2014 Non-Crows AFL Discussion

[mattymac]

Trick is for us to win most of our games against similar level teams.

Would be great to finish off mid table again. Especially after the draft pick crisis it will be awesome to middle again and get a middling first rounder to add to our middling list.

 

[The Sloane Ranger]

Would be great to finish off mid table again. Especially after the draft pick crisis it will be awesome to middle again and get a middling first rounder to add to our middling list.

This years draft is very even and runs deep so with that in mind I'll rather finish between 6 and 8 and give our young team finals experience then finish between 9 and 12

 

[Kane McGoodwin]

Would be great to finish off mid table again. Especially after the draft pick crisis it will be awesome to middle again and get a middling first rounder to add to our middling list.

Shall we tank 5 games in...

 

[mattymac]

This years draft is very even and runs deep so with that in mind I'll rather finish between 6 and 8 and give our young team finals experience then finish between 9 and 12

We're not going to make finals after a 0-3 start. But if we do the experience of getting eliminated immediately will be invaluable I'm sure. This was the year for a top 5 pick and get Triggy sacked, maybe even an external review. But lets finish 10th and go round again instead

 

[Glenno23]

We're not going to make finals after a 0-3 start. But if we do the experience of getting eliminated immediately will be invaluable I'm sure. This was the year for a top 5 pick and get Triggy sacked, maybe even an external review. But lets finish 10th and go round again instead

I just can't see an 7-8 win season is enough to do that

It would take a 2-20 or something similar to even go close to removing Trigg and his cohorts and to get an external review.... fun times

 

[*PAF]

IMO you will make the finals or at the very least go really close to making them.
Not an ideal start but your best team is more than good enough.

 

[Hank93]

We're not going to make finals after a 0-3 start. But if we do the experience of getting eliminated immediately will be invaluable I'm sure. This was the year for a top 5 pick and get Triggy sacked, maybe even an external review. But lets finish 10th and go round again instead

Deliberately sucking from Round 4 will be great for the culture...........

 

[Kane McGoodwin]

We're not going to make finals after a 0-3 start. But if we do the experience of getting eliminated immediately will be invaluable I'm sure. This was the year for a top 5 pick and get Triggy sacked, maybe even an external review. But lets finish 10th and go round again instead

I reckon we will make the finals.

Giving up when 2-3 is a pathetic attitude.

 

[mattymac]

I reckon we will make the finals.

Giving up when 2-3 is a pathetic attitude.

0-3 against finals bound sides

 

[Kane McGoodwin]

0-3 against finals bound sides

So you already know who are making the finals? Got xlotto numbers too?

Irrelevant any way as it is pathetic for a club to tank 2-3. Not the attitude I want from my club!

 

[TubbsFarquhar]

Encouraging losing is a horrible culture that has bitten Melbourne and Carlton on the arse. Look at Geelong and Sydney, they never bottomed out and have won recent flags. I'm not suggesting we are like those two but high draft picks does not always equate to success. Besides, even if we do finish 9th or 10th we'll still get pick #9 or #10 which are still very high picks, and this is draft is also very deep so there will still be potential quality late.

 

[mattymac]

Deliberately sucking from Round 4 will be great for the culture...........

Unfortunately its the way the AFL is set up. Being fundamentally the VFL, it is set up so that the Victorian teams can remain cyclically competitive. Hence the omission of zones and employment of a draft. The draft ensures sides have a chance to contest the premiership by absorbing the best talent after bottoming out. We can proudly middle on for another two decades, squeezing the most out of middling picks and rookies or play along.

Unless you have F/S luck or COLA, bottoming out for top picks, as crappy as it is, is the only way to the top in the AFL. Surprising people still can't see this. The whole league revolves around this "equalisation" concept to keep Victoria's pre-AFL teams competitive.

As regards 'culture', bottoming out did nothing to hurt the 'cultures' of Hawthorn, Collingwood and Freo did it?

 

[mattymac]

Encouraging losing is a horrible culture that has bitten Melbourne and Carlton on the arse. Look at Geelong and Sydney, they never bottomed out and have won recent flags. I'm not suggesting we are like those two but high draft picks does not always equate to success. Besides, even if we do finish 9th or 10th we'll still get pick #9 or #10 which are still very high picks, and this is draft is also very deep so there will still be potential quality late.

