Picks 24, 33, 39

[audas]

Was dead certain we would be able to retain both and posted my reasoning as to why and it turned out so. i wasnt happy with Thornton as at the end of the day he is going to be our third tall, at which he will excel. Dont think he some super star and felt the way his manager approached the entire thing lacked consideration for the club. In the end it worked out at about the way it should have. No need to get carried away about thornton, no need to bag him, perspective.

 

[btdg]

The real question with those picks is not the actual players taken, but the overall eventual standard of players taken between pick 20 and pick 45 in this draft.

We pretty much know Thornton is solid but nothing special, while Russell is average but might still improve. If those 26 picks include, say, 6 stars, 10 solid players and 10 duds, then you'd have to say 3 picks in that range would be worth more than Thornton and Russell. If they include 2 stars, 12 solid players and 14 duds, then you'd have to say we did alright in not making the trades. When it comes down to it, given our recruiting history we'd have to lower the chances of us doing well with those picks anyway, so maybe it was the right decision to hang on to a safe bet rather than take a gamble.

I still reckon we should have gone for the picks though, as much as anything to try and match ages on our list with Murphy, Gibbs and co. If we used those picks for 1 good player, 1 solid player and 1 complete dud, all the same age as Gibbs I reckon that would leave us better off than we are now (and thats not even considering the impact on Thornton and Russell as players forced to play somewhere they didn't want to be, because we don't yet know how much that is the case, and how it will affect them). Still, no use crying over spilt milk...