Second half fade outs

[Maddog37]

Re: Second half fade outs

Love the passion guys.

I heard Lindsay Gilbee on the radio today and he said that Bmac has basically stripped the club back to bare bones and is rebuilding from the ground up. He said that if we stick with him we will be much stronger for it. We tried the Rocket way and got close but ultimately failed.

At the moment things are bad no doubt but after 58 years of trying and failing to win a flag I, like Gilbs, am willing to do whatever is needed to be a long term viable, succesful club. Bmac deserves the chance to do it his way.

[Greystache]

Re: Second half fade outs

That's a really surprising statement GS when considering that from our debut players only Clay Smith has played any type of substantial role.

And do players like Campbell, Jong, JJ, Talia & Roberts fit into the category of only receiving little more than a debut game considering none have played over 5 games and most have only played once we have opened the gates and let anyone (except Panos) play?

It means that what year you actually debut really means very little, it's about the number of games you play in a particular season as an inexperienced player. Those players you listed have only had some token games as well.

Some of our very inexperienced players have formed a core part of the team this year that wasn't the case last year.

Such as

Cordy had played less than 2 games before this year, this season he's played 12
Wallis debuted last season but barely played, this year he's played 18
Libba's played nearly every game
Dahlhaus the same

As well as debutants

Smith has played 15
Dickson has played 15

It's fine to say we debuted this number of players last year so we were giving kids a game, but this season that's 6 players who'd played 16 games or less that have played the majority of the season. Then you can add in the handful of token games to debutates this year and the team is genuinely comprised of inexerperienced players every week.

[SlimPickens]

Re: Second half fade outs

Love the passion guys.

I heard Lindsay Gilbee on the radio today and he said that Bmac has basically stripped the club back to bare bones and is rebuilding from the ground up. He said that if we stick with him we will be much stronger for it. We tried the Rocket way and got close but ultimately failed.

At the moment things are bad no doubt but after 58 years of trying and failing to win a flag I, like Gilbs, am willing to do whatever is needed to be a long term viable, succesful club. Bmac deserves the chance to do it his way.

Good post and agree. 58 years of failing is making it difficult for some supporters to see the bigger picture (I don't blame them). BMac is putting a system and style in place that will hopefully lead to long term success. It may be a difficult for a couple of years but unfortunately this what is going to have to happen before we go forward. Blind Freddy can see with have massive holes in our list, our top end talent is old and a new young guns are very young.
It's going to take patience, I'm willing to stick through it I just hope a few others can as well.

[Bornadog]

Re: Second half fade outs

To be fair, this is somewhat of a loaded question. What response were you after?

Yes it was loaded. I agree there are posters who are negative about what is going on with the thrashings, yet some posters can't stand the club being criticized and seemingly everything is rosy. We all have an opinion, so no need to attack those that are unhappy.

We have a very fragile club, make no mistake about it and I mean financially and long term viability. Members are voting with their feet with he lowest average attendance at games since 1996, and this scares me.

All I can say is come mid next year, if the win loss ratio is not a positive one, all hell will break loose.

[Mofra]

Re: Second half fade outs

Love the passion guys.

I heard Lindsay Gilbee on the radio today and he said that Bmac has basically stripped the club back to bare bones and is rebuilding from the ground up. He said that if we stick with him we will be much stronger for it. We tried the Rocket way and got close but ultimately failed.

At the moment things are bad no doubt but after 58 years of trying and failing to win a flag I, like Gilbs, am willing to do whatever is needed to be a long term viable, succesful club. Bmac deserves the chance to do it his way.

I do have one major issue with this, and it's probably unprecedented - we are rebuilding at the same time as GWS & GCS. It's going to be very, very difficult to compete on talent terms with those franchises - unless there are some poaching raids in 2-3 years, as seems to have already started to drip-feed through with the Caddy situation.

I really hope that this year is part of a longer term plan. The education of players sounds excellent, and the tactics seem a huge worry.

[Bornadog]

Re: Second half fade outs

I do have one major issue with this, and it's probably unprecedented - we are rebuilding at the same time as GWS & GCS. It's going to be very, very difficult to compete on talent terms with those franchises - unless there are some poaching raids in 2-3 years, as seems to have already started to drip-feed through with the Caddy situation.

I really hope that this year is part of a longer term plan. The education of players sounds excellent, and the tactics seem a huge worry.

Agree, GWS and GC have sucked out another 80 players from the system that were potentially going to be in the other 16 sides. The possible effect of this is the standards overall of the AFL may drop.

[LostDoggy]

Re: Second half fade outs

To be fair, this is somewhat of a loaded question. What response were you after?

Happy was the wrong word. Tolerate was the word used.

Those that can't tolerate continual thrashings, want to recruit recycled players.

[Doc26]

Re: Second half fade outs

Should we have been doing anything through the year to rectify our lack of run or should we just wait to the end of the season?

To me it looks like the players have been treated with kiddy gloves with respect to training loads and playing demands (lots of weeks off)... Long term this might help in their development, but players need to build their resilience to the demands of being an AFL player and I would have preferred a harder approach.

