Combined Vent threads.

[astro_toby]

Clearly this season has been a disgrace, but i think the thing that has made it the worst is - we are COMPLETELY back to being the laughing stock again. Not just for the way we got ahead of ourselves and perform weekly well under our own vocalised expectations - but we are just doing dumb, weak shit.

The list is quite damning really

1) Jake King warned about bikies - Jake King then has lunch right near channel 7's offices with the head of a bikie gang - club does't react and shrugs it off

2) Dustin Martins general contract negotiations - club fails to control it before it become a farce

3) Dustin Martin moves in with "sleeping pills" Connors- 12 months after he is told he is banned from hanging out with him period - club shrugs it off and doesn't react.

4) Club totally squibs it when a chance to honour a passed away great - ala when Jack Dyer died and again now with Hafey

5) Hardwick attempts to change the game plan to something the team that just won the flag just did ( i.e once again we react and copy, than create our one wheel ).

6) Hardwick proclaims Vickery the future of our forward line over Riewolt...Vickery then spends several weeks playing in reserves due to poor form, teamwork and attitude.

7) Hit the recycled/mature age recruit bag with total utter insanity by recruiting Hampson, Banfield, Lloyd, Gordon, Edwards, Chaplin, Stephenson, Pettard, Thomas, Knights over a 2 year period... then let a unique to our list, loyal, tiger at heart stalwart like White walk as we can't offer him the contract he clearly deserved

8 ) Riewoldt publicly critical of the game plan. Club over-reacts, then try's to play it as light hearted.

9) Riewoldt then loses his shit when the camera's come for him and goes off like a running man hiding between cars and catching a train home - even though he drove to training

10) Captain comes out and proclaims the players think he is sot

11) The Coach comes out and proclaims the players this he is soft

12) a matter of only days later, the clubs backs up those honest very public feedbacks with a total piss poor performance against a hated arch rival

That list of totally ridiculous & embarrassing unprofessional chain of events is why supporters have laughed at us for decades. We implode. We have no idea how to handle any success, poorly copy other clubs cultures & always end up where we began - nowhere.

Is it just me or is the above totally nuts???? it was 12 months ago we had a young squad competing like a top 4 team with a club culture and attitude to back it up??? How the hell does this always happen??

 

[thecotch]

It's just you

 

[astro_toby]

It's just you

fortunately - i can think of 50 reasons tonight where i am sure it is not me. They are a joke, once again.

What the **** happened to this war chest we were going to raid the FA with???

 

[thecotch]

fortunately - i can think of 50 reasons tonight where i am sure it is not me. They are a joke, once again.

What the **** happened to this war chest we were going to raid the FA with???

Jack took it all.

 

[astro_toby]

Jack took it all.

Thats just our new answer to everything isn't it? Jack did it.

End of the day, Jack is the only one who clearly gives a shit and is embarrassed by what we push every week. He was spot on - Hardwick tried to copy the latest fad and got caught out being a try hard version of Clarkson - the recruiting the last 24 months is worse than any of the recycled shit Frawley attempted after the last fake dawn in 2001.

 

[Barry_Badrinath]

7) Hit the recycled/mature age recruit bag with total utter insanity by recruiting Hampson, Banfield, Lloyd, Gordon, Edwards, Chaplin, Stephenson, Pettard, Thomas, Knights over a 2 year period... then let a unique to our list, loyal, tiger at heart stalwart like White walk as we can't offer him the contract he clearly deserved

Matt White did not deserve a $300-350,000 a year 3 year deal and he was certainly not loyal.

 

[jko'neal]

You missed the point about average teams going to play finals with 11 or 12 wins only in the years we are shit!

 

[marcus12]

Matt White did not deserve a $300-350,000 a year 3 year deal and he was certainly not loyal.

Better paying him more money, than useless ****heads like hammer, chaplin and grigg.

 

[Barry_Badrinath]

Thats just our new answer to everything isn't it? Jack did it.

End of the day, Jack is the only one who clearly gives a shit and is embarrassed by what we push every week. He was spot on - Hardwick tried to copy the latest fad and got caught out being a try hard version of Clarkson - the recruiting the last 24 months is worse than any of the recycled shit Frawley attempted after the last fake dawn in 2001.

Frawley traded away our number 1 pick three years in a row.

In 2001 he traded pick #17.

In the 2002 draft he downgraded:

pick #2 > pick #12
pick #18 > pick #28 (pick #28 was then on traded)
pick #32 > pick #41

In 2003 he traded pick #6 and pick #20.

 

[Tiger08]

Our problems are because our players aren't fit enough. They don't work hard enough and don't cover enough ground.

