List Mgmt. 2025 List Management Discussion - Part IV

[Hubnester]

2025 List Management Discussion - Part 4

Now that our season is over, and news is starting to break - it's time for a fresh thread.

This thread is to discuss all things list management - trades, draft, free agency, delistings and more.
As we are now officially in our off-season, we'll be wanting to keep this thread more strictly on-topic than the previous iterations.
Be respectful. You are allowed to disagree with someone - but play the ball, not the man. Repeat offenders will have their posting rights revoked.

Thanks to Lore once again for this incredibly useful spreadsheet.

2025 KEY DATES
Free Agency Period: Friday, October 3rd - Friday, October 10th
Trade Period: Monday, October 6th - Wednesday, October 15th
AFL Draft: Wednesday, November 19th - Thursday, November 20th

See Also:
2025 Year in Review Rumours & Confirmed Movements 2025 Draft Discussion
​

 

[Stan_Darsh72]

That photo never ceases to crack me up.

Far out how did we let that spud and Danny F'in Sexton run our footy dept for 6 years?

When the 2000's hit we were on top of the game, it changed we made a bad seaford move, cucked ourselves, spent the post roscoe years drafting goodboys and paying off debt, and then somehow we got a decent player base via the rookie draft, the few national drafts we did not **** up, mid season drafts and trading.

In 2011 we picked Ross, Newnes and Webster that was our best draft for a very long time, 2013 should have been good, but developent had no money, 2014 just pretend we got Sinclair at number 1, 2015 got Gresham but injuries, 2016 Ben Long and Battle (win but it took a while and they are not here, although did get marshall), 2017 Coffield and Clark are injured more than they should be and one is not even at the club, 2018 looked promising but King and Wilkie are only left, 2019 we went for Trades and did fill gaps we needed from the 2011 to 2019 era, 2020 covid draft but got Higgins and then finally in 2021 Sharman midseason, NWM, Owens, Windhager.

A decade of crap, injures and bad drafs killed us.

 

[Longmembrey]

who are the elite small stoppers in the league now?

All the good teams have 1

 

[bph25]

"Unless the free agency rules are changed, I would think contracted players are at your club unless you decide otherwise," he said.

"And as (Cats coach) Chris Scott said to me, (Tim) Kelly wanted to go home, he had children under duress, and they needed family support, but we weren't trading him.

"They kept him for another 12 months and got two first round picks and got (Jeremy) Cameron through the door.

"He said to me, Ross, if you're a club and you trade your contracted players, put your shingle up and say we're not a very good club.

"So everyone wants to model Geelong, and on this front, I'll be modelling Geelong."

-----------

Ross Lyon from a month or two ago, you better be putting your money where your mouth is boss.

I’d say the difference is. Tim actually wanted to stay. We know the situation. He went on and was all Australian and brownlow contender. Cats got rewarded. I’m not sure Marshall playing off the bench out of position most games and ticking over 30 next year is going to land you the same haul. He might be worth a late second rounder in 12 months that’s if any interest at all

 

[Dr Spaceman]

We have been a badly run club for 15 years. Every club talks big and most fail to deliver on it. We haven’t earned respect or relevance either.

It will take time to make people see us as anything but a novelty until it translates to on field success. Richmond, the Dogs and Melbourne had to win a flag to change perceptions.

We have slapped a few people awake and made the media look up. Now we need to win games to do the next bit.

I don’t mind being underestimated from
Outsiders . It will make it more fun to watch them suffer later.

 

[BrutThough]

Death riding Geelong when they just made the granny could mean for a disappointing year.

Worpel and Marshall address two absolute weaknesses in their line-up. Imagine if they do get Curnow... its a better draft next year but any draft pick associated with Geelong will be late teens next year.

I hope we don't fold. SDK, or a pick to get a player we haven't been linked to please.

If they made the granny, the pick is no worse then it is now. but at least we wont be using it in what many recruits believe in the worst draft ever.

 

[_Maximus_12]

I try not to get carried away but if the following happens (which in reality, is realistic) then **** Brisbane and their three peat attempt it’s coming home to the bayside

• King returns to pre injury levels
• JSOS & TDK play a full season the way they started this year
• Pou has the breakout year he was supposed to this year
• Flanders goes 2024 mode
• Nas continues his hot run

 

[Captain Paddy]

Reckon LOC has all the attributes to be the lock down defender. Gonna be a true Ross boy

 

[St Neil]

Can't always have it our own way, but I'm getting a pretty bad feeling about this Marshall trade.

We should tell Geelong to go and jump.

Fair dinkum. Easy trade to do. Stand them up.

They are such a difficult and self entitled club.

