The Bevolution. Are you yes or no?

[bornadog]

Thanks ED feeling a lot better today.

Ready for tonight?

[mighty_west]

I think the point of this evolution is to trial players who the majority of time have been in good form in the VFL to come in and play a role, McNeil was killing it in the pre season games so he got a gig round 1, but was dropped the following week, Sanders was given a few games off a strong and very impressive pre-season, but he's now back in the VFL working on his game, Freijah is now in, Cleary, and if their form doesn't hold up or don't seem ready they will also go back.

The Pies won last years Premiership and are on the way up again after a slow start to the season, they are bringing in two debutants this week (one played cricket against Pakistan and the other is Ben Allen's kid who a lot of us had an eye on in the Busslinger draft), and whether the team is mid range and needing a quickfire rebuild, refresh, Bevo-lution etc OR they're knee deep in contending, teams will still need to have in place some form of "evolution" with their teams whether it being smaller or on a larger scale, i mean, we even won a Premiership with two kids with only a handful of games each under their belts in Dunks and Cordy.

[Grantysghost]

Ready for tonight?

Yep, even if i last a half i'll be happy! Be interested to see what the crowd will be.
I'm tipping not that huge.

[The Adelaide Connection]

I have been guilty of telling mates that Bevo has no Plan B and that he is usually out coached- leading to some pretty average teams beating us.

Last night I braced myself for the last quarter. Five day break. Three out. Swans starting to run all over us.

Credit where credit is due- the changes were brilliant and reinvigorated us. Super ballsy to take out your champion from the middle and load it full of a crew of pretty green Riley?s.

With just a pinch more luck we steal that. But regardless, going down like that versus the 10 goal loss I was expecting from 3/4 time was immense.

[Hotdog60]

Could it be that the changes made in the off season allows Bevo to concentrate more on his coaching so he's better prepared to run plan A or B or C.

[The Adelaide Connection]

Could it be that the changes made in the off season allows Bevo to concentrate more on his coaching so he's better prepared to run plan A or B or C.

It certainly couldn't hurt in general terms.

But I don't think there was any planning on this one- it was pulled out of necessity with the unique set of dominoes that fell. I like to think it was on the fly and it was a great set of moves.

[Uninformed]

That we can evolve without rebuilding? I don't disagree - I'm still not sure we've got all boxes ticked - the Garcia vs Gallagher argument in another thread is an example of this...I get what you are saying in terms of players being selected for roles - I do - but I still can't get behind what's happened so far this year when:

JOD and Khamis are two of three tall defenders and Khamis continuously found himself the deepest.
Clarke is selected despite just not being anywhere next to ready.
Freiiah is selected after a handful of good games when experienced options are available.

Do I think we've landed in a pretty good spot NOW? Well - sure. I'm with Mantis that the midfield minutes for Gallagher and Garcia need to be 'flipped', but Freijah has seemingly settled in OK and Keath has (thankfully) replaced Khamis giving us both a big body AND a mature head behind the ball. Is that 'Bevolution' or is that simply following the bouncing ball of form/results?

Back to your question, I'm curious what your thoughts are re- the Bevolution and game-style.

Jordan is coming for Dale - who is driving us from half-back. What is his plan?
Heeney is probs leading the Brownlow - what is his plan?
They are 100% going to try and free up Blakey - what is his plan?

For three (or more) years now we have gone into games with a plan that seemed to be "Let the chips fall where they may...our best vs their best" - and the outcome has more often than not been a 'good effort' but a close loss where the oppo's best players (eg. Stewart at Geelong, May at Melbourne) ultimately had the biggest say in the result.

Thanks for this. Only just got back to it and now it is after the game. So I can say that, though I saw the dangers in exactly those areas (Blakey/Heeney/Jordan) plus Warner and Gulden, I could not come up with a plan to manage them before the game.

Having watched the game, I thought we went really well. Does it seem that we went well because we had a plan or was it a 'Let the chips fall..' scenario again?

On the Bevolution, I think a lot of the selections this year could be traced to form and injury and training load. McNeil, Gallagher and Sanders off good pre-seasons, Macrae building training load in the 2s from injury and indifferent form. Buku through preseason form and injury to other options. Keath having proven his form in the 2s.

I think other selections, especially Bramble, come from implementing a faster moving game plan.

I understand, and agree, with your view that we should not select on potential, but I don't think that is the only basis for selecting JOD as he has performed pretty well most of the time. And Clarke was way too early, but maybe that was a bit of 'who else' and 'lets have a look at him.'

I think Darcy and Lobb showed the ideal basis for selection. Darcy was killing it in the 2s, Lobb's form dropped sufficiently to make the change an obvious one. Experience, age, potential were not the main criteria. If Darcy's form drops, or he runs out of gas, and Lobb is dominating in the 2s he comes back in.

If the Bevolution is bringing in younger players who are playing as well as, or ideally better than, older players in that position then it seems sound to me. I like the Geelong and Sydney models of continuous evolution without the bang or bust mentality of the 'you have to bottom out and rebuild to get elite talent' approach.

From listening to him, I think Bevo's approach is: select and recruit for now without ignoring the future.

I bolded the first bit as it has primary importance, but only if connected to the second bit in italics. You don't put the future, and speculations about premiership windows, ahead of wining it this year! But you also don't sacrifice your future to win it this year. Win it this year without giving up half a decade of future first round picks to to do it, in simple terms. And win it with the best list you can assemble year by year and best 23 you can find week by week.

I think this is what Bevo has been doing since he got here and that what I call a Bevolution.