We had a diabolical year. Absolutely terrible

Yet I see some young talent
Weitering
McKay
Curnow
Cripps
Docherty
Marchbank
SPS
Fisher
Williamson
Dow
Obrien
Kennedy
Pickett
Cunningham
Macreadie
Pick 1

Others
Plowman
Jones
Murphy

But can the coaches and High performance team pull it all together.

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Go Blues

Had this article pop up in the FB feed. Not bad

https://themongrelpunt.com/afl/2018/8/2 ... ew-carlton

Good article. Particularly like the comment regarding Fasolo. Good idea to use our second round picks to trade up. Still struggle to find a valid reason for bringing in Mitch McGovern. Our focus must be midfielders surely.

Yes, midfielders, midfielders and midfielders.
Fasolo does not excite me at all.

We got to get Matthew Kennedy fit and on the park for heaven's sake. It was supposed to be Gibbs out, Kennedy in.

Goody. There are 3 seasons a year. We excel in 2 of them - off and pre.
Now that the bad bit is over the next 6 months should be pleasant viewing.

If we get McGovern and retain Rowe, I could see Jones having some currency. The Pies are desperate for a tall defender.

I do look forward to the middle part being the most exciting part again.

_________________
WADA medical director Dr Alan Vernec describes Essendon* FC drug case as biggest scandal in team sport the world of sport has seen. #WC2WB

#GUILTY

McGovern , Libba , Shiel and Walsh would be a nice turnover if SOS can get it done.

Get Doc on the park (all-Australian half-back don't forget).
Get a full season of Matthew Kennedy (grunt relief for Crippa).
Get a much better game plan (aka more like 2016/17).

We should win at least 6, more like 8 games. Our list does not suck as bad as our results would indicate.

P.S. I'd skip Libba. We need line breakers, we already have Cripps and Kennedy and Ed inside.

We have gone down the quantity path the last few years to get us some mature bodies and to take some pressure off the young players. They were brought in cheaply to serve a purpose but unfortunately, there was no diamond in the rough and no Liam Jones of 2017. The list is long.

I would be happy to trade for McGovern and some one like Shiel and leave it at that. If any player we trade for this off season is not a lock in our best 22 then let's not get them. No more fringe players from other clubs. I get the why but we are now past that era.

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Koperek.

This.

Improved – Players who are better than they were 12 months ago
Ciaran Byrne
Patrick Cripps
Charlie Curnow
Harry McKay
Tom De Koning
Paddy Dow
Zac Fisher
Lochie O'Brien
Pat Kerr
A Schumacher

Your Excused – Players whose output is in line with what they were doing 12 months ago
Ed Curnow
Kade Simpson
Dale Thomas
Caleb Marchbank
Jed Lamb
Matt Lobbe

Injured – Injured for too many games to assess whether they have improved, stalled or gone backwards
David Cuningham
Sam Docherty
Jarrod Garlett
Matt Kennedy
Matt Kreuzer
Kym LeBois (R)
Harrison Macreadie
Lachie Plowman
Tom Williamson
Liam Jones

Stalled – No improvement, but haven’t gone backwards
SPS
Jack Silvagni
Jarrod Pickett
Cameron Polson
Darcy Lang
Andrew Philips

Gone backwards – Not as good as they were 12 months ago
Jacob Weitering
Aaron Mullet
Marc Murphy
Matt Wright

Thanks and goodbye – Please make room on the list for someone else
Levi Casboult – trade for a third round pick
J Glass-McCasker (R) – delisted
Nick Graham – delisted
Sam Rowe – delisted/retired
Matt Shaw (R) – delisted
Alex Silvagni (R) – retired
Sam Kerridge – delisted
Cam O’Shea – I know you have a contract but please retire, please

All the following players would want to have injury free significant years or show real improvement next year to remain on the list in 2020.
Pickett, Garlett, Lang, Mullet, LeBois, Cuningham, Jones and Philips

Biggest concerns above are Weitering and SPS. I am a big believer in Weitering after watching his first season. Was then tried as a forward to his detriment and now seems unsure of himself. Has not been helped out by the long term injuries to 80% of the backline for sure, and is still only 20 so plenty of time. I hope he is kept in the backline and allowed to continue the development and natural ability he showed in his first year (with a regular bunch of team mates around him).

