Almost guaranteed now a top 8 pick

[Penelope]

The Melbourne win cost us nothing. Absolutely nothing. In fact, it's quite possible if we had lost, right now people would be spewing that we picked trengove while Martin carved it up for Freo.

[RollsRoyce]

The Melbourne win cost us nothing. Absolutely nothing. In fact, it's quite possible if we had lost, right now people would be spewing that we picked trengove while Martin carved it up for Freo.

Thank you for confirming that Al.
You know Mighty Tige's I caught up with our mutual friend straight after the Melbourne game last week, and she and her little clique were still grumbling that that win last year had cost us a priority pick. I tried to explain for the 1,000th time that we'd already blown it by beating Essendon, but was howled down by the majority.
I wish you'd been at the Rowena Parade Milk Bar with me last Sunday arvo Al

[Infamy]

The Melbourne win cost us nothing. Absolutely nothing. In fact, it's quite possible if we had lost, right now people would be spewing that we picked trengove while Martin carved it up for Freo.

The win against Melbourne also didn't actually hand them the two picks either, it meant that they could still beat Freo and get them though
If we'd have lost, then Melbourne would have had to tank against Freo in Melbourne, which would have been "interesting"

[FooffooValve]

I do agree with one thing FFV said. Melbourne were smart at trading (McLean for pick 11).

Let's not kid ourselves that Melbourne's current resurgence has anything to do with tanking. From a Melbourne supporter:

1) Grimes - trade for Johnstone
2) Jamar - been on the list for a long time now
3) frawley - a Daniher draftee at 12
4) Sylvia - picked up in 04
Bruce
Green
Mcdonald
MacDonald - trade
Bate and Dunn - Daniher draftees
Garland and warnock late pick and rookie
Jones - Daniher Draftee

the list goes on

Morton has not played much this year
Watts is developing
Jurrah was a rookie
as was Davey
Moloney a trade
Gysberts - trade for Mclean
then that only really leaves Scully and Trengove, and Trengove has missed some footy too.

Clearly Melbourne's improvement is attributable to things other than tanking: maybe drilling a game plan into them as much as possible is the most important? I think so.

Keep in mind that every single coach will tell you that the most important thing for a young side to do is play games and commit to and learn the game plan. There are only 22 opportunities to do that in serious competition each year. That's not many. It is vital that young players learn the game plan layer by layer, until each layer becomes second nature before beginning the next layer. It is pure folly to suggest that teams should start tinkering with that learning process 3, 4, 5, 6 or even (as some suggest) 10 games out from the end of a season by shifting players into unfamiliar positions or deliberately unbalancing sides or faking injuries to players. You might consider it in the last game, if it meant picking up an extra top 3 pick, but to suggest that throwing away these teaching opportunities is worth moving from pick 8 to pick 4 or 6 or whatever, is madness. That isn't "playing the system" or being "professional",  its being negligently wasteful.
On the other hand, the preseason has become so crucial to the development of each player, and the team, that it is just good management to put players like Tambling into surgery or Foley and Cotchin into the warehouse now. If they have yet another interrupted preseason, we'll be talking about tanking again next season, after round 12. 

[Smokey]

Well said FFV.  Maybe way too much logic, fact and common sense for some though.   

[wayne]

We all shouldn't get too excited by Melbourne yet anyway. They haven't done anything really. They could be just having a Richmond 2008 false dawn season for all we know.

[tiga]

We all shouldn't get too excited by Melbourne yet anyway. They haven't done anything really. They could be just having a Richmond 2008 false dawn season for all we know.

I agree, I think Melbourne still have a few "Bowden" type cameo players on their list that only pop their heads up when they really have to or at contract renewal time. Green, Bruce & Sylvia are just three examples. I think we have gotten rid of most of ours or are about to. Morton was heading that way but has improved substantially in recent weeks and Nahas is kind of a Mr Cameo.Tucky was like that last year but this year has really pulled up his socks.

