List Mgmt. 2025 List Management Discussion - Part IV

[Hubnester]

2025 List Management Discussion - Part 4

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
​

 

[Armoooo]

Based on your opinion here, if the giants wanted a first rounder - we should pay it.

That’s not how this works. We evidently rated Aleer slightly higher than Heath and were willing to smooth over the deal with a swap of seconds.

For negotiations to fall apart. It’s clearly been made clear that second round pick only going to the giants was a non negotiable

That's a ridiculous, incredibly poorly thought out straw man argument.

The clubs should have known whether a deal was possible before getting Aleer to nominate. They don't just go into these things blind. The clubs know what the backbone of the deal is before trade week and then just sort out the finer details.

GWS wanting a future 2nd involved would not have been a surprise.

You're desperate for the giants to be the bad guys here. But even if they said a 2nd rounder was a non negotiable today, it may not be on Wednesday afternoon with the PSD threat hanging over their head.

 

[beside the seaside]

It seems we'd have been better off just letting it run through to Wednesday and saying we couldn't get a deal done.

 

[heynow85]

Kane is now claiming we should have traded Marshall and sent that pick for Aleer.

If you look at it like that.

Would you trade

Out - Marshall, future 2nd
In - Aleer, Pick 19

I don’t think anybody does that trade, overall we are better balanced having Marshall than Aleer after we got JSOS.

 

[saintmike65]

IT IS LIST SPOTS!

ALEER DIRECTLY LINKED TO THE MARSHALL TRADE, AND THE REASON WHY WE PUT THE SPOTLIGHT ON STEELE!

I reckon with both Marshall and Steele staying we can't afford Aleer now.
Ironically, Mathew Lloyd said a while ago Aleer isn't up to AFL standard!

 

[Armoooo]

I see the bed wetters are out in force again after yesterday's announcement. Funny how the dees did it to Derksen and not one word but saints do it and tomorrow is the start of the apocalypse and the world ending. Good on the saints for not rolling over.

People using Derkson as a comparable situation have finally shown to be why trade radio is a thing.

I never want to hear the muppets on there criticised on this board again. This take is as bad as suggesting we should have passed on Carlisle and drafted Gresham with pick 5 anyway.

 

[gubby88]

Well GWS asking a price that we might think it overs, but the AFL public in general wouldn't find outlandish, with half the trade period to go.

St Kilda have completely walked away, apparently without so much as a phone call.

Its pretty obvious what side the manager is and should be on.

Maybe if we spoke to him before hand the PSD threat would have been on the cards. So we either had buyers remorse, or we failed to do our due diligence.

and? why does it matter what other people think? this is business. we are in a business to win premiersips....would you rather Aleer or Wilkie?

 

[#1_pigeonracer]

Call me stupid but I still think one of Marshall and Aleer gets done. Maybe both.

 

[Lightsxo]

We have objectively ****ed over Aleer which isn’t great. No doubt if his agent was higher profile we wouldn’t have done that and kept negotiating in good faith. Not calling him/agent if true is also objectively poor.

That being said people will forget about it by the time the draft happens and whichever of Leek/Jsos came second would have been superfluous so realistically no great loss lol.

 

[saintmike65]

He also said we should have ditched TDK instead of Aleer

Cornes is an over paid troll

 

[bakes10]

Why did Melb backflip on Durk Son?

 

[SainterinSydney]

Much prefer the scenario where Ro stays and we don't get Aleer.

 

[saintmike65]

Sure it needs to be reasonable but Geelong is nothing to do with us dealing with the giants

Geelong unlikely to get either target now

 

[stavro#4]

Well GWS asking a price that we might think it overs, but the AFL public in general wouldn't find outlandish, with half the trade period to go.

St Kilda have completely walked away, apparently without so much as a phone call.

Its pretty obvious what side the manager is and should be on.

Maybe if we spoke to him before hand the PSD threat would have been on the cards. So we either had buyers remorse, or we failed to do our due diligence.

That's a ridiculous, incredibly poorly thought out straw man argument.

The clubs should have known whether a deal was possible before getting Aleer to nominate. They don't just go into these things blind. The clubs know what the backbone of the deal is before trade week and then just sort out the finer details.

GWS wanting a future 2nd involved would not have been a surprise.

You're desperate for the giants to be the bad guys here. But even if they said a 2nd rounder was a non negotiable today, it may not be on Wednesday afternoon with the PSD threat hanging over their head.

There isn’t a positive spin on this nor am I desperate for anything.

We don’t have to value a player at the same level of opposition clubs.

Let’s be really clear on the state of play.

We have 2 players who have nominated a trade. Marshall Geelong Aleer to us.

Marshall is contracted and Geelong haven’t given a ****, offered what they have thought is fair. It hasn’t got the deal done. They just moved on to Curnow. Applauded.

Aleer is out of contract. Could walk to us in the draft. We have an agent seemingly not willing to do that and getting pissy we won’t pay whatever the giants want and we are getting slammed.

Both players will be losing money in 2026 from these actions.

The simple fact is that there won’t be one single club at fault for this. But you also can’t sit there and expect the saints to bend over on both deals when they have sorted Ryan and Flanders incomings with little fuss and sent Heath packing seemingly during our first conversation with little issue - as Lamb had said we hadn’t yet spoken at 1pm yesterday.

