List Mgmt. 2025 List Management Discussion - Part 3

[Hubnester]

2025 List Management Discussion - Part 3

Now that our season is over, and news is starting to break - it's time for a fresh thread.

This thread is to discuss all things list management - trades, draft, free agency, delistings and more.
As we are now officially in our off-season, we'll be wanting to keep this thread more strictly on-topic than the previous iterations.
Be respectful. You are allowed to disagree with someone - but play the ball, not the man. Repeat offenders will have their posting rights revoked.

Thanks to Lore once again for this incredibly useful spreadsheet.

2025 KEY DATES
Free Agency Period: Friday, October 3rd - Friday, October 10th
Trade Period: Monday, October 6th - Wednesday, October 15th
AFL Draft: Wednesday, November 19th - Thursday, November 20th

See Also:
2025 Year in Review Rumours & Confirmed Movements 2025 Draft Discussion
​

 

[Sainter62]

if we could keep one out of marshall or steele which one would you keep?

Marshall

 

[CursingFijian]

Looks like we're accumulating some fantastic assets on our list, which means we will have real flexibility at future trading and draft periods. If we can continue to develop and bring on our youth like Keeler, Dodson, Boxshall, Garcia, Travaglia, Wilson, Tauru, Hastie and Collard then we will have to work very hard to retain players in coming years. Playing in finals will be a very important part of that retention strategy, so the pressure will be well and truly on Ross & Co from 2026 onwards.

But we're all going to have to learn to live with having a list that other clubs ogle.

 

[saintbill]

The Blues should use this whole situation as a wake up call to refresh the entire club from top to bottom. But of course they won't and will just make bs excuses until the cows come home.

They are obsessed with us as well. Always the loser club barbs. I have an ongoing cumulative ladder thread I maintain in ChatGPT. This is every clubs win % since the year 2000. So for the last 25 years the only clubs worse than the Blue were expansion clubs. Also, it is not like I cherry picked this data. We were dead last in year 2000 when the data starts.

Cats are miles in front, but only 6 teams with a winning % is interesting. We are roughly 8% better than the Blues, which is statistically significantly over about 500 games.

Dees have also poor for a long time, but snagging 1 flag makes it all worth it.

In summary, Carlton really have been diabolically poor for 2 and half decades. Its a bit rich for a 30 year old to be dishing out smack talk in our direction when all they have know is being diabolically crap.

The big question is, how long to the expansion teams overtake them


EDIT: My initial table was incorrect. It wasn't factoring in GWS and Gold Coast have played less games. GWS have already overtaken them. Glorious.

Rank	Club	Wins	Draws	Losses	Games	Win %
1	Geelong	342	3	207	552	62.1%
2	Sydney Swans	303	4	245	552	55.0%
3	Collingwood	293	3	256	552	53.3%
4	Hawthorn	288	1	263	552	52.6%
5	Port Adelaide	286	1	265	552	52.0%
6	Adelaide	284	1	267	552	51.8%
7	Brisbane Lions	263	5	284	552	47.8%
8	West Coast	256	1	295	552	46.5%
9	Western Bulldogs	252	1	299	552	45.8%
10	Fremantle	245	2	305	552	44.5%
11	St Kilda	238	4	310	552	43.1%
12	North Melbourne	228	4	320	552	41.4%
13	Richmond	212	7	333	552	41.1%
14	Essendon	218	4	330	552	39.5%
15	Melbourne	203	3	346	552	37.0%
16	GWS Giants	116	2	204	322	36.3%
17	Carlton	193	3	356	552	35.4%
18	Gold Coast	86	1	258	345	25.0%

 

[MrFoster]

Not sure what the consensus here is but I feel very strong on targeting MacKenzie over Flanders

Cam 2.5 years younger. 188cm vs 183cm, you can play the former as a first possession mid

Damaging ball use, agility, composure in traffic whereas Flanders is a contest-winner but won't hurt opposition teams

We already have Garcia/Windy/Travaglia as guys who'll be in the contest winning clearances for us, as well as Macrae/Steele who'll do it short term

The most similar player we have to Cam is Phillipou, but they can coexist imo. Cam in the midfield, Pou in the F50 kicking 50 metre snap goals

Cam is the type to get tagged - Flanders is not

Midfield setup:
TDK
NWM - full ground coverage; McCluggage type
MacKenzie - engine mid two way runner and prominent in transition chains; Will Ashcroft type
Boxshall - defensive mid, supports defence with his tank and overhead; Josh Dunkley type
Garcia - extractor; Neale type
Pou - striker; Rayner type
Windy - tagger/wing; Berry type
Hall - dynamo; Bailey type

Plenty of variety and balance with the added class of Cam which frees up our forward half ball users to stay forward rather than trying to force them into the midfield when it might not be optimal (ie. Hall, Pou)

To be honest, we need both. Midfield has been our achiles heel for the longest time, if you have the opportunities to improve it, you should do it. Yes, we have some young players who have potential, but they are still maybes, remember we thought Billings/Dunstan/Acres are going to be stars and fix our midfield woes? we need to give ourselves the best chance to build a power house midfield, TDK is a good start, have Macrae, Flanders/Mackenzie, Boxshall/Garcia/Hall/Windhager going through is very promising.

