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List Mgmt. 2026 List Management

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Andy Brennan said:
Would love Banfield to stay on as a development coach/peel stalwart if we let him go a la Brady grey.
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Wouldn't be too surprised by this. Also IMO bringing players back for 2028 is an option. It might not be Banfield or even a Freo player but by the time you reach rookie draft/SSP in the 2027/28 off season it might just be better to list a mature aged player (possibly with AFL experience) than a youngster we don't really rate.

Think there's going to need to be a bit of different recruiting from us next year to make even 5-6 changes to our list. Getting rid of some older players in our 24-30 range might just mean we're turning over 3-4 instead. Think that's the plan anyone.

Certainly don't think we'd re-sign JOM or McDonald for 2028 so the question may be whether we have their roles covered for 2027. Banfield is a bit younger but still reasonably easy to replace.
 
To be a fly on the wall when Walls is sketching out our recruitment strategy for the next 2-3 years.

Surely he's cooking up some diabolically left field hail marys to keep us ticking over with talent despite Tassie eviscerating the drafts. Some combination of success-chasing trade-ins, picking off the surplus Tassie talent a-la GC and GWS, trading futures to swoop when the Tassie inevitably misses a few gems and picking the eyes out of the rookie drafts and SSP periods.

He's already built us a list that legitimately contends, now he's got to figure out how to keep us there.
 
With no footy this weekend I’m delving into areas I don’t normally wander.

What I find interesting is that we have never really used the mid season draft to bring in ready made players, they’ve generally been project players. Correct me if I’m wrong. On occasions we haven’t even bothered despite having a hole to fill.

Additionally for the first 4 or so years we never used the Pre-season supplemental selection period to bring in players. I’m guessing we had players trialling but never selected? Or maybe never had a spot?

In 2023 we seemed to have changed tactic, maybe looking at the success other clubs were having? or we had spots available, whether that was by chance or design. Or there were players of interest we just couldn’t pass up? Or all of above?

2023 Voss, Sharp.
2024 Narkle, Dudley.
2025 Cox, Scerri.

It’s a been a relatively successful use of that strategy. 3 of the first 4 are a tick with Sharp seemingly improving his overall game but yet to crack it consistently.
Cox has been important & Scerri is still a question mark.

Do punters think this is a deliberate strategy by Walls planned throughout the back half of the season or just a coincidence?

I feel he is far too strategic for this to be a coincidence.
Instead of using the mid season draft where we haven’t had them in our system so it can be a desperate punt that has worked elsewhere. I feel he & the coaches prefer to have them in the system for a month or 2 to pass the no dickhead rule & ensure they are the right fit culturally with feedback from senior players.
(Voss may have been an interesting consideration)

Or am I full of shit?
 
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Stinky Lomax said:
With no footy this weekend I’m delving into areas I don’t normally wander.

What I find interesting is that we have never really used the mid season draft to bring in ready made players, they’ve generally been project players. Correct me if I’m wrong. On occasions we haven’t even bothered despite having a hole to fill.

Additionally for the first 4 or so years we never used the Pre-season supplemental selection period to bring in players. I’m guessing we had players trialling but never selected? Or maybe never had a spot?

In 2023 we seemed to have changed tactic, maybe looking at the success other clubs were having? or we had spots available, whether that was by chance or design. Or there were players of interest we just couldn’t pass up? Or all of above?

2023 Voss, Sharp.
2024 Narkle, Dudley.
2025 Cox, Scerri.

It’s a been a relatively successful use of that strategy. 3 of the first 4 are a tick with Sharp seemingly improving his overall game but yet to crack it consistently.
Cox has been important & Scerri is still a question mark.

Do punters think this is a deliberate strategy by Walls planned throughout the back half of the season or just a coincidence?

I feel he is far too strategic for this to be a coincidence.
Instead of using the mid season draft where we haven’t had them in our system so it can be a desperate punt that has worked elsewhere. I feel he & the coaches prefer to have them in the system for a month or 2 to pass the no dickhead rule & ensure they are the right fit culturally with feedback from senior players.
(Voss may have been an interesting consideration)

Or am I full of shit?
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Defo not full of shit.

