Gary March and Craig Cameron Futures at RFC

[TigerLand]

Cameron needs to go.
Never liked him.

What are his achievements?

Melbourne's drafting when he was there has been poo.
Richmonds drafting when he was here has been poo.

They guy has had 2 innings and been bowled for 2 golden ducks.

Adios.

[TigerLand]

My issues with Cameron as initially our list manager and then promoted to head of our footy dept....

(i) In his first draft (2008) as list manager we only picked up two kids (Vickery and Post) when we were meant to be rebuilding our list. He then traded a decent 3rd round pick for Adam Thomson who couldn't kick to save himself and as a inside mid couldn't get a game in a bottom 4 Port side that was crying out for inside mids. Cameron gave some garbage reasoning about Thomson being the number 1 clearance player in the AFL per time on ground. Then he used a 4th round pick on Hislop. That kind of recruiting was no different to under Greg Miller's reign who Cameron replaced.

(ii) When Wallace was sacked mid-2009, Cameron by then was head of the footy dept. and should have mapped out plan for the next 3 years to maximise our draft selections and use the draft system and priority pick rules to our advantage. The club knew GC and GWS would hog the 2010-11 drafts and the club knew we were going down the youth path. We had just 2 wins at the midpoint of 2009 so Cameron should have instructed caretaker coach Jade Rawlings to make sure via team selections and matchday match-ups we won no more than 2 more games to gain a end of round 1 priority pick which could have got us one of Nathan Fyfe or Ryan Bastinac. Instead we threw it away winning meaningless games against other bottom sides in the second half of the season.

(iii) Just 4 wins in 2009 would have also set us up to get picks 4 and 6 in the 2010. We knew we had the very young and inexperienced list and a new first-time senior coach and that showed losing the first 9 games. Once again we reached the midpoint of the season with hardly a win on the board and once again threw a chance of getting priority pick winning games in the second half of the season to exceed the 4 win mark. So we could have still got Conca plus one extra top kid such as a Heppel, Lynch or Gaff for example.

So in total not planning to make the most of priority picks on offer in the past two years has cost us another two quality young players who could have played for us alongside Cotch, Martin, Jack and co. for the next decade. It's no point complaining about lack of funds for recruiting if you throw away the chance to gain bonus top 20 draft picks. Sure people can say we screwed up our top picks in 2004-5 but since 2006 when Francis Jackson went full time as a recruiter he has drafted Jack, Cotch, Rance, Vickery, Martin, Griffiths and Conca with our top 20 picks which is a pretty good return. Too bad we were dumb as a club and didn't give him the chance of two more top 20 picks!

(iv) Wasting rookie list spots on keeping or recycling duds such as Hislop and Miller. Richmond has been there done that many times in the past.

(v) Some re-signings have been quite questionable such as giving McGuane as 3 year contract  ???.

(vi) Our fitness staff has basically remained the same since Wallace was still senior coach.


Another thing that needs addressing is we still have a too small and light-weighted playing list. We have an excess of smalls and most aren't up to AFL level. It's no point drafting players under 6ft unless they have exceptional skills, speed and footy smarts.

Sensational posts.

I sometimes think if some guys on here were running the club we'b be in better pastures.

[10 FLAGS]

the pro tanking forces have always been ridiculed by those who wanted us to be the cleanskins of the AFL. Sadly that means finishing towards the bottom on a constant basis and never having any success. Thats the price we have had to pay for stupidity.

On the other matter of doing better in terms of our personnel - YES we should do better but we never ever do better because the RFC has been a mates club for the best part of 20 years. Mates clubs dont work in football terms anymore, now money is what counts because money gets you the best CEO, money gets you the best football director, money gets you the best recruiting manager and network, money gets you the best coaches, the best list managers etc etc.

Now I have one simple question - How many people in here seriously believe that Richmond have chased say Stephen Wells from Geelong in recruiting or the Collingwood recruiting manager over the last 5 years? How much effort has gone into getting a Neil Balme? Why havent we been successful at getting the best people.

How come we cant attract good players from other clubs? How come potential father and sons never choose to come to Richmond when they have a choice of another club - ie. Andy Gowers who barracked for us but chose to play for Hawthorn or Travis Cloke.

Theres way too much that needs to be done before we become a decent club let alone a good one.

[TigerLand]

My issues with Cameron as initially our list manager and then promoted to head of our footy dept....

(i) In his first draft (2008) as list manager we only picked up two kids (Vickery and Post) when we were meant to be rebuilding our list. He then traded a decent 3rd round pick for Adam Thomson who couldn't kick to save himself and as a inside mid couldn't get a game in a bottom 4 Port side that was crying out for inside mids. Cameron gave some garbage reasoning about Thomson being the number 1 clearance player in the AFL per time on ground. Then he used a 4th round pick on Hislop. That kind of recruiting was no different to under Greg Miller's reign who Cameron replaced.