[Smokey]

We all shouldn't get too excited by Melbourne yet anyway. They haven't done anything really. They could be just having a Richmond 2008 false dawn season for all we know.

They are about to lose 2 very influential veterans that will take them a while to replace - Bruce and McDonald.  Their 2nd tier (~27 yo) that will move on to replace those veterans are from the group of Davey, MacDonald, Miller, Moloney, Rivers and Warnock - hardly a collective of hard working, A-grade mids likely to strike fear into the heart of the opposition and adequately fill the shoes of those retiring.  Add to that Jamar and Johnson both turn 30 in the next couple of years and at that point ruckmen are always prone to becoming less effective.  Melbourne need to succeed much sooner than it might look at face value if they are to get the most out of this current group.

[Judge Roughneck]

We need all draft picks we can get..

I thought an article of Leigh Matthews from the AFL site this week is quite relevant to this discussion, especially when have been discussing the possibility of turning "manure into strawberry jam" and the critical need to tank for high draft picks to build a decent side.  Here is what he has to say:

The sum of parts

By Leigh Matthews 7:11 AM Wed 28 July, 2010
TO BE blunt, I’ve always believed in the old saying that it’s impossible to make strawberry jam out of horse manure.

Given Collingwood have half a team of rookies and lowly ranked draft choices that have been instrumental in the Magpies' surge to the top of the AFL ladder, the effectiveness of Mick Malthouse’s coaching and development operation is reversing that well-proven theory.

And I use this analogy in the nicest possible way because the outstanding Collingwood form has some unique features.

Firstly, there is a big group of Collingwood players whose performances this season have been very good despite them not being established, proven senior players.

Looking through the side that dismantled Richmond last Saturday, I found 11 players who wouldn’t exactly cause shockwaves if they were left out of the side in the weeks ahead.

There’s Dayne Beams, Jarryd Blair, Leigh Brown, Chris Dawes, Tyson Goldsack, Ben Johnson, Tarkyn Lockyer, Brent Macaffer, Steele Sidebottom, Alan Toovey and Sharrod Wellingham.

These are players who would still be a bit nervous ahead of selection every Thursday night. That’s not to say some of these players haven’t been playing well.

Only last Saturday Brown received a vote in the 3AW Player of the Year award, as he’d done the week before. Clearly, he’s had two terrific games.

Beams has averaged 21 possessions and kicked 17 goals in 16 games, and Sidebottom 18 possessions a game for 16 goals in 16 games.

Johnson and Wellingham have averaged 21 possessions from 15 games, while Dawes, with 21 goals in 11 games, sits second on the club goalkicking list, equal with Travis Cloke and behind only Didak (29).

But what I’m saying is that these players are not necessarily permanent fixtures in the senior side and might not survive a few down weeks and still hold their spot.

I’ve always believed that while playing for your position each week may be a good motivation, it can also be quite nerve-wracking and not exactly conducive to maximising performance levels.

At Collingwood, though, this ‘living on the edge’ process seems to be working a treat.

But back to my first paragraph..

The thing that hits me the most about the Collingwood team at the moment is the unusually high number of players who have come into the AFL system with a relatively modest draft ranking.

Sure, they’ve got the normal handful of high draft selections. And by ‘high’ I mean 1-20. There’s Dale Thomas (pick No.2), Alan Didak (3), Scott Pendlebury (5), Ben Reid (, Simon Prestigiacomo (10) and Sidebottom (11). Plus Luke Ball, who was originally taken at No.3.

Their list also includes two comparatively cheap father/son signings in Heath Shaw and Cloke, and what you might term a high-price recruit in Darren Jolly, who cost the Magpies selections No.14 and 46 in last year’s national draft.

Otherwise, it is a line-up dominated by players from humble football beginnings.

I must say I’ve always been a bit cynical when I hear clubs talking of a five-year plan. To me a month is a long time in footy, and next year is an absolute eternity away.

