Analysis SETTLE IT: Why didn't Crows go for Mattaes Phillipou?

[ABAB]

I'll disagree with you there..I think they were the primary instigator

By hoodwink West Coast and GWS to accept unders??? Logic suggest otherwise......

 

[MsTopG]

Q. Why didn't AFC manage to draft Mattaes Phillipou?

A: TL;DR It's clear AFC likely valued IR more than MP otherwise AFC could have held on to pick5 at the risk of missing out on IR.

Once we gave up pick5, AFC either couldn't trade back into an early enough pick for MP before Saints' pick, or simply preferred to hang on to 2023 r1 pick.

(initial guess at reasons - will update here if needed after some discussion)


The question of why AFC did not get into a position to draft Matt Phillipou (MP) in 2022 comes up frequently, especially as MP seems to be doing well as that big bodied midfielder that we on Bigfooty think we need.

Without someone from the club spilling the beans, it looked from the outside that the AFC didn't try very hard to get into a position to draft MP.

Below are some points to consider in trying to figure out why things turned as they have.

<.1.> Izak Rankine (IR) asked GC be treated fairly or he stays

It has been reported/suggested IR asked that a fair trade GC is made for him or he will stay in GC.

<.2.> GC didn't want a 2023 pick due to Academy players

This doesn't really make sense because GC will need points to pay for their Academy players, especially if they do end up attracting r1 bids. For 3 such players, having high value picks must be preferable to trying to collect multiple lower picks to combine - especially as the number of picks a club can take into draft is limited to how many free list spots they have.

Some think AFC should have been more ruthless and insisted on GC accepting AFC's 2023 r1 pick for IR but if <.1.> is true, AFC had no choice but accept GC's demand for 2022 pick 5 for IR.

It seems likely AFC valued IR more than MP as AFC could have insisted on hanging on to pick 5 at the risk of missing out on IR.

<.3.> Ess rumoured to be interested in MP with pick 4.

This might have made AFC more willing to part with pick 5 for IR as if AFC managed to hold on to pick 5 (by paying with 2023 r1 pick) for IR but Ess drafts MP anyway, that would have been a wasted effort.

Spoiler: ..... weighing it up .....

Tas post:

<.4.> Which clubs have picks after Ess' & before Saints' ?

Could AFC have traded for 2022 r1 pick with say our F1 pick (and an extra F2 pick) once Ess did not pick MP?

There seemed to be a common view at the time that the 2023 draft was looking like a very strong draft and clubs did seem to be keen to trade out of the 2022 draft and into 2023 so would think AFC might have been able to line up a trade with club for a pick to get MP should he slip down the draft order.

The clubs and picks after Ess' are as follows.

GC (from AFC) - we wouldn't have been able to trade for this pick during draft night (rules!)

Haw - pretty much in a rebuild so wouldn't want a 2023 pick.

Gee (from GC) - committed a lot to get pick from GC

WCE - also pretty much in a rebuild so wouldn't want a 2023 pick

StK - pounced on MP when they could, probably wouldn't want a 2023 pick.

This likely shows AFC would have had a tough time trading for a pick to get MP before Saints did.

Spoiler: ..... trading back in? .....

Mutineer post:


TAFKATMS post:

<.5.> AFC valued 2023 r1 more than MP

Could it be AFC valued who they might be able to pick with their 2023 r1 pick more highly than pick 5 in 2022 or MP?

Could this be the case? There were rumours (though disputed) that there were "red flags" around MP.

Spoiler: ..... MP Red Flags .....

Volbeat, who has a pretty good record for Crows rumours in the past said there were "redflags" with MP from his sources though he didn't know what they were exactly.

Meanwhile TAFKATMS, who also has a good record (and possibly is a past Crows player) had the opposite view.

Volbeat post:


TAFKATMS post:

<.6.> Does the AFC feel the need for a big mid?

Or is it really that we on Bigfooty think we need big bodied midfielder?

Our current up and coming, big-gish bodied mids include Pedlar (183cm), Schoenberg (183), Dowling (187cm), Bond (185cm) and Nankervis (191cm) as a potential mid.

.

Apparently he was too tall for the crows.

In all seriousness I still can't believe we handed over pick 6 for Rankine. He's a good player but he's worth 15-20. A ruthless club (which aren't) would have traded out a player to get a pick around 15 for Rankine. I would have moved Doedee on if need be because we need mids not 3rd talls that go missing most weeks. We also have Worrell and Michalanney as 3rd talls. GC had no power with an out of contract Rankine, they were never forcing him to the draft. The crows have to learn to give something up to get something they need more of. I wouldn't have parted with pick 6.

