The Royal Sampler
Floreat Pica, Bitch!
- Joined
- Nov 26, 2006
- Posts
- 39,873
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- Free Assange!
- AFL Club
- Collingwood
- Other Teams
- VFL Magpies
Time to pull the trigger on this one ahead of December 15.
The general feeling is that we've had a particularly good trade/draft period, despite a strong season resulting in a weak draft position. This being the first of several years of compromised drafts and draft cohorts, it's important to keep our rookie list as strong as possible going forward. In 2010 the option is again open to forego a National Draft selection and promote a rookie. We will likely have 2 selections in this 2009 rookie draft, which is probably not a bad position to find ourselves in. Several clubs promoted a large number of rookies and so have considerable space to fill on their list. The overall standard of this cohort is considered to be quite low, and as much as there are name players finding themselves undrafted, it's perhaps more a reflection of the contrasting opinions of recruiters this year. There were a lot of unfamiliar names being read out from the 40's onward in the National Draft.
One thing we cannot be confident of is gaining an indication from the upcoming permission to train list. Last year our boys had Bryce Carroll and Michael Gugliotta for company at training, however Carroll was picked up by Essendon before our first rookie selection (since delisted), and Gugliotta wasn't rookied at all. Equally, the likes of Francis and Blair were not invited to train with Collingwood to the best of my knowledge; certainly if they were they didn't take the offer up. As our selections are again going to be quite late, somewhere in the order of #19 and #35, there is a distinct possibility that players we are keen on fail to reach us.
Given our drafting of mids over the past three years, and the fact that we've abstained from picking up a key position player other than Thoolen post 2006 (and even that's debatable), I think this is where we need to head. Mind you, the loss of Bennell may lead the recruiting staff to look for a small, elusive forward, and I can certainly see a rationale here too. For the most part though we have a good crop of young KP prospects, and the three-year head start they would have on anyone we were to rookie now sets up our list nicely. We can afford to be patient with a prospect, and yet some depth/insurance will be important.
Many may consider that the best approach is simply best available, and normally I would agree. When dealing with a seemingly shallow draft pool, perhaps it is wise to snap up the players who have the highest upside, or the greatest likelihood of achieving said upside, in spite of their preferred position. However with the current status of our list, I fear that even an above-average midfield prospect, as a rookie, would possibly find gaining an opportunity to show their best beyond their reach. We may also have reached our limit for ruck prospects, with Keeffe and MacNamara being our 4th and 5th rucks in development it would be difficult to provide another young ruckman with time in the middle even at VFL level. Vinnie Vegas once posted on the importance to a player's development of fitting within a club's list and subsequently gaining the necessary opportunities to improve their game, stay motivated, and show their worth to the team. I think that is certainly true in this instance.
With that in mind, I'm hoping that we grade on somewhat of a curve; giving preference to athletic key position prospects from either end of the ground, small forwards and small defenders. Of the two players we select, I'm hoping at least one is a key tall for reasons already stated. Below, I'm going to throw some names up, although I'm more than happy to admit my knowledge on many of them is fairly scant. Our recruiters will have done far more research than my reading of profiles, watching of videos and scouring mock drafts.
Key Talls
Matthew Panos (very unlikely to reach us)
Mitch Thorp (again, see above)
Tom Mackenzie (bonus points, is a Pie supporter
)
Tom Hill
Sean Tighe
Kyle Hartigan
Luke Thompson
Myles Pitt (cousin of J-Mac)
Alex Stopp
Majak Daw
Serhat Temel
Small Forwards
Derick Wanganeen
Best Available - (ie. appear to have talent but fail to fill an obvious need)
Claye Beams
Alex Carey
Joe Dare
Jack Weston
Jamie McNamara
Myles Sewell
Michael Barlow
Dylan Grimes
Which players are you keen on? What would be your overall rookie draft strategy (position or best available)? Which positions (if any) would you put the most emphasis on?
The general feeling is that we've had a particularly good trade/draft period, despite a strong season resulting in a weak draft position. This being the first of several years of compromised drafts and draft cohorts, it's important to keep our rookie list as strong as possible going forward. In 2010 the option is again open to forego a National Draft selection and promote a rookie. We will likely have 2 selections in this 2009 rookie draft, which is probably not a bad position to find ourselves in. Several clubs promoted a large number of rookies and so have considerable space to fill on their list. The overall standard of this cohort is considered to be quite low, and as much as there are name players finding themselves undrafted, it's perhaps more a reflection of the contrasting opinions of recruiters this year. There were a lot of unfamiliar names being read out from the 40's onward in the National Draft.
One thing we cannot be confident of is gaining an indication from the upcoming permission to train list. Last year our boys had Bryce Carroll and Michael Gugliotta for company at training, however Carroll was picked up by Essendon before our first rookie selection (since delisted), and Gugliotta wasn't rookied at all. Equally, the likes of Francis and Blair were not invited to train with Collingwood to the best of my knowledge; certainly if they were they didn't take the offer up. As our selections are again going to be quite late, somewhere in the order of #19 and #35, there is a distinct possibility that players we are keen on fail to reach us.
Given our drafting of mids over the past three years, and the fact that we've abstained from picking up a key position player other than Thoolen post 2006 (and even that's debatable), I think this is where we need to head. Mind you, the loss of Bennell may lead the recruiting staff to look for a small, elusive forward, and I can certainly see a rationale here too. For the most part though we have a good crop of young KP prospects, and the three-year head start they would have on anyone we were to rookie now sets up our list nicely. We can afford to be patient with a prospect, and yet some depth/insurance will be important.
Many may consider that the best approach is simply best available, and normally I would agree. When dealing with a seemingly shallow draft pool, perhaps it is wise to snap up the players who have the highest upside, or the greatest likelihood of achieving said upside, in spite of their preferred position. However with the current status of our list, I fear that even an above-average midfield prospect, as a rookie, would possibly find gaining an opportunity to show their best beyond their reach. We may also have reached our limit for ruck prospects, with Keeffe and MacNamara being our 4th and 5th rucks in development it would be difficult to provide another young ruckman with time in the middle even at VFL level. Vinnie Vegas once posted on the importance to a player's development of fitting within a club's list and subsequently gaining the necessary opportunities to improve their game, stay motivated, and show their worth to the team. I think that is certainly true in this instance.
With that in mind, I'm hoping that we grade on somewhat of a curve; giving preference to athletic key position prospects from either end of the ground, small forwards and small defenders. Of the two players we select, I'm hoping at least one is a key tall for reasons already stated. Below, I'm going to throw some names up, although I'm more than happy to admit my knowledge on many of them is fairly scant. Our recruiters will have done far more research than my reading of profiles, watching of videos and scouring mock drafts.
Key Talls
Matthew Panos (very unlikely to reach us)
Mitch Thorp (again, see above)
Tom Mackenzie (bonus points, is a Pie supporter
)Tom Hill
Sean Tighe
Kyle Hartigan
Luke Thompson
Myles Pitt (cousin of J-Mac)
Alex Stopp
Majak Daw
Serhat Temel
Small Forwards
Derick Wanganeen
Best Available - (ie. appear to have talent but fail to fill an obvious need)
Claye Beams
Alex Carey
Joe Dare
Jack Weston
Jamie McNamara
Myles Sewell
Michael Barlow
Dylan Grimes
Which players are you keen on? What would be your overall rookie draft strategy (position or best available)? Which positions (if any) would you put the most emphasis on?
