If the draft was tomorrow and he is as good as everyone says he is, I'd absolutely taken him ( I would have taken Tipungwuti last year too - it is where our list is at). What are we paying Hird, Thompson and our development department for if they don't want to/can't at least try to get the best out of someone like this. We are trying to get the advantage in player development.
There isn't much point going back to the state leagues to look to find more honest triers. We have plenty of players that fit that mold (and it would be underselling them at that). We need to round out our list with elite crumbing and outside skill. Gartlett has it, if he has shown genuine willingness to turn his life around, even if he is not quite there, the rest is up to us.
Gartlett may not be the best example of it all, because it doesn't seem to be cultural as much as it is to do with him being a lad, but I can't help think of Matt Rendell's warning (not the parent comment which was never keep in the context in which that prick Mifsud understood it - on this I'll take my cues from Dean Rioli). It is about the judgment that gets made. Gartlett will probably never live down his past and I don't know how wise that is.
