, even though he's taken over 10 years in the system to get to that number.

It's also important to note who is the driving force in the team, going by our boards voting on the game 4 of the best 5 players are 25 and under.

 

[Strapping Young Lad]

Yes he is, because it's false we were way more inexperienced than St. Kilda. the data says it was much of a muchness.

Didn't you just post that we had 3 more players with less than 50 games their name?

 

[Davo23]

Okay, it was a disaster.
We had seat behind the goals, quite a large group of Hawk supporters. The stadium had lots of COVID limits in place, no standing and watching the game, and artificial barriers which did little more that just restrict movement.
Thank goodness we don’t go there too often.

A summary:
1. The team seemed to be flat: they were trying hard enough but getting caught out of position, making mistakes, lacking any coordination, particularly in the midfield. Very little came off.

2. We have a limited number of good players. It was lost in the midfield so it doesn’t help with O’Meara & Wingard on the sidelines, giving us limited choice in the middle. TFP has posted many times that we need extra midfielders to compete, and we just don’t have them.

3. My thought is that 5 weeks of supreme effort caught up with them, and they had a downer. That even used to happen in the great days, so it’s not surprising.

4. Everything the Saints did came off, they seemed to have spare players everywhere. Enjoy it Saints, back in 1966, you were level in premierships with the Hawks, we know the rest. At least we know you are good losers!

Back to the MCG next week, so at least it’s a decent venue.

 

[eldorado]

The effect of not having Cyril these last three years is, I would say, incalculable.

 

[HODGEYROAD]

Didn't you just post that we had 3 more players with less than 50 games their name?

Yep but we also had more players with 150+ games. All in all the experience was a much of a muchness, both sides were relatively young.

 

[theiaofseed]

Yep but we also had more players with 150+ games. All in all the experience was a much of a muchness, both sides were relatively young.

They had more players with 100+

They also only had 1 player 22 an under in their best 6, we had 3

 

[rei154]

That's fine.

St.Kilda 83
Hawthorn 87

Yep- a negligible difference, now if we distribute across age I think we have a more tilted chart. Then if we take it a step further and distribute by age and in position by the importance of position I think the chart becomes even more tilted.

 

[Bugs1977]

Oh fu** even worse then, so the saints were younger than us ? point still stands it's nonsense Clarko mentioned how inexperienced we were compared to the Saints.

I think a bit of perspective of where their list is and our list is needs to be realised. Are they a better team than us atm? Yes they are but it’s also worth noting that they have shelled out big $$$ on players like Hill, Crouch and others so there isn’t much salary cap room left for them to get better much better apart from internal improvement so IMO they better bloody well be better than us.

Now looking at where we are in our rebuild situation... we have a boat load of cap space which if we use it use it wisely then we have the opportunity to set ourselves up as a long term contenders similar to Port + Brisbane and also where I feel the Swans are headed. If we can have a little bit of luck injury wise, nail our picks in the upcoming draft combined with keeping a very clean salary structure I feel we are on the right path. I like many think the Saints are on the same faux path as Carlton and will be found out soon enough.

Now getting back to the age demographic yes it’s not perfect and there are clearly some holes that need to be filled but it’s not something that cannot be achieved overnight.

 

[BuddyHawk]

Yeah it's not like the swans have a had a leg up drafting wise or anything.

It’s also worth remembering that the Swans did finish bottom four in 2019 and 2020. Their list looks in excellent shape at the moment, but they did have a pretty significant dip after making finals every year from 2010-18, as they lost some quality experience and got games into their younger brigade.

The Cats are the only team to have avoided bottoming out in the past 15 years. And looking at the age profile of their list, you’d expect some tough times are ahead for them as well.

 

[grumbleguts]

Oh fu** even worse then, so the saints were younger than us ? point still stands it's nonsense Clarko mentioned how inexperienced we were compared to the Saints.

Sorry, I have to break my vow of silence. How the hell is 24 years and 5 months younger than 24 years and 4 months. Since you either don't know how numbers work, or you can't read the post you are replying to, stop trying to sh*tcan a bloke by using statistics, you just don't understand them.

 

[Strapping Young Lad]

It was good of Cousins to get his hands on as much as he did, but I want to see better use of it, and I'm not sure he can do that.

Bramble's little hammy setback came at a really bad time.

 

[Bruno Oresar]

It's also important to note who is the driving force in the team, going by our boards voting on the game 4 of the best 5 players are 25 and under.

Ah yes. Lies, damn lies and statistics.
Love the persistence. Don’t give ground. Just keep spinning you gorgeous whirling dervish.

 

[burner1]

Was our midfield really any worse than last week? Just think we came up against better opposition who worked really hard who also play the ground well.

Other teams have been playing sides every week as young/experienced as we put out yesterday (and some like the crows even more inexperienced). We just need to stay the course. Remember how bad the crows were last year and now have some signs of hope? Even the swans were criticised over last two years for being crap but they were fast tracking youth and have found some players.

Will Finn, cousins, Jeka and kosi be better with 10-15 games experience? Most likely. Will we be hard to watch while kids get experience? Most likely. Will they make it? Way too early to know. But at least by end of season will have a better sense what the future rebuild task is. But we have no option but to try as the 22’s we rocked out in the first few rounds aren’t going to win much.