So with the SSPs over the last few years, we've had 1 "fake" SSP (someone we were set on signing but used the SSP to get them on the rookie list) and 1 "real" SSP (someone that actually needed to train on to get their spot). Sharp, Narkle and Cox all were decided on in advance, Voss, Dudley and Scerri trained on and competed for their spots.

You're right about previous periods where we trialled players unsuccessfully. End of 2021/start of 2022 off the back of Luke Valente's retirement, Tyler Keitel, Blake Schlensog, Bailey Rogers, Lachlan Cullen and Luke Polson all trained on, but none got a spot. End of 2022/start of 2023 it was Sam Stubbs and Liam Serong.

In the past with the MSD, we didn't have particularly high picks, so we leaned towards the projects. I think the reality is that, looking past the teams that just have the #1 picks, the teams that have the most success in the MSD aren't doing it accidentally. Much like if Tasmania unearth genuine AFL players through their VFL team, that won't be accidental. There's months of investment and knowledge gathering that the WAFL rules probably hamstring us from accumulating.

The way I see it is the shift from the MSD to the SSP to fill out rookie spots comes down to learning what fits best for us. We want to have maximum players on the rookie list for cap purposes, but we want them to be more than a blind punt. The "fake" SSP has been a recent delistee that we think can do something for us (and we've been right about 2/3, Narkle realistically was just there to help out Shai Bolton + we missed out on Jack Martin). The "real" SSP is someone where, to your point, we've put homework into before they come train on, then get a good close look at them.

Using the Scerri example, Code Sports reporter Paul Amy was all over that story. Tested in October, so far from a name we just plucked out of the hat.
 

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oldgoat said:
Where would he slot in or would he be depth?
Or to cover retirements?
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Good question. Dudley and Switta appeared locked in 23 but a bit more pressure on both spots wouldn't hurt.

How much of a squeeze is it fit 3 small forwards into the 23.

Maybe Frederick more Wing, someone like JOM out.

He continues to impress me, and with Bulldogs chasing Butters and a key back e.g. Butt's someone will get pushed out.
 
IMG_4070.webp IMG_4072.webp
It’s important to look at the age profile. Those older players can drop off a cliff quickly. Luke Ryan IMO sits in that category. Mason Cox, Alex Pearce, Oscar Macdonald, Corey Wagner are all 29 or older. In my opinion Nathan O’Driscoll currently is in better form than Wagner and JOM. Arguably better than Matt Johnson too, except the outlier 1 match he dominated Lachie Neale. His form otherwise has been average. Don’t get me wrong, Johnson has huge potential, pace size etc. he’s Jack Crisp IMO without the dickhead factor.

Keeping NOD and Sharp on the list is far more important than keeping JOM. We want a 4-6 year window. There’s no possibility of JOM contributing meaningfully in 2028 and beyond.

Replacing Alex Pearce and Luke Ryan is the key to maintaining our window. I don’t think Draper, Davies, Oli Murphy are it.

I’d be head hunting Sam Taylor, Jaspa Fletcher, Josh Weddle or similar players long before going after Heppell.

Limit the age targets to between Sean Darcy and Murphy Reid.

Being really shrewd I’d target one the of the Hawks running backs that’s being played out of position in the midfield because the midfield sucks. Need to directly impair our flag competitors.

EDIT: didn’t realise Fletcher, Taylor and Weddle were all signed up long term. These are calibre players we should be looking at. Sydney is a problem. Who can we pinch from them?
 
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rgauci said:
View attachment 2635963View attachment 2635964
It’s important to look at the age profile. Those older players can drop off a cliff quickly. Luke Ryan IMO sits in that category. Mason Cox, Alex Pearce, Oscar Macdonald, Corey Wagner are all 29 or older. In my opinion Nathan O’Driscoll currently is in better form than Wagner and JOM. Arguably better than Matt Johnson too, except the outlier 1 match he dominated Lachie Neale. His form otherwise has been average. Don’t get me wrong, Johnson has huge potential, pace size etc. he’s Jack Crisp IMO without the dickhead factor.