If anyone can’t see the above. I’d argue you are far too caught up in your own emotions. We probably go back to the table on both deals. If Geelong gives us what we want. It probably makes it easier to do Aleer.

 

[CHBench]

It is entirely different.

A contracted player not being able to go to the other club he would like to play for is a world of difference to an uncontracted player (ahead of the biggest contracted of his career), making an agreement with one club, basically closing down 17 other options, only for it to come undone with 5 days to spare.

If you think saints have a right to screw over players and you don't care because they're not one of our guys, just say it. There's no argument against it.

But trying to act like this is something that happens regularly is ridiculous.

I don't disagree either, firmly on the fence about it. Not super comfy with how it's been handled, at the same time if we don't want him anymore then lets not be stuck with a stupid 700x4 contract.

I think the fact that we ~supposedly~ offered a contract that in reality far beyond market value makes this look like Aleer has been robbed or mistreated.

But can we contrast and compare with Wade Derksen?

Mature aged mid season draftee from NT with a family on a bare bones contract, Melbourne pursued him as a contracted player last year - primarily for opportunity - GWS said no. He remains and doesn't break through for a single game. Melbourne show interest again, only to then pull out. He does not have a taker atm, his AFL career is possibly over before it even started. This is shitty and unfair but it happens in business - where's the outcry there?

Aleer's AFL career will continue on at least a 3 year contract with GWS. The guy has lost a couple hundred $ at maximum and the inconvenience of having to find a new taker whilst he's in Europe. Annoying for him, feel a little played, but it happens in business.

There's alot of outside noise because this is literally the only thing happening at the moment. The media cycle will move on

 

[BucketsandBanger]

I hope we come out today and explain this from our point of view. Can't let that slime bag manager drag us through the mud publicly like that without a response. Also we should be helping Tauru transition to a new manager immediately.

 

[saintmike65]

Much prefer the scenario where Ro stays and we don't get Aleer.

Likely get your wish

 

[Molly29]

Much prefer the scenario where Ro stays and we don't get Aleer.

More than happy for us to keep Ro

 

[CaptainRisky]

I reckon with both Marshall and Steele staying we can't afford Aleer now.
Ironically, Mathew Lloyd said a while ago Aleer isn't up to AFL standard!

Agree , The term looks like Tarzan plays like Jane comes to mind with me , has no idea on how to read the game

Might take a screamer now and again and that's about it

 

[SainterinSydney]

I'm sure someone posted this but can't be assed scrolling back to check:

 

[MrFoster]

Based on your opinion here, if the giants wanted a first rounder - we should pay it.

That’s not how this works. We evidently rated Aleer slightly higher than Heath and were willing to smooth over the deal with a swap of seconds.

For negotiations to fall apart. It’s clearly been made clear that second round pick only going to the giants was a non negotiable

I think we need to take stock of what we’ve done this off season and get off our high horse when something goes wrong without knowing the full picture. Football administrators makes decisions in the best interest of the club, whilst we try to take care of players, club comes before individuals..

Aleer is only worth it at the right trade price, nothing more or nothing less. And if our situation changes which it sounded like it has, then all bets are off. Simples.

Can I take a company to court if they promised me a job and then had to withdraw the contract because of budget or internal issues? No. It’s not ideal, but it’s life. Criticising the club from a morality perspective is really poor.

 

[phantom13]

If it’s as reported (and obviously take all that shit with a barrel of salt) then we walked away from the Aleer deal and we’ve walked away from the Marshall deal.

Trying to claim that somehow those two things are the same is pretty silly.

To be clear I don’t really care but trying to make the cats look like they’ve done what we did is dumb.

 

[Gavinmitchell11]

I’m all good with not getting Aleer but not thrilled with how it’s panned out. You’d like to think every conversation with him came with the caveat ‘provided we can get a trade done’ but I’m not sure it has. It’s strange the way it came out as well with a straight off hard no. We could have released a statement saying that the teams are at loggerheads and a deal is no guarantee.
It would have softened the blow and given GWS a chance to reconsider before everything blew up.

Anyway, hopefully the cats can’t get Curnow either,

I’d love to swoop in and get Curnow ahead of the Cats but that’s impossible.

Jack Steele

9

Jack Steele

Age

29

Ht

187cm

Wt

90kg

Pos.

Mid

Career

Season

Last 5

D

20.9

5star

K

8.7

3star

HB

12.2

5star

M

3.7

4star

T

6.8

5star

CL

3.6

5star

D

21.3

5star

K

10.0

4star

HB

11.3

5star

M

4.0

4star

T

5.8

5star

CL

4.6

5star

D

16.8

4star

K

5.0

2star

HB

11.8

5star

M

2.6

3star

T

6.4

5star

CL

3.6

5star

situation is interesting, he’d rather stay with us even after effectively being asked to leave. He must really love the place. Happy to have him stay and hopefully he proves the coaches wrong.

 

[saintmike65]

I hope we come out today and explain this from our point of view. Can't let that slime bag manager drag us through the mud publicly like that without a response. Also we should be helping Tauru transition to a new manager immediately.

Pretty hard to defend

 

[MightySaintas]

The whole situation does look a bit amateurish at the moment but it can only really be judged at the ennd of trade period. No point wetting the bed until the whole story is known.

 

[SaintersUnite]

Who gives a flying **** honestly, it will make absolutely ZERO difference to our future trade negotiations lmao.