 

[Eagleboy2011]

Apparently he was too tall for the crows.

Woodville oval was too far from West Lakes to properly assess him.

 

[Golumless]

We blew our powder on Rankine, needed collateral for Michaelanny and didn't have an interest in trading our first round pick into 22. Phiilipou would have been nice, but you can't draft everyone.

It especially didn't help that we got pipped in the Bowes trade by Geelong as that probably removed our only genuine pathway.

Considering how much we ended up moving to '23, '22 just seemed like a holding year for the list.

Kids are starting to come home more frequently and Saints aren't exactly a desirable club. So it's not the doom and gloom of yesteryear where an undrafted SA kid is gone for good.

 

[DJ75]

My understanding is that as a club we loved MP.
We committed to the Rankine trade a long way out (I still think far too easily), so we knew our first pick would be gone.
I believe we tried repeatedly to make a trade to get back in, including with St K, but no one would take it.
I thinks it’s unlikely now, but I hope we can get him back in the future because I know the family were really hoping he would end up at the Crows.

 

[Firewalker]

They absolutely panicked over the being given the ‘hard to deal with’ tag from Sydney over Dawson, then Rankine sticking his nose in & wanting fair compensation also ruins the clubs hand but the strongest reason I still feel came from Ogilvie and his team from watching these players from 15 years old and believing this 2023 draft is ‘better’ and being a bit selfish and not wanting to give up the pick.

So you can’t really have this conversation until that pick is used, that player versus Phillipou is going to be a blockbuster thread.

 

[pjcrows]

Because we are soft.

 

[GreyCrow]

Either the club is incompetent in getting the capital to play the market

Or MPs redflags were going to be too much for us to contain

Now when I say flags I dont mean 3am shenanigans but watching the young lad he has a lot of self belief and confidence in himself. Like JHF I get the feeling he expected to play R1 and maybe said something along those lines

We dont do that. 2 years in the SANFL lad and you will like it!

I dont know - I just got the impression there was a disconnect somewhere

#TeamVolbeat

 

[BunjiMac]

Ultimately they said he wasn't worth the asking price.

It's crap to say it wasn't possible.

 

[Hodgy]

Ultimately they said he wasn't worth the asking price.

It's crap to say it wasn't possible.

100% correct. If we really, really wanted Phillipou then we could have made it Happen.

I actually have a more cynical theory. I wonder if the AFL wanted Bowes out of GC for some behavioral reason and Geelong seemed the best place after the success of their Stengle plan. if they dictated that we would give up pick 6 for Rankine, the it would explain why we came out and offered it so early in the process.

As we know, if the AFL fear bad press, they will manipulate any situation to minimize it regardless of the negative effect on fair competition. The interference with the proposed trade of Luke Dunstan to us so the Saints could free up cap space for Brad Crouch because the Vic press didn’t want us to have picks 1 and 2 is a great example. Or suspending Dean Bailey while he was coaching us for aparently single handedly tanking for pick 1 When at Melbourne Is another. Then of course changing the rules purely so GC could trade pick 7 and Bowes to free up cap space is the latest example. There are so many examples of us rolling over when the AFL really want us to do something That this isn’t really a conspiracy theory.

 

[Eagleboy2011]

100% correct. If we really, really wanted Phillipou then we could have made it Happen.

I actually have a more cynical theory. I wonder if the AFL wanted Bowes out of GC for some behavioral reason and Geelong seemed the best place after the success of their Stengle plan. if they dictated that we would give up pick 6 for Rankine, the it would explain why we came out and offered it so early in the process.

As we know, if the AFL fear bad press, they will manipulate any situation to minimize it regardless of the negative effect on fair competition. The interference with the proposed trade of Luke Dunstan to us so the Saints could free up cap space for Brad Crouch because the Vic press didn’t want us to have picks 1 and 2 is a great example. Or suspending Dean Bailey while he was coaching us for aparently single handedly tanking for pick 1 When at Melbourne Is another. Then of course changing the rules purely so GC could trade pick 7 and Bowes to free up cap space is the latest example. There are so many examples of us rolling over when the AFL really want us to do something That this isn’t really a conspiracy theory.

How do we get someone like Eddie or Kennet in to just fight every battle for us.

 

[Golumless]

100% correct. If we really, really wanted Phillipou then we could have made it Happen.