The process of recruiting raw talent and developing it to maximum potential is the obvious first step in any club operation.

Enormous credit must go to the Collingwood coaching and development system which has churned out a big group of players who were low-ranked horse-manure draft and rookie choices, but are producing strawberry jam performances.

With Shaw and Cloke missing from the top side last weekend, there were no less than 15 players who were drafted at 25-plus, including an extraordinary seven players who started out as rookies.

The ex-rookies are a talented list in their own right - captain Nick Maxwell, Harry O’Brien, Wellingham, Lockyer, Macaffer, Toovey and Blair.

To have seven players in the top team who started their careers as obscure rookies is quite remarkable.

Of the others, there was Dawes, taken at selection No.28, Beams (29), Leon Davis (34), Dane Swan (58), Johnson (62), Goldsack (63) and Brown (73), plus Ball, whose price tag to the Pies was selection No.30 in last year’s national draft.

As hard as it might seem to be underrated playing for the heavily publicised Magpies, there are a lot of relative young unknowns playing well above their reputation. And, oddly, there are some more high profile types not in the side. Like Jack Anthony, Nathan Brown, Brad Dick, Josh Fraser, Paul Medhurst, Shane O’Bree and Cameron Wood.

Interestingly, too, only one Collingwood player - midfielder Swan - is a certain All-Australian.

Didak might be classified as a ‘likely’ All-Australian choice, with O’Brien a possibility, but otherwise they have no genuine Team of the Year contenders.

No doubt this year Jolly, as a strong power ruckman, and Ball, as another in-close ball-winner, have been valuable additions to the Collingwood side.

The biggest improver in its own ranks is full-back Reid. Drafted at No.8 in 2006 as a highly-rated key forward, he had played only eight games in three years prior to this year. Last year he played two senior games while spending most of his time learning to play key defence in the VFL.

Obviously he did so with very good effect in what is further proof of a development process that requires young players to be given time, patience and training at a lower level to gain the necessary confidence and skill-set to be successful at the top level.

Leaving aside first-year players in terms of those who can be measured from season to season, Reid might just be the competition’s most improved, progressing from out of the team into a very competent key defender.

Collingwood started the season as one of the five clubs that I thought could win the premiership and their chances have only grown after 17 rounds. And they have got to the top with a champion team more so than a team of champions.

Therein lies that nagging doubt because to win the flag they will have to find a way to beat the mighty Geelong, who have the proven double: they are both a champion team and a team of champions.

http://www.afl.com.au/news/newsarticle/tabid/208/newsid/99099/default.aspx

We will continue to consign ourselves to the scrapheap of football failures if we embrace the direction of deliberately taking steps to lose games of football just to gain that critical, all-conquering, almighty, higher number at the draft table.  The salvation and future of our team and our club lies in our attitude, our culture, our skillset, our professionalism, our sense of team - or if I combine it under one heading - 'our development'.  Tanking?  Smart list management?  Good coaching?  Call it whatever you want but cheats, rorters, bludgers and egotists all get found out eventually and all fail in the pressure cooker environment of team sports like AFL football (in life actually but that's for another day).  And there is no evidence to suggest or prove that taking the 'easy' shortcut works or has ever succeeded.  If you think that tanking is the way forward then go follow your Melbourne, your Carlton and enjoy all the success you have with them.  Just don't embarrass yourself by trying to look me in the eye when I'm celebrating my team's victory won through the virtues of hard work, courage, honesty and team - you already know what I think of you and your cheating ways and I won't bother meeting your gaze.

[mightytiges]

I do agree with one thing FFV said. Melbourne were smart at trading (McLean for pick 11).