Geelong had an independent review and a glut of F/S picks

Sydney had da COLA

Deliberately sucking sucks, but when you throw your season away after the first three rounds it doesn't hurt to start rebuilding, putting games into your future players.

The attitude of "the secret is to beat as many teams similar in quality to us", which is what I responded to, sucks as well. It just leads to years of middling.

 

[Wright Away]

Unfortunately its the way the AFL is set up. Being fundamentally the VFL, it is set up so that the Victorian teams can remain cyclically competitive. Hence the omission of zones and employment of a draft. The draft ensures sides have a chance to contest the premiership by absorbing the best talent after bottoming out. We can proudly middle on for another two decades, squeezing the most out of middling picks and rookies or play along.

Unless you have F/S luck or COLA, bottoming out for top picks, as crappy as it is, is the only way to the top in the AFL. Surprising people still can't see this. The whole league revolves around this "equalisation" concept to keep Victoria's pre-AFL teams competitive.

As regards 'culture', bottoming out did nothing to hurt the 'cultures' of Hawthorn, Collingwood and Freo did it?

That's nice mate!

You try to win every game you can. If you're building towards the future you might consider playing younger players instead of older players and that may result in poorer results. Looking at the Crows side who exactly aren't we playing that we should be?

Rutten - not playing
Reilly
Podsiadly

These three players are three I wouldn't be playing if I were building towards a future side.

Pods will go when Walker is ready.
Reilly will go when Hendo is fit.
Rutten isn't currently playing.

3 players.

There is also Thommo, but he is a champ so he still plays.

So 2 players the Crows could re-think their selection of and will likely re-think their selection of at a later date.

What the **** do you actually expect the Crows to do? Deliberately lose games??? I don't know what kind of backwater swamp or cave you have been living in but the Crows haven't exactly come off welll in recent times when they've been caught cheating.

 

[mattymac]

So you already know who are making the finals? Got xlotto numbers too?

Go back to 2001 if you want to see us make finals after a 0-3 start. The difference then was some ridiculously good cattle. Even so we just scraped into the 8 and were eliminated immediately in the first EF.

 

[Wright Away]

This is the round 5 side. Now apart from the 2 players at the bottom, who exactly isn't being played that should be played?

Senior (25+ players that are too good not to play:


Scott Thompson
Josh Jenkins
Sam Jacobs
Eddie Betts
David Mackay
Richard Douglas - Replaced by 21 year old 8 gamer Mitch Grigg in the round 6 side


Players for the future, players both young and performing well enough to be in the side:
Patrick Dangerfield
Rory Sloane
Daniel Talia
Brodie Smith
Sam Kerridge
Luke Brown
Rory Laird
Kyle Hartigan
Matthew Jaensch
Matt Crouch
Matthew Wright
Jared Petrenko
Sam Shaw
Tom Lynch


Players that could be replaced by younger players and will be when those players are fit:

Brent Reilly
James Podsiadly

 

[Wright Away]

Go back to 2001 if you want to see us make finals after a 0-3 start. The difference then was some ridiculously good cattle. Even so we just scraped into the 8 and were eliminated immediately in the first EF.

What exactly are we supposed to do then?

Break the rules and tank? What?

Really what it would come down to is playing different "players for the future" than we are playing now.

 

[Danoz]

Are you Adelaide folk lucky enough to be seeing the GWS v GC game at the moment? If not you are missing one of the best school boy games you'd ever see. It's atrocious.

Case in point: ball kicked from 50 towards the giants goals. 6 players completely miss the ball. It dribbles towards the behind post, Cameron tries to flick it back into play but assumes the ball is over the line. Every player stops. The umpire standing next to them is dumbfounded. Waves his hands around and you can hear the exasperation in his voice over the Mike, play on! he yells. The ball is still live!

Woeful skills all around, even the little master. Except for Jon Patton, he has been a star today. Playing through the midfield!

 

[mattymac]

This is the round 5 side. Now apart from the 2 players at the bottom, who exactly isn't being played that should be played?

