Gary March and Craig Cameron Futures at RFC

[FooffooValve]

As you've illustrated above, our drafting and trading in the past 3 years has been OK, if not pretty good.

Basically your argument is that Craig Cameron should go because of the Thompson trade, and the club didn't tank. I don't prescribe to the opinion that the decision to tank is Cameron's alone.

Not a strong argument IMO, and would be throwing the baby out with the bathwater as punishment for not holding to a loser philosophy in a club that had had a loser philosophy for nearly 30 years.

[RedanTiger]

The List Management debate has been done to death and most people have already decided on which side they stand.

For me the more important thing is his management of the entire department.

In the same way that an independant List Manager is required to plan for the future and combat the natural short-term desires of the current coaches, the General Manager is required to oversee other departments in the same way.

1) The Elite Performance area has a duty to physically condition to AFL standard, REGARDLESS of the desires of the senior coach for a particular type of fitness.
2) The Medical area has a duty to treat players to ensure their long term well-being, REGARDLESS of the desire of the senior coach wanting to risk for short term results.
3) The Development area has a duty to firstly consider the personal welfare of new recruits, REGARDLESS of what the club or coaches may want from them.
4) The Operations area has a duty to provide the best opportunities for Coburg (our reserves team), REGARDLESS of the fact it is our subordinate junior partner.

 

[Hard Roar Tiger]

As you've illustrated above, our drafting and trading in the past 3 years has been OK, if not pretty good.

Basically your argument is that Craig Cameron should go because of the Thompson trade, and the club didn't tank. I don't prescribe to the opinion that the decision to tank is Cameron's alone.

Not a strong argument IMO, and would be throwing the baby out with the bathwater as punishment for not holding to a loser philosophy in a club that had had a loser philosophy for nearly 30 years.

Bone Cameron. Bone him.

[RedanTiger]

Craig Cameron was signed to a five year contract when hired by Miller as List Manager in December 2007.
After Miller left the club he was promoted (after other applicants were approached) to the General Manager of Football Operations.
He has another year to go on his contract. IMO he should be allowed to run to the end of his contract next year.
There is little advantage in early termination and a lot of downside.

The Football sub-committee of the board should use the Football review that was done in 2008-9, the strategic plan referred to in the post from one-eyed, current operations of other clubs and relevant section (including the goals and benchmarks that should be available) as part of Gale's five year plan to organise the entire football department to achieve best practice.
After a plan for the structure is agreed upon, the criteria for new or replacement staff can be finalised and selection of those staff can be done over the next eighteen months.

In the meantime, as part of the organisation of the entire department, some much needed improvements can be made to current practice.
As an example related to point four in my previous post, I would draw attention to the quote from the Coburg coach, Adam Potter, after his recent win.

“It’s a good alignment because the Richmond boys came to training on Wednesday, and they were there Friday, which allows us to train together, which is really important.”
http://www.richmondfc.com.au/news/newsarticle/tabid/6301/newsid/119814/default.aspx

The idea that Richmond listed players do not train on a regular basis with the team they are playing for is plain stupid and a recipe for failure.
It is wrong on so many counts - team spirit, mutual player respect, professional ethics. It is not a surprise that Potter has publicly mentioned this setup.
The organisation where half the team is allowed to skip team training is just dumb.   
   

[gerkin greg]

A year to go for CC you say?

How much longer did Malthouse say he would be at Collingwood?

Sweet 

[FooffooValve]

The idea that Richmond listed players do not train on a regular basis with the team they are playing for is plain stupid and a recipe for failure.
It is wrong on so many counts - team spirit, mutual player respect, professional ethics. It is not a surprise that Potter has publicly mentioned this setup.
The organisation where half the team is allowed to skip team training is just dumb.   
   

What's the solution?

We'd all love to field a dedicated Richmond side in the VFL. Clearly that is the preferred model, but its an expensive one. For the time being, it's hard for players to be in two places at once.

[Loui Tufga]

The idea that Richmond listed players do not train on a regular basis with the team they are playing for is plain stupid and a recipe for failure.
It is wrong on so many counts - team spirit, mutual player respect, professional ethics. It is not a surprise that Potter has publicly mentioned this setup.
The organisation where half the team is allowed to skip team training is just dumb.   
   

What do you mean by this? The Richmond listed players missing Richmond training or Coburg training.
I am pretty sure all AFL listed players that are playing for there VFL affiliate only attend on main training session a week for the affiliate club, I know this is fact with the SANFL and pretty sure the same applies for the VFL as well.