Let's not kid ourselves that Melbourne's current resurgence has anything to do with tanking. From a Melbourne supporter:

1) Grimes - trade for Johnstone
2) Jamar - been on the list for a long time now
3) frawley - a Daniher draftee at 12
4) Sylvia - picked up in 04
Bruce
Green
Mcdonald
MacDonald - trade
Bate and Dunn - Daniher draftees
Garland and warnock late pick and rookie
Jones - Daniher Draftee

the list goes on

Morton has not played much this year
Watts is developing
Jurrah was a rookie
as was Davey
Moloney a trade
Gysberts - trade for Mclean
then that only really leaves Scully and Trengove, and Trengove has missed some footy too.

Clearly Melbourne's improvement is attributable to things other than tanking: maybe drilling a game plan into them as much as possible is the most important? I think so.

Keep in mind that every single coach will tell you that the most important thing for a young side to do is play games and commit to and learn the game plan. There are only 22 opportunities to do that in serious competition each year. That's not many. It is vital that young players learn the game plan layer by layer, until each layer becomes second nature before beginning the next layer. It is pure folly to suggest that teams should start tinkering with that learning process 3, 4, 5, 6 or even (as some suggest) 10 games out from the end of a season by shifting players into unfamiliar positions or deliberately unbalancing sides or faking injuries to players. You might consider it in the last game, if it meant picking up an extra top 3 pick, but to suggest that throwing away these teaching opportunities is worth moving from pick 8 to pick 4 or 6 or whatever, is madness. That isn't "playing the system" or being "professional",  its being negligently wasteful.
On the other hand, the preseason has become so crucial to the development of each player, and the team, that it is just good management to put players like Tambling into surgery or Foley and Cotchin into the warehouse now. If they have yet another interrupted preseason, we'll be talking about tanking again next season, after round 12. 

We could develop as best as possible all the Jake King types on our list and we still wouldn't improve. Footballers need the ability first and foremost and then under proper development and their own hard work will they make it in a top side.

Melbourne's resurgence has only just begun. They aren't there yet but you can see the pieces in place given the list they now have. It'll be the newbies who are starting out or haven't played yet that will eventually push them up the ladder from their current 10th spot and turn them into a regular finals side. It was Scully btw in the last quarter (a Tiger supporter nevertheless ) who got them going and smashed us in the last quarter last week. Class won out in the end. 


Melbourne

33: McDonald (248 )
30: Bruce (221)
29: Green (217)
-----------------------------------------------------
27: Davey (138 ), Jamar (92), Miller (133)
26: Moloney (106), Warnock (50), Johnson (68 )
25: Macdonald (95), Bell (66),  Rivers (105)
24: Sylvia (100), Meesen# (6)
23: Martin (29), Newton (23), Dunn (67), Bate (82), Hughes# (2)
------------------------------------------------------
22: Bartram (77), Garland (37), Jones (89), Bail (8 ), Petterd (35)
21: Frawley (58 ), Jurrah (14), Wonaeamirri (23), Grimes (26)
20: Cheney (14), Jetta (21), Maric (12), McNamara (3), Morton (48 ), Bennell (33), Strauss (2), Healy# (-), Spencer# (8 )
19: Blease (-), Watts (15), Scully (18), Gysberts (3), Fitzpatrick (-), Tapscott (-), McKenzie# (19)
18: Trengove (15), Gawn (-)

Oldies: 3
Prime: 16
Youth: 27


14 of the Melbourne players (highlighted) who played against us were 24 and under. 12 of them 22 and under. They were also missing Petterd and Grimes from that group who are in their current best 22. That's 16 just there. They have roughly another half a dozen or so top 20 picks in the wings. Jamar at 27 years old is not old for a ruckman. They are on the way up after maximising their draft opportunities while truly bottoming out. Remember they played finals just 4 years ago in 2006 then had 3 crap years 2007-9 where they learnt after 2007 that an honourable win that costs you a PP screws you at the draft table so they made the most of the draft system while at the bottom in 2008-9. That pain is now starting to bear fruit and by 2012 they'll be a top 6 side.

