Synbad wrote:
jbee, tell me if im wrong but were going to get high draft picks no matter...
whats important is developing.
Do you think we wont get high draft picks???
Ive outlined my plan over three years.you dont recruit duds.
You dtaft as much talent as possible and develop them to the modern game.
Lance???He isnt a modern footballer so you trade him.
Saddington isnt a quality player so you dont recruit him.. same with McLaren and Co.
If the best possible player you can draft is say Cam Wood.. (ruckman 4 years ??) you recruit him... cos its 4 years and we havent had a ruckman..!!!
You dont play players who wont be in the long term plan of this footy club.. (They shouldnt even be here.. im talking about Lance .. im talking about McLaren.. im talking about Saddington0 None of those players are good enough or what we need to be taking up development spots from Russell... For example we dont Saddington to be a HBF or Lance.. wea want Russell and Bower.. or flint.
Of course they we will lose with them... but theyre the future.
A player like Power should have been GOT!!!.. he is what we need for leadership and direction.. and the club has to continue to draft quality.
On a sidenote.. a very knowledgeable person told me yesterday that Seller has the makings of being a Sticks!!!.. very impressive kid.. both ability wise and how he commands those around him.
Thats the type of thing id be looking for in a kid.
So, just for the record Synbad, and just in case you ever do run for the board, your master plan is:
a) don't recruit duds, recruit talent
b) teach them to play
c) only play long term players
d) when a player like Luke Power is available, get him
e) trade Lance
A and B are self-evident, but I would like to see it presented with a straight face to our recruiting department. The problem is that you treat the draft as if it were a science, it isn't. You are recruiting kids who are still at school for roles they are not expected to play for 4 years. Your theory of stooping for low picks ignores the possibility that you do so for a Goddard when a Fisher will be passed over by every club at least 4 times. Cam Wood, who you nominate as a preferred player, was pick 18. Clearly 15 recruiting manager's who are paid to identify talent, thought that there were better options than Cameron. 3 years later we still don't know who was right on that call.
C is to misunderstand the current game. The AVERAGE AFL career is 4 years. It follows that about half of every list is going to have just 3 or less pre-seasons with a club, yet you want us not to play those guys? The result under your model would be that every player with half a chance would be thrown to the wolves like Livo. What should happen is that the kids are developed with the Ants, as happened with Waite and is happening with Russell. Further, every club has its fringe players, players with experience and who may or may not make the grade. Saddo is not going to be a Sexton, but he might allow T-Bird to have a more free-running role. Brett Johnson was never going to be a new Greg Williams, but he provided at least an option so that Kouta did not have to play 120 minutes in the middle. So, yes, we like every club, needs some honest battlers. As a matter of interest, having already written off McLaren, and with Barny towards the end of his career (therefore presumeably not part of your long term plan) - who would you play first ruck in round 1?
D - is just silly. Power did not want to come to us. He has said so twice. You write elsewhere that you only want players here who want to play for the jumper, so do most of us. Yet if Power or Kosi come off contract you want to throw 10% of our TPP and the captaincy at them, and on a long-term contract (pretty similar to Kouta's current contract, which you also criticise). Thats head-hunting a mercenary as your CEO, not a football captain. You don't BUY leadership. Leaders put their hand up. I want our next skipper to come from within, so that when he holds up premiership cup 17 he can say he did so knowing all the crap we have had to go through over these past years, a bit like Border when the Australian Cricket teams fortunes finally changed. Those sort of guys hold on to the pain the group goes through and one flag is not enough, they want sustained success and payback.
E ... what is the modern footballer Synbad? Whilst you think about that, we will hang on to the guy who the club reckoned was the third best player on our list last year. Lance is one of the few who on our list that can catch and kick properly and make position (presumeably some of the talents you want us to look out for in the kids) and yet you want to get rid of him?!
Maybe the above requires clarification, but at the moment it would rank as about as stable a platform for election as Valmorbida fessing up to being the incumbent Chair of the Marketing Committee!