Also think SPS will be a fine player, but he is the type that needs Cripps, Kennedy and Docherty around him to show his talents.

I think Mullet and O’Shea have contracts along with Levi otherwise I would like to see them turned over for other mature players.

Which brings me to our mature recruits. Our recruitment from the draft has been, in my opinion, very good. Our mature recruits have been very poor. Smedts, Palmer, O’Shea, Kerridge etc. There would have been constraints to what we could get (trying to keep to 95% of cap, limited players wanting to come to us, possible salary cap dumps to get other players from the same club) but I think we have failed to identify any quality lower league players and our recycled mature players have been very poor for us even as depth players come first 18 due to injuries. A review of and investment in this recruitment area, if it hasn’t happened already, needs to happen. No more replacing crap with crap. That time has passed. We have banked enough of the salary cap, use it on a FA or trade target. The kids have shown they will start standing up more, target quality players to fill that gap left by years of poor drafting 2008-2014 and having to sell the older talent we did have for the kids we now have. Can we can convince them to come!?

Credit to the environment the club has created that at the moment that no one is looking to leave, but another year like this and a few young players will start getting sick of weekly beltings.

Depending on the trade period, hoping we add an experienced quality player (or two) into the team, I think we will know after next year if the clubs strategy will pay off in 2020 and beyond or whether we sold the cow for magic beans.

Out Gibbs, Henderson, Bell, Touhy, Yarran etc for draft picks. Pick lots of kids. Try and get a core of kids together like Geelong, Hawthorn previously and Richmond now. Keep them together and on the field, then add from trades and FA by banking cap. Have sustained success over many years and an ability to keep playing finals consistently by topping up and selling your first round pick. Get the development, fitness and medical rooms sorted. Have a coach figure out the next small improvement to the game that provides an edge. Cross your fingers.

So already we’ve heavily been linked to these guys
(and my own opinion of what we'd be giving up)

- McGovern (PP)
- Shiel (2019 1st)
- Setterfield (Early 2nd)
- Fasolo (FA)
- Liberatore (FA)
- Brodie (Early 2nd)
- Scrimshaw (Late 2nd / Early 3rd)
- H Goddard (DFA)
- Lonie (FA)

Anyone I’ve missed?

Assuming for a second we got all of these guys (and they replaced our current dead weight), it'd be a massive improvement on our current list, would help us in areas where we are deficient and move our age profile in the right direction.

The big concern of this list is the injury history, with more than a few of those guys having experienced long-term or recurring issues. We’d better be damn sure we’ve got our shit together in this area in 2019.

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WADA medical director Dr Alan Vernec describes Essendon* FC drug case as biggest scandal in team sport the world of sport has seen. #WC2WB

#GUILTY

TDK and Setterfield, bringing 80’s back to Carlton! That could be the trigger for the glorious 20’s.

x2

Our pp should be enough for Shiel even M Crouch (which i would be a great get) but too much for McGovern.

he's an upgrade on both Rowe and Jones and only 23
or
he allows charlie to move up the ground and he plays inside 50 with mckay

We wanted (and received) 2 first round picks for a contracted player that turned 29 before the season started.
And you think pick 12 in a stronger draft is enough for a contracted Dylan Shiel or a contracted 23 year old All Australian and reigning B&F in Matt Crouch?

It's great to play hard ball but let's attempt to be slightly realistic.

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Looking forward to seeing our potential realised.

i think we should keep our first rd pick for next year.Give our pp for shiel if they say no we walk away and keep building from the draft.I do not like the idea of not having a 1st rd pick (to valuable) if our first was like 14 /15 like hawks yes swap the pick for a player.

Weitering was so confused to his role and it showed when our wonder match commitee decided 4 tall defenders was the go. Once we lost some talks Weitering had a role and was a much better player. More poorly managed than having gone backwards.