Toast The Curious Case of Jack Darling

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WCE_phil said:
Darling carried a back injury basically from round 3-4 onwards. It settled over the course of the year but was particularly bad before the bye. I think if the club didn't have such a huge injury list he wouldn't have played a lot of the season.

His stats don't look great but I still think he had a decent year. Was double teamed most of the time, undersized, playing under duress and still managed to halve most contests.

Think also about the number and quality of inside 50's the club had and him being even more of a decoy than normal and it is what it is.

I think people are judging him really harshly due to the fact we have had an embarrassment of riches in F50 for so long and he has been battered as an undersized KPF for 13 years. Eventually even iron jacks body is going to break down.
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He ends up getting double teamed because he has no pace anymore to get any separation on his opponent and someone just rolls back. Any amount of body pressure and he can’t mark and struggles to even bring the ball to ground in one on one’s where he can’t mark it..

It looks more and more that the games gone past him.


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Goroyals22 said:
He ends up getting double teamed because he has no pace anymore to get any separation on his opponent and someone just rolls back. Any amount of body pressure and he can’t mark and struggles to even bring the ball to ground in one on one’s where he can’t mark it..

It looks more and more that the games gone past him.


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I found this year he did a lot of stationary calls for the ball (by putting 1 hand in the air) to be bombed to him whilst standing next to an opponent (instead of running).
 
He's had his fair share of controversies and he is past his peak for sure but no dud manages to play 250 AFL games and kick 500 goals. Get the feeling 2024 is his last but he can retire knowing he has a flag, overtaken Sumich (hopefully) in terms of goals kicked for West Coast and that his heir apparent is looking quite good.

I will always be grateful for his possibly match-winning third quarter in the 2018 Grand Final.
 

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The wily weagle said:
I think its time to face the truth about Jack, and that is even though he teases us that he has the potential to tear a game apart, he never will.
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Jack Darling’s third quarter

How many people were ready to write Darling off at half time?

At the long break, Darling had been a complete non-factor, with his opponent, Jeremy Howe, arguably amongst the best players on ground at that point. But the third quarter… well, it was now or never for Darling, and he decided it was NOW!

There must have been some demons on his shoulders, whispering in his ears after his last Grand Final failure. What would they have been whispering? You don’t belong in Grand Finals? You’ve got a track record here? Remember how you failed last time?

To see Darling shrug those demons off in the third quarter was so gratifying, and it must have been such a relief for him. He clunked mark after mark as he continually presented as a marking target for the Eagles. With pressure coming from all angles, he rallied to lead all players in contested marks on the day, totalling four. Many will talk about Cox clunking marks in the fourth quarter, and we’ll get to him, but when West Coast needed him, Darling stepped to the fore and proved he did belong, that his track record didn’t matter, and that his failure last time was just that – last time.
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Forward Press said:
He's had his fair share of controversies and he is past his peak for sure but no dud manages to play 250 AFL games and kick 500 goals. Get the feeling 2024 is his last but he can retire knowing he has a flag, overtaken Sumich (hopefully) in terms of goals kicked for West Coast and that his heir apparent is looking quite good.

I will always be grateful for his possibly match-winning third quarter in the 2018 Grand Final.
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And the best player in the comp for half of 2018, was beast mode for all those games.
 
Goroyals22 said:
He ends up getting double teamed because he has no pace anymore to get any separation on his opponent and someone just rolls back. Any amount of body pressure and he can’t mark and struggles to even bring the ball to ground in one on one’s where he can’t mark it..

It looks more and more that the games gone past him.


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The bloke had a fractured ankle at the end of the pre-season (yet somehow got back by rnd 2), a back injury all season and a broken arm. I don't think it's fair to write him off as physically cooked, let's give him a clean pre-season and see what he can do.
 
Mop said:
Definitely worth the draft pick we took him at and then some.
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Darling is in the top couple of players from the 2010 draft.

Comparatively there is:
Luke Parker - Pick 40 (273 games, 196 goals, 2016 AA, 3 x B&F)
Jack Darling - Pick 26 (277 games, 510 goals, 2019 AA)
Tom Lynch - Pick 11 (216 games, 456 goals, 2016 AA, 1 x B&F)
Andrew Gaff - Pick 4 (275 games, 83 goals, 2015 & 2018 AA, 1 x B&F)
Dion Prestia - Pick 9 (212 games, 70 goals, 1 x B&F)
Isaac Smith - Pick 19 (280 games, 205 goals)
Brodie Smith - Pick 14 (225 games, 67 goals, 2014 AA)
Dyson Heppell - Pick 8 (235 games, 67 goals, 2014 AA)
Tom Liberatore - Pick 41 (216 games, 81 goals)
Jeremy Howe - Pick 33 (231 games, 98 goals)
David Swallow - Pick 1 (219 games, 99 goals, 1 x B&F)

I'd probably place him 2nd behind Parker. I think he's statistically a level above the next best players in Lynch, Gaff and Prestia.
Considering that of the other 10 best players from the draft 7 were picked ahead of him I think he's an absolute steal.
 