 

[SainterinSydney]

I try not to get carried away but if the following happens (which in reality, is realistic) then **** Brisbane and their three peat attempt it’s coming home to the bayside

• King returns to pre injury levels
• JSOS & TDK play a full season the way they started this year
• Pou has the breakout year he was supposed to this year
• Flanders goes 2024 mode
• Nas continues his hot run

 

[StCicatriz]

I want to hold Marshall. Think we need to see how it goes. Dont think the pick will be of any use.

 

[sauce_head]

So he plays for St Kilda and they can pick up Harry Boyd as a DFA.

We owe Geelong nothing and they are going after one of our best contracted players as evidenced by multiple top half dozen or so finishes in our B&F.

What irks me is we'll cop it about his value now but then when he's winning games for them it will be, god he was a steal for Geelong... what a genius pick up, they've done it again yada yada yada

Like exactly what happened with Battle. Played a statistically worse year than his last with us yet somehow becomes all Australia ahead of Willie and people saying he had improved out of sight.

 

[StCicatriz]

Marshall could be like blicavs. Think its super important we have him in the best 22 next year.

Will be make us a better side. Far more important than a junk end of first rounser which is all geelong will offer.

 

[austinnn]

When the 2000's hit we were on top of the game, it changed we made a bad seaford move, cucked ourselves, spent the post roscoe years drafting goodboys and paying off debt, and then somehow we got a decent player base via the rookie draft, the few national drafts we did not **** up, mid season drafts and trading.

In 2011 we picked Ross, Newnes and Webster that was our best draft for a very long time, 2013 should have been good, but developent had no money, 2014 just pretend we got Sinclair at number 1, 2015 got Gresham but injuries, 2016 Ben Long and Battle (win but it took a while and they are not here, although did get marshall), 2017 Coffield and Clark are injured more than they should be and one is not even at the club, 2018 looked promising but King and Wilkie are only left, 2019 we went for Trades and did fill gaps we needed from the 2011 to 2019 era, 2020 covid draft but got Higgins and then finally in 2021 Sharman midseason, NWM, Owens, Windhager.

A decade of crap, injures and bad drafs killed us.

With all due respect, I know that much about our history already. I lived through thst. But some details have become blurry through the years:

My question is:
How did Richo survive as coach?
How did Cox / Sexton survive as Footy boss?
How did Trout survive as LM?

Wasn't the board reviewing the inner workings of the club? What were the KPIs then?

We were taking giant strides off field and I get that a lot of the context was just stemming the bleeding and correcting mistakes, but we didn't have proven winners in any if the key roles and results were never fantastic.

There were loads of mitigating circumstances as you detailed, and I remember myself being optimistic (always) though divided on Richo & Co's effectiveness at the time, without having any inside knowledge that the board must have had at that time. I think I remember around the time of Richo's last extention, we had had a pretty good year, might have been when Joey and Roo were still playing. Still, what were the reasons we didn't start pulling ourselves out of the mire until around the time Ratts was appointed?

Was that just all we could afford? No one else wanted to drive down to Seaford to coach one of the only 18 afl teams in the country?

Another exercise - Sliding doors moment: in that brief power struggle between snr asst Adam Kingsley and Richo, the board backs Kingsley. What happens?

 

[Leap of Faith]

I hope

I try not to get carried away but if the following happens (which in reality, is realistic) then **** Brisbane and their three peat attempt it’s coming home to the bayside

• King returns to pre injury levels
• JSOS & TDK play a full season the way they started this year
• Pou has the breakout year he was supposed to this year
• Flanders goes 2024 mode
• Nas continues his hot run

I hope you’re right but am placing none of my hopes at all on Max King. He’s one significant injury away from being an injury bust. If he comes good it’s a bonus not an expectation. The club should start planning contingencies for a forward set up without him.

 

[Captain Paddy]

We should tell Geelong to go and jump.

Fair dinkum. Easy trade to do. Stand them up.

They are such a difficult and self entitled club.

Worst case for us is that we get to have the TDK/Roma combo which also gives us cover for any TDK or Max injuries

Worst case for Geelong is that they ruck Stanley again.

Think we get what we want if we just hold our nerve

 

[Stan_Darsh72]

With all due respect, I know that much about our history already. I lived through thst. But some details have become blurry through the years:

My question is:
How did Richo survive as coach?
How did Cox / Sexton survive as Footy boss?
How did Trout survive as LM?

Wasn't the board reviewing the inner workings of the club? What were the KPIs then?

We were taking giant strides off field and I get that a lot of the context was just stemming the bleeding and correcting mistakes, but we didn't have proven winners in any if the key roles and results were never fantastic.

There were loads of mitigating circumstances as you detailed, and I remember myself being optimistic (always) though divided on Richo & Co's effectiveness at the time, without having any inside knowledge that the board must have had at that time. I think I remember around the time of Richo's last extention, we had had a pretty good year, might have been when Joey and Roo were still playing. Still, what were the reasons we didn't start pulling ourselves out of the more until around the time Ratts was appointed?

