Malthouse 'so excited' by Blues' trade bargains

[GVGjr]

Re: Malthouse 'so excited' by Blues' trade bargains

Sorry G-Mo but I can't agree. Jones had plenty of chances and just lacks the mental capacity to impose himself on games. He drops his bundle easily and even his form in the VFL finals showed that he wants to play on his terms.

For Carlton he is a good fit replacing Mr Potential (Waite) with another inferior version.

And yet he wasn't in danger of being delisted by us and we really wanted to keep him.

I think his move to Carlton isn't a good one for him as he has a lot of competition just to get a game.
Kreuzer is being touted as spending time as a forward, Jaksch is probably better suited to being a forward, Henderson has looked good when playing in the forward line and of course Casboult seems to demand a key forward position. Sam Rowe was also considered a forward before playing a lot of his footy last year as a defender.

Even allowing for Henderson and maybe Jaksch playing in the backline Jones has a bit of competition to keep a spot.

[jeemak]

Re: Malthouse 'so excited' by Blues' trade bargains

And yet he wasn't in danger of being delisted by us and we really wanted to keep him.

I always got the impression we were saying the right things in public when it came to demonstrating we wanted to keep Jones. However, I also got the impression that we may have been fairly firm with what our buying demands were and what we were prepared to offer Jones privately.

As for what we got for him in the trade, I wonder whether we would have been happy if we paid any more than a mid-third rounder to get Jones to our football club on his exposed form. I have a feeling many of us wouldn't have been all that chuffed at the prospect of foregoing junior talent to start fresh with, in favour of securing a player who couldn't command a game for the 15th placed club (screaming out for a tall forward) due to inconsistent physical and mental application over a number of years.

[G-Mo77]

Re: Malthouse 'so excited' by Blues' trade bargains

As for what we got for him in the trade, I wonder whether we would have been happy if we paid any more than a mid-third rounder to get Jones to our football club on his exposed form. I have a feeling many of us wouldn't have been all that chuffed at the prospect of foregoing junior talent to start fresh with, in favour of securing a player who couldn't command a game for the 15th placed club (screaming out for a tall forward) due to inconsistent physical and mental application over a number of years.

I guess it depends on if we had Boyd or not. If not I'm sure some of us would have been thinking "Here we go again" having Boyd makes Jones' job a lot easier and it would have been a nice little coup had the shoe been on the other foot. Malthouse brought up a good point and it's one I've believed over the course of Jones' time with us "The Carlton coach said Jones had struggled with the weight of playing as the Bulldogs' principal forward for much of his 66-game career at the Whitten Oval." He's had teh weight of the world on his shoulders here maybe easing the load will help him as a footballer. Good luck to him, I like the kid and hope he is successful. I'll always hold a fond place to the players who played in that VFL GF.

[GVGjr]

Re: Malthouse 'so excited' by Blues' trade bargains

I always got the impression we were saying the right things in public when it came to demonstrating we wanted to keep Jones. However, I also got the impression that we may have been fairly firm with what our buying demands were and what we were prepared to offer Jones privately.

We did the trade late on the last day of the trade period and I believe we had a go at trying to talk him around in the last week now unless that was mainly because of the Griffen, Cooney and Higgins departures I'm not sure but I tend to think at pick 28 we were happy enough to do the deal but we were somewhat reluctant knowing that the third round was the best on offer. The alternative of losing him for nothing in the PSD eventually made the third round pick on offer reasonable.

As for what we got for him in the trade, I wonder whether we would have been happy if we paid any more than a mid-third rounder to get Jones to our football club on his exposed form. I have a feeling many of us wouldn't have been all that chuffed at the prospect of foregoing junior talent to start fresh with, in favour of securing a player who couldn't command a game for the 15th placed club (screaming out for a tall forward) due to inconsistent physical and mental application over a number of years.

It's an interesting question you pose, I think he might have improved just by having Boyd in the side. I recently watched his game against Collingwood again and the thought of him doing that 3 or 4 times a year is probably the reason why I'm not that comfortable in losing him.

[Flamethrower]

Re: Malthouse 'so excited' by Blues' trade bargains

The problem with Jones was that for every good game (usually matched up on a 3rd or 4th string defender like Langdon from Collingwood), he had 5 or 6 shockers on good defenders.

[jeemak]

Re: Malthouse 'so excited' by Blues' trade bargains

Thanks GvG and G-Mo, I definitely understand your line of thinking.