Rowan18 said:
The bloke had a fractured ankle at the end of the pre-season (yet somehow got back by rnd 2), a back injury all season and a broken arm. I don't think it's fair to write him off as physically cooked, let's give him a clean pre-season and see what he can do.
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Then there was was last year… oh but vaccine excuse and this and that… what about the year before that.. was his back again wasn’t it.. there’s always an excuse and a hope he will somehow rediscover form from 5 years ago now… sorry he is stuck a fork in him done as a regular average performer… he doesn’t even have defensive pressure anymore to fall back on…

He has been a good footballer.. has been being the term
 
Goroyals22 said:
Then there was was last year… oh but vaccine excuse and this and that… what about the year before that.. was his back again wasn’t it.. there’s always an excuse and a hope he will somehow rediscover form from 5 years ago now… sorry he is stuck a fork in him done as a regular average performer… he doesn’t even have defensive pressure anymore to fall back on…

He has been a good footballer.. has been being the term
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He kicked 42 goals in 2021, that's a pretty good effort
 

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We love to hang s**t on Jack but most AFL clubs would sell the farm for a key forward who’s kicked 500+ career goals playing as a number 2 forward for their entire career.

When you look at the numbers players like Charlie Dixon, Matt Taberner, and Joe Daniher have put up in comparable time frames, we’ve been very blessed.

He’s put up similar numbers to Jeremy Cameron and Taylor Walker despite those two being the focal points of their attacks.
 
TY24 said:
We love to hang s**t on Jack but most AFL clubs would sell the farm for a key forward who’s kicked 500+ career goals playing as a number 2 forward for their entire career.

When you look at the numbers players like Charlie Dixon, Matt Taberner, and Joe Daniher have put up in comparable time frames, we’ve been very blessed.

He’s put up similar numbers to Jeremy Cameron and Taylor Walker despite those two being the focal points of their attacks.
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If you can find the club that will sell the farm for him go ahead….
 
He is on the wrong side of the hill but Im not writing him off after 1 bad game. So many round here just waiting to plunge the fork into any player older than 26 who has a down day.
I do think this is most likely his last year but reckon he still has some value to offer and prepared to give him a block of 4 or 5 games to show it before replacing him with a Maric of Jilliams. Not that I would blast the MC if they did priorotise youth but he has earned the right to have a bad game now and again and have some faith shown.
 
He’s 3 goals away from drawing level with Sumich for career goals so will soon become our second highest goal scorer

Is comfortably our third best ever KPF behind Kennedy and Sumich despite being the size of a modern day midfielder

Yet for some reason he’s never been truly appreciated

That said, he will come under serious pressure to hold his spot once Flynn returns and Bailey Williams reverts back to a forward/ruck
 
Jack could just as easily play himself back into form, often does.
Didn't he miss a bit of preseason with an injury?
But Gaff's demotion to the Waffle will send a signal to all seniors -
been rarely done by Simmo amongst his faves..
 
Last edited:
His issue is that, at 192cm, he is no longer a Key forward. He has also lost his spring in the air. The games changed and keys are all north of 196, so he has 200cm defenders who have no issue dominating the air.

What simmo should do is put him in the midfield. Remember 2015 GF and hawks throwing roughy in the midfield. Darling would've been a perfect blunt to that

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Wooshaaaa said:
His issue is that, at 192cm, he is no longer a Key forward. He has also lost his spring in the air. The games changed and keys are all north of 196, so he has 200cm defenders who have no issue dominating the air.

What simmo should do is put him in the midfield. Remember 2015 GF and hawks throwing roughy in the midfield. Darling would've been a perfect blunt to that

On Pixel 6 Pro using BigFooty.com mobile app
Click to expand...

Back issues have robbed him of his pace. He can't get separation on the lead anymore and TBH it doesn't look like he even tries to do that much anymore either. You can see how much more readily Waterman can get and maintain that step on the lead these days at more or less the same height as Jack.

It doesn't help that Jack never seems to get a whistle in his favour either. He gets flat out mugged a lot of the time and the defender at least feeling like they have some officiating pressure to stop a guy legally can be a huge boon to making a little space for yourself as a forward.

Hopefully Jack can turn it around but it does have the hallmarks of a West Coast fadeout after 30 at this point.
 
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