In the priority pick thread.Did I say priority pick? I said help!
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In the priority pick thread.Did I say priority pick? I said help!
I don't agree with this "Damo has been consistent" crap. Maybe at some point in the hours and hours of content he does every month he can go through and cherry pick out some quotes from the past where he expressed some discomfort about AFL assistance to other clubs. But that wouldn't be representative of his overall stance.
He certainly didn't wage a jihad against help to other clubs like he has with us. He is writing articles bitching and moaning about it all season with us and using very aggressive and emotive language to galvanise his audience to join his jihad. He was absolutely NOT doing that when the AFL helped North. So i do not accept that he has been consistent at all.
And if his reason is that the draft is already too compromised then maybe he join the majority of AFL fans in demanding that that be rectified. Which he hasn't so far. He has toed the AFL's line in supporting the free kicks to the Northern clubs. But now he admits and cites that problem as a reason not help a club whose rebuild has been severely impacted by it.
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The other dumb issue with this besides what has already been discussed is the “if a club suffers a period of self-inflicted pain…” What club that has drafted and recruited really well is going to stink to high heaven for at least four years straight? Of course every club that is this bad has done quite a few things wrong. I do take issue with the argument that it’s been full self inflicted though, given the large number of career-ending or career-altering injuries to most of our best players and a WAFL setup that makes developing players in the twos really difficult.
Yeah but listen to how Suma sums it up
Because if I don't listen to me no one will.Why listen to an idiot?
Given we are talking about the 2026 and on seasons surely just the 1 Premiership in 20 years and that by a kick should be part of argument .If you just take a step back and look at west coast's results over the past three years, and look at the limited amount of talent coming through, you can mount a serious argument that no team in the history of the AFL has been this bad for this long and so poorly placed to rebuild.
People talk about our juniors coming through like we just need time for them to develop, but whilst there are some positives, there's not really any indication our current crop of kids is special. In fact in terms of what they have shown I worry its actually fairly similar to what most other clubs not in full rebuild mode have got cooking away in the 2s, rather than what you would expect a team this bad to have gotten from multiple years with good access to the draft- Some will come good, some will wash out, but the state of our list is so dire and there is so little talent in the middle of our list age bracket that there's a good chance the kids coming through will just maintain rather than actually improve the state of our list. Eg if Brock turns out to be an amazing, AA calibre defender that doesn't mean we are better, it just means we won't get even worse when Gov retires. The critical mass we need, of four or five top tier midfield prospects coming through, simply isn't there. If you look at what we have in the pipeline compared to say North or Richmond, we're gambling with a losing hand.
So yeah, we need assistance.
Don't get me wrong, it sucks. it sucks that the history of west coast as a power club has been effectively washed away by a combination of bad luck and incompetence. It sucks that we are now so bad that the rest of the competition isn't even laughing at us anymore, they're genuinely concerned what we mean for the integrity of the league. And it sucks that the club has ****ed the situation so badly that there's effectively no pathway out of it on our own, but that is where it is at. Trading picks for Baker last year was an exercise in delusional thinking about the state of the list, and failing to ask for priority picks or any other assistance from the AFL would be even more delusional.
The team should be begging for whatever sort of draft pick or list assistance it can get.
Max Gawn says WCE shouldn't be getting one.The arguments against seem to boil down to two factors. We're a rich club (irrelevant when there are salary caps in play), and that we won a premiership seven years ago.
Pretty piss weak arguments really when considering the state of the list going forward and our ability to overhaul it given how compromised the draft is, but I just can't see the VFL doing anything to help us.
The Kelly and Baker trades are what poor, desperate, cellar dweller clubs do.The other dumb issue with this besides what has already been discussed is the “if a club suffers a period of self-inflicted pain…” What club that has drafted and recruited really well is going to stink to high heaven for at least four years straight? Of course every club that is this bad has done quite a few things wrong. I do take issue with the argument that it’s been full self inflicted though, given the large number of career-ending or career-altering injuries to most of our best players and a WAFL setup that makes developing players in the twos really difficult.
And?Max Gawn says WCE shouldn't be getting one.
The Kelly and Baker trades are what poor, desperate, cellar dweller clubs do.
Not aimed at you of course.Not unexpected, but it's started already.
Two headlines from The Age and Herald Sun (which I won't open).
West Coast’s ‘inappropriate’ draft assistance request:
Seven years after winning a flag, the Eagles have asked the AFL for draft help
Max Gawn says he had no idea that Joel Smith was supplying half the club with nose beers whilst he was captain of said club. Nobody should take what he says seriously.Max Gawn says WCE shouldn't be getting one.
Ïts too rigged already, we cant afford to rig it anymore is certainly a strange defense from the AFL
And from the captain of a club fined $0.5M for not tanking with the fine then paid by the AFL as the club was so financially incapable.Max Gawn says he had no idea that Joel Smith was supplying half the club with nose beers whilst he was captain of said club. Nobody should take what he says seriously.
Baker? Give it a rest. Probable B&F winner and our most at-it player.The Kelly and Baker trades are what poor, desperate, cellar dweller clubs do.
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