(ii) When Wallace was sacked mid-2009, Cameron by then was head of the footy dept. and should have mapped out plan for the next 3 years to maximise our draft selections and use the draft system and priority pick rules to our advantage. The club knew GC and GWS would hog the 2010-11 drafts and the club knew we were going down the youth path. We had just 2 wins at the midpoint of 2009 so Cameron should have instructed caretaker coach Jade Rawlings to make sure via team selections and matchday match-ups we won no more than 2 more games to gain a end of round 1 priority pick which could have got us one of Nathan Fyfe or Ryan Bastinac. Instead we threw it away winning meaningless games against other bottom sides in the second half of the season.

(iii) Just 4 wins in 2009 would have also set us up to get picks 4 and 6 in the 2010. We knew we had the very young and inexperienced list and a new first-time senior coach and that showed losing the first 9 games. Once again we reached the midpoint of the season with hardly a win on the board and once again threw a chance of getting priority pick winning games in the second half of the season to exceed the 4 win mark. So we could have still got Conca plus one extra top kid such as a Heppel, Lynch or Gaff for example.

So in total not planning to make the most of priority picks on offer in the past two years has cost us another two quality young players who could have played for us alongside Cotch, Martin, Jack and co. for the next decade. It's no point complaining about lack of funds for recruiting if you throw away the chance to gain bonus top 20 draft picks. Sure people can say we screwed up our top picks in 2004-5 but since 2006 when Francis Jackson went full time as a recruiter he has drafted Jack, Cotch, Rance, Vickery, Martin, Griffiths and Conca with our top 20 picks which is a pretty good return. Too bad we were dumb as a club and didn't give him the chance of two more top 20 picks!

(iv) Wasting rookie list spots on keeping or recycling duds such as Hislop and Miller. Richmond has been there done that many times in the past.

(v) Some re-signings have been quite questionable such as giving McGuane as 3 year contract  ???.

(vi) Our fitness staff has basically remained the same since Wallace was still senior coach.


Another thing that needs addressing is we still have a too small and light-weighted playing list. We have an excess of smalls and most aren't up to AFL level. It's no point drafting players under 6ft unless they have exceptional skills, speed and footy smarts.

sounds an awful lot like a pro tank post. sheesh some of us copped plenty of crap for daring to voice exactly the above  at the time,  what you so eloquently have posted now.

oh on those jackson picks first its easy to ignore the bad and only post the good, second i firmly believe we could have done better with the rance griffiths and conca picks rance in particular as hes been around long enough to make a call .

and finally since 2006 id say nearly all clubs have found at least decent players with their top 20 picks.yeah theres the odd one that has failed but theres not many. ffs you or i could have done reasonably well with top 20 picks without having a footy dept behind ya.

will say it again the roles of head recruiter and list manager are the two most important roles at any afl club. we can never find people good enough and we should always be looking to do better in these areas, especially when those we have barely passes at best.

its only an opinion but to me i would like to see us look for better than jackson he was definately an upgrade on beck  but imo we need to do better.

I'm happy with all 3 draft selections.

I'm not interested in the pety arguement of "If we chose (x) he is 2% better than what we chose. Not good enough" Thats wasting breath.

The real problems are when your draft selections in the top 30 are not AFL standard. If you have a choice out of the top 30 kids in the country they should be AFL standard and play 100 games minimum. 150 if your fair dinkum. If you can't pick a future 100 gamer in the top 30 kids in the country you can't call yourself a recruiter, especially when our club gifts games to very ordinary players.

When you say we should have picked Heppell over Conca or Bastinac over Griffiths, it doesn't change things significantly.
What would change things significantly is when you look at our top 30 draft picks in the last 6 years and see where the failed picks are who havent gone onto be AFL standard.:

2003
#21 Alex Gilmore - Finished

2004
#1 Brett Deledio - AFL Standard
#4 Richard Tambling - Borderline AFL standard
#12 Danny Meyer - Finished
#16 Adam Pattison - Finished
#20 Dean Polo - Borderline AFL standard

2005
#8 Oakly Nicholls - Finished
#24 Cleve Hughes - Finished

2006
#13 Jack Riewoldt - AFL Standard
#26 Shane Edwards - Borderline AFL Standard

2007
#2 Trent Cotchin - AFL Standard
#18 Alex Rance - Borderline AFL Standard (Improving)

2008
#8 Ty Vickery - AFL Standard
#26 Jayden Post - Borderline AFL Standard (Needs break out year next year)

2009
#3 Dustin Martin - AFL Standard
- #19 Ben Griffiths - Youth

2010
#6 Reece Conca - Youth
#30 Jake Batchelor - Youth

So in 7 drafts out of top 30 picks:

5 are AFL Standard
3 are Youth and are exempt from classification
5 are Finsihed footballers, no career in football
5 are Borderline AFL Standard

So out of 20 top 30 picks only 5 of them are established AFL players. 1 in 4 selections.

That is where the problem lies. Not the tit for tat; we should have picked X over Y. Its the fact that 3 out 4 players we have drafted are not to the standard of AFL. From the top 30 kids in the country, that is inexcusable.