Senior (25+ players that are too good not to play:


Scott Thompson
Josh Jenkins
Sam Jacobs
Eddie Betts
David Mackay
Richard Douglas - Replaced by 21 year old 8 gamer Mitch Grigg in the round 6 side


Players for the future, players both young and performing well enough to be in the side:
Patrick Dangerfield
Rory Sloane
Daniel Talia
Brodie Smith
Sam Kerridge
Luke Brown
Rory Laird
Kyle Hartigan
Matthew Jaensch
Matt Crouch
Matthew Wright
Jared Petrenko
Sam Shaw
Tom Lynch


Players that could be replaced by younger players and will be when those players are fit:

Brent Reilly
James Podsiadly

So you admit we're wasting games on players who won't be part of our future?

Look, I was responding to this attitude:

Trick is for us to win most of our games against similar level teams.

This is frustrating because this is the attitude that has got us to 15 years without a GF appearance. Its the AFL FFS, not some fair competition. If you want to succeed you have to play along and pick up top picks. Look at Hawthorn, Collingwood, Freo, Essendon, Port etc etc. We have to be aiming to get in a position where we win most of our games against top 4 sides not most of our games against bottom 8 sides.

I was always of the attitude that you should always try to win every game but I just can't deny how the AFL functions any more. We need more top talent. In this 'competition' to win you have to lose first. After the draft sanctions and blowing our season 3 games in I think this wouldn't be a bad time to restock on talent and have a really good look at our list.

 

[The Sloane Ranger]

GC vs. GWS is like a game of basketball

 

[fabs33]

There's no way we'd get away with tanking, not our club, we're not clever enough. We'd also get a real punishment, not a Melbourne type punishment but the real kind where we'd have to pay the fine ourselves.

 

[alex_is_on_fire]

We should aim to win every game of football we play but we should also be smart and very strategic about looking towards the future.

I still don't see any point in playing the J-Pod this year. We should be giving those games to SMACK or Johnston and having ether of those 2 develop a partnership with Tex and JJ.

After going 0-3, I think it's safe to say we are not a legitimate premiership team. Yes we might make the finals and tomorrow's game will tell us much more. However, we still need to look towards the next 3 to 5 years.

Back to LJ or SMACK, they need to be given 20 games to understand what it takes. If they haven't performed up to the standard required, delist them. If they don't play again this year, we need to delist both.

No guts, no glory. The bigger the risk, the bigger the reward and that result may take a while but we need to find out if they can or can not play at that level. We piss around with this all the time. From Gary Aryes to Neil Craig to now Brenton Sanderson - the sane issues about player development are arising.

Unless we win a premiership this year, playing the J-Pod will be a monumental mistake because what is the point of playing him as he will either retire at seasons end and we are back to square one with Tex and JJ not developing any forward line relationship with either player.

We have beaten St Kilda and GWS - those were good wins but neither were won based on what the J-Pod has brought to the game. 2014 will go down as another baseless season that will see us finish somewhere between 6th and 14th. If we were brave, we could implement a development system that we could see who can and who can not play at that level.

The choices we make today will impact on the chances we have to win a premiership tomorrow (in the future) as we still don't know if Martin, Johnston, snack, Lyons, Thompson, Jeansch, Petrenko, Shaw and even Jenkins but as long as we have a yo-yo selection system, we will only ever be mediocre.

We will only make the standard 4 to 6 list changes again this off season and next year will continue to be the same. We need to be brave and implement a system that will promote kids that give us every chance at winning at demote players who just don't have it. Either ant more or not at all. If that means we only win 5 games, at least we know we will get a few good players who can then advance us quickly up the table.

 

[hey shorty]

Agree to an extent alex, but if we drop Pods for Tex in a round or so who else do we drop to fit LJ and Smack in ??

 

[alex_is_on_fire]

Agree to an extent alex, but if we drop Pods for Tex in a round or so who else do we drop to fit LJ and Smack in ??

I don't believe they will drop the J-Pod for walker.

They will either drop lynch or Jenkins and play both.

 

[hey shorty]

Id actually like them to play Pods and Walker with Lynch and JJ. But for arguements sake we drop JPod for Tex, both LJ and Smack arent ideal replacements but I tend to agree they need more time for a final judgment.