Caroline Wilson on AFL and Bad Behavior

[Ghost Dog]

Ok this might surprise you all, as I'm the king of mispelling and bad punctuation, but I taught Academic writing at Uni for two semesters a year or so ago. The topic today is sports writing.

One thing I know is that a paragraph should have a point to it - a controlling idea.
Now Caroline Wilson is supposed to be the most decorated sports journalist at Theage.
What a wafty piece of writing this is!
I read it three times and still found it hard to follow exactly what her main points were so I wrote a statement trying to sum up each paragraph. When you add all the statements together it seems to A. take a long time to get around to her points, some of which I agree with and B. Seems intent on slandering players without much evidence to back things up. Can you actually write about someone in a newspaper and allude to 'stories that might be true?'. Isn't that kind of character assassination?


http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-new...123-29yyp.html

SOME players simply seem to be ill-suited to a lengthy holiday period. For all the work put into micromanaging their unusual young lives, fine-tuning their bodies and attempting to spend more and more time on their minds, there are young men whose experience cannot hope to match their wealth and who are easy targets for the wrong sort of people.

Some players are not cut out for AFL.

Of course some simply are the wrong sort of people to start with. Richmond is hoping that Dustin Martin is just young, experimental and impressionable - a risk-taker whose love for football and his teammates will get him through eventually. Yet there are those at Tigerland who seem prepared to envisage a future without him for all his explosive talent.

Dustin martin might not be cut out for AFL.


A colleague suggested Martin faced two clear choices. Did he want to become Brendan Fevola or Dane Swan? The inference being that Swan was a bad boy who had made a success of his football and Fevola had ended his AFL career an admitted broken man. In Fevola's exit interview he admitted suicidal tendencies on top of a broken marriage, a gambling addiction and a drinking problem. For too long he was not disciplined at Carlton but maybe he could never have helped himself.


There are so many ideas in this paragraph it's a bit hard to see the point?


Yet there are those at Collingwood now who seem to be losing patience with their premiership-winning Brownlow medallist Swan - a three-time Copeland Trophy winner who seems to have no interest in leadership or following team rules under a coach who, as a player, was one of the game's most committed disciplinarians. The issues with Swan appear more than simply the Magpies trying to tolerate their favourite ratbag.

Swan might not be cut out for AFL.

Swan admitted early in the season that he was already looking to a life beyond the game, with the implication that he had better things to do. It is true he remains contracted to Collingwood and, at his best, is one of the club's true elites. But as a law unto only himself who is not truly committed to the cause, maybe his future is shorter than he believes.


It might seem unfair to single out two players notorious for courting bad publicity, but their cases are compelling given their talent and the fact that one is beginning his career and another is nearing the end. And both were suspended for off-field misdemeanours in 2012.
The hope for Richmond is that Trent Cotchin and Brett Deledio will prove leaders who can continue to tackle that club's long losing culture and take Martin with them. The hope at Collingwood is that Swan's influence on impressionable young players can be minimised.



Swan and Martin might not be cut out for AFL. Depends.


The same must be said of Sam Fisher, who has enjoyed something of a wild holiday season and is also one of St Kilda's best and most respected players. Yet Fisher's place in the leadership group is under threat and should be if half the stories about his behaviour are true. Clubs have no hope of building good cultures when senior players are poor influences.

Sam Fisher might not be cut out for AFL.

The clubs, too, must get better. Friday's draft analysis by Emma Quayle suggest clubs had deliberately steered clear of a number of talented players with behavioural issues; notably Dayle Garlett, who was overlooked completely despite being considered worthy of a top-10 pick in terms of raw talent.


Another colleague, Michael Gleeson, pointed out that although clubs had pre-listed a number of indigenous players, only three were taken in the main draft. The inference being that clubs are steering clear of taking on players who might struggle to adapt to the regime of life as an AFL footballer - a life that even the game's most senior figure Mike Fitzpatrick said he would not enjoy.
This seems to be something of a cop out, certainly for the wealthier clubs, who constantly boast of boosting their welfare and increasing their emphasis on human resources.


Clubs boast about having good welfare programs in place, yet are reticent to take on troubled recruits. Cop out?


Interestingly, West Coast redrafted a fourth indigenous player, Brad Dick, and the Eagles remain the only club in the competition to employ an indigenous welfare officer.

(Is that true? What is Goodes position with us? Essentially it’s indigenous welfare officer? or have I got it wrong.)

There is not enough support for indigenous players in the AFL.

West Coast appears to have come the full circle since Ben Cousins was the club's spiritual leader. Suspected of having exaggerated Jack Darling's behavioural issues before taking him ridiculously late (No. 26) in the 2010 draft, the Eagles also recently recruited another of Collingwood's wilder players, Sharrod Wellingham. It is true the club now seems firm in the belief it has rebuilt its culture and will back itself.