The good have been good, but for mine the value of a recruiter is picking good AFL players from picks 15-30. We have failed in doing so in my opinion. Getting a first round pick right, isn't very hard. Getting a 2nd round pick right isn't hard either... but we've made out it to be. IMO thats where our problem lies - getting picks right 2nd round and above.

[TigerLand]

the pro tanking forces have always been ridiculed by those who wanted us to be the cleanskins of the AFL. Sadly that means finishing towards the bottom on a constant basis and never having any success. Thats the price we have had to pay for stupidity.

On the other matter of doing better in terms of our personnel - YES we should do better but we never ever do better because the RFC has been a mates club for the best part of 20 years. Mates clubs dont work in football terms anymore, now money is what counts because money gets you the best CEO, money gets you the best football director, money gets you the best recruiting manager and network, money gets you the best coaches, the best list managers etc etc.

Now I have one simple question - How many people in here seriously believe that Richmond have chased say Stephen Wells from Geelong in recruiting or the Collingwood recruiting manager over the last 5 years? How much effort has gone into getting a Neil Balme? Why havent we been successful at getting the best people.

How come we cant attract good players from other clubs? How come potential father and sons never choose to come to Richmond when they have a choice of another club - ie. Andy Gowers who barracked for us but chose to play for Hawthorn or Travis Cloke.

Theres way too much that needs to be done before we become a decent club let alone a good one.

The argument against us tanking is that our history of recruiting has been so poor that we'd stuff up the extra picks anyway lol.

I must admit I wasn't one for tanking, a whole year, however I was against meaningless wins against bottom 4 sides. If we lost a priority pick because we beat a top 4 side I was for that. But beating a bottom 4 club was 100% pointless.

[Penelope]

totally agree.
would never ever pick any kid in the draft if he wasnt OVER 6ft.2ins
If you look through our list, way too many undersized players

Cotchin ain't 6ft2. Would you have taken Cale Morton (pick 3) over him?

use some brains, you can have an exception
Also if you needed a small forward, you could trade to get one.
instead of the current situation of having 6-8 midgets at punt rd

  you're not tony abbot are you?

when do we take you word literally and when don't we?

[the claw]

My issues with Cameron as initially our list manager and then promoted to head of our footy dept....

(i) In his first draft (2008) as list manager we only picked up two kids (Vickery and Post) when we were meant to be rebuilding our list. He then traded a decent 3rd round pick for Adam Thomson who couldn't kick to save himself and as a inside mid couldn't get a game in a bottom 4 Port side that was crying out for inside mids. Cameron gave some garbage reasoning about Thomson being the number 1 clearance player in the AFL per time on ground. Then he used a 4th round pick on Hislop. That kind of recruiting was no different to under Greg Miller's reign who Cameron replaced.

(ii) When Wallace was sacked mid-2009, Cameron by then was head of the footy dept. and should have mapped out plan for the next 3 years to maximise our draft selections and use the draft system and priority pick rules to our advantage. The club knew GC and GWS would hog the 2010-11 drafts and the club knew we were going down the youth path. We had just 2 wins at the midpoint of 2009 so Cameron should have instructed caretaker coach Jade Rawlings to make sure via team selections and matchday match-ups we won no more than 2 more games to gain a end of round 1 priority pick which could have got us one of Nathan Fyfe or Ryan Bastinac. Instead we threw it away winning meaningless games against other bottom sides in the second half of the season.

(iii) Just 4 wins in 2009 would have also set us up to get picks 4 and 6 in the 2010. We knew we had the very young and inexperienced list and a new first-time senior coach and that showed losing the first 9 games. Once again we reached the midpoint of the season with hardly a win on the board and once again threw a chance of getting priority pick winning games in the second half of the season to exceed the 4 win mark. So we could have still got Conca plus one extra top kid such as a Heppel, Lynch or Gaff for example.

So in total not planning to make the most of priority picks on offer in the past two years has cost us another two quality young players who could have played for us alongside Cotch, Martin, Jack and co. for the next decade. It's no point complaining about lack of funds for recruiting if you throw away the chance to gain bonus top 20 draft picks. Sure people can say we screwed up our top picks in 2004-5 but since 2006 when Francis Jackson went full time as a recruiter he has drafted Jack, Cotch, Rance, Vickery, Martin, Griffiths and Conca with our top 20 picks which is a pretty good return. Too bad we were dumb as a club and didn't give him the chance of two more top 20 picks!

(iv) Wasting rookie list spots on keeping or recycling duds such as Hislop and Miller. Richmond has been there done that many times in the past.

(v) Some re-signings have been quite questionable such as giving McGuane as 3 year contract  ???.

(vi) Our fitness staff has basically remained the same since Wallace was still senior coach.


