List Mgmt. Recruiting and leadership void

[St Kilda Death]

Just addressing a couple of points here.
Continually read about our poor recruiting/development.

I actually reckon we have recruited really well since 2014.
Just still not at the critical mass of quality on our list because of poor recruitment from 04-13.
Catching up though.
As long as you’re adding at least a couple into your 22 rotation each off season you’re getting it right

2021: NWM, Owens, Windhager, Hayes.
2020: Higgins, Crouch, Wood, Sharman.
2019: Butler, Hill, Howard, Jones, Ryder.
2018: King, Wilkie.
2017: Coffield, Clark, Paton.
2016: Steele, Long, Battle, Marshall.
2015: Gresham (and Carlisle was very good for us for 4 years until his body broke down)

2014: even with the catastrophic failure of Paddy Mccartin and Hugh as our 2 first picks, I would still call this year a success in recruiting, as we came out of it with Sinclair, Membrey and McKenzie.

Despite any myths, that is 8 years of good recruiting.
We are building well, but still not at a critical mass of quality players as clubs above us.
The problem was recruitment in the decade prior to this.
This also adressses our other continually stated problem, which I believe to be true:
Lack of on field Leadership.

Here are players on our list recruited prior to 2014:
Billings, Ross, Webster.
Only 3.
Now Ross has been a good player for us, as have the other 2, but there is no superstar among them, and not one of them a leader.

Compare to clubs now playing finals in 2022:

Bris: Zorko, Rich, Gardiner, Mcstay.
Only 4 but captain and vice captains.

The rest have at least 5, all have undeniably bigger stars than our 3, and all include club captains, and vice captains, even past captains.

Mel: Gawn, Salem, harmes, hunt, McDonald.
Gee: Selwood, Hawkins, Duncan, Guthrie, kolo, bews.
Syd: Buddy, Parker, loyd, rampe, Reid, Cunningham.
Coll: Pendlebury, Sidebottom, Elliot, Grundy, adams.
Rich: Martin, Cotchin, Riewoldt, Edwards, Vlaustuin, Grimes, Macintosh.
Freo: Mundy, Fyfe, walters, Pearce, Taberner.

Even Carlton, who only hold 3 players the same as us..
Cripps(C), Docherty(VC), Ed curnow.

The dogs, who will finish above us.
Bont, Macrae, Libba, Hunter, Wallis.

We should be better placed over the next couple of years moving forward if we continue our recruiting, and as Steele, Sinclair, Marshall and membrey move into this experienced Senior bracket for us.

 

[George]

A breath of fresh air - a well thought out opinion backed with some reasoning.

Keep posting

 

[sauce_head]

And now add Lenny to return!

 

[True Blue Saint]

I think the recruiting and drafting has been improved in recent seasons, as you rightly point out.

The problem seems to moreso lie in coaching and development.

How many players have we had show glimpses of real potential - particularly during the Richo years - then seem to stagnate and fall away as they mature?

 

[NarklesHelmet]

I’m with you on this.

Have no real problem with our recruiting.

What we do with them once we get them? That’s another issue completely.

 

[Ads734]

Just addressing a couple of points here.
Continually read about our poor recruiting/development.

I actually reckon we have recruited really well since 2014.
Just still not at the critical mass of quality on our list because of poor recruitment from 04-13.
Catching up though.
As long as you’re adding at least a couple into your 22 rotation each off season you’re getting it right

2021: NWM, Owens, Windhager, Hayes.
2020: Higgins, Crouch, Wood, Sharman.
2019: Butler, Hill, Howard, Jones, Ryder.
2018: King, Wilkie.
2017: Coffield, Clark, Paton.
2016: Steele, Long, Battle, Marshall.
2015: Gresham (and Carlisle was very good for us for 4 years until his body broke down)

2014: even with the catastrophic failure of Paddy Mccartin and Hugh as our 2 first picks, I would still call this year a success in recruiting, as we came out of it with Sinclair, Membrey and McKenzie.

Despite any myths, that is 8 years of good recruiting.
We are building well, but still not at a critical mass of quality players as clubs above us.
The problem was recruitment in the decade prior to this.
This also adressses our other continually stated problem, which I believe to be true:
Lack of on field Leadership.

