So SOS wasted first round picks on Cuningham, SPS, Dow, O'Brien, Stocker, Kemp and Philp.
Throw in Mcreadie, Fisher, Polson, Williamson, Finbar, Ramsay, Schumaker and BSOS as national draft selections.
Add the GWS rejects that his ego couldn't allow to be seen as failures including Bugg, Garlett, Lamb, Phillips, Sumner, Marchbank, Pickett, Setterfield, Palmer.
Not to forget our expert trading to get Smedts and Lang. (which netted Geelong Gryan Meiers)

Many of those selections would be filling our crucial 25-28 year old group where our depth is poor.
But yeah, it's Nick Austins fault that we have no depth.

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Looking forward to seeing our potential realised.

How is it working out for Carlton.
When SOS left the trajectory was up.
Since Austin arrived the trajectory was down.

A few on that list are still getting regular games at the club they went to. Plus SOS was list manager for longer than Austin so of course the numbers would be greater.
SOS brought in Walsh Curnow Mackay JSOS Weiters Williams pretty handy bunch.

Give me an Austin success story. Just one will do.

We were flying in 2023
Had a set back though injury in 2024 and Austin blew the place up went full rebuild mode again and now we are screwed for 5 to 10 years.

What made it possibly worse. This year he went out and got the players we needed last year

You are smart enough to know that


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If you allow the Government to change the Laws in an emergency
They will create an Emergency to change the Laws

Williams.

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"The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter" - Winston Churchill.

SOS was sacked in 2019.
In 2020 we finished 11th. In 2021 we finished 13th.
It took us 4 years to make finals after we got rid of him.
Under Austins list management we won 2 finals in 2023 and made the finals again in 2024.
We've had one down year because we got rid of SOS' perennially injured players which as you rightly said, impacted our depth. (Cunningham, Marchbank, Martin)
Let's see how 2026 goes before breaking out the razor blades.

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Looking forward to seeing our potential realised.

Hewett and Haynes.
1st and 4th in the B&F this year?
Both for zero draft picks.
Or did you only want one?

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Looking forward to seeing our potential realised.

That's it
That is the best you can come it with.
4 draft and trade period and That's it.

What I love about posters like you and Bondi is you are passionate about the club.
It is the previous guy was shit and they new guy will be so much better.

It's not a bad trait to have being positive about the future. But sometimes in life you got to call it for what it is.
We had an opportunity and stuffed it.
We are now a bottom feeder club developing talent for the top sides to pick at our carcass.
We have become the new GWS and Gold Coast.
JSOS and TDK said if I ain't winning a flag I might as go and get paid more.
Charlie said no i want to win one so contacted clubs in the window.

We were in the window. Players like Houston were reaching out to us to come.

Austin gave the bird to the players the coach and the supporters and played the grand final in October and November.

The affect of what he did last year have been catastrophic for the football club.

Sometimes you just have to call it for what it is one gigantic cock up.

Sure we can all be positive but we are bottom six in 2026 with our eye on some 18 year old. Whilst Walsh goes on to wearing hoops

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If you allow the Government to change the Laws in an emergency
They will create an Emergency to change the Laws

You asked for one success story. "One will do".
Then you complain 2 examples aren't enough.

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Looking forward to seeing our potential realised.

I would add Cooper Lord as a success story simply because he was #9 in a mid season rookie draft and is now looking like he'll be a 100+ gamer in navy blue. Don't recall SOS ever getting that kind of value; the fact that you list a couple of #1 ND picks and a father-son in his career highlights speaks volumes. He deserves credit for H, CC & TDK but aside from that he was utterly woeful and his inability to tell a midfielder from a pig's arsehole contributed heavily to our inability to build on the late-00s draft bonanza.

Every recruiter has successes and failures. The success of the club doesn't solely rely on the recruiter. It is the development/fitness group, the medical department and the coaching staff that also have an input.

A number of years ago I spoke to some recruiters from Melbourne Storm. I asked them why had Melbourne Storm had so much success. Is it down to the recruiting, is it the coach in Craig Bellamy or is it getting generational talent in Smith, Slater and Cronk or is it all three? They replied that it was indeed all three. A month ago I met John Ribot who founded Melbourne Storm. I told him about that discussion and I asked him whether there was a fourth factor that being the administration. He said that Melbourne Storm had always had a good administration.

Most supporters are hopeful after the trade and draft period that the club is going in the right direction. Most would have been happy last year when we got rid of the injury prone players. It is only in hindsight you realise that it left a few holes. So we learn from our mistakes. We fix it up and we start again. We have to live in hope because the alternative is not too much fun.

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Jagga

He has a terrible memory.

Some still don't get it.
Players are walking out the door because they don't want to be part of another rebuild.

Rebuilding takes years and is very rarely successful.

If you want the team to have the best success you need to hang onto the talent you have and bring more in.

You can't keep going to the draft it doesn't work.

How many times do you want to go down this track until you realise it is a waste of time.

BV mentioned Austin success stories they weren't draft picks

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If you allow the Government to change the Laws in an emergency
They will create an Emergency to change the Laws

Sydney, we just brought in 368 games' experience from your namesake alone

Sydney has a point. Our players this year felt let down by depth and game plan. They have jumped ship because they don’t buy what we have been selling. I hope we don’t have a Walsh walking but I have no doubt Geelong are sweet talking nice things in his ear. If you want to ignore all that and play happy club. that’s fine, but don’t blame posters for raising the obvious.

