Player Watch #17: James Stewart - Groin injury, not running yet. couple of weeks once he starts running - 23/4

Maddogm

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To be fair he works so well for us because he's a 3rd forward. If he was number 1 it'd be different.
I guess that's one of the exciting things, he's should keep working this well for us getting the 3rd defender. And if he starts getting the 2nd defender that should free up Hooker.
 

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BrunoV

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Why are we saying thanks Collingwood?


Without being able to recall the exact state in which Collingwood's list was in and the father-son drafting rules, it's a bit harder than I thought to rationalise their decision not to recruit Stewart.

At the end of 2012 Buckley started the purge. They had picks at 18, 19, 20, 38 and 94. From memory it has been reported that they made the decision not to take Stewart at all (as in not even with pick 38 or later), which is a bit strange.

From memory he was regarded as one of GWS' more speculative picks they took because they had more picks than they had other ideas. I read some draft profiles when we traded him in and the sum total of the comments was 'is tall and athletic, struggles to consistently impact a game forward and clunk a mark and looks better in defence'.

198cm athletes/projects will always get drafted but for every 1 which is drafted there would be 3 to 4 who don't make it.

Collingwood were still very much in the discussion as a premiership contender. I assume that what they meant when they told Stewart that they wouldn't take him was that they rated him somewhere from 38 to 94 and that they had no expectation that he would be available in that range.

It's a long way from being unforgivable to not have recruited Stewart in the above scenario. It may well have been different now given their ability to use a future pick, etc. There have been a number of tall athletes I've read about who we've overlooked on the third round and on balance more have flopped than not.

Fast forward 4 years from the 2012 draft and not much had changed for Stewart. It made perfect sense for us to add a 23 year old, 198cm mobile key forward (given that out key forward stocks lacked depth and mobility). Collingwood was never in the running.

We trade him in for pick 77 and within 12 months he'd already started playing footy that was a long way ahead of what we would have expected of him. Worsfold has been candid about expectations when he said that Stewart was offered a contract without the promise of best 22 footy.

How many times has a guy like him come good as a power forward let alone a guy who could genuinely 'play small' on a wing or at half forward? Stewart's now closer than not to fulfilling the promise of the 50 players who went before him and whose names we would not recognise. He'll probably get the next 50 drafted too.

I almost feel sorry for Collingwood. All of the character and athletic data farmed from sessions at the Hird academy would not have made us any more likely to know that he'd come good as a player.
 

Zach Package

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I don't even thing the Pies had their JHA equivalent up and running at the time. Fair to say they just airballed it, probably due to existing contracts on their list given that they apparently made a commitment to him earlier in the year and then reneged, didn't pick deep into the draft or take any rookie selections in that draft at all.

It happens, we whiffed on Ashby in the same round of the same draft, it just becomes less forgivable given they had more info on him than your standard draftee
 

Ambrosia

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With Cloke retired and Moore in defence I do enjoy giving shit to my Collingwood supporting mates about how the best Pies father son KPF plays for the Dons.
 

JayJ20

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Without being able to recall the exact state in which Collingwood's list was in and the father-son drafting rules, it's a bit harder than I thought to rationalise their decision not to recruit Stewart.

At the end of 2012 Buckley started the purge. They had picks at 18, 19, 20, 38 and 94. From memory it has been reported that they made the decision not to take Stewart at all (as in not even with pick 38 or later), which is a bit strange.

From memory he was regarded as one of GWS' more speculative picks they took because they had more picks than they had other ideas. I read some draft profiles when we traded him in and the sum total of the comments was 'is tall and athletic, struggles to consistently impact a game forward and clunk a mark and looks better in defence'.

198cm athletes/projects will always get drafted but for every 1 which is drafted there would be 3 to 4 who don't make it.

Collingwood were still very much in the discussion as a premiership contender. I assume that what they meant when they told Stewart that they wouldn't take him was that they rated him somewhere from 38 to 94 and that they had no expectation that he would be available in that range.

It's a long way from being unforgivable to not have recruited Stewart in the above scenario. It may well have been different now given their ability to use a future pick, etc. There have been a number of tall athletes I've read about who we've overlooked on the third round and on balance more have flopped than not.