Here are players on our list recruited prior to 2014:
Billings, Ross, Webster.
Only 3.
Now Ross has been a good player for us, as have the other 2, but there is no superstar among them, and not one of them a leader.

Compare to clubs now playing finals in 2022:

Bris: Zorko, Rich, Gardiner, Mcstay.
Only 4 but captain and vice captains.

The rest have at least 5, all have undeniably bigger stars than our 3, and all include club captains, and vice captains, even past captains.

Mel: Gawn, Salem, harmes, hunt, McDonald.
Gee: Selwood, Hawkins, Duncan, Guthrie, kolo, bews.
Syd: Buddy, Parker, loyd, rampe, Reid, Cunningham.
Coll: Pendlebury, Sidebottom, Elliot, Grundy, adams.
Rich: Martin, Cotchin, Riewoldt, Edwards, Vlaustuin, Grimes, Macintosh.
Freo: Mundy, Fyfe, walters, Pearce, Taberner.

Even Carlton, who only hold 3 players the same as us..
Cripps(C), Docherty(VC), Ed curnow.

The dogs, who will finish above us.
Bont, Macrae, Libba, Hunter, Wallis.

We should be better placed over the next couple of years moving forward if we continue our recruiting, and as Steele, Sinclair, Marshall and membrey move into this experienced Senior bracket for us.

I ve followed the draft for a long time and I think you rbing up an important pint, yes it is important to hit on your high picks but the teams who consistantly recruit and draft well have their niches. IMO Ill group these teams together

Tier One
Sydney
Hawthorn
Geelong

Tier two
Pies
Dogs

Whilst some of those teams have hit with picks lower down, I think the key is they stuck to their recruiting approached.

For instance, Sydney have their forumlar which is to recruit ultra competative, dual position players.
Collingwood/Dogs - like guys who have scope (The bolter type)
Hawthorn/Geelong like their highly skilled types, Geelong specificlly like their mature age type of players.

I think prior to the Lethers era, we were actually going along ok. Arguably the above teams have done it without nailing/having super high picks specifclly Hawks,Geelong/Pies exlcusive of some ovious FS help.



I think our recruiting was actually going along ok. For instance, our niche seemed t be picking up young talented guys who couldn;t get opportunity at other teams, bring them in relatively cheaply and get good gains out of them

Ie Steele, Roberton, Skunk, Bruce, This was supplemented with some solid rookie drafting (Sincs, Ro ,Wilkie Hayes, Sharman even Hind and Highmore without absolutely nailing out top picks. Then we decided to change course and sart recruiting above average players form other teams instead of backing in our recruiting strategy.

I think that we tried to be something that was not within our 'edge'



I agree wholeheartedly that our poor drafting is overstated, and perhaps poor top end drafting would be a more apt catogorisation.

 

[Ads734]

I’m with you on this.

Have no real problem with our recruiting.

What we do with them once we get them? That’s another issue completely.

Finally someone says it, love your work Narkles. Development vs recruiting imo is the most undertalked about issue. I'll use a few examples.


Brisbane exodous - Untill Brisbane sorted out their player wellfare/coaching situation , their young players sucked and left.

Melbourne - They were given priority picks and more but untill Roos came in and fixed the culture, nothing came of it. The culture and development was much mroeimportant then any extra pick.

Last one is GC - Had a great list and good players but they all left, untill Dew came in, they wern't able to achieve anything outside of GAJ.

 

[Hayes4PM]

2017 probably the only year at this stage on that list that looks a little underwhelming given our draft hand but without a doubt the last 2 or 3 years we've taken some big steps forward in list management, and even being able to get players traded in. From about 2011 - 2015 it was pretty barren in terms of trade targets and players interested in coming here, things have definitely turned in that department. Now we probably just have to be a little more discerning.

I think that last draft haul will probably be a "make" type off season for us in a decade or so looking back, if you were to view as "make or break". Windhager has show enough he'll be an A grade player, has been thrown into a tagging role as a first year player on some of the games best and gotten it done as well as win his own ball. Owens has shown signs as that part time mid and forward, plus his contested marking and strength for an 18 year old, crazy has a lot of development left. and NWM is the kind of vision and kicking skills we haven't seen come through in yonks.

I think the lack of finals this year is being blown out of proportion a bit and so is this notion of "rebuilds". You've only got to look at what Collingwood did to their list a few off seasons a go and the chaos at that club compared to now and how they're tracking to realise the "rebuild" thing can sometimes be sorted in one or 2 off seasons.