Moral of the story, never assume your young players will turn out to be stars.. Improve the team whenever you can e.g. Flanders / Mackenzie looking for midfield minutes

 

[Joffaboy]

Don't know if it's been posted already in this thread. Gettable on AFL.com reporting that Melbourne is interested in Max Heath. If we keep Roma, TDK comes in and we have Dodson developing, would we keep Max? Third rounder, late second?

Reckon its best for Mooses career to move to Melbourne. Dodson and Keeler in front of him.

 

[MrFoster]

Reckon its best for Mooses career to move to Melbourne. Dodson and Keeler in front of him.

Keeler is a forward who can play ruck. Dodson is the one in front of him. But since Marshall is more than likely to move on, why would we trade Heath unless Melbourne make an offer we couldn't refuse.

 

[Joffaboy]

The Blues should use this whole situation as a wake up call to refresh the entire club from top to bottom. But of course they won't and will just make bs excuses until the cows come home.

Shut up, St.Kilda flog, don't you know the mighty Bloos have won 16 premierships, the last as little as 30 years ago, you lot have 26 wooden spoons, like our flags all in the 20th century, can't even match us for wooden spoons this century. You rabble, don't you know we are a big club, just like that other 20th century success, Essendon?

 

[SinCitySainter]

Reckon its best for Mooses career to move to Melbourne. Dodson and Keeler in front of him.

I agree would make sense. He is worth basically nothing in a trade though. I would imagine it would be a fourth rounder at best or even we would possibly delist him to give him a free move.

 

[CaptainRisky]

Does something like this work with Flanders, TDK, Ryan, JSOS/Aleer in?


SENIORS

FB: Wilkie, Howard, JSOS/Aleer
HB: Flanders, Caminiti, Sinclair
R: TDK, NWM, Steele
C: Wilson, Windhager, Henry
HF: Owens, Marshall, Sharman
FF: Higgins, King, Ryan
IC: Macrae, Philiipou, Hall, Garcia, Clark

RESERVES

FB: Stocker, Barrat, Hastie
HB: Schoenmaker, Tauru, Byrnes
R: Heath, Travaglia, Boxshall
C: Hill, Dow, Carroll
HF: Wood, Keeler, Butler
FF: Collard, Dodson, Said
IC: Armstrong, O'Connell

Only obvious gap I can see is for small defenders, with a bit too much height present.

I'd suggest a changing of the guard needs to happen, with Hill, Wood, and maybe to a lesser extent Stocker, Butler, Howard spending time at VFL, which would be a good thing, providing a lot of advice and guidance (along with Jones and Cordy if they hang around!) to the young blokes there.

Genuinely buoyed by the ambition, but the collection of the Dow's, Carroll's, etc. only adds to the ??? around what does our best team look like. If everyone played to their highest and best performance, it would make for finals football in both leagues AFAIC.

Yeah , here is Dougs teaching the young fellas how to kick out

 

[akaifu]

grain of salt

 

[stavro#4]

grain of salt

Should announce bulldogs or pies tomorrow based off his previous track record.

 

[stfan]

"Charlie has wanted out of the lifestyle, not necessarily the club"

Well that explains everything. Carlton have been running a Swingers Club, rather than a Football Club.

 

[BrutThough]

grain of salt

The JSOS dream is over

 

[MrFoster]

grain of salt

He destroyed us in this game. Intercept marking, smother, transitioning the ball with ease, great offensive kicking and tough as nails.. Imagine having 2 Wilkie's in our defence.. sign him up... much better than Aleer...

 

[SainterinSydney]

Should announce bulldogs or pies tomorrow based off his previous track record.

Maybe Faulkner legit goes off Bigfooty lol. Or it shows that all the noise in the last 48 hours re JSOS to Saints has serious legs.

 

[gringo2011]

Not sure what the consensus here is but I feel very strong on targeting MacKenzie over Flanders

Cam 2.5 years younger. 188cm vs 183cm, you can play the former as a first possession mid

Damaging ball use, agility, composure in traffic whereas Flanders is a contest-winner but won't hurt opposition teams

We already have Garcia/Windy/Travaglia as guys who'll be in the contest winning clearances for us, as well as Macrae/Steele who'll do it short term

The most similar player we have to Cam is Phillipou, but they can coexist imo. Cam in the midfield, Pou in the F50 kicking 50 metre snap goals

Cam is the type to get tagged - Flanders is not

Midfield setup:
TDK
NWM - full ground coverage; McCluggage type
MacKenzie - engine mid two way runner and prominent in transition chains; Will Ashcroft type
Boxshall - defensive mid, supports defence with his tank and overhead; Josh Dunkley type
Garcia - extractor; Neale type
Pou - striker; Rayner type
Windy - tagger/wing; Berry type
Hall - dynamo; Bailey type

Plenty of variety and balance with the added class of Cam which frees up our forward half ball users to stay forward rather than trying to force them into the midfield when it might not be optimal (ie. Hall, Pou)

Flanders looks like a much better player. It's only projecting what he might become that CMac has any advantage over Flanders. What we have plenty of is good kids in development. What we don't have is those mid career guys who can help carry the side. At 25 Flanders still has 7 plus years left and already had a year at the absolute top 5 of the stats sheets.