Fast forward 4 years from the 2012 draft and not much had changed for Stewart. It made perfect sense for us to add a 23 year old, 198cm mobile key forward (given that out key forward stocks lacked depth and mobility). Collingwood was never in the running.

We trade him in for pick 77 and within 12 months he'd already started playing footy that was a long way ahead of what we would have expected of him. Worsfold has been candid about expectations when he said that Stewart was offered a contract without the promise of best 22 footy.

How many times has a guy like him come good as a power forward let alone a guy who could genuinely 'play small' on a wing or at half forward? Stewart's now closer than not to fulfilling the promise of the 50 players who went before him and whose names we would not recognise. He'll probably get the next 50 drafted too.

I almost feel sorry for Collingwood. All of the character and athletic data farmed from sessions at the Hird academy would not have made us any more likely to know that he'd come good as a player.
Yeah but this is bigfooty so we lol at lollingwood
 

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BrunoV

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I don't think it's a foregone conclusion that Hooker kicks more goals than Stewart.

It seems like the roles have been slightly reversed, presumably to give Stewart a bit of a rest to enable him to ruck.

Stewart's hands are also improving. He's not going to boss the same amount of marks but Stewart has a similarly effective trick of working over opponents aerobically and then dominating the same smaller guys physically.

Hooker probably plays a game this year that gets him 12 shots on goal but I otherwise think output will be quite similar.

I'm putting very few limitations on what Stewart can do at the moment. He's arguably the most improved player in the AFL.
 
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Jade

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He's arguably the most improved player in the AFL.
Geez that's a huge call.

But not a terrible one.

I mean consider his journey - he's gone from being totally rejected as a F/S pick, being very much on the outer at an admittedly strong side, and traded for absolute peanuts.

He was forced to fight his way through the VFL to get a senior gig, and has by and large gone from strength to strength whilst clearly addressing deficiencies in his game.

A lot to like there, that's for sure.
 

Lore

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Geez that's a huge call.

But not a terrible one.

I mean consider his journey - he's gone from being totally rejected as a F/S pick, being very much on the outer at an admittedly strong side, and traded for absolute peanuts.

He was forced to fight his way through the VFL to get a senior gig, and has by and large gone from strength to strength whilst clearly addressing deficiencies in his game.

A lot to like there, that's for sure.
The thing I like is that he was not a great overhead mark previously. From what I can recall he basically played as a small last year, whereas this year he's starting to play more like a proper lead up KPF. Preseason obviously did him a lot of good in that (and other) areas of his game.

I wonder how much better he would be by now if he'd had the opportunities Joe had in the first few years of his career, rather than the limited ones presented at GWS.
 

Liberator

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I’m with Bruno here. The addition of better hands in marking contests along with a bit of natural physical development means he’s a pretty gnarly proposition.
If the midfield aren’t completely ****** by the bulldogs, watch him tear them a new scrotum this week. (Is that even possible?).
 

CBombers17

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It's great to see a player improve. Must be a hard worker at training.

Making the most of his chances and career its terrific to have this sort of example at the club for the even younger guys coming through.
 

Wangawuti

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Really admire his work rate at ground level. Isn't afraid to take on a tackle and backs himself to break it and feed the ball out.
 

Lore

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Did anyone else realise that Daniher and Stewart were both born on March 4th 1994?
I think I pointed it out on the first or second page of the thread :p My spreadsheet says what age the players are by putting their bday in and then a formula automatically calculates it (so I don't have to check back and manually copy it in all the time). So when I added him to the spreadsheet I was like :eyes: :eyes: :eyes:
 

Rack Watts

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I think I pointed it out on the first or second page of the thread :p My spreadsheet says what age the players are by putting their bday in and then a formula automatically calculates it (so I don't have to check back and manually copy it in all the time). So when I added him to the spreadsheet I was like :eyes: :eyes: :eyes:
Ahh.
I was thinking to myself "they'd be around the same age and draft year right?".
Oh, they're born on the same day.
 
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