Another thing that needs addressing is we still have a too small and light-weighted playing list. We have an excess of smalls and most aren't up to AFL level. It's no point drafting players under 6ft unless they have exceptional skills, speed and footy smarts.

sounds an awful lot like a pro tank post. sheesh some of us copped plenty of crap for daring to voice exactly the above  at the time,  what you so eloquently have posted now.

oh on those jackson picks first its easy to ignore the bad and only post the good, second i firmly believe we could have done better with the rance griffiths and conca picks rance in particular as hes been around long enough to make a call .

and finally since 2006 id say nearly all clubs have found at least decent players with their top 20 picks.yeah theres the odd one that has failed but theres not many. ffs you or i could have done reasonably well with top 20 picks without having a footy dept behind ya.

will say it again the roles of head recruiter and list manager are the two most important roles at any afl club. we can never find people good enough and we should always be looking to do better in these areas, especially when those we have barely passes at best.

its only an opinion but to me i would like to see us look for better than jackson he was definately an upgrade on beck  but imo we need to do better.

I'm happy with all 3 draft selections.

I'm not interested in the pety arguement of "If we chose (x) he is 2% better than what we chose. Not good enough" Thats wasting breath.

The real problems are when your draft selections in the top 30 are not AFL standard. If you have a choice out of the top 30 kids in the country they should be AFL standard and play 100 games minimum. 150 if your fair dinkum. If you can't pick a future 100 gamer in the top 30 kids in the country you can't call yourself a recruiter, especially when our club gifts games to very ordinary players.

When you say we should have picked Heppell over Conca or Bastinac over Griffiths, it doesn't change things significantly.
What would change things significantly is when you look at our top 30 draft picks in the last 6 years and see where the failed picks are who havent gone onto be AFL standard.:

2003
#21 Alex Gilmore - Finished

2004
#1 Brett Deledio - AFL Standard
#4 Richard Tambling - Borderline AFL standard
#12 Danny Meyer - Finished
#16 Adam Pattison - Finished
#20 Dean Polo - Borderline AFL standard

2005
#8 Oakly Nicholls - Finished
#24 Cleve Hughes - Finished

2006
#13 Jack Riewoldt - AFL Standard
#26 Shane Edwards - Borderline AFL Standard

2007
#2 Trent Cotchin - AFL Standard
#18 Alex Rance - Borderline AFL Standard (Improving)

2008
#8 Ty Vickery - AFL Standard
#26 Jayden Post - Borderline AFL Standard (Needs break out year next year)

2009
#3 Dustin Martin - AFL Standard
- #19 Ben Griffiths - Youth

2010
#6 Reece Conca - Youth
#30 Jake Batchelor - Youth

So in 7 drafts out of top 30 picks:

5 are AFL Standard
3 are Youth and are exempt from classification
5 are Finsihed footballers, no career in football
5 are Borderline AFL Standard

So out of 20 top 30 picks only 5 of them are established AFL players. 1 in 4 selections.

That is where the problem lies. Not the tit for tat; we should have picked X over Y. Its the fact that 3 out 4 players we have drafted are not to the standard of AFL. From the top 30 kids in the country, that is inexcusable.

The good have been good, but for mine the value of a recruiter is picking good AFL players from picks 15-30. We have failed in doing so in my opinion. Getting a first round pick right, isn't very hard. Getting a 2nd round pick right isn't hard either... but we've made out it to be. IMO thats where our problem lies - getting picks right 2nd round and above.

pretty much agree with most of that and is basically whats been said for a long time by some.

i do disagree though on the petty comments. yes if you pick a afl standard player i suppose you have done well. but top 10 picks should be aimed at very good to elite. 10 to 20 good to very good  etc etc. if say you have a top 10 pick  no make it specific and say pick 5  and end up with a good player or up to standard player and directly after you have picked the next 5 picks  end up very good to elite players you have every right to question if you could/should  not have done better.
griffiths imo had many questions about him was always high risk and was clearly not best available. the same thing is being debated about conca the only thing that will justify us taking conca in front of not just heppell but a fair few others is if he ends up in the very good to elite category.
yes where we take them and who was is available when we take them is vaklid and could mean the difference between top 4 and top 8.

for me and its only opinion but i think both list management and recruiting since 05 jacksons time at the club only average at best.

[Damo]

So in 7 drafts out of top 30 picks:

5 are AFL Standard
3 are Youth and are exempt from classification
5 are Finsihed footballers, no career in football
5 are Borderline AFL Standard

So out of 20 top 30 picks only 5 of them are established AFL players. 1 in 4 selections.

That is where the problem lies. Not the tit for tat; we should have picked X over Y. Its the fact that 3 out 4 players we have drafted are not to the standard of AFL. From the top 30 kids in the country, that is inexcusable.

I thought the youth were exempt from status? So it would be 5 from 17?

You produce a high quality post and then tilt the stats in your favour.

But even saying that, 8 from 20 is still a pisspoor strike rate. Ill happily call it now, Griffiths conca and batch are all AFL Standard.

[Francois Jackson]

My issues with Cameron as initially our list manager and then promoted to head of our footy dept....