 

[St Kilda Death]

2017 probably the only year at this stage on that list that looks a little underwhelming given our draft hand but without a doubt the last 2 or 3 years we've taken some big steps forward in list management, and even being able to get players traded in. From about 2011 - 2015 it was pretty barren in terms of trade targets and players interested in coming here, things have definitely turned in that department. Now we probably just have to be a little more discerning.

I think that last draft haul will probably be a "make" type off season for us in a decade or so looking back, if you were to view as "make or break". Windhager has show enough he'll be an A grade player, has been thrown into a tagging role as a first year player on some of the games best and gotten it done as well as win his own ball. Owens has shown signs as that part time mid and forward, plus his contested marking and strength for an 18 year old, crazy has a lot of development left. and NWM is the kind of vision and kicking skills we haven't seen come through in yonks.

I think the lack of finals this year is being blown out of proportion a bit and so is this notion of "rebuilds". You've only got to look at what Collingwood did to their list a few off seasons a go and the chaos at that club compared to now and how they're tracking to realise the "rebuild" thing can sometimes be sorted in one or 2 off seasons.

Looks like we struck gold doesn’t it?
Future midfield in captain Windhager, Owens and Milera.

 

[St Kilda Death]

Finally someone says it, love your work Narkles. Development vs recruiting imo is the most undertalked about issue. I'll use a few examples.


Brisbane exodous - Untill Brisbane sorted out their player wellfare/coaching situation , their young players sucked and left.

Melbourne - They were given priority picks and more but untill Roos came in and fixed the culture, nothing came of it. The culture and development was much mroeimportant then any extra pick.

Last one is GC - Had a great list and good players but they all left, untill Dew came in, they wern't able to achieve anything outside of GAJ.

If your talking about players leaving from those 3 clubs, I don’t think we’ve ever had that problem have we?

 

[gringo2011]

Finally someone says it, love your work Narkles. Development vs recruiting imo is the most undertalked about issue. I'll use a few examples.


Brisbane exodous - Untill Brisbane sorted out their player wellfare/coaching situation , their young players sucked and left.

Melbourne - They were given priority picks and more but untill Roos came in and fixed the culture, nothing came of it. The culture and development was much mroeimportant then any extra pick.

Last one is GC - Had a great list and good players but they all left, untill Dew came in, they wern't able to achieve anything outside of GAJ.

I don't agree, we blew plenty of drafts with poor talent identification. If we'd taken Bont over Billings, he wouldn't have been a worse player, we just weren't great at picking high end talent. Development was shithouse as well but we were always pretty good at finding GOPs. The difference between us and the Dogs is that they are really good at spotting guys who are in that star class and helping bring it out.

Part of it is development for sure. Listening to JUH talking about Bevo and how he encourages players to go for high marks and have a snap and how he really encourages the natural instincts of the players. He also trains players in tight so that they can move the ball around quickly in games obviously train to get free kicks.

I think the "nice boy" recruiting policy was a huge impediment, taking McCartin over Petracca over the straightness of his bed linen would be one of the most comical decisions ever.

King looks like our best first round pick in 20 years and our academy guys from last year look as good a haul as we've had in years. All have a bit of X factor. I heard on SEN someone saying that academy kids tend to stand out over their peers because they have an extra couple of years in the system and gives them a real leg up. It's a real shame we don't get McKenzie for that reason.

Anyway, hopefully it's turned around now. I wish we had some better development staff who helped bring out the best in what we have but I'll take better talent identification even.

 

[gringo2011]

If your talking about players leaving from those 3 clubs, I don’t think we’ve ever had that problem have we?

If your talking about players leaving from those 3 clubs, I don’t think we’ve ever had that problem have we?

Part of that is guys got paid overs to be GOPs for a long time as there wasn't much competition for spots and we had to spend the cap.

 

[St Kilda Death]

I ve followed the draft for a long time and I think you rbing up an important pint, yes it is important to hit on your high picks but the teams who consistantly recruit and draft well have their niches. IMO Ill group these teams together

Tier One
Sydney
Hawthorn
Geelong

Tier two
Pies
Dogs

Whilst some of those teams have hit with picks lower down, I think the key is they stuck to their recruiting approached.