I'm taking the ready made player who probably costs around the same or less. We need to start putting wins on the board not stuffing more on our developing youth pile.

 

[gringo2011]

this one was good too

We should chase Harry Lemmey and offer a straight swap.

 

[gubby88]

grain of salt

Ol Willy with the nooz

 

[Gavinmitchell11]

He destroyed us in this game. Intercept marking, smother, transitioning the ball with ease, great offensive kicking and tough as nails.. Imagine having 2 Wilkie's in our defence.. sign him up... much better than Aleer...

In that diabolical loss to Richmond in round 1, he was the only Blues player in the second half to give a yelp. They swung him forward and he took a great contested mark. Would really love to see him at the Saints. He’s as good a Battle replacement that you’d find if that’s even still a thing.

 

[sauce_head]

this one was good too

I think he is confused with the difference between “ironic” and “a farquin miracle”.

 

[billings2paddy]

I think he is confused with the difference between “ironic” and “a farquin miracle”.

That's delusion of the highest order

 

[Banger9798]

Sad to say so, but yes.
Besides I don’t think we can afford to play both Steele and Macrae together anymore.

Agree on Marshall as a forward. Always a danger in there. And can ruck forward 50.
Definitely like to keep him and line him up at CHF flanked by Michito and Higgins. Sharman , King and Leaping Liam deep....and we've got some real aerial threat and pretty good off the deck.

 

[Remboy]

They are obsessed with us as well. Always the loser club barbs. I have an ongoing cumulative ladder thread I maintain in ChatGPT. This is every clubs win % since the year 2000. So for the last 25 years the only clubs worse than the Blue were expansion clubs. Also, it is not like I cherry picked this data. We were dead last in year 2000 when the data starts.

Cats are miles in front, but only 6 teams with a winning % is interesting. We are roughly 8% better than the Blues, which is statistically significantly over about 500 games.

Dees have also poor for a long time, but snagging 1 flag makes it all worth it.

In summary, Carlton really have been diabolically poor for 2 and half decades. Its a bit rich for a 30 year old to be dishing out smack talk in our direction when all they have know is being diabolically crap.

The big question is, how long to the expansion teams overtake them


EDIT: My initial table was incorrect. It wasn't factoring in GWS and Gold Coast have played less games. GWS have already overtaken them. Glorious.

Rank	Club	Wins	Draws	Losses	Games	Win %
1	Geelong	342	3	207	552	62.1%
2	Sydney Swans	303	4	245	552	55.0%
3	Collingwood	293	3	256	552	53.3%
4	Hawthorn	288	1	263	552	52.6%
5	Port Adelaide	286	1	265	552	52.0%
6	Adelaide	284	1	267	552	51.8%
7	Brisbane Lions	263	5	284	552	47.8%
8	West Coast	256	1	295	552	46.5%
9	Western Bulldogs	252	1	299	552	45.8%
10	Fremantle	245	2	305	552	44.5%
11	St Kilda	238	4	310	552	43.1%
12	North Melbourne	228	4	320	552	41.4%
13	Richmond	212	7	333	552	41.1%
14	Essendon	218	4	330	552	39.5%
15	Melbourne	203	3	346	552	37.0%
16	GWS Giants	116	2	204	322	36.3%
17	Carlton	193	3	356	552	35.4%
18	Gold Coast	86	1	258	345	25.0%

Thanks for that. I started doing something similar beginning with 1987 (start of the national comp) but never finished it.
It’s amazing that Carlton and Essendon will always be considered successful clubs because they won flags 80+ years ago.
Richmond is surprising. Three flags in four years and they’re still only 41.1%. Have to give some credit to the Cats, 62.1 is amazing.

 

[Winmar2Lockett]

Thanks for that. I started doing something similar beginning with 1987 (start of the national comp) but never finished it.
It’s amazing that Carlton and Essendon will always be considered successful clubs because they won flags 80+ years ago.
Richmond is surprising. Three flags in four years and they’re still only 41.1%. Have to give some credit to the Cats, 62.1 is amazing.

I used to regularly tell a Filth supporting mate to keep celebrating those flags that his great grandfather watched.

Then flipping 2010 came around.

 

[Remboy]

wowiiee... Might as well give us the 2026 Flag now.

2026 will be the first time a club has unfurled the premiership flag at the start of the season in which it wins it.