Richmond has had 4 years of really being crap onfield from 2007-10 where we've finished 16th, 9th (after just 3 wins from first 12 rounds), 15th and now 15th again. And guess what for all that pain we've got just one second round PP which we traded away to show for it. Laughable if it wasn't such a crime against the Club. Okay people may argue that from 2007-mid 09 we had Wallace "locked and loaded". However Wallace was gone by mid-2009 when we had just 2 wins at that stage of last season. We knew we needed to clean out the list and take our medicine bottoming out to rebuild properly and that this would take time (even the club publicly admitted 18-24 months). We knew we would struggle in 2010 and quite possibly in 2011 as well given all the retirements last year and how young and inexperienced our list was/is. So did we as a Club maximise our draft position in 2009 (ie. gain a  freebie PP) by winning no more than 4 games? Nup! Did we plan to win 4 games last year to maximise our draft position for 2010 given we knew we would struggle this year? Nup! If we struggle again in 2011 which is a strong possibility given our young list, have we at least maximised our draft position this year (4 wins) for such a scenario next year? Nup! It's not simply a case of pick 4 vs pick 6 vs pick 8 although those picks after far better than pick 17 you get for finishing ninth this year. It's that unlike other clubs we never seem to learn from the past, nor understand how to make the most of the draft system, nor plan ahead for likely scenarios for the next successive few years when it comes to list management. Painful floggings such as yesterday just reaffirm to me how desperately we needed those extra PPs to access more of the talented kids we need to truly improve our list. Whereas an extra couple of wins that make you feel good for a couple of hours does stuff all in the long run. Whatismore, not only do you gain another kid at the top end of the draft for free but for every PP you gain it gives you the chance to offload another list clogger and turn over your list faster which accelerates the rebuild.

[mightytiges]

The Melbourne win cost us nothing. Absolutely nothing. In fact, it's quite possible if we had lost, right now people would be spewing that we picked trengove while Martin carved it up for Freo.

Thank you for confirming that Al.
You know Mighty Tige's I caught up with our mutual friend straight after the Melbourne game last week, and she and her little clique were still grumbling that that win last year had cost us a priority pick. I tried to explain for the 1,000th time that we'd already blown it by beating Essendon, but was howled down by the majority.
I wish you'd been at the Rowena Parade Milk Bar with me last Sunday arvo Al

I wish I was there too RR. Sounds like a fiesty conversation was had by all .

I never said the Melbourne game last year cost us a PP. It was the Dees tanking in that game who were after a PP. However we did miss out on a top 20 PP if you include that game and the draw with North. Further those 1.5 "wins" stuffed us up this year from ever being able to get our hands on two top 6 picks had we kept our wins to 4. So for a measly 3.5 wins over two seasons we've thrown away a top 4 and a top 20 pick. As I said in the previous post yesterday's embarrassment hurts even more knowing how badly we could have used both PPs. Those short monthly runs of form/wins both last year under Rawlings and this year are easily forgotten when we've been pants 3 times in the past 5 games and blown away in the last quarter last week. Reality checks hurt RR especially to those pricks from Lexus Swan St and Royal Parade when they shove our faces in it onfield .

[RollsRoyce]

Aaargghh! Fine, fine you got me. I'm wrong for wanting to try and win every time we run out. Forgive me, but I thought that was the basic premise of all sporting endeavour. Silly me. Obviously losing, but cleverly disguising it as "experimenting" with match-ups and resting "injured" players is the way to go. After 30 years in the wilderness Richmond obviously needs to lie down for another 5-10 years and stock up on quality draft picks. After all, we all live forever don't we?
In the meantime, I think I'll book myself into a cryogenic chamber. Wake me up in a few hundred years when the Tigers are competitive again. By the way MT, the sarcasm evident in this post is not directed at you. I'm just sick of the lousy, corrupt, inequitable AFL and their whole stinking system.
Between this priority pick nonsense, and what some clubs have shamelessly done to acquire them, the flooding, the continued creation and propping up of soulless interstate franchises, umpires, match review panels and fixtures that always seem to favour Collingwood, while giving us short shrift I'm just fed up with the game altogether. 