The Eagles have improved their support of players.


It is a cliche to say this, but one of Australia's greatest problems is that young men drink too much, take too many drugs, drive recklessly, break the law, disrespect women, act violently and harbour depressive tendencies. Naturally then, it is one of the AFL's biggest problems also and money only appears to worsen the dilemma.

Men's behavior is one of the biggest problems in Australia.

But the game must do better because its resources are better than those of any other sport in this country and its procedures - certainly in terms of drug use - are tougher in that players are monitored all year round.
It is not good for the game if clubs are giving up on young men with social problems before they have even started. It is true that some people are beyond help and also true that the AFL system is not rehab, but surely every club must have the resources to handle such issues. That's where the AFL and an improved equalisation policy comes in. Then all that is required is will and hard work. Something surely the game at this level is all about.

AFL clubs should be able to take on more players with behavioral issues and not avoid drafting them.
( What is an equalisation policy? )

[AndrewP6]

Goodes' position is Welfare Officer. I don't think his role is specific to indigenous players, but obviously he'd be beneficial in his area.

As for Carowhine's page filler, well, she's got to find something to shake her head disapprovingly about. The third last line says it for me... "The AFL is not rehab"... As sad as some of these cases are, the AFL is big business, and if they identify someone as being too risky, I don't really blame them for overlooking them.

[Dry Rot]

one of Australia's greatest problems is that young men drink too much, take too many drugs, drive recklessly, break the law, disrespect women, act violently and harbour depressive tendencies.

Don't be ageist.

Most guys I know my age are like that, except obviously myself.

[Ghost Dog]

Haha.
Badge of Honor?

I remember when I was kid, they used to have a 'special term' for the best mark on field in the Seniors league.
We used to emulate such heights in the primary playground. And upon taking a mark, we would sing out ' Slab of the day!', the name given to the award at senior level.
My how times have changed!!

[Ghost Dog]

Goodes' position is Welfare Officer. I don't think his role is specific to indigenous players, but obviously he'd be beneficial in his area.

As for Carowhine's page filler, well, she's got to find something to shake her head disapprovingly about. The third last line says it for me... "The AFL is not rehab"... As sad as some of these cases are, the AFL is big business, and if they identify someone as being too risky, I don't really blame them for overlooking them.

Noice!

[LostDoggy]

Any discussion on Caro's poor journalism could last all bloody day, but to address this specific article...

She talks about young men in Australia being the country's biggest problem, because they:
1. drink too much,
2. take too many drugs,
3. drive recklessly,
4. break the law,
5. disrespect women,
6. act violently and
7. harbour depressive tendencies.

That's not masculinity, Caroline, that's youth. I could point out just as many young girls who do every thing on that list (with the obvious exception being point 5, though even then they hardly respect themselves or their peers). To take that flawed argument and apply it to the AFL is merely doubling the error. What's she banging on about? That we should raise the draft age to 35?

It's just one of her points but I feel it highlights her major fault: she loves to whine about the situation — whatever that may be at any given time — but lacks both the intellect to suggest any kind of solution, and the sense of fair play to mention the 700-odd players who don't fit her complaint.

She's working for the wrong newspaper, in my opinion.

[ledge]

Any discussion on Caro's poor journalism could last all bloody day, but to address this specific article...

She talks about young men in Australia being the country's biggest problem, because they:
1. drink too much,
2. take too many drugs,
3. drive recklessly,
4. break the law,
5. disrespect women,
6. act violently and
7. harbour depressive tendencies.

That's not masculinity, Caroline, that's youth. I could point out just as many young girls who do every thing on that list (with the obvious exception being point 5, though even then they hardly respect themselves or their peers). To take that flawed argument and apply it to the AFL is merely doubling the error. What's she banging on about? That we should raise the draft age to 35?

It's just one of her points but I feel it highlights her major fault: she loves to whine about the situation — whatever that may be at any given time — but lacks both the intellect to suggest any kind of solution, and the sense of fair play to mention the 700-odd players who don't fit her complaint.

She's working for the wrong newspaper, in my opinion.

Yeah but didn't The Truth go out of production years ago?

[Mofra]

As much as there are no doubt some bad apples in the AFL, I actually think behavior by their equivalent, non-AFL counterparts at the same age is worse.
Their lives are controlled so much that during the season small indiscretions are tabloid fodder whilst similar, worse incidents happenign every day of the week are so commonplace as to be ignored.

Libba gets caught with one pill and the web goes into meltdown - I'd guess that more than half of kids the same age would be dabbling, with many regular recreational users.

On another note:

One thing I know is that a paragraph should have a point to it - a controlling idea.

One lecturer in semester 2 this year offering the class advice on writing the major assessment was that "I expect you to have a clear point at all times, especially in the introduction - it's not meant to be a murder mystery"