Game Day The 2025 Draft Day Thread

[UseR2006]

And a song to sing as we watch,

Hey Matty Clarke by Kevin (Random260) Wilson :

Hey Matty Clarke you campaigner, where the **** is Sharp
I’ve looked at all these other spuds and there’s no one that I like
I wrote you a ****ing letter and posted about it twice
You dopey ****ing Richmond fart, you forgot my ****ing Sharp

If I wanted a stupid ruckman type, I would’ve bloody asked
And this half back flank and temu mid, you can shove right up your arse
You’ve stuffed the bloody order up, it’s enough to make you spew
But it’s not just me who’s snakey, SGIO is dirty too

Next time I come to see ya, I’m going to punch you in the guts
And I’ll sack the other recruiting knobs and kick Toddy in the nuts
You just wait 'til next year when you go back to the draft
And me and me little GIO come stomping through the door
And we'll say, yeah, you wait for it

Hey Pyke and Woosh you smell his breath
And check his bloodshot eyes
And don't listen to him eagles fans 'cause he tells ****ing lies
He's just a ****ing useless campaigner and he's not even very bright
'Cause the stupid ****in' w***er, forgot me ****in' Sharp

Hey Matty Clarke you campaigner, where the **** is Sharp
I’ve looked at all these other spuds and there’s no one that I like
I wrote you a ****ing letter and posted about it twice
You dopey ****ing Richmond fart, you forgot my ****ing Sharp

A Quick Ai rendition: https://suno.com/s/blQP3cSnulhqYb5g
It's funny how it interrupted the lyrics XD

 

[MrAsh7777]

ESPN final power rankings had NHH ranked 13.
Twomey had him at 23.
Seems like a rookie draft steal that could heal some Banfield, Evans & F2 wounds.

 

[amazingjoshy]

Wes Walley beaten at the finish line by Darcy Montgomery.

I mean Darcy Montgomery is a pretty cool name but come on Wes

 

[Bleedblueandgold]

It's the relief of the moment, the club you were meant to go to didn't have the draft capital and you're left in no mans land. Players that get that deep in the draft have 0 guarantees they're even getting a spot at an AFL club.

I'm happy for them given the circumstances... Can't lie that I wish that we had the spots for them (obviously). It's a case of what could have been.
As I've said before the final list lodgements, we didn't have to put ourselves in the situation of having to select between our NGA/FS or other players. Delisting a player or 2 wouldn't have meant the end for them. If they had enough potential, another team could've given them another opportunity or we could re-rookie them.
There was certainly a lot of uncertainty about whether they would attract a bid.
Seeing across the road that neither of their NGA's were bid on rubs the salt in.
It honestly could have gone either way, perhaps? That's why it hurts so much.

 

[Keys]

That’s our age profile after the draft and allowing for the three SSP signings we’ve committed to adding to our list next week.

There’s going to be at least one more 18 year old added to that when we confirm the addition of Walley as a Cat B rookie. Maybe two depending on how we fill the last Cat A rookie spot

It’s an extraordinarily young list - at least 23, possibly 24, will be 21 or under to start 2026. Only 4 will be 29 or older

And it’s also very inexperienced with only 18 (less than 40%) having played over 50 games and just 9 playing over 100 games.

Have a listen to the excellent interview with our Head of Development, Jamie Maddocks, that’s been posted in the media thread. He talks about the inexperience of the playing group and the challenges in developing such a young list because of the absence of experienced players to learn from and to challenge themselves against

It helps to see why we’re bringing in three middle aged fringe players, in addition to Starcevich and Young, to strengthen a missing age demographic and to help the young group develop. He has an analogy of a rising tide helping to float a boat

He also touches on how poor the development was at the club when he arrived last year, largely due to the lack of guidance for the young players to learn from

Now we could have moved Cripps on but I suspect he was retained once Ryan requested a trade out. Whatever you want to say about Cripps, he is unquestionably a good trainer and will help our young forwards next year whether that be in the seniors or the WAFL. We should have shifted him to the rookie list though and had we done so, Banfield would be an Eagle. As it stands what would’ve been his spot will/should be taken by the first pick in the rookie draft who’ll be roughly comparable in quality/chance to succeed

Barnett was the most obvious other delistee after three underwhelming years on the list and arguably only survived the cull because he had a contract. Could’ve paid him out as cap space isn’t an issue for us at the moment.