(i) In his first draft (2008) as list manager we only picked up two kids (Vickery and Post) when we were meant to be rebuilding our list. He then traded a decent 3rd round pick for Adam Thomson who couldn't kick to save himself and as a inside mid couldn't get a game in a bottom 4 Port side that was crying out for inside mids. Cameron gave some garbage reasoning about Thomson being the number 1 clearance player in the AFL per time on ground. Then he used a 4th round pick on Hislop. That kind of recruiting was no different to under Greg Miller's reign who Cameron replaced.

(ii) When Wallace was sacked mid-2009, Cameron by then was head of the footy dept. and should have mapped out plan for the next 3 years to maximise our draft selections and use the draft system and priority pick rules to our advantage. The club knew GC and GWS would hog the 2010-11 drafts and the club knew we were going down the youth path. We had just 2 wins at the midpoint of 2009 so Cameron should have instructed caretaker coach Jade Rawlings to make sure via team selections and matchday match-ups we won no more than 2 more games to gain a end of round 1 priority pick which could have got us one of Nathan Fyfe or Ryan Bastinac. Instead we threw it away winning meaningless games against other bottom sides in the second half of the season.

(iii) Just 4 wins in 2009 would have also set us up to get picks 4 and 6 in the 2010. We knew we had the very young and inexperienced list and a new first-time senior coach and that showed losing the first 9 games. Once again we reached the midpoint of the season with hardly a win on the board and once again threw a chance of getting priority pick winning games in the second half of the season to exceed the 4 win mark. So we could have still got Conca plus one extra top kid such as a Heppel, Lynch or Gaff for example.

So in total not planning to make the most of priority picks on offer in the past two years has cost us another two quality young players who could have played for us alongside Cotch, Martin, Jack and co. for the next decade. It's no point complaining about lack of funds for recruiting if you throw away the chance to gain bonus top 20 draft picks. Sure people can say we screwed up our top picks in 2004-5 but since 2006 when Francis Jackson went full time as a recruiter he has drafted Jack, Cotch, Rance, Vickery, Martin, Griffiths and Conca with our top 20 picks which is a pretty good return. Too bad we were dumb as a club and didn't give him the chance of two more top 20 picks!

(iv) Wasting rookie list spots on keeping or recycling duds such as Hislop and Miller. Richmond has been there done that many times in the past.

(v) Some re-signings have been quite questionable such as giving McGuane as 3 year contract  ???.

(vi) Our fitness staff has basically remained the same since Wallace was still senior coach.


Another thing that needs addressing is we still have a too small and light-weighted playing list. We have an excess of smalls and most aren't up to AFL level. It's no point drafting players under 6ft unless they have exceptional skills, speed and footy smarts.

Sensational posts.

I sometimes think if some guys on here were running the club we'b be in better pastures.

hahahaha so funny you say that because ive often thought this to myself.

A very astute person is MT. Post was spot on again.

[mightytiges]

the pro tanking forces have always been ridiculed by those who wanted us to be the cleanskins of the AFL. Sadly that means finishing towards the bottom on a constant basis and never having any success. Thats the price we have had to pay for stupidity.

On the other matter of doing better in terms of our personnel - YES we should do better but we never ever do better because the RFC has been a mates club for the best part of 20 years. Mates clubs dont work in football terms anymore, now money is what counts because money gets you the best CEO, money gets you the best football director, money gets you the best recruiting manager and network, money gets you the best coaches, the best list managers etc etc.

Now I have one simple question - How many people in here seriously believe that Richmond have chased say Stephen Wells from Geelong in recruiting or the Collingwood recruiting manager over the last 5 years? How much effort has gone into getting a Neil Balme? Why havent we been successful at getting the best people.

How come we cant attract good players from other clubs? How come potential father and sons never choose to come to Richmond when they have a choice of another club - ie. Andy Gowers who barracked for us but chose to play for Hawthorn or Travis Cloke.

Theres way too much that needs to be done before we become a decent club let alone a good one.

Cloke's mum barracks for the Pies so his attachment to the Tigers wasn't that great. Also we would've had to pick up all 3 brothers to gain Travis which is hindsight you would do but no one could have predicted Cogs' career would be crueled at such a young age after just one B&F year due to groin problems and then a ACL finished him off  .

[mightytiges]

My issues with Cameron as initially our list manager and then promoted to head of our footy dept....

(i) In his first draft (2008) as list manager we only picked up two kids (Vickery and Post) when we were meant to be rebuilding our list. He then traded a decent 3rd round pick for Adam Thomson who couldn't kick to save himself and as a inside mid couldn't get a game in a bottom 4 Port side that was crying out for inside mids. Cameron gave some garbage reasoning about Thomson being the number 1 clearance player in the AFL per time on ground. Then he used a 4th round pick on Hislop. That kind of recruiting was no different to under Greg Miller's reign who Cameron replaced.