[RedanTiger]

What's the solution?

We'd all love to field a dedicated Richmond side in the VFL. Clearly that is the preferred model, but its an expensive one. For the time being, it's hard for players to be in two places at once.

Do the teams train at the same time?
Since Coburg has players with full time jobs I assume they train evenings like other minor leagues.
Richmond seem to train mostly during the day.
The solution? If necessary, get VFL selections to attend Coburg and miss a Richmond session if necessary. It might teach some important lessons.

What do you mean by this? The Richmond listed players missing Richmond training or Coburg training.
I am pretty sure all AFL listed players that are playing for there VFL affiliate only attend on main training session a week for the affiliate club, I know this is fact with the SANFL and pretty sure the same applies for the VFL as well.

Read the quote and decifer for yourself.
Considering all AFL players only attend one session for affiliates I wonder what happens at Collingwood and Geelong. You know, the teams we're trying to emulate.
Edit: Have just read the post from the club's site and note the last sentence from Gale.
http://oneeyed-richmond.com/forum/index.php?topic=12496.30

[WilliamPowell]

Do the teams train at the same time?
Since Coburg has players with full time jobs I assume they train evenings like other minor leagues.
Richmond seem to train mostly during the day.
The solution? If necessary, get VFL selections to attend Coburg and miss a Richmond session if necessary. It might teach some important lessons.

Tiger players selected to play with Coburg on the weekend train with Coburg once a week on the Friday night

[big tone]

What makes you think that these decisions are solely Craig Cameron's work? Is it the Football Manager's decision alone to unilaterally decide that we must lose games? Aren't you projecting your philosophy of losing and tanking onto Craig Cameron?
What is/was Francis Jackson's role in these decisions?

And what of our drafting and trading in the past 2 years? Not going to mention that? Or are the good decisions made by someone else?

Craig Cameron has been head of our footy dept. since 2008 as well as our list manager from 2008-2010 until Blair Hartley came on board this year. The buck ultimately stops with him regarding footy dept. and list managerment decisions as it should. You don't want the coach making short-term top-up decisions to save his own backside in the final year of a contract. FJ as chief recruiter would advise Cameron on the strength of upcoming drafts and have a major say in new draftees chosen at each draft pick but he isn't the list manager nor can FJ instruct the coach to make sure wins are limited to 4 to gain a priority pick. Only Cameron has the authority to implement a whole footy dept. strategy and then delegate respective tasks to the various parties within the footy dept. to implement it.

Am I projecting my philosophy of tanking onto Craig Cameron? While I do support and have argued for us to tank for a number of years now as the draft system rewards tanking, I would argue any cluey footy dept. head and list manager wouldn't need to be told to tank if in the position we have found ourselves in. The benefits should/would be so bleedingly obvious and automatic to anyone (re)building our list. They would've jumped at the opportunity for long-term gain. The ability to pull it off in our case should have been simple to implement as well given we had just 2 wins by midseason 2009 and just 1 win by midseason 2010. It was hardly a stretch to keep our wins in both years to 4 each. If Cameron had/has a 'moral' objection to tanking and taking advantage of the draft rules to benefit the RFC via bonus priority picks then he's in the wrong job.

Our recruiting record since 2008...

2008:
Trades: pick 42 for Adam Thomson
ND:      8. Vickery, 26. Post, 58. Hislop
PSD:    6. Cousins
RD:      8. Nahas, 26. Gourdis [demoted], 39. Browne, 53. Gilligan

2009:
Trades: Raines for pick 44, Schulz for Farmer and pick 71
ND:      3. Martin, 19. Griffiths, 35. Astbury, 44. Dea, 51. Taylor?, 67. Webberley, 71. Nason
PSD:    2. Grimes
RD:      7. Hicks, 23. Contin, 38. Roberts, 51. Westhoff, 62. Polak [demoted], 70. O'Reilly

2010:
Trades: Collins for Grigg, Tambling for compo pick and pick 51
ND:      6. Conca, 30. Batchelor, 47. Helbig, 51. MacDonald, 63. Derickx
PSD:     3. Houli
RD:       11. Jakobi, 28. Miller, 45. Hislop [demoted]


2008 was poor with just two kids picked up in the ND. The Thomson trade was pathetic as I said at the time.

2009-10 the philosophy was at least right loading up with 13 picks in the two NDs and PSDs and using them all on kids/newbies (Houli being the only exception in the PSD which is fair enough).