Some of my issue with Jones relates to work rate and attitude when the chips are down, and Jones has struggled to be consistent in this area whether he's lining up against the best or third best opposition defenders.

[GVGjr]

Re: Malthouse 'so excited' by Blues' trade bargains

Thanks GvG and G-Mo, I definitely understand your line of thinking.

Some of my issue with Jones relates to work rate and attitude when the chips are down, and Jones has struggled to be consistent in this area whether he's lining up against the best or third best opposition defenders.

This is probably off topic but would you have preferred to keep either Jones or Grant at the end of the season?

[bulldogtragic]

Re: Malthouse 'so excited' by Blues' trade bargains

This is probably off topic but would you have preferred to keep either Jones or Grant at the end of the season?

Grant for me. Grant has a bad year with injury. Jones seemed to have a bad year with attitude. I would have liked Jones to stay, but he's got a lot of flaws which may or may not be fixable. Moreover, I would've prefered a slight better deal.

[jeemak]

Re: Malthouse 'so excited' by Blues' trade bargains

This is probably off topic but would you have preferred to keep either Jones or Grant at the end of the season?

Grant, though would have been equally apathetic towards him leaving if he hadn't had an injury interrupted year.

[Twodogs]

Re: Malthouse 'so excited' by Blues' trade bargains

This is probably off topic but would you have preferred to keep either Jones or Grant at the end of the season?

I would have preferred Jayden Foster over Jones.

[G-Mo77]

Re: Malthouse 'so excited' by Blues' trade bargains

This is probably off topic but would you have preferred to keep either Jones or Grant at the end of the season?

Tough one, different mold but similar problems, well so it seems anyway. Grant around Boyd and healthy seems more enticing than Jones IMO. There are arguments from both sides and I could be swayed either way.

[F'scary]

Re: Malthouse 'so excited' by Blues' trade bargains

Posters getting all sentimental about Jones are thinking about 2011. Four seasons ago. Others amongst us prefer recent form as the best guide to the future.

[Jeanette54]

Re: Malthouse 'so excited' by Blues' trade bargains

Posters getting all sentimental about Jones are thinking about 2011. Four seasons ago. Others amongst us prefer recent form as the best guide to the future.

Given that his most recent form was the VFL Grand Final, I would argue with this statement.

During that last quarter when the ball came in very quickly (and regularly) giving the defenders very little time to get organised Jones was a powerful focal point. I also loved his confidence in taking that hurried, set longshot before the Hawks tall timber could get to the goal square.

The one thing that I thought he always lacked was the second/third effort after his initial effort was unsuccessful, and I thought his efforts when he didn't actually have the ball were non existent. Shame he couldn't have taken a leaf out of Jack Redpath's book here. Without the ball Redpath shepherds, bulldozes, tackles and intimidates. Watch the replay if you can, there's a couple of hawks caught frozen like rabbits in a headlights glare as Jack approaches at high speed, his intent clear.

If Mick can get some extra off ball effort from Liam Jones, and Carlton can get the ball to him quickly, we will regret seeing him go. I just hope he doesn't finally demonstrate his true potential when playing against us.

[Twodogs]

Re: Malthouse 'so excited' by Blues' trade bargains

Given that his most recent form was the VFL Grand Final, I would argue with this statement.

During that last quarter when the ball came in very quickly (and regularly) giving the defenders very little time to get organised Jones was a powerful focal point. I also loved his confidence in taking that hurried, set longshot before the Hawks tall timber could get to the goal square.

The one thing that I thought he always lacked was the second/third effort after his initial effort was unsuccessful, and I thought his efforts when he didn't actually have the ball were non existent. Shame he couldn't have taken a leaf out of Jack Redpath's book here. Without the ball Redpath shepherds, bulldozes, tackles and intimidates. Watch the replay if you can, there's a couple of hawks caught frozen like rabbits in a headlights glare as Jack approaches at high speed, his intent clear.

If Mick can get some extra off ball effort from Liam Jones, and Carlton can get the ball to him quickly, we will regret seeing him go. I just hope he doesn't finally demonstrate his true potential when playing against us.

It's a beautiful thing to watch.

[G-Mo77]

Re: Malthouse 'so excited' by Blues' trade bargains

Posters getting all sentimental about Jones are thinking about 2011. Four seasons ago. Others amongst us prefer recent form as the best guide to the future.

What a load of rot.