Matt White went from being our fittest bloke to about number 7 at Port.

You would have thought the embarrassment of the final last year would have driven them to get better.

Apparently not.

 

[Hipster Doofus]

Frawley traded away our number 1 pick three years in a row.

In 2001 he traded pick #17.

In the 2002 draft he downgraded:

pick #2 > pick #12
pick #18 > pick #28 (pick #28 was then on traded)
pick #32 > pick #41

In 2003 he traded pick #6 and pick #20.

Blumfield, oh yes I remember
Good times

 

[Hipster Doofus]

Our problems are because our players aren't fit enough. They don't work hard enough and don't cover enough ground.

Matt White went from being our fittest bloke to about number 7 at Port.

You would have thought the embarrassment of the final last year would have driven them to get better.

Apparently not.

Content with an EF loss

 

[astro_toby]

Matt White did not deserve a $300-350,000 a year 3 year deal and he was certainly not loyal.

We never needed to offer White that size contract to stay - if we had offered $500k over 2 he would have - port over paid, like all clubs do trying to lure a player that has to move interstate. It was pretty common knowledge last year that this was the case.

Instead we now have about 10 2nd hand / recycled players that are not up to it.... "go us"

And you are a total dick if you a being critical @ white's loyalty. Tiger his whole life and would have accepted a lot less money to stay with us - we were just too obsessed with signing Conca & Martin to see that.

 

[JAKLAUGHING]

Buying a membership...

 

[marcus12]

Content with an EF loss

Dimma: "Hey boys bad luck but that'll do the supporters for another decade, surely? GRIGGA LETS GO GET SOME DINNER!"

 

[Barry_Badrinath]

We never needed to offer White that size contract to stay - if we had offered $500k over 2 he would have - port over paid, like all clubs do trying to lure a player that has to move interstate. It was pretty common knowledge last year that this was the case.

Instead we now have about 10 2nd hand / recycled players that are not up to it.... "go us"

And you are a total dick if you a being critical @ white's loyalty. Tiger his whole life and would have accepted a lot less money to stay with us - we were just too obsessed with signing Conca & Martin to see that.

We gave him a better contract than that and he knocked it back.

 

[theflea]

Our problems are because our players aren't fit enough. They don't work hard enough and don't cover enough ground.

Matt White went from being our fittest bloke to about number 7 at Port.

You would have thought the embarrassment of the final last year would have driven them to get better.

Apparently not.

Whilst I agree we aren't fit enough White wasn't our fittest player(no 3). This has been said time and again.

 

[astro_toby]

Frawley traded away our number 1 pick three years in a row.

In 2001 he traded pick #17.

In the 2002 draft he downgraded:

pick #2 > pick #12
pick #18 > pick #28 (pick #28 was then on traded)
pick #32 > pick #41

In 2003 he traded pick #6 and pick #20.

To be fair the trade in 2003 would have be a absolute home run if Brown didn't have a freak leg break - the 2003 draft was a total shit heap and Brown was a total Blue Chip star, and played like one for us till his leg snapped in half. Pick 6 was Kepler Bradley and Sam Butler. 2002 was a total brain fart - but again to be fair, the AFL just deciding to change the order of the draft after the trade week was a bit bullshit... I'm not going to argue though how badly we disrespected draft picks in that era - no doubt our use of 1st round picks has been A1 compared to those years.


Its the recycled shit that bothers me, all in the need for "depth"

That list in my OP post is pretty damming mate - its horrid and its a mistake we have made too many times to forgive

 

[astro_toby]

We gave him a better contract than that and he knocked it back.

Sorry i don't believe your number and facts. If White was getting offered $1million over 3 years, we would have most likely got a compensation pick for him.

My belief is we had offered him the same $100k 1 year contract for several years and we only marginally upped it when he was 26 and coming off winning our most improved player award.

His speed and fitness was pivotal for us in many occasions last year, and we clearly miss it this time round. If the club needed convincing of how important it was, we only need to look at the Carlton final last year when he was out. The other issue is we didn't really try to replace him with a new like minded player - if anything we also let another "speed" player walk for nothing in Nahas ( which i don't necessarily disagree with ).

I just fail to understand the value in recruiting "depth" like edwards, Thomas, Hampson, etc etc etc if it comes at the cost of players who were already providing similar quality depth, or even better - like losing White, Nahas & McGuane. as much as McGuane was a wild card, he provided a more competitive and hungry depth player than edwards. We let 2 genuine competitors walk out for nothing in favour of keeping new players that had not proved to love our club like both those boys did. With King out we are totally lacking in truly competitive players - and all those recycled blokes are playing in the seconds and not providing any real alternative to what we already had. The depth is actually worse - it is totally undeniable.