But the club, who see and work with him every day beyond just game day, felt he was persevering with. And ruckman notoriously take time to develop- the league is littered with rucks who only succeeded at their second, or even third club, in their mid to late twenties

Can Barnett turn it around? My money would be on no, but if the club want to keep him another season then let’s see what happens. If he starts to thrive then they look like geniuses

Cole will most likely spend most of the time in the WAFL where he’ll be a vital asset for the development of our group and give the WAFL side sone much needed experience/leadership

Johnston showed plenty of promise in his first year which he struggled to back up this year which was partly explained by an elbow injury sustained in preseason. At just 20 still he’s absolutely worth persevering with

I don’t like everything we did and as I said earlier I’d have preferred we shifted Cripps to the rookie list so we could add Banfield. There’s also other stuff around the margins we could’ve been better with - something that’s been an ongoing issue and needs to be addressed

But looking at the big picture I can see what the club is trying to achieve and on balance we’ve had a solid trade/draft period without quite hitting it out of the park the way we would have all hoped

So you can look forward to what hopefully is an improvement in 2026 or wallow in what might have been on decisions at the margins

 

[larrikin]

I may be over simplifying this, but if the club thought Evans and Banfield were worth getting on to the main list they had plenty of ways to make it happen. They didn’t, and here we are.

 

[Eastern Rangers]

Banfield & Evans IMO aren't going to be deal breakers in the long run. We will add another bunch of 5 kids next year, all the guys will have another pre season in them & we will start seeing who's got what it takes. Someone said we now have 27 kids under 23 so plenty to work with.

I would expect and hope on talent more than 5 players going next year and I don't see our additional Rookie spots getting cut by the AFL. We should be churning those mature guys if they don't make the 23.

 

[jdisc]

Major benefit of this off season and the rumored rookie selections is our WAFL side might actually be competitive next year

 

[Forward Press]

Banfield & Evans IMO aren't going to be deal breakers in the long run. We will add another bunch of 5 kids next year, all the guys will have another pre season in them & we will start seeing who's got what it takes. Someone said we now have 27 kids under 23 so plenty to work with.

Banfield and Evans are only talked about because of their fathers.

There's a reason why they were amongst the last picked in the draft. Of course they could turn out to be 200 game guns, but the chances are low and I can understand why the club prefers mature age SSP selections this year. If it was Charlie Smith and Koby Smith with no ties to the club being taken, we wouldn't really care anywhere near as much.

Still, not exactly the best draft with losing an F2 for a one pick upgrade, and a huge punt taking a player with an ACL, but again I can see the rationale. I'm not getting paid the big bucks though, so I sure hope they know what they're doing.

 

[jdisc]

Time will tell, many rate Banfield but are we biased due to the surname and locality, i'm not unhappy with our draft but the romantic in me would've loved another scotchie at the club

 

[Coasters7]

I may be over simplifying this, but if the club thought Evans and Banfield were worth getting on to the main list they had plenty of ways to make it happen. They didn’t, and here we are.

This is the same club that thought adding Matt Owies to a trade for pick 3 was the thing that tipped it in our favour. Also as recent as yesterday traded up to miss out on the player we wanted.

Hard to have any confidence in their judgement.

 

[Bleedblueandgold]

I'm kinda pissed that after not having 2 NGA/FS to add, we've seemingly already decided that we're gonna leave a train on spot. I hope that we at least look at the options available at pick 1 in the RD and assess our options. I hate the finality of it, just like deciding to only take 1 out of 3 NGA/FS by not creating extra list spots and deciding closer to the draft.

 

[Eastern Rangers]

Seems like I'll be eternally cycling through the stages of grief until Banfield & Evans request a trade back home.
View attachment 2482491

I'm still convinced Cogs will sign up any day now.

 

[Deplorable trumpster]

Unfortunately blowing the salary cap by more than a million in one season, to take a punt on 2 speculative rookies, probably isn't a good idea IMO.

Blowing the cap by a million dollars????? You must be joking.

Do you think the club that has by far the youngest list in the comp and won one game for the season is on the edge of the cap and has no space to move?

And are you under the impression that Owies is on a million a year?

 

[Coasters7]

Banfield and Evans are only talked about because of their fathers.

There's a reason why they were amongst the last picked in the draft. Of course they could turn out to be 200 game guns, but the chances are low and I can understand why the club prefers mature age SSP selections this year. If it was Charlie Smith and Koby Smith with no ties to the club being taken, we wouldn't really care anywhere near as much.