We blame drafting, we blame culture, we blame trading, we blame players skills, we blame development, we blame football department management and coaching. We have been weak in every single area and yet this club has had NFI how to fix any of it for 30 years?

Let’s hope our new white night can turn things around, because it’s close to breaking point.
The best part of all, is posters calling out others for raising these issues as negative. That too me is the poorest excuse yet.

And lost our goal to goal line. That’s the point. We have reduced our depth and quality.

Sorry, for some reason I thought we were comparing SOS to Austin

Yep SOS was a pretty crapola list manager.

Austin was appointed in 2020.

Our drafts in his reign. Make up your own minds.

2024 National Draft
Pick 3: Jagga Smith *
Pick 40: Harry O'Farrell
Pick 43: Ben Camporeale *
Pick 54: Lucas Camporeale


Note: Given bids later picks 'move' i.e. O'Farrell pick was originally pick 38


2023 National Draft
Pick 29: Ashton Moir Plympton / Glenelg (SANFL)
Pick 34: Billy Wilson Dandenong Stingrays / Dromana FC


2022 National Draft
Pick 11: Oliver Hollands Murray Bushrangers / Wodonga Bulldogs (VCFL).
Pick 30: Lachlan Cowan Tasmanian Devils (TAS), North Launceston (TAS), Devonport (TAS).
Pick 32: Jaxon Binns Berwick (VCFL) / Caulfield Grammar / Dandenong Stingrays (TAC Cup).
Pick 47: Harry Lemmey * West Adelaide (SANFL) / Blackwood FC.

Note Cincotta and O'Keeffe were added as SSP selections for 2023...


2021 National Draft
Pick 27: Jesse Motlop, South Fremantle / South Coogee JFC / ​Aquinas College (WA).


2020 National Draft
Pick 37: Corey Durdin, Central Districts / Golden Grove
Pick 41: Jack Carroll, East Fremantle / Chapman Valley

Brian Waldron says hi .

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All my dangerous friends

“Players are walking out the door because they don't want to be part of another rebuild.”

“They have jumped ship because they don’t buy what we have been selling.”


TDK was made an offer he would have been an idiot to refuse. No other club offered anywhere near it and we would have been insane to match it. He’s a good player but he’s still a long way from great. Will he ever be great? Maybe. Maybe not. But if we’d bet the farm on that and screwed our list for the next eight years we’d all be screaming.

Silvagni likewise was offered well above his market value. Collingwood offered about the same as us. Daddy offered him a superannuation package that will likely burn his new club. He played 128 games in nine years and only recently found a position that suited him before getting injured again. With O’Farrell and Dean coming through and an unreliable body who wouldn’t take a guaranteed $850k in 2030?

Curnow is a very talented player but has always been conditional. How many times have you seen him drag his team over the line? If he had Jeremy Cameron’s football intelligence, enthusiasm and second efforts he’d be the best player in the league. Instead he does stupid shit multiple times a game and let us down in the big moments too often. This is a supposed marquee player who’s played in three finals and never kicked more than a single goal in any of them. He’s probably won us more games heading to the last line of defence than by kicking clutch goals in the last quarter. He may have won two Colemans but I was always a fan of trying him at CHB and leaving Harry up forward. At least in the backline his laziness would have been fully exposed rather than watching him do a half-arsed lead and then throw his hands in the air over and over.

With TDK and Silvagni there was absolutely nothing we could do when they were getting ridiculous offers by a club with a list manager with a grudge who is pushing his new club off a cliff.

With Curnow we could have held firm and kept a guy who’s never fully realised his true talent due to laziness and a lack of professionalism but instead got a return that gives us huge flexibility over the next couple of years including picking up Cody Walker who, if we didn’t pick him up next year would see supporters calling for Austin’s head.

If I was in Austin’s position I would have made exactly the same call on all three of them.

It’s too soon to judge him on his total performance as a list manager but blaming him for any of the above is ridiculous.

We should be applauding that he held his nerve.

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“When a clown moves into a palace, he doesn't become a king. The palace turns into a circus.”
Turkish Proverb

Do you honestly think if we were in a position to win a flag contesting finals those players would have still taken the offers.
You are dreaming if you think that.

Look around the league. Merret wanted out , Draper departed ,Oscar Allen, Petracca, Oliver and Jy Simpkin tried to get out.

They are all playing in sides that are shit and the players want success.

TDK and JSOS thought if I am not going to win flag I might as well cash in.

Top sides for years have been ripping the hearts out of lower sides. We used to be that side we were the masters of it.
We were a nasty club that pushed the boundaries. We are now Wokeville playing by the rules and being an obliging nice club.

The club is doing exactly what the AFL wants it to do by embracing the draft and becoming a feeder club to prop up its favourites.

Essendon* is the same and Melbourne and North and Richmond had been for years.

Stkilda has said stuff that we are sick of it and the Northern clubs have changed their strategy.

Adelaide went out and topped up.
Freo is trying to do the same.


We are giving away our top line players and making it easy for them


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_________________
If you allow the Government to change the Laws in an emergency
They will create an Emergency to change the Laws