(ii) When Wallace was sacked mid-2009, Cameron by then was head of the footy dept. and should have mapped out plan for the next 3 years to maximise our draft selections and use the draft system and priority pick rules to our advantage. The club knew GC and GWS would hog the 2010-11 drafts and the club knew we were going down the youth path. We had just 2 wins at the midpoint of 2009 so Cameron should have instructed caretaker coach Jade Rawlings to make sure via team selections and matchday match-ups we won no more than 2 more games to gain a end of round 1 priority pick which could have got us one of Nathan Fyfe or Ryan Bastinac. Instead we threw it away winning meaningless games against other bottom sides in the second half of the season.

(iii) Just 4 wins in 2009 would have also set us up to get picks 4 and 6 in the 2010. We knew we had the very young and inexperienced list and a new first-time senior coach and that showed losing the first 9 games. Once again we reached the midpoint of the season with hardly a win on the board and once again threw a chance of getting priority pick winning games in the second half of the season to exceed the 4 win mark. So we could have still got Conca plus one extra top kid such as a Heppel, Lynch or Gaff for example.

So in total not planning to make the most of priority picks on offer in the past two years has cost us another two quality young players who could have played for us alongside Cotch, Martin, Jack and co. for the next decade. It's no point complaining about lack of funds for recruiting if you throw away the chance to gain bonus top 20 draft picks. Sure people can say we screwed up our top picks in 2004-5 but since 2006 when Francis Jackson went full time as a recruiter he has drafted Jack, Cotch, Rance, Vickery, Martin, Griffiths and Conca with our top 20 picks which is a pretty good return. Too bad we were dumb as a club and didn't give him the chance of two more top 20 picks!

(iv) Wasting rookie list spots on keeping or recycling duds such as Hislop and Miller. Richmond has been there done that many times in the past.

(v) Some re-signings have been quite questionable such as giving McGuane as 3 year contract  ???.

(vi) Our fitness staff has basically remained the same since Wallace was still senior coach.


Another thing that needs addressing is we still have a too small and light-weighted playing list. We have an excess of smalls and most aren't up to AFL level. It's no point drafting players under 6ft unless they have exceptional skills, speed and footy smarts.

sounds an awful lot like a pro tank post. sheesh some of us copped plenty of crap for daring to voice exactly the above  at the time,  what you so eloquently have posted now.

That's because it is a pro tank post! 

oh on those jackson picks first its easy to ignore the bad and only post the good, second i firmly believe we could have done better with the rance griffiths and conca picks rance in particular as hes been around long enough to make a call .

and finally since 2006 id say nearly all clubs have found at least decent players with their top 20 picks.yeah theres the odd one that has failed but theres not many. ffs you or i could have done reasonably well with top 20 picks without having a footy dept behind ya.

will say it again the roles of head recruiter and list manager are the two most important roles at any afl club. we can never find people good enough and we should always be looking to do better in these areas, especially when those we have barely passes at best.

its only an opinion but to me i would like to see us look for better than jackson he was definately an upgrade on beck  but imo we need to do better.

Of course we can do better as far as our picks at all rounds of the draft especially those mid-range 2nd and 3rd round picks which can make a huge difference to rebuilding a list if a club nails a whole draft or two (eg: Geelong in 1999 and 2001). However I would take into account that 5 years ago our recruiting resources were arguably the poorest and worst in the comp. We are still now adding to our recruiting dept. to try and catch up with the top clubs who have a number of  scouts watching say each U18 TAC Cup game. Given our recruiting dept. isn't as strong as other top clubs then why miss the opportunity to gain top 20 picks where it's easier to gain top talent.

Anyway my post wasn't a judgement of FJ as recruitier. My point was simply that failing to gain priority picks in recent years in our situation has been detrimental to our rebuild in a big way given we've missed out on at least two more A-graders and that's just pure negligence bordering on incompetence from our list manager and footy dept. head whose job it is to plan out in advance what we need and to use smarts to exploit the rules to gain it. It's the reason why recruiters at all clubs are sent out to watch U16 champs footy to comprehend what talent is coming through two years in advance at least. The draft system has been around for a quarter of a century and we as a Club still don't understand how it fully works and how to exploit it to our advantage.

[the claw]

My issues with Cameron as initially our list manager and then promoted to head of our footy dept....

(i) In his first draft (2008) as list manager we only picked up two kids (Vickery and Post) when we were meant to be rebuilding our list. He then traded a decent 3rd round pick for Adam Thomson who couldn't kick to save himself and as a inside mid couldn't get a game in a bottom 4 Port side that was crying out for inside mids. Cameron gave some garbage reasoning about Thomson being the number 1 clearance player in the AFL per time on ground. Then he used a 4th round pick on Hislop. That kind of recruiting was no different to under Greg Miller's reign who Cameron replaced.

(ii) When Wallace was sacked mid-2009, Cameron by then was head of the footy dept. and should have mapped out plan for the next 3 years to maximise our draft selections and use the draft system and priority pick rules to our advantage. The club knew GC and GWS would hog the 2010-11 drafts and the club knew we were going down the youth path. We had just 2 wins at the midpoint of 2009 so Cameron should have instructed caretaker coach Jade Rawlings to make sure via team selections and matchday match-ups we won no more than 2 more games to gain a end of round 1 priority pick which could have got us one of Nathan Fyfe or Ryan Bastinac. Instead we threw it away winning meaningless games against other bottom sides in the second half of the season.