2009-10 trade periods have been reasonable given what we had to offer up with the Tambling trade being by far the pick of the bunch. Grigg and Farmer were sideways trades but as I said we didn't have much to offer other clubs outside our half-dozen or so untouchable young guns.

Our use of the rookie draft is still poor. Last year's RD was a complete waste. You could clean out most of our rookie list and we wouldn't blink. Given other strong clubs have done very well with rookies over the past 5 years we are still behind the eight ball. 

Anyway my main point is how we missed out on top talent because we didn't plan to tank in 2009-10 and gain as many top picks as we could have. Take away the stupidity of the Thomson trade and add us "tanking" over 2009-10 and the same NDs without changing any selections would look something like this:

2008:      8. Vickery, 26. Post, 42. Liam Anthony, 58. Hislop
2009:      3. Martin, 18. Bastinac/Fyfe, 19. Griffiths, 35. Astbury, 44. Dea, 51. Taylor?, 67. Webberley, 71. Nason
2010:      4. Gaff/Heppell, 6. Conca, 30. Batchelor, 47. Helbig, 51. MacDonald, 63. Derickx

Take your pick of Bastinac/Fyfe and Gaff/Heppell but in the end we've given up the opportunity to get 3 quality young up and coming players who would walk into our best 18 and make us a strong side over the next decade. Two of them we missed out on for the sake of 3 meaningless late season wins over 2009-10 that only meant the difference between finishing 15th and 16th on the ladder in both years.

Whether supporters want to blame Cameron or the Club as a whole, there's no doubt not tanking and using the draft rules to our advantage was dumb dumb dumb policy/philosophy/planning! We can't use lack of funds and resources as an excuse either as it costs no money to tank.

Come years end we may have missed out on a priority pick again by winning 1 to many games. Cannot see us winning another game.

[RedanTiger]

Tiger players selected to play with Coburg on the weekend train with Coburg once a week on the Friday night

Fair enough facts WP, but it still looks to me from the quote that training at Coburg is optional on at least Wednesdays and the Coburg coach wants at least two regular session of all players each week.
“It’s a good alignment because the Richmond boys came to training on Wednesday, and they were there Friday, which allows us to train together, which is really important.”

I can understand having players train at Coburg on Wednesday can give out selection info but IMO getting all fringe players at that session wouldn't be a bad thing.
A gentle hint to players they are in the frame to be dropped is a good stick to get rid of complacency as well as improving Coburg's performance.

[mightytiges]

As you've illustrated above, our drafting and trading in the past 3 years has been OK, if not pretty good.

Basically your argument is that Craig Cameron should go because of the Thompson trade, and the club didn't tank. I don't prescribe to the opinion that the decision to tank is Cameron's alone.

Not a strong argument IMO, and would be throwing the baby out with the bathwater as punishment for not holding to a loser philosophy in a club that had had a loser philosophy for nearly 30 years.

Sorry FFV for the delayed reply to your post.

Firstly as shown in my initial post in this thread my argument wasn't just based on the Thomson trade and us not tanking. You can add a list that is overall too small and light weight, our continually poor use of the rookie list (last year's rookie draft was a waste) and holding onto the players not up to it with long-term contracts (eg: McGuane given 3-years and Gourdis contracted until 2012).

Not sure how expecting the employed footy dept. head and list manager to have done his upmost including using any draft rules in place to bring as many of the best talented footballers as possible to Punt Rd is a "loser philosophy". Having say Nathan Fyfe and Andrew Gaff on our list in addition to what we have wouldn't make our list worse  ???. Holding the footy dept. head and list manager  in his 4th year accountable is not throwing the baby out with the bathwater either (the same argument goes for the President in his 6th year and football director Tony Free in his 4th year on the Board). In fact I would argue tolerating the opposite is a loser philosophy. It's not like we back in the old days of us sacking people who don't achieve success immediately. The media like bringing up our past from 15-25 years ago but we've had continued stability off-field for the past 7 seasons (since the start of 2005) and supporters/member supported the Club going down the youth-path in terms of rebuilding the list. 

The AFL is an elite professional competition both on and off field where every club is looking for an advantage in any and every area over the rest of the competition. To become the best you need to be the best. Surely we want people at Richmond who are smart, cunning and ruthless at doing what's best for Richmond in the long run. When it comes to list management and recruiting, for them to understand every nook and cranny of the draft system and exploit it to our advantage when the opportunity arises. Look at Scott Clayton at the Suns last year. He could