Mid season review

[LostDoggy]

In hindsight the half-hearted pursuit of Walker may have been a mistake.
While he gets a few opportunists goals, he is 4th in the Coleman.
Playing as a quick midsized forward, gets solid pressure and has an absolute elite tank. Right up there in terms of fitness and the 'easy' goals he gets are from just out running his man up and down

[Topdog]

All good in theory, but very difficulot to execute. We tried to get Andrew Walker from Carlton but just couldn't get the deal done. We tried to offload Hill, again couldn't. Its not easy to do these deals and you can't blame list management for not getting it done.

I'm sorry but that just basically means that there is no such thing as a bad negotiator / trade facilitator and I can't accept that.

We couldn't offload Hill because we over valued him.

We got DJ.

We didn't get Walker because we didn't try enough.

[bornadog]

I can't agree with this. We went harder for Sherman than we did for Walker and we had a deal for Hill (that we originally agreed to) but then reneged on it due to timing stating he was now worth a top 20 draft pick. We also paid too high of a price for Djerrkura because we didn't close the deal correctly.

In my opinion it's not a theory that we kept Eagleton and Akermanis on one season too many and it's not a theory that we didn't cut into the list sufficiently leading into the compromised drafts. I know we aren't going to get every player that we target but we have a way to go before I would say we are good list managers.

Well I never said we were good at it. I said its all good in theory that we should have done this and should have done that, but in reality, its very hard to get the players in a trade that you really want.

[bornadog]

I'm sorry but that just basically means that there is no such thing as a bad negotiator / trade facilitator and I can't accept that.

We couldn't offload Hill because we over valued him.

We got DJ.

We didn't get Walker because we didn't try enough.

Never said no such thing as a bad negotiator, your putting words into my mouth, I said its difficult to get the players you REALLY want.

What is easy is to sit back and criticize.

[Jasper]

What is easy is to sit back and criticize.

Its also easy to sit back and complacently accept the status quo - a meaningless comment that adds nothing to the discussion.

[bornadog]

Its also easy to sit back and complacently accept the status quo - a meaningless comment that adds nothing to the discussion.

that statement is crap. You obviousley can't read. Where did I say I accept the status quo? Where did I say we were good at trade time?

You may think its meaningless to the discussion but I don't because I find discussing what we should have done as meaningless.

[LostDoggy]

Firstly, well its their job to get the deal done. And secondly list management is about who you retain. We have retained too many players of the same age and of similar skill set and needed to cull these by trade or delisting some players earlier.

It would've been a genius call to cull more of our senior players given johnno, aker and eagleton all fell out plus they had made the decision to cull Hahn. They clearly felt the window was solid but the reality is the impact from also losing an AA full-back (effectively still injured given he doesn't trust his knee = can't play), a brownlow medal mid-fielder (shot -put him on ice until '12), your two first choice ruckmen and one of the best full-forwards in the league is massive. To my mind whilst the year is a write-off I still see a swift upside next year and the year after if coons comes back, lake comes back and we develop hill, panos, jones or cordy as a full - forward. Cordy surely has to stand up soon. I also think we need to draft for a key back, a damn fast midfielder and Paul Roos.

I would trade Higgins as it's not happening for him and I don't see further improvement year on year. I'd also consider trading Lake (ouch) if he doesn't want to listen to orders as someone would offer decent currency for him. Geeze I wish we'd grabbed Walker.

[FrediKanoute]

It would've been a genius call to cull more of our senior players given johnno, aker and eagleton all fell out plus they had made the decision to cull Hahn. They clearly felt the window was solid but the reality is the impact from also losing an AA full-back (effectively still injured given he doesn't trust his knee = can't play), a brownlow medal mid-fielder (shot -put him on ice until '12), your two first choice ruckmen and one of the best full-forwards in the league is massive. To my mind whilst the year is a write-off I still see a swift upside next year and the year after if coons comes back, lake comes back and we develop hill, panos, jones or cordy as a full - forward. Cordy surely has to stand up soon. I also think we need to draft for a key back, a damn fast midfielder and Paul Roos.

I would trade Higgins as it's not happening for him and I don't see further improvement year on year. I'd also consider trading Lake (ouch) if he doesn't want to listen to orders as someone would offer decent currency for him. Geeze I wish we'd grabbed Walker.

