I'd be really really worried if it was not for one fact - a new coach, in whom I am placing all my faith he can polish turds into diamonds.

I think this is unfair.

With leadership, structure and proper guidance a good solid player can be very good at this level.

We haven't had that.

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Formerly: Ackland the Wonderkid / Army the Wonderkid / quivering mess / molsey / Tony Lynn Fan Club

I reckon three or four of them will be regulars for many years, but time will tell. I am interested who this raft of young talent is? Yarran, Hendo and Menzel couldn't be bothered and Tom Bell put in and was good but probably won't get better and has dreadful disposal. Hendo walked out, Yarran wasn't interested and could walk next year as a free agent, very talented but no longer young in footy terms and disinterested.

Menzel is talented but didn't raise a sweat this year, maybe we have gone for toughness over talent.

We don't want players who pick and choose when they will try, we want players who care about the team and put in all the time. That's the starting point. Bell was the only one in that category that we have lost and he had no more talent than at least three of the guys we brought in.

....obviously neither checked with ColourMan who would have confirmed to them that neither are correct as Carlton was the only team that seriously chased a player and failed to get their man....

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"They're [REDACTED]'

not only that but we are the only team to lose players too.

nobody loves us.

Dogs made their offer very late in the trade period... so late that it wasn't possible for a medical or anything else because Lobbe was in Vietnam

Tomlinson had his medical with us weeks ago, did the tour etc...

Lobbe also made it clear that he wasn't interested in leaving the Power... and he's still there!

But keep going!

http://m.foxsports.com.au/afl/afl-premiership/afl-draft-2015-carlton-has-the-best-draft-position-based-on-total-draft-points/story-e6frf3e3-1227582423579

Sure there was some disappointment on losing menzel but hey we have 4 picks inside the top 20!!

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Cripps is the man

Who gives a flying f--- about draft points ...

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In WADA we trust

What the list analysis doesnt show is what are we trying to achieve? The fact is with our current list we could have either retained the like of Menzel and the others and tried to incrementally improve through the single allocated pick per round. Even allowing for a majortity of these picks to be succesful it will never build a top 4 squad and if you play all yours cards right right you may end up with a competitive middle fo the road squad (Adelaide, Richmond, Roos etc). These type of teams will never win a flag in their current incarnation.

The other choice is to take a chance and hope to have a super draft like the likes of Geelong (99 & 01) or Hawthorn (01 & 04). The fact is the core of their squads were drafted in a 2-3 drafts in bulk, not incrementally. These clubs largely got lucky, as when you look at their picks in the surrounding years they are largely spuds. The fact is getting it right at the draft takes an enormous amount of luck and you need as many picks as possible to optimise your chance of the bet paying off. SOS has 4 goes this year, and we should follow a similar path next year and hope we come up with the goods. If not, it could get very ugly!

Analysis, like that on The Roar, lack insight and an understanding of what it takes to build a list. It is safe, and too scared of taking chances. Although free agency is changing the market place, luck at the draft is still the only way to get in top end talent (without giving up too much) and more picks in the first round optimise this. By no means is this a recipe for success, but the other ways rarely get you there. There can be short lived gains with tactial advantages in a good team (Eagles this year) but even this tends to be short lived and rely too much on form and injuries. That is another rant though!

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Have I run too far to get home?

I know I'm already over the points system. This league is a shambles.

I like your post SA Blue. But I don't see where we get early picks again next year. Besides Cripps, who would get us a first or even a second rounder? Maybe Gibbs or Docherty?

Gibbs, Jacobs, Menzel, Betts playing for the Crows in 2017 a real possibility.

Plenty of options to trade up into first round: Gibbs, Kruezer (if he plays most games this season), Casboult, later picks for Academy points, PSD, free agents (although I would play this card until we show promise and players want to come not just for big $$$).
One step at a time.

I agree with this.
I think the superdraft approach will work best for us
(but I don't write off the Roos' chances of pinching a flag - they have done very well with keeping their core players. their reliance on Boomer Harvey is a massive question mark though).

We had a chance to take this path during our previous run at the bottom with #1 draft picks, but we failed miserably.
We tried to top up with Brock, Warnock, Johnson, Hadley ..... with Judd as the mega bandaid.
We were going in too many directions at once - topping up with #1s, trading away second rounders, shipping away Kennedy, getting Judd, but not building around Judd.

I feel comfortable that we did the right thing getting Judd - the culture at the time was so bad. We didn't have the spine to to start from scratch with a team filled with young kids. We might have been in limbo for even longer than the Dees were.

Now our bubble has burst, and Judd has gone.
If we were to be successful over the last 10 years, we needed a clear strategy.
Surprise surprise - we didn't.

Finally we have a list manager.
It would be great if we had a larger recruiting team in place around him this year, which will be a critical year in the draft for us - but at least we have a list manager.
The list manager has set a strategy at last.

I hope we stick with the plan.
I don't care if we are bottom 6 for a couple of years - as long as we are constantly moving upward as a squad.
Drafting young players of the same age with talent and hunger is one way to achieve this.

I just wish we had the option to go one step further and trade one of Murphy or Gibbs for high picks, but I don't think that will happen now.

That is the difficult part. That decision will depend on our asseement of this years draft crop. If we believe we have made 3/4 top choices then the requirements for picks is less. If we feel we have made mistakes, there will be some uncomrfortable conversations about players like Gibbs and Docherty.

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Have I run too far to get home?

Will be trickier to get multiple early picks next year, but, we could give the pp compensation angle another shake - and if we go backwards in the WIN LOSS column that'll help our chances of getting the pp - and we should have $ freed up to try and lure a FA, granted they usually don't want to go to a team on the bottom, but maybe we can sell HOPE (ie: we are about to rise on the back of lots of early picks and a young list).

Agreed Casboult & Kreuzer could potentially be worth something.

Could conceivably get a end of first round pp, so we go to the draft with ...

1
19
20
38

And if we can trade a Krezuer for example for, say pick 24, we could package 19 and 20 like we did this year to get an earlier pick, like 11, so we could go to the draft with ...

1
11
24
38

+ get a star FA.

See if we can snag a few 2nd or early 3rd round picks for players like Everitt and Casboult, then bundle them up and trade to the clubs who need points for their Academy kids.

Disagree with this section. No matter what happens in this draft I think we need to continue to seek early draft picks in 2016 and 2017. Our 2014 class is unproven at this point and outside of Cripps we have nothing to show for 2013. Our recent trading has bolstered our playing stocks from the 2011 & 2012 classes, but Jed Lamb is all we have from the 2010 group.

To me we still have a lot of holes and won't be ready to trade for established players, hit free agency hard or move away from the draft for another 3 years. Trade into early picks in 16 & 17 to complement the talent we get this year, develop cripps and the boys from the 11 & 12 drafts (Docherty, Sumner, Kerridge, Buckley, Plowman, Jaksch, Graham) and we might then have a core that we can add to through other means and move away from the draft.

The issue is how do we get into each of the next couple of drafts. It's easy to say we trade away any talent over 25, but we need to be mindful of developing a strong culture too. Casboult, Murphy, Kreuzer, Tuohy, Gibbs, Curnow, Everitt etc can be turned in to early picks, but we have to trade the right ones and keep the ones who will truly lead a young group and improve their development.

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@cecil_anderson

Don't we also have the bulldogs 3rd rounder next year? We could package up the two 3rd rounders for a better pick...

Yeah, it's not as if all the good players start out as draft picks somewhere along the line... Wait - !

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Just because I'm offended, doesn't mean I'm wrong.