For instance, Sydney have their forumlar which is to recruit ultra competative, dual position players.
Collingwood/Dogs - like guys who have scope (The bolter type)
Hawthorn/Geelong like their highly skilled types, Geelong specificlly like their mature age type of players.

I think prior to the Lethers era, we were actually going along ok. Arguably the above teams have done it without nailing/having super high picks specifclly Hawks,Geelong/Pies exlcusive of some ovious FS help.



I think our recruiting was actually going along ok. For instance, our niche seemed t be picking up young talented guys who couldn;t get opportunity at other teams, bring them in relatively cheaply and get good gains out of them

Ie Steele, Roberton, Skunk, Bruce, This was supplemented with some solid rookie drafting (Sincs, Ro ,Wilkie Hayes, Sharman even Hind and Highmore without absolutely nailing out top picks. Then we decided to change course and sart recruiting above average players form other teams instead of backing in our recruiting strategy.

I think that we tried to be something that was not within our 'edge'



I agree wholeheartedly that our poor drafting is overstated, and perhaps poor top end drafting would be a more apt catogorisation.

Not sure if you have missed my point, that all these teams have recruited well, the difference being all those I listed, the teams above us on the ladder, have a better base of established players who have been there prior to 2014.
If there was poor recruiting/development/culture prior, it’s been corrected since 2014.

Also to your post,
It certainly helps the dogs when they are gifted JUH and Darcy,
Collingwood the daicos boys.
Sydney Heeney, mills and Blakey…

Looks like we finally got our own gifts in Owens and Windhager which is great, although missing out on McKenzie this year and none of them were ever rated top 5 picks like those listed above.

I don’t think Cats are recruiting genius either.
Geelong just happens to be where Dangerfield, Ablett and jez Cameron wanted to live. Can’t believe it’s such a destination personally.

 

[CaptainRisky]

Not sure if you have missed my point, that all these teams have recruited well, the difference being all those I listed, the teams above us on the ladder, have a better base of established players who have been there prior to 2014.
If there was poor recruiting/development/culture prior, it’s been corrected since 2014.

Also to your post,
It certainly helps the dogs when they are gifted JUH and Darcy,
Collingwood the daicos boys.
Sydney Heeney, mills and Blakey…

Looks like we finally got our own gifts in Owens and Windhager which is great, although missing out on McKenzie this year and none of them were ever rated top 5 picks like those listed above.

I don’t think Cats are recruiting genius either.
Geelong just happens to be where Dangerfield, Ablett and jez Cameron wanted to live. Can’t believe it’s such a destination personally.

Yeah it must just sh1t living in a nice big house overlooking the ocean in Fairhaven , Anglesea ect and getting to play in front of a real home crown 10-11 times a year, Id swap from Melbourne anytime

 

[SaintOfLondon]

The bloody school girl saga still hurting us resulting in recruiting 'nice polite boys' for a decade.

Agree with your analysis of the last 7 or so years though. Also an interesting point the poster made on our change of recruiting strategy that I hadn't previously considered.

If recruiting is heading in the right way, we still have a massive gap with culture/coaching/structure/strategy although the optimist in me does believe we have the best administration we've ever had so hopefully we can surround Ratts with elite footy brains like Melbourne did with Goodwin.

 

[gringo2011]

Not sure if you have missed my point, that all these teams have recruited well, the difference being all those I listed, the teams above us on the ladder, have a better base of established players who have been there prior to 2014.
If there was poor recruiting/development/culture prior, it’s been corrected since 2014.

Also to your post,
It certainly helps the dogs when they are gifted JUH and Darcy,
Collingwood the daicos boys.
Sydney Heeney, mills and Blakey…

Looks like we finally got our own gifts in Owens and Windhager which is great, although missing out on McKenzie this year and none of them were ever rated top 5 picks like those listed above.

I don’t think Cats are recruiting genius either.
Geelong just happens to be where Dangerfield, Ablett and jez Cameron wanted to live. Can’t believe it’s such a destination personally.

Geelong are just a champion team more than a huge list of champions these days. Cameron and Tomahawk are star quality but the rest, even guys like Stewart are excellent players but the side's real strength is in their lack of weakness and the ability to all stick to a plan together.

Sydney too, they have a lot of talent but they are club that doesn't play individual footy. Everything works in a direction together.