Not a fan of trading Higgins. The guy is all class and yes he isn't showing it at the moment, but if we lose Ward to GWS and trade Higgins, its a bloody big hole in our midefield which guys like Libba and Wally just aren't ready to fill.

as for grabbing Walker, he was the one guy I reckon we should have gone after, problem was his 5 goals on the last day of the season meant that rather than being worth a pint of larger and a packet of chips, his price rocketed......maybe rather tham bemoaning what we haven't got we should look at what we do have and hope that just as Walker seems to have turned it all around this year Higgo will do the same.

[Bulldog Joe]

Well collectively supporters do seem to take a negative long term view pretty easily.

2011 to date has been a season where plenty has gone wrong and certainly things need to be done to address the problems that have occurred.

However, I don't agree with those calling for the head of the coach.

Issues around Lake, Cooney and others on fitness issues may have been better handled, but unless we are on the inside, we really don't know and we are not the first club to be severely hampered by injury problems.

I do believe we made some mistakes at trade time.
We absolutely overpaid for Djerrkura.
Everitt needed to be traded but Veszpremi is yet to give any value.
The Hill trade could have been taken.
...but none of these may have made a difference.

We can all use hindsight to point out what could have been done, but it does not allow us to revisit.

When we look back on the Eade era, we have had the most sustained period of success in our history, albeit without the ultimate goal.

What I don't want is a return to things the way they were prior to the stability brought by Smorgon and Eade. Maybe I am an eternal optimist, but I retain faith in the people in charge.

[Ghost Dog]

Not a fan of trading Higgins. The guy is all class and yes he isn't showing it at the moment, but if we lose Ward to GWS and trade Higgins, its a bloody big hole in our midefield which guys like Libba and Wally just aren't ready to fill.

as for grabbing Walker, he was the one guy I reckon we should have gone after, problem was his 5 goals on the last day of the season meant that rather than being worth a pint of larger and a packet of chips, his price rocketed......maybe rather tham bemoaning what we haven't got we should look at what we do have and hope that just as Walker seems to have turned it all around this year Higgo will do the same.

If I was a HR guy in a company, I would look at Higgins and say ' crying out for responsibility'. Put him in charge of something, maybe even vice captaincy. One guy I feel would grow quickly with a role and not take it for granted.

Not getting a return on our investment there and the years are ticking by. the nature of our performance so far this season is going to have people sharpening their axes but it would be a waste to get rid of players who can still give us something.

[Desipura]

Hey Moffra, I think we could fit Walker in our current forward line, what do you think?

[Jasper]

that statement is crap. You obviousley can't read. Where did I say I accept the status quo? Where did I say we were good at trade time?

You may think its meaningless to the discussion but I don't because I find discussing what we should have done as meaningless.

A couple of points:

When you can spell, I'll read better 'obviousley'

Those who don't learn from history are destined to repeat its mistakes. Every single club conducts an end of season review, and a part of that process will be 'how could we have done that better'.

[bornadog]

Those who don't learn from history are destined to repeat its mistakes. Every single club conducts an end of season review, and a part of that process will be 'how could we have done that better'.

This I agree with, but what I don't agree with is talking about we should have gone for Betts or should have got Nahas or such and such. We don't even know if these guys were up for trade, but your judging the recruiters as if they were. We tried to get a number of players, and we didn't, but the players we got in the trade ie Sherman, DJ and Vez the club were happy about. Now whether they live up to expectations is another thing. One thing I am not happy about is the 3 year deal for DJ. Lets hope for the clubs sake he works out.

I am more happy about discussing what we should do at end of year.

[Happy Days]

This I agree with, but what I don't agree with is talking about we should have gone for Betts or should have got Nahas or such and such. We don't even know if these guys were up for trade, but your judging the recruiters as if they were. We tried to get a number of players, and we didn't, but the players we got in the trade ie Sherman, DJ and Vez the club were happy about. Now whether they live up to expectations is another thing. One thing I am not happy about is the 3 year deal for DJ. Lets hope for the clubs sake he works out.

Good call on all of this; I'm going to be waiting for DJ to get a decent crack at making the forward pocket his before getting into potting him. The three year contract is still ridiculous though.