But Mantis isn't this the mantra at Essendon under Hird (& 'The Weapon') ? Would not appear to have done them any favours this season and only time will tell if it has set them up for future success or whether the soft tissue damage incurred under such demanding loads will have lingering effects beyond this season. Just possibly, McCartney has taken some learnings away with him from his time at Essendon in this regard.

[Sockeye Salmon]

Re: Second half fade outs

As an isolated stat it sounds similar to this year, but last year we debuted 9 young players but very few were given much more than a debut game. We really only played young players out of necessity where as this year they're forming the foundation of the team.

Last year

Skinner played 1 quarter
Cordy played round 22 & 23 (Once a caretaker coach tookover)
Tutt played round 22-24 (Once a caretaker coach tookover)
Mulligan played 3 games as a last option stop gap
Wallis played 5
Howard played 6
Schofield played 7
Markovic was a mature debutant

Realistically Libba and Dahlhaus were the only 2 that played considerable games last year, and they were two of our better players for the season.

Eade was sacked on the Wednesday. Match committee met and picked the team on the Tuesday. Eade had the pleasant task of informing them they would play that week. Eade might not have coached them, but he did select them.

[Mantis]

Re: Second half fade outs

But Mantis isn't this the mantra at Essendon under Hird (& 'The Weapon') ? Would not appear to have done them any favours this season and only time will tell if it has set them up for future success or whether the soft tissue damage incurred under such demanding loads will have lingering effects beyond this season. Just possibly, McCartney has taken some learnings away with him from his time at Essendon in this regard.

It seems to me that we are very much following down the Essendon path in that they try and load up during the pre-season and then do nothing but recover throughout the season.

[LongWait]

Re: Second half fade outs

I'm willing to meet you half way with this.
If younger ones arn't progressing as they should or as quickly as they should, you are in real danger of instilling a looser culture into them and the club. Just ask Melb, Port, and Richmond how that has worked out for them.
By cycling through experience, they help the kids develope as well as remind people of bigger picture stuff. However cycling through too many old ones you may run the risk of never getting anywhere but 6 - 11 position every year.
Fine line and I wish I had the answers.

I think that your approach is probably the right way to go. We need to strike the correct balance between playing heaps of kids, versus topping-up incessantly and never quite having enough top-end talent. Like most things in life - it's about the correct balance, rather than all or nothing.

I'd rather that we keep some of the older players we have on the list as depth players with harder, more seasoned bodies (such as Gia, Lake, Cross, Addison, Minson, Williams, Morris, maybe even Marcovic and Austin) and draft kids around them, instead of either doing a Melbourne and having almost nothing but kids, or trying yet again to trade in older players. At least we know what we have with the older guys on our list and, provided they play the way the coach wants them to, we should stick with them rather than trading them out for recycled players from other clubs.

[Greystache]

Re: Second half fade outs

Eade was sacked on the Wednesday. Match committee met and picked the team on the Tuesday. Eade had the pleasant task of informing them they would play that week. Eade might not have coached them, but he did select them.

Irrelevant it round 22 and they'd not payed in a team Eade coached.

[Eastdog]

Re: Second half fade outs

Love the passion guys.

I heard Lindsay Gilbee on the radio today and he said that Bmac has basically stripped the club back to bare bones and is rebuilding from the ground up. He said that if we stick with him we will be much stronger for it. We tried the Rocket way and got close but ultimately failed.

At the moment things are bad no doubt but after 58 years of trying and failing to win a flag I, like Gilbs, am willing to do whatever is needed to be a long term viable, succesful club. Bmac deserves the chance to do it his way.

Good post Maddog37. We are really rock bottom right now and the only way we are going to improve this squad is to draft well (this year is a strong draft) but more importantly make sure we develop them. I think the pain right now is the price for a stronger team in the future. 2003 and 2004 we as supporters went through exactly the same thing. I just don't think we should take short cuts because they most likely will break down (eg: Brisbane getting recycled players).

[Doc26]

Re: Second half fade outs

It seems to me that we are very much following down the Essendon path in that they try and load up during the pre-season and then do nothing but recover throughout the season.

Although we haven't endured anywhere near the soft tissue injuries inflicted at Bomberland. One would assume there is a difference in the 'loading' being applied or then maybe we aren't cracking in enough.

[Ghost Dog]

Re: Second half fade outs

Good post Maddog37. We are really rock bottom right now and the only way we are going to improve this squad is to draft well (this year is a strong draft) but more importantly make sure we develop them. I think the pain right now is the price for a stronger team in the future. 2003 and 2004 we as supporters went through exactly the same thing. I just don't think we should take short cuts because they most likely will break down (eg: Brisbane getting recycled players).

What I want to do, is look at other clubs who have undergone bare bones rebuilds.
Melbourne, Richmond and so forth. How many times did they win first quarters in games while re-building?
I take confidence from the fact we beat Sydney, who are a quality outfit, for the first Qtr. if we can X4 this it certainly bodes well.