Knightmare
Brownlow Medallist
- Sep 22, 2010
- 19,533
- 19,542
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- Collingwood
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- Chicago Bulls
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- #4,001
Thanks for the reply KM.
I think my main point is that although you are right in some ways. If the Tigers can grab someone like Green from GWS next year (for type of player), pick up a quality KPF in the draft then they suddenly start to have a decently balanced list.
To me the tigers list is, for young guys, relatively shallow and not well balanced. But the 25-30 age group is actually quite strong and deep. The weakness is that the A grade players are mainly 30+ now. I don't think that picking up decent older players cheap will fix that. What the club is doing is trying to fix short term issues whilst rebuilding the list from the draft - unlike the other dynasty teams so far. So what I see is 2-3 year problem of the list becoming unbalanced and losing quality. (Which I suspect Geelong will face very soon if not this year). But I also think that a couple of good pick ups = rebuild (in the short term - a la Geelong). If the club can pick up a few more key pieces in the next couple of years then, with some good development, the Tigers will be back somewhere around contention at the same time as the big $ from Dusty etc come off the books. That then leads to the ability to go hard for FA's. Anyway, that's how I see it - a 3-5 year plan to be back in the window.
Green would be an obvious and excellent target if he comes onto the market.
Ages 25-33 is where Richmond's talent is largely concentrated, with Baker and Graham soon to join that age bracket. That means you're in the win-now category. I'd be making the most of that opportunity and aggressively pushing given that. And in any club situation, I'd be looking to improve my list.
The point people and clubs alike miss is age demographics don't matter. No one knows it, because clubs are always busily talking about their age demographics and drafting youth to ensure they meet age demographic levels they intend to stay within. It misses the point entirely that most of the young players you draft will fail and be out of the competition in a few years and that only a small few of those young ones drafted could in the long run be pieces of significance who can be built around.
Older lists that have played together for a long time helps towards winning normally, but the push for good youth by all clubs is overboard and not in keeping with past results when we reflect back.
We're in the free agency era whereby you can easily trade for and acquire undervalued players at discount rates and on top of that, there are mature age prospects who offer both higher floors and higher ceilings than their younger draft alternatives. No club has aggressively pushed the limits, but if they did, and clubs outside of the first two rounds of the draft went almost always for mature agers, and would happily trade down and trade for undervalued opposition talents, there is huge potential to outperform, with these being the highest % opportunities to improve your list and secure the best value from an opportunity cost perspective.
What people miss looking at Geelong is they haven't overconcentrated by drafting mature agers, but the mature agers they have taken despite not even being early picks have been so good that they've elevated Geelong's list and a number of them have been among their best players. Mature agers drafted generally aren't even that old with clubs, and Richmond recently to their credit is the only club that doesn't have this total blind spot, with clubs ignoring mature agers over the age of 25 completely.
Building through the draft (and securing youth) is the lowest percentage way of building a list and the easiest way to get wrecked and often generationally wrecked, particularly when clubs overconcentrate on the draft and don't put together the established footballers and established leaders around them to enable them to develop.
I'll create on YouTube over the coming weeks a breakdown of in hindsight those best-15 players from each draft. I'm not yet decided just how far I'll go back. Perhaps to 2009 as that was when I started contributing on Bigfooty. People won't believe until going through the names how many mature agers and overagers make those top-15s and how much later they went - be it mid draft/late/rookie compared to those younger guys who make those top-15s.
It staggers me, and this isn't a go at any one person in particular as my view is universally everyone in the industry is guilty of this as they're just not aware, but it staggers me how broadly no one understands that mature age prospects offer both, and this is across any draft you look at, higher floors and higher ceilings compared to players drafted out of the u18s and that there is a point in every draft where you're moving into the higher success % threshold once going for mature agers every time from at least outside the first 40 picked.