I actually have a more cynical theory. I wonder if the AFL wanted Bowes out of GC for some behavioral reason and Geelong seemed the best place after the success of their Stengle plan. if they dictated that we would give up pick 6 for Rankine, the it would explain why we came out and offered it so early in the process.

As we know, if the AFL fear bad press, they will manipulate any situation to minimize it regardless of the negative effect on fair competition. The interference with the proposed trade of Luke Dunstan to us so the Saints could free up cap space for Brad Crouch because the Vic press didn’t want us to have picks 1 and 2 is a great example. Or suspending Dean Bailey while he was coaching us for aparently single handedly tanking for pick 1 When at Melbourne Is another. Then of course changing the rules purely so GC could trade pick 7 and Bowes to free up cap space is the latest example. There are so many examples of us rolling over when the AFL really want us to do something That this isn’t really a conspiracy theory.

Cynical, but unlikely. I think it's just a case of Bowes being forced out for cap issues and decided to gun for a premiership when Geelong announced their interest. Equally, I think we gave up pick 6 for Rankine because we didn't really care about this draft (and it was a polarised draft in the leadup), seeing we spent a lot of our time trading out of it and only traded back in when a couple of kids slid further than we expected (seemingly, seeing we engineered ways back for Dowling and Bond).

There are a lot of examples of the AFL being s**t scared of teams being stuck at the bottom for long periods of time.

 

[Crow till I die]

Cynical, but unlikely. I think it's just a case of Bowes being forced out for cap issues and decided to gun for a premiership when Geelong announced their interest. Equally, I think we gave up pick 6 for Rankine because we didn't really care about this draft (and it was a polarised draft in the leadup), seeing we spent a lot of our time trading out of it and only traded back in when a couple of kids slid further than we expected (seemingly, seeing we engineered ways back for Dowling and Bond).

There are a lot of examples of the AFL being s**t scared of teams being stuck at the bottom for long periods of time.

What a cop out..its like going into Haggle and paying full price for a rug or whatever because we didn't care about getting the best deal. Every draft pick we have is an asset that should be treated as such. We should be looking to extract every last drip of value from them, not just flipping the best ones away because

 

[Golumless]

What a cop out..its like going into Haggle and paying full price for a rug or whatever because we didn't care about getting the best deal. Every draft puck we have is an asset that should be treated as such. We should be looking to extract every last drip of value from them, not just flipping the best ones away because

It was an asset and it bought 10 years of production from an elite forward, which Rankine was in the backend of last year, and has started his time for Adelaide. This talk about "better deals" is just fantasy land stuff.

Equally stating we didn't care about the top 10 of 2022 is correct because we refused to pay more to work our way back, and ultimately trading back into the draft to be able to pick up Phillipou should be expected to cost pick 6 and our 2023 1st. We didn't see anyone in that draft in our hitting range as worthwhile for an extra first round pics, and really, that's a reasonable position seeing how little players are worth that (and draftees are horrifically overrated - case in point, this thread existing).

 

[Hodgy]

What a cop out..its like going into Haggle and paying full price for a rug or whatever because we didn't care about getting the best deal. Every draft pick we have is an asset that should be treated as such. We should be looking to extract every last drip of value from them, not just flipping the best ones away because

Exactly. Also, if we didn’t rate this draft then it confirms that we don’t believe our midfield needs any upgrading at all, which defies belief. Pick 5 this year would have got us our choice of McKenzie, Gimbey, Jye Clark, Phillipou or Hollands. If our club really thinks that none of those would improve our side then we have very serious list management problems.

 

[BunjiMac]

Exactly. Also, if we didn’t rate this draft then it confirms that we don’t believe our midfield needs any upgrading at all, which defies belief. Pick 5 this year would have got us our choice of McKenzie, Gimbey, Jye Clark, Phillipou or Hollands. If our club really thinks that none of those would improve our side then we have very serious list management problems.

This is exactly what our club thinks.

Or more specifically it's what our list management and recruitment team think.

 

[Crow till I die]

It was an asset and it bought 10 years of production from an elite forward, which Rankine was in the backend of last year, and has started his time for Adelaide. This talk about "better deals" is just fantasy land stuff.

Equally stating we didn't care about the top 10 of 2022 is correct because we refused to pay more to work our way back, and ultimately trading back into the draft to be able to pick up Phillipou should be expected to cost pick 6 and our 2023 1st. We didn't see anyone in that draft in our hitting range as worthwhile for an extra first round pics, and really, that's a reasonable position seeing how little players are worth that (and draftees are horrifically overrated - case in point, this thread existing).