Still, not exactly the best draft with losing an F2 for a one pick upgrade, and a huge punt taking a player with an ACL, but again I can see the rationale. I'm not getting paid the big bucks though, so I sure hope they know what they're doing.

They both have looked good enough to get on the list. Especially at the expense of guys on our list who clearly won’t make it.

Banfield won Claremont a flag with one of the most dominant finals campaigns you’ll see and Evans was being talked about as a first round talent who had injury problems. Both more than worth the gamble on.

 

[EagleMutt]

Did that vfl player we were linked to get picked up? Blaimires?

 

[jdisc]

This is the same club that thought adding Matt Owies to a trade for pick 3 was the thing that tipped it in our favour. Also as recent as yesterday traded up to miss out on the player we wanted.

Hard to have any confidence in their judgement.

the trade brought in Liam Baker who won the B&F and Bo Allan, so simplifying it down to just Owies is a bit disingenuous

the actual pick 3 hasn't debuted yet so we have nothing to compare it to

 

[amazingjoshy]

I may be over simplifying this, but if the club thought Evans and Banfield were worth getting on to the main list they had plenty of ways to make it happen. They didn’t, and here we are.

Yeah I dont think we were blind sided or mis managed the situation, we simply didn't rate them that high

Which, given the reigning premiers did (rate one of them at least), its pretty fair to question whether our recruiting staff have made the right call

We'll find out in 5 years or so

 

[Jootube]

Ok.



Ok. That clearly wasn't the plan at all, based off the fact that WCE indeed didn't free up the spots for those 2.

Clarke said it himself: they'd take those 2 if they made it to the rookie list and they didn't.

You may not like the plan, and that's entirely fine, but that obviously was the plan going in and not some random **** up because someone couldn't count list spots

Yes, our plan was to cross our fingers and hope they weren't bid on so we can rookie list them.
Just like our plan to bid on Addinsall and Murray, and cross our fingers and hope we nabbed one.

Zero contingency plans and it's cost us - very sick of people doing backflips to justify these moronic moves from the back office.

 

[jdisc]

I mean Darcy Montgomery is a pretty cool name but come on Wes

the guy from Stranger Things?

 

[Wce17]

I would expect and hope on talent more than 5 players going next year and I don't see our additional Rookie spots getting cut by the AFL. We should be churning those mature guys if they don't make the 23.

I was just going off a quick look at the main list when I came up with 5 so as you say it will be more.

Cripps, Cole, Long, Barnett & Johnson all most likely gone I think to start with.

 

[eagles rule]

Surely we will add a genuine mid in Greeves tomorrow..The BBMWHAW to help Harley split the packs open ..

 

[amazingjoshy]

Banfield and Evans are only talked about because of their fathers.

There's a reason why they were amongst the last picked in the draft. Of course they could turn out to be 200 game guns, but the chances are low and I can understand why the club prefers mature age SSP selections this year. If it was Charlie Smith and Koby Smith with no ties to the club being taken, we wouldn't really care anywhere near as much.

Still, not exactly the best draft with losing an F2 for a one pick upgrade, and a huge punt taking a player with an ACL, but again I can see the rationale. I'm not getting paid the big bucks though, so I sure hope they know what they're doing.

Evans was an NGA, nothing to do with his father

Banfield was rated because alot watched the Colts finals and he dominated it. And yes, the romance of father-son but so what. There's still room for it

 

[bzparkes]

Yes, our plan was to cross our fingers and hope they weren't bid on so we can rookie list them.
Just like our plan to bid on Addinsall and Murray, and cross our fingers and hope we nabbed one.

Zero contingency plans and it's cost us - very sick of people doing backflips to justify these moronic moves from the back office.

Should listen to Clarke's presser on Zerohangar a page or so back. Basically explains the entire strategy.

 

[bzparkes]

Surely we will add a genuine mid in Greeves tomorrow..The BBMWHAW to help Harley split the packs open ..

The ball will be 100m away before he even gets to the drop zone of a ruck contest..

 

[bzparkes]

I may be over simplifying this, but if the club thought Evans and Banfield were worth getting on to the main list they had plenty of ways to make it happen. They didn’t, and here we are.

Nah, they can't count, ****ed up, have no strategy, no contingency plans, etc.

To sum it all up:




Or something like that....