Free agents is the best way to pick up A grade players.
Costs you salary cap space and moves you one spot down the draft order.

You might be surprised. Attractive and relevant. This year. The football department hasn't look this organised and professional in a very long time. So when you have the CEO, the Head of Football, the List Managers, the coach and the captain all singing from the same hymn sheet - footballers start to notice and their managers start to take notice too.

But as a footballer - you'd actually be better off coming to Carlton now. And the aforementioned gentlemen are making that known. The pitch to a prospective player looks a hell of a lot better when you're on the cusp of something. They're selling the fact that they think they're on the cusp of something pretty damn good. And they're not doing that just for the likes of Dan Butler and Tom Papley - neither of which will need much enticing. They're casting the net pretty wide to try and entice someone before they come out of contract next year.

Right now - Carlton are a player managers dream. Robbie D'Orazio (part of Connors Sports Management) knows exactly what Collingwood need to pony up for Brodie Grundy because the Blues have already tabled what they think he's worth. Same goes for Lachie Whitfield, same goes for Braydon Fiorini, Brayden Sier, Oliver Florent. All out of contract soonish, all wanting to play finals, all wanting to get paid what they're worth. We can't sell them finals....but we can sell FOMO. And you don't want to get to the end of your career and say 'Probably should have signed with Carlton when they were chasing me'.

Those moments don't come along very often. Neither does an organised and happy Carlton. Best to strike while the iron is hot.

TBH, I have a more positive view about Betts and I’m more optimistic about Teague.
However, I think this (remaining reserved about Teague atm) is a perfectly reasonable position.
Picking a head coach is one of the toughest jobs to get right - even the super coaches don’t always succeed in all conditions at different clubs or even at the same club at different times.
Teague has done an amazing job, no doubt.
BUT, as others have pointed out, he has picked some low hanging fruit (e.g. Murphy and Ed into the middle) and probably benefited from a change in tone.
The question remains about how he goes when he has to build a more robust game plan and needs the players to execute plans a bit more than just play free. And also, once other coaches start to work us out a bit more.
IMO, one of the strengths he displayed this year was responding tactically on game day which also showed good planning as well as smarts.
So, I’m positive and think he will be great.
But we won’t know for sure for a while. (Even Bolton got a bounce in his first year...)

FWIW... according to Sam Edmund (Carlton supporter) on SEN

Liddle was working on Ellis back in Feb then got Brad Lloyd on board. SOS then recently canned it.

Teague wants Betts on board but again, SOS resistant.

Upshot was there's a breakdown in chain of command, apparently.

Liddle & Lloyd are the only ones out of line here. The CEO in particular.

Not that you’d give any oxygen to a haircut like Edmund’s.

FWIW... according to Sam Edmund (Carlton supporter) on SEN

Liddle was working on Ellis back in Feb then got Brad Lloyd on board. SOS then recently canned it.

Teague wants Betts on board but again, SOS resistant.

Upshot was there's a breakdown in chain of command, apparently.

FWIW... according to Sam Edmund (Carlton supporter) on SEN

Liddle was working on Ellis back in Feb then got Brad Lloyd on board. SOS then recently canned it.

Teague wants Betts on board but again, SOS resistant.

Upshot was there's a breakdown in chain of command, apparently.

tencentpiece said:
Ellis camp started demanding more money late in the piece (after it became apparent that we wouldn't get cogs), that's why we dropped interest. There is a chance that we will take another look now but SOS isn't happy that what was basically a hand shake deal tried to get changed at the last minute due to the perception we had more money to spend. Really a matter of finding out how much Ellis had to do with that and how much was his management team.

I'd be happy with Martin, Viney and Butler.

Papley would be a nice bonus too...

I bet there's more than one player's manager SOS is discussing but are still in Finals:
Some of them may be calls to SOS from managers, rather than the standard SOS enquiries. Destination Club and all.

West Coast ... Petrocelli and (another big name squeezed out for Kelly) ?
Richmond ... Butler, some other? possibly Ellis (FA) ?
Brisbane ... Cutler, Christensen, other?
Collingwood ... Elliot (FA), De Goey, Grundy (he may have a fallout next year), Other?
Geelong ...no one I really care for TBA

GWS ... anything can fall out from there, Williams, Tomlison (FA)? SOS wants a big win from them?

30 more days before finals finish.

I am so excited from our 2020 prospects.
I really expected us in this position last year.
Better late than never.
I have to remind myself the majority on our list are still quality kids.

I'm still expecting to net Martin, Papley, Cameron and a big midfield fish (Wines, Viney, Williams, types).
Papley is a big fish, Betts like, but small forwards.
Betts to add the cream to the cake for all the good publicity he brings plus 30 goals he can bring.
Butler is testing us and vice versa. I doubt SOS is promising the world.

Can never have enough good players
Injuries happen.

Success is determined by the quality of the bottom 6 in the 22 that run out each week.
We need 24+yo's to improve our experience needed for a finals profile in 2 years.

The list is getting deeper, and richer.

bondi tell us more about this romantic pubicity..... do you have a link?

Thanks, but when one has to explain the joke it's over