(iii) Just 4 wins in 2009 would have also set us up to get picks 4 and 6 in the 2010. We knew we had the very young and inexperienced list and a new first-time senior coach and that showed losing the first 9 games. Once again we reached the midpoint of the season with hardly a win on the board and once again threw a chance of getting priority pick winning games in the second half of the season to exceed the 4 win mark. So we could have still got Conca plus one extra top kid such as a Heppel, Lynch or Gaff for example.

So in total not planning to make the most of priority picks on offer in the past two years has cost us another two quality young players who could have played for us alongside Cotch, Martin, Jack and co. for the next decade. It's no point complaining about lack of funds for recruiting if you throw away the chance to gain bonus top 20 draft picks. Sure people can say we screwed up our top picks in 2004-5 but since 2006 when Francis Jackson went full time as a recruiter he has drafted Jack, Cotch, Rance, Vickery, Martin, Griffiths and Conca with our top 20 picks which is a pretty good return. Too bad we were dumb as a club and didn't give him the chance of two more top 20 picks!

(iv) Wasting rookie list spots on keeping or recycling duds such as Hislop and Miller. Richmond has been there done that many times in the past.

(v) Some re-signings have been quite questionable such as giving McGuane as 3 year contract  ???.

(vi) Our fitness staff has basically remained the same since Wallace was still senior coach.


Another thing that needs addressing is we still have a too small and light-weighted playing list. We have an excess of smalls and most aren't up to AFL level. It's no point drafting players under 6ft unless they have exceptional skills, speed and footy smarts.

sounds an awful lot like a pro tank post. sheesh some of us copped plenty of crap for daring to voice exactly the above  at the time,  what you so eloquently have posted now.

That's because it is a pro tank post! 

oh on those jackson picks first its easy to ignore the bad and only post the good, second i firmly believe we could have done better with the rance griffiths and conca picks rance in particular as hes been around long enough to make a call .

and finally since 2006 id say nearly all clubs have found at least decent players with their top 20 picks.yeah theres the odd one that has failed but theres not many. ffs you or i could have done reasonably well with top 20 picks without having a footy dept behind ya.

will say it again the roles of head recruiter and list manager are the two most important roles at any afl club. we can never find people good enough and we should always be looking to do better in these areas, especially when those we have barely passes at best.

its only an opinion but to me i would like to see us look for better than jackson he was definately an upgrade on beck  but imo we need to do better.

Of course we can do better as far as our picks at all rounds of the draft especially those mid-range 2nd and 3rd round picks which can make a huge difference to rebuilding a list if a club nails a whole draft or two (eg: Geelong in 1999 and 2001). However I would take into account that 5 years ago our recruiting resources were arguably the poorest and worst in the comp. We are still now adding to our recruiting dept. to try and catch up with the top clubs who have a number of  scouts watching say each U18 TAC Cup game. Given our recruiting dept. isn't as strong as other top clubs then why miss the opportunity to gain top 20 picks where it's easier to gain top talent.

Anyway my post wasn't a judgement of FJ as recruitier. My point was simply that failing to gain priority picks in recent years in our situation has been detrimental to our rebuild in a big way given we've missed out on at least two more A-graders and that's just pure negligence bordering on incompetence from our list manager and footy dept. head whose job it is to plan out in advance what we need and to use smarts to exploit the rules to gain it. It's the reason why recruiters at all clubs are sent out to watch U16 champs footy to comprehend what talent is coming through two years in advance at least. The draft system has been around for a quarter of a century and we as a Club still don't understand how it fully works and how to exploit it to our advantage.

we are pretty much on the same page.  a pretty fair point about resources for jackson, still dont rate his performances though money or no money. believe it or not i was advocating the tank as far back as 02 some of the debates ive had over this issue have been heated and over the top.ive been screaming for the recruiting dept to be properly financed and run to the detriment of all else for as long as i can remember almost.

[TigerLand]

So in 7 drafts out of top 30 picks:

5 are AFL Standard
3 are Youth and are exempt from classification
5 are Finsihed footballers, no career in football
5 are Borderline AFL Standard

So out of 20 top 30 picks only 5 of them are established AFL players. 1 in 4 selections.

That is where the problem lies. Not the tit for tat; we should have picked X over Y. Its the fact that 3 out 4 players we have drafted are not to the standard of AFL. From the top 30 kids in the country, that is inexcusable.

I thought the youth were exempt from status? So it would be 5 from 17?

You produce a high quality post and then tilt the stats in your favour.

But even saying that, 8 from 20 is still a peepoor strike rate. Ill happily call it now, Griffiths conca and batch are all AFL Standard.

Damo the stats are correct - since 2003 draft we have had 23 top 30 picks, minus the 3 picks that are exempt from classification, hence 5/20 is correct. Apologies for not making that clear.