Was that just all we could afford? No one else wanted to drive down to Seaford to coach one of the only 18 afl teams in the country?

Another exercise - Sliding doors moment: in that brief power struggle between snr asst Adam Kingsley and Richo, the board backs Kingsley. What happens?

I feel it was money and that at that time we had a fair share of controversies.

We went safe and dare I say too safe.

But like you I was optimistic but hindsight is 2020.

A lot of things went wrong for the club at the same time and we went dull rather then full **** up mode.

 

[puppy_dog7]

Fmd, have a visit of any other teams trade boards and all they are talking about is us.

We are the trade period, so hot right now

Almost everybody thinks this trade period is going to blow up in our face.

Amazing how quickly JSOS and Flanders went from being guns to spuds once they nominated us.

Love this aggressive approach. No guarantees of success, but just happy to see us making moves.

We clearly don't care about this years draft.

I feel like we’re happy to just get Kye Fincher through NGA and a few other later picks, whilst bringing in more experienced players in that 24-27 year age bracket that we currently lack a bit

 

[austinnn]

I hope

I hope you’re right but am placing none of my hopes at all on Max King. He’s one significant injury away from being an injury bust. If he comes good it’s a bonus not an expectation. The club should start planning contingencies for a forward set up without him.

I would be surprised if that's not already the case. My guess is 2026 is the final chance, he'll have been given an idea of what the clubs position is at this stage and either he holds up and performs or he doesn't and we move ahead without him. We have Keeler and Caminiti as tall options plus whoever we draft. Its a bit too early to move past him right now, considering the ceiling if all goes well for him.

 

[St Neil]

Worst case for us is that we get to have the TDK/Roma combo which also gives us cover for any TDK or Max injuries

Worst case for Geelong is that they ruck Stanley again.

Think we get what we want if we just hold our nerve

I’d rather keep Marshall. For all the reasons mentioned in this thread.

Being relieved of the majority of the bash and crash impacts in the ruck will extend his career.

Should be an elite around the ground follower.

 

[puppy_dog7]

Sam McClure and Mitch Cleary saying on their pod the club didn't inform Marshall of the TDK acquisition and he found out through the media.

That doesn't sound right..

You do realise Cleary is from Geelong and a MASSIVE cats fan

 

[Billy Connolly]

Kane Cornes said we should be getting a second lol

Yeah because he's the biggest ****wit going around!

 

[bakes10]

Hoping we can snag another indigenous small forward like Bobby Hill or Malakai Champion. Imagine having Collard, Liam Ryan

1

Liam Ryan

Age

29

Ht

181cm

Wt

76kg

Pos.

Fwd

Career

Season

Last 5

D

11.3

3star

K

8.6

3star

HB

2.7

2star

M

3.0

3star

T

2.0

4star

G

1.3

5star

D

9.9

3star

K

8.0

3star

HB

1.9

1star

M

3.3

3star

T

1.6

3star

G

1.3

5star

D

11.4

3star

K

9.0

4star

HB

2.4

3star

M

3.8

4star

T

1.8

4star

G

1.6

5star

, and 1 more dangerous crumber causing havoc.

 

[puppy_dog7]

It's also been under the radar, this is at least 4 years in the planning (NWM may have brought it forward a year).

There's a shock factor to this in that it hasn't been done before and no "reporter" saw it coming.

The lack of financial acumen from the football media at this time of year is astounding, but they can get away with almost anything because of the hidden nature of football contracts. Most 'reporting' is parroting sources, no investigative journalism is occurring.

It may or may not turn out, but it's a bold strategy and needs to be admired (once understood).

100% this

Attacking FA is clearly the best way to go as you don’t have to give up any draft capital or players to bring them in.

The best clubs are constantly looking at Free Agents/Draft quality and even homesick players 2-4 years out.

We looked at TDK a few years ago and would’ve clearly placed him on the list to go after once he hit FA. I feel there’s probably another one in Ben King next year.

The club would’ve also realised last year that the quality of this draft was poor (along with all the draft concessions for F/S and NGA) hence ensuring we got multiple top 10 picks last year and will most likely look at increasing our draft hand for next year as opposed to this year.

The strategy is sound. We just need a little bit of luck and then from here on out, with both injury and development (and fixture)

 

[Significant]

S I G N I F I C A N T L Y

You rang?

 

[puppy_dog7]

I’d say the difference is. Tim actually wanted to stay. We know the situation. He went on and was all Australian and brownlow contender. Cats got rewarded. I’m not sure Marshall playing off the bench out of position most games and ticking over 30 next year is going to land you the same haul. He might be worth a late second rounder in 12 months that’s if any interest at all

Well I’d rather have Marshall for another year as backup for TDK/King and lose him next year for a 2nd rounder than accept a pick which gets pushed out into the 20’s in a weak draft.