Keeping NOD and Sharp on the list is far more important than keeping JOM. We want a 4-6 year window. There’s no possibility of JOM contributing meaningfully in 2028 and beyond.

Replacing Alex Pearce and Luke Ryan is the key to maintaining our window. I don’t think Draper, Davies, Oli Murphy are it.

I’d be head hunting Sam Taylor, Jaspa Fletcher, Josh Weddle or similar players long before going after Heppell.

Limit the age targets to between Sean Darcy and Murphy Reid.

Being really shrewd I’d target one the of the Hawks running backs that’s being played out of position in the midfield because the midfield sucks. Need to directly impair our flag competitors.

EDIT: didn’t realise Fletcher, Taylor and Weddle were all signed up long term. These are calibre players we should be looking at. Sydney is a problem. Who can we pinch from them?
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I don't have the distances and speeds covered by players, I imagine Wagner and Drizz are both pretty reasonable for distance but I'd think Wagner would have him for speed.
Could just be correlation, but earlier in the season when we were missing some speed we looked a fair bit worse, so that could be a factor for Wagner in both selection and list management (as long as he can maintain it).
 
Murphy Reid and Oscar McDonald covered more ground than both O'Driscoll and Wagner against the Roos. O'Driscoll had the most sprint efforts.

Reid and O'Driscoll were our best runners against the Lions in terms of distance, again O'Driscoll lead up in sprint efforts.
 
Paracleet said:
I appreciate the terms 'fat' and 'skinny' are meant to be relative not absolute, but a bit like nearly every cricketing term they have different meanings in different contexts. Yes, the fat side of the ground is the opposite side of the ground to wherever play happens to be, and skinny by extension the opposite. HOWEVER:
1) Footy has always mostly played down one side of the ground because one side is going to be windward to the prevailing winter wind. That is why footy pavilions are nearly always on the West side of the ground. (In WA West or South West. In Melbourne the pavilions are North West)
2) Even large modern bowl stadiums play still mostly goes down one side. Whatever side the coaches box is on.
Hence one side getting permanently referred to as the fatside in general rather than just in play and fatside wingers becoming a thing.
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I have thought further about this and I must remember to watch WAFL matches when there is a really strong wind across the ground to test out this idea: In those circumstances it makes sense to me to swap your defensive (fat side winger) if you are kicking into the wind because you are not going to try and move the ball down the attacking side because if you turn it over the opposition are kicking into the forward with the wind behind them.

I.e. For the defending the team the far side becomes the thin side, where as with the wind you would want to attack down the nearside as normal to avoid the ball being forced out or having to shoot back across the breeze.
 

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dexter_ said:
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There's a bit of the old Carlton & Essendon big club big chequebook mentality about the Pies now. A very Collingwood style pickup. Mixed bag for Lachie: Not close to family in the short term but definitely enough for a good retirement package where he doesn't need to worry to be able to support his kids whilst he starts near the bottom in his post playing life.

Not sure it will make the needle move for Collingwood all that much as they have a few players who one way run and rely on a heavy old school Ross Lyon defence to cover them but will make them more imposing around the clearances. Also has the benefit of saving us from ourselves a bit.
 
Kapow!!! said:
There's a bit of the old Carlton & Essendon big club big chequebook mentality about the Pies now. A very Collingwood style pickup. Mixed bag for Lachie: Not close to family in the short term but definitely enough for a good retirement package where he doesn't need to worry to be able to support his kids whilst he starts near the bottom in his post playing life.

Not sure it will make the needle move for Collingwood all that much as they have a few players who one way run and rely on a heavy old school Ross Lyon defence to cover them but will make them more imposing around the clearances. Also has the benefit of saving us from ourselves a bit.
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Good post. I especially enjoyed that final sentence.
 

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