I think both boys left as they didn't think they would get the opportunities they deserved with us, we didn't sell the fact they would well enough. - cos the fact is, both those boys would be getting as much opportunity this season as they are getting currently. I think we prioritised their contracts incorrectly and we got too focused on the Martin & Conca signing

 

[richcogs]

F the RFC simply not good enough. Disgrace Hardwick to blame trying to change the game style

 

[theflea]

Sorry i don't believe your number and facts. If White was getting offered $1million over 3 years, we would have most likely got a compensation pick for him.

My belief is we had offered him the same $100k 1 year contract for several years and we only marginally upped it when he was 26 and coming off winning our most improved player award.

His speed and fitness was pivotal for us in many occasions last year, and we clearly miss it this time round.

I just fail to understand the value in recruiting "depth" like edwards, Thomas, Hampson, etc etc etc if it comes at the cost of players who were already providing similar quality depth, or even better - like losing White & McGuane. as much as McGuane was a wild card, he provided a more competitive and hungry depth player than edwards. We let 2 genuine competitors walk out for nothing in favour of keeping new players that had not proved to love our club like both those boys did. With King out we are totally lacking in truly competitive players - and all those recycled blokes are playing in the seconds and not providing any real alternative to what we already had. The depth is actually worse - it is totally undeniable.

I think both boys left as they didn't think they would get the opportunities they deserved with us, we didn't sell the fact they would well enough. - cos the fact is, both those boys would be getting as much opportunity this season as they are getting currently. I think we prioritised their contracts incorrectly and we got too focused on the Martin & Conca signing

1m over 3 years doesn't get you any comp at all. Has to be at least 400k per year for that. And if you think he was on 100k per year then you are sadly mistaken, as that is nearly less than a new draftee who plays every game.

 

[astro_toby]

1m over 3 years doesn't get you any comp at all. Has to be at least 400k per year for that. And if you think he was on 100k per year then you are sadly mistaken, as that is nearly less than a new draftee who plays every game.

Either way - i still don't believe that he was asking for what port was offering to stay. I am sure if we offered the same money over 2 - or$100-150k less over the 3, he would have stayed. I find it strange when people argue someone's worth even after it is clear we have missed their input and the team that drafted him are on top of the ladder and getting amazing output from him - he clearly was worth the money and the club who had him for 6-7 years didn't even see it.

Honestly, i sometimes think Port have a better judge of our players than we do. I would take both Schulz & White back before about 30 blokes we currently employ on our list. That their is the proof the club go it wrong

 

[rfctigerarmy]

May aswell make a thread about it.

Mentioned this after the loss after the week we lost after Tommy's passing.

Here's a few recently losses when the match has been build up as a big one. Remember, in most of these matches, we've barely fired a shot:

Dreamtime, season on the line vs Essendon 2014
vs Melbourne after Tommy's passing 2014
vs Carlton Round 2 after elimination final loss 2014
vs Carlton Elimination Final 2013

And then a few more which have happened in the last 10 years:
Loss after Jack Dyers passing
Richmond centenary match vs Carlton
Ben Cousins first match vs Carlton
Richo farewell lap of honour match
Basically any Richo milestone match
Ben Cousins last match vs Port Adelaide

Feel free to add if I missed any.

Will Richmond ever be capable of something similar to Freo vs Sydney in the Prelim last year where their pressure is just so relentless thar the opposition is unable to win on a big occasion?

 

[theflea]

Either way - i still don't believe that he was asking for what port was offering to stay. I am sure if we offered the same money over 2 - or$100-150k less over the 3, he would have stayed. I find it strange when people argue someone's worth even after it is clear we have missed their input and the team that drafted him are on top of the ladder and getting amazing output from him - he clearly was worth the money and the club who had him for 6-7 years didn't even see it.

Honestly, i sometimes think Port have a better judge of our players than we do. I would take both Schulz & White back before about 30 blokes we currently employ on our list. That their is the proof the club go it wrong

You cant revisit things in Hindsight. Shultz wanted to be traded the year before he did, and at that stage hadn't done much for us, and by his own recollection, needed a new head start and a better application to his footy. As for White, he was offered a better contract per year, for more years. Its simple as that.

 

[astro_toby]

We gave him a better contract than that and he knocked it back.

Since you seem to think you know all the details of everyones contracts - what are we paying Hampson? We gave up a 2nd rounder for him, while White was apparently not worth any comp pick - so what kind on contract did he offer him? Are we getting value from that, or at least better value than White offered? And what exactly did Hampson do prior to us giving him that contract to deserve it?