[TigerLand]

pretty much agree with most of that and is basically whats been said for a long time by some.

i do disagree though on the petty comments. yes if you pick a afl standard player i suppose you have done well. but top 10 picks should be aimed at very good to elite. 10 to 20 good to very good  etc etc. if say you have a top 10 pick  no make it specific and say pick 5  and end up with a good player or up to standard player and directly after you have picked the next 5 picks  end up very good to elite players you have every right to question if you could/should  not have done better.
griffiths imo had many questions about him was always high risk and was clearly not best available. the same thing is being debated about conca the only thing that will justify us taking conca in front of not just heppell but a fair few others is if he ends up in the very good to elite category.
yes where we take them and who was is available when we take them is vaklid and could mean the difference between top 4 and top 8.

for me and its only opinion but i think both list management and recruiting since 05 jacksons time at the club only average at best.

I understand where your coming from and if we were in St.Kildas shoes and playing a good brand of football but failing to have that killer punch in September I would be agreeing with you that these little 1% of improvement were the difference. However we are not a top 4 side, we are uncompetetive and have an unfortunate embarressing list. Countless reasons why, but the biggest fact is that since 2003 we have a 25% success rate in finding AFL standard footballers when using picks 1-30. Thats not finding the best available, that is straight up finding and selecting a player that can play to the standard of AFL. Top 30 picks out of the top 30 kids in the country each year to find only 1 in every 4 attempts is just embarrassing. That is basic recruiting, not whinging about finding superstars we have 25% success rate when drafting standard AFL players.

That is why we are in the state we are in above all else. Poor development, lack of football department spending, VFL stand alone side, no debt etc. have all magnified where we are at but the brute of the problem for where we are at is our recruiting and failures to find 100+ gamers, and in turn not even drafting AFL standard/currency. But if you take that percentage and improve it to 50% success rate we have an extra 5 players on our list that would be of AFL standard. These would replace the current fringe players we have that we have had to bring to the club from the rookie draft, trades and 30+ selections who are not AFL standard.

You can't blame the club for failing to develop rookies and picks 30-70 for the lack of success and state of the club. The problem is the fact that 75% of the picks in the top 30 for the last 7 years are not upto standard. How you can get such a low percentage is beyond me.

To put it in perspective, take all the players who have been failed top 30 draft picks; in terms of failing to even compete/develop into AFL standard.


#21 Alex Gilmore - Finished
#4 Richard Tambling - Borderline AFL standard
#12 Danny Meyer - Finished
#16 Adam Pattison - Finished
#20 Dean Polo - Borderline AFL standard
#8 Oakly Nicholls - Finished
#24 Cleve Hughes - Finished
#26 Shane Edwards - Borderline AFL Standard
#18 Alex Rance - Borderline AFL Standard (Improving)
#26 Jayden Post - Borderline AFL Standard (Needs break out year next year)


You can excuse Post seeing as he is still a young KP player and being kind I'll also excuse Rance as he's improving rapidly in comparison to last year.

So that leaves us with 5 completely failed picks and 3 unsuccessful ones.

The size of the failure is what concerns me, out of all those players other than Tambling and Edwards none had any currency 3 years out of drafting them. Considering what we paid for them (high draft picks) that is a disgrace. Unfortunately Jackson wears this as he is head of recruiting, even if it wasn't him who made the call, he unfortunately cops the whack, just as Damien Hardwick does for on field performance.

Now, we could be upset with what we have missed out when you compare Conca to Heppell and Fyfe to Griffiths (as examples) yes there is an improvement, but only marginal. Which is why I think its irrelevant. Many of the top 4 clubs have missed out on best availables but are able to still create a premiership/finals list. Conca, Griffiths and Rance have AFL standard all over them, which at minimal is a pass, even though you can argue we missed out on best available, you can't expect every pick to be 100% correct. What you do expect is for top 30 picks, at worst, to be AFL standard.

So if we take our 5 finished players:
#21 Alex Gilmore - Finished
#12 Danny Meyer - Finished
#16 Adam Pattison - Finished
#8 Oakly Nicholls - Finished
#24 Cleve Hughes - Finished

All with quality picks 3 being first rounders. If we take those and actually drafted AFL standard players, not even being greedy with "the best availble" if we even only got these picks slightly wrong our list would be improved dramatically.

Compare this to having Heppell over Conca or Fyfe over Griffiths, the list only improves slightly.

Where as if we picked up AFL standard 4th rounders with these high draft picks we'd have 5 extra players on the list mid 20s, bigger bodies and 5x100 games experience - that is a massive improvement to the list.

So if we even got these half right, and settle for some mistakes in - the Tambling, Polo and Edwards draft picks you'd have a pass mark for the clubs recruiting and all of a sudden - presto - you have a competetive football list. Unfortunately we don't. This is why I have no problem with Conca, Griffiths and Rance selections. They are/will be AFL standard and that above all else is the most important when recruiting, you can't possibly expect to predict the future and draft the best available every pick.

[The Big Richo]

I don't support not winning when you can win. I want us to give our best every week come what may.