[Judge Roughneck]

Aaargghh! Fine, fine you got me. I'm wrong for wanting to try and win every time we run out. Forgive me, but I thought that was the basic premise of all sporting endeavour. Silly me. Obviously losing, but cleverly disguising it as "experimenting" with match-ups and resting "injured" players is the way to go. After 30 years in the wilderness Richmond obviously needs to lie down for another 5-10 years and stock up on quality draft picks. After all, we all live forever don't we?
In the meantime, I think I'll book myself into a cryogenic chamber. Wake me up in a few hundred years when the Tigers are competitive again. By the way MT, the sarcasm evident in this post is not directed at you. I'm just sick of the lousy, corrupt, inequitable AFL and their whole stinking system.
Between this priority pick nonsense, and what some clubs have shamelessly done to acquire them, the flooding, the continued creation and propping up of soulless interstate franchises, umpires, match review panels and fixtures that always seem to favour Collingwood, while giving us short shrift I'm just fed up with the game altogether. 

the AFL choose to make the system the way it is

blame

a) the afl
b) richmond for not playing the system the last dozen years

[bojangles17]

geez MT, take a bext and lie down mate, pretty clear to me the club has put the cue in the rack and is going through the motions in this last stanza, so your carping that we have won too many games and hoping we win none next year....that simple minded narrow view would spell doom for the club, would love to see the prospect of re-signing our young stars if the outlook was as bleak as the pipe dream you just smoked...we have a club to run, what we achieved in the 2H of the year demonstarted is we are on the right track with everything we have put in place. Had Cotch and Jacko not been suspended for a month I'd doubt we would have competely lost the momentum we seemingly did. 45-50 possies , upteen clearances is hard to replace with debutants...recent results are meaningless, we have been deliberately undermanned.

with 7 selections likely on top- of 14 additions last year...whoa, it's all happening

[mightytiges]

So winning just 1.5 more games than the PP criteria last year and 2 more this year has stopped players from walking  ???. Sheesh we've won just 11 from the past 42 matches and been on the end of 9 non-competitive floggings this year so it's hardly a get on the Tiggy bandwagon win/loss record. Jack (vs Nth 09), Jordie (vs Melb 09), Collo (vs Syd 10) all missing the last goal of the match kicks plus Adelaide kicking straight 2 weeks back and we would have our list in exactly the same place as now yet we'd have another top 20 last year and top 4 pick this year to go with it. It was hardly a long stretch for us to meet the PP criteria both last year and this year . Players are re-signing because they believe in the process and gameplan Dimma has set-up not because we won a couple of extra games.

I don't hope we don't win any games next year smokey. I would love nothing better than for us to play finals but we have to be honest and realistic in saying that like this year we will struggle to win many games next year given our young list and if we have bad luck (ie. injuries to key players) then we could finish near last  . That's just the reality of where we are at - in the middle of bottoming out. I'm not having a go at Dimma nor our young players for that. It's not their fault where we are. However given we are bottoming out and playing kids we from a list management p.o.v. did not make the best of a poor period both last and this year by exploting the draft system to the max. as most other clubs cleverly have. Not doing it has effectively extended our bottoming out phase by a year. So by not "tanking" we have only prolonged the very pain and more losing seasons that the anti-tankers argue they don't want.

Losing Cotch and Jacko didn't cost us momentum btw. It just exposed our complete lack of depth and unless we have our best 22 guys giving 100% we have little hope of even being competitive. Once again the whole point of "tanking" to gain PPs is to turnover the list quickly and build up that depth with a talented young list that bats deep. Not "tanking" has prolonged that process. The only way now to make up for that is to trade players away that will gain us early picks. However do we have any surplus players with high trade value that will score us more first round picks?!