Essendon and St Kilda (and Carlton last year) both suffer from lots of good pieces all going in different directions. You get kids in who learn bad habits and they play to hold their spot instead of trying to fill a role. I don't know how you turn that around. I guess you just keep chasing guys from systems that hold up and try to convince players to focus on a unified goal.

 

[MordySaint]

I’m with you on this.

Have no real problem with our recruiting.

What we do with them once we get them? That’s another issue completely.

100% .. don't agree with the context of this thread at all.

Look at a player like Billings, he could have been anything. More to the point he can be anything, as I'm not writing him off.

Our coaching and player development is our problem.

 

[Sully111]

It's the coaching.

 

[MordySaint]

It's the coaching.

I'd also point the finger at higher up in the chain as well ...

You think the club would have programs to foster sports leadership, there are programs to develop leadership skills.

I know the club sent Richo over to New York to develop his "coaching" skills, they may have not tried to develop leadership using external programs.

Correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[lewdogs]

100% .. don't agree with the context of this thread at all.

Look at a player like Billings, he could have been anything. More to the point he can be anything, as I'm not writing him off.

Our coaching and player development is our problem.

It's been a problem in the past but there are signs at the moment that Ratts is actually pretty good at developing players and it may be a strength. The kids this year a case in point.

 

[MordySaint]

It's been a problem in the past but there are signs at the moment that Ratts is actually pretty good at developing players and it may be a strength. The kids this year a case in point.

Mmmmm

This is his third year, so he didn't bother with developing players in his first two?

No doubt Windy is a future leader. I'd like to see him fast tracked into the leadership group.

 

[Ricmel]

Just addressing a couple of points here.
Continually read about our poor recruiting/development.

I actually reckon we have recruited really well since 2014.
Just still not at the critical mass of quality on our list because of poor recruitment from 04-13.
Catching up though.
As long as you’re adding at least a couple into your 22 rotation each off season you’re getting it right

2021: NWM, Owens, Windhager, Hayes.
2020: Higgins, Crouch, Wood, Sharman.
2019: Butler, Hill, Howard, Jones, Ryder.
2018: King, Wilkie.
2017: Coffield, Clark, Paton.
2016: Steele, Long, Battle, Marshall.
2015: Gresham (and Carlisle was very good for us for 4 years until his body broke down)

Agree, we have built an exceptional 8th - 14th team. Very competitive in that bracket. Sort of like South Africa. Can look a million bucks playing Sri Lanka, West Indies, Pakistan and weak as p1ss playing Australia, England and India.

It is hard to know whether Saints problems lie in recruitment or development. I mean we have had a bunch of top 10 picks since 2013 and are yet to get an A grader. Is that poor recruiting a la McCartin over Petracca (although this may also be a case for poor development as Paddy heads toward being in the McGovern class) or poor development a la Clark or Billings?

 

[lewdogs]

Mmmmm

This is his third year, so he didn't bother with developing players in his first two?

No doubt Windy is a future leader. I'd like to see him fast tracked into the leadership group.

I think when you look through the list there are a lot of players that have improved. Don't think the development has been that bad under Ratts.

 

[gringo2011]

It's the coaching.

At the moment it's coaching holding us back but we had the double for a long time. Poorly coached so poor development and poor at drafting/ buying old guys and avoiding the draft to try to make it quicker.

There is no one thing that got us here but the bit we can change now is coaching and development staff and keep bringing in talent.

 

[gringo2011]

I think when you look through the list there are a lot of players that have improved. Don't think the development has been that bad under Ratts.

There is also a lot of guys like Battle, Marshall, Long, Ross, Hill etc that have gone backwards then got back to how they were. Guys like Butler and Snags have gone the other way. King looks poorly developed etc.

Sinclair has been a slow but steady progress and at 27 has hit absolute peak form. Crouch is back to being a gun mid etc.

To me the list isn't so bad with lots of pieces brought in to make us competitive now but we haven't been able to make any serious progress despite that.

I still feel like when you look at the way sides progress you usually get a rise in player output and that leads to confidence and consistency, we probably should be further ahead accordingly.

If we are underperforming half way through next season I think we just have to make a call on Ratts because there are some limitations due to not having heaps of players under 23 where your real growth is coming from. Probably need to start climbing soon or it's not happening.