Cool..we bought a very nice rug but for the full asking price at Haggle. Don't take me wrong, rankine was a must get...but in my opinion we did not extract maximum value from that pick 5 and i won't change my opinion until i hear from the club exactly how hard they tried to split it to still get GC a good pick or 2 but grab extra draft collateral....especially since the very same GC gave pick 7 in the very same draft to geelong for taking bowes contract

 

[Boundryump]

Don't need anymore defenders?

 

[MRB37]

You are right they were lucky but they still worked a big multiclub trade to get their men...could you see us roping in 4 other sides to nab acouple of primary targets if we had ports draft hand?

We did when we got Brad Crouch originally the trade involved us, GWS, Fremantle and Hawthorn. There were multiple versions of that Crouch trade that got rejected, involving multiple teams, until we finally worked it out directly between us and GWS. Hell, we just got involved in a 4 team trade in 2021 with us, Melbourne, St Kilda and the Bulldogs to get the picks required to satisfy Sydney with Jordan Dawson.

So yea, we would if the club had a locked in target they wanted to get and that was the way to get them.

 

[Cleric]

Rankine was worth everything he cost us. He was more than just he does on the field. The club wanted another Eddie Betts type player that brings people to the ground.

I also think that Phillipou was a bit strange in how he handled himself. I think I remember at one point he said that he preferred to go to a Victorian club.

 

[Eagleboy2011]

Rankine was worth everything he cost us. He was more than just he does on the field. The club wanted another Eddie Betts type player that brings people to the ground.

I also think that Phillipou was a bit strange in how he handled himself. I think I remember at one point he said that he preferred to go to a Victorian club.

 

[MsTopG]

Rankine was worth everything he cost us. He was more than just he does on the field. The club wanted another Eddie Betts type player that brings people to the ground.

I also think that Phillipou was a bit strange in how he handled himself. I think I remember at one point he said that he preferred to go to a Victorian club.

Maybe he wasn't thinking of that Victorian club being the saints.

 

[1970crow]

Its quite simple..we have a fairly conservative approach to trading. If a Rankine or Dawson is there and we get the feel they want to come home and it helped they both didn't want port, we can get a deal done - but thats the end of it, our team is happy.

FYI, Richmond realised they needed more midfield strength, so did they just settle for Hopper? - nah, they got Hopper AND Taranto in the one trade period.

Port had some middling F1's and JHF was a pick 1 under contract that wanted to come home. Did port get discouraged when trying to land him with North wanting a very high return?..nah, they bend a 5 club trade scenario after the 6 club one they engineered fell over and got their guy AND slid Rioli in there too.

Quite simply, other clubs seem to have people there that won't take no for an answer, we don't

that doesn't explain the gulf between negotiating tactics for Dawson and Rankine. Whilst negotiating for Dawson, we put every worthwhile pick for 2 years on the table for JHF. With Rankine, even though 5 100% gets him in the national draft, we still paid that and more to Suns even though they were burning 7 to Cats as a salary dump. There's no doubt there was an outside influence that drove those 2 very different negotiating strategies.

 

[1970crow]

Cynical, but unlikely. I think it's just a case of Bowes being forced out for cap issues and decided to gun for a premiership when Geelong announced their interest. Equally, I think we gave up pick 6 for Rankine because we didn't really care about this draft (and it was a polarised draft in the leadup), seeing we spent a lot of our time trading out of it and only traded back in when a couple of kids slid further than we expected (seemingly, seeing we engineered ways back for Dowling and Bond).

There are a lot of examples of the AFL being s**t scared of teams being stuck at the bottom for long periods of time.

that not caring about this draft was pure fantasy created by Kristof to retrofit a decision that went against his strong pre-deal views. Has become an urban myth now. His evidence was clubs trading out of the draft, ignoring that clubs are trading into the draft. Phillipou went at 10 and we traded back in late, yeh, crap draft that nobody cared about.

 

[plugger59]

Bowes would also have been comfortably a best 22 player so even if we had to pay him $1m per year it wouldn't have been a total loss of money.

I would have been comfortable giving up $1.6 to $1.8m of salary cap space over 4 years to nab Bowes and Rankine for zero draft capital

But it was a salary dump at $700k a year on his long-term contract. If he was prepared to renegotiate his contract down then the Suns would have kept him and pick 7. And we know that paying 700 a year for another player was never going to be an issue for Geelong - even with Henry and co coming in.