Pure_Ownage - can you detail how the bidding for both Naish and Ballenden may work next Friday? When does a bid for either mean that they are having to use their next pick on their respective player?
i.e. If the Bulldogs bid for Naish then am I correct in assuming that Richmond's pick 17 will just be effectively swapped with the Bulldog's pick 16 assuming they match? You'd think that a club will put a bid in for him relatively early to force their hand wouldn't you?
The bidding system is like this:
Every pick has a points value, what pick the player is bid on the club matching gets a 20 % discount and has to provide the rest of the points. They have to use their next pick after the bid they can't choose to use later picks. If the pick used is worth more points than needed to match the club gets a residual pick given back in the 50s/60s/70s.
So Naish is bid at 16 worth 1067 (Richmond gets 213 points discount thus 853 points required to match). Richmond matches with 17 (1025 points) and gets given back pick 58 (172 points) (every other club with a pick after 58 has their pick pushed back one slot).
Because you have to use your next pick after where the player is bid you can't completely manipulate it to your advantage but what you can do is if you expect your player to be bid mid range say 20-35 you can try and trade up your first rounders as high as possible so they are live picks prior to bids, trade out your mid range 20-50 picks but keep a few up your sleeve in the 50-65 range which means if your player is bid after 20 your earlier selections are still live and then you match a bid of say 25 or 30 with some picks in the 50s or 60s. You can see both Richmond and Brisbane are trying to set up for this with Richmond trading into 17 20 25 and then 53 and 55 and Brisbane having 15 18 and then some 3rd rounders. I think we will try similar next year which is why we were happy to trade out the 2nd rounder for Ablett providing we could trade in later 3rd/4th rounders which we did because the club would be hoping Brownless isn't bid too early but say in the 20-30 range in which case there is no practical difference between matching that bid with a 2nd rounder or with 2 or 3 3rd/4th rounders. The club probably felt having a 1st rounder 2 3rd rounders and 2 4th rounders (all of which we now have) would produce about the same outcome bid wise as having the first and 2nd rounder.
In terms of Brisbane their recruiter today on radio was saying they hoped to get mids at 15 and 18 and then academy talls (Ballenden and Payne) with later picks so I would say that means he thinks Richmond won't bid on him (I wouldn't be surprised if Richmond and Brisbane have done a deal not to bid on each other's players but you would never prove that) and obviously GC are unlikely to bid on someone else's academy player so they probably feel Ballenden will get to the 20s before a bid which is what they would be hoping (whether we bid at 22 I don't know). Naish is probably more likely to be bid early purely because some teams Sydney and WB for example have a need for that type if outside mid. But Richmond are clearly hoping he isn't bid until 25-30 based on their trading strategy. I think it's possible clubs may bid to force another's hand (for example Sydney clearly bid on Bowes last year to force GC's hand as they didn't themselves need mids of his type) but unlikely as if a player slides who they rate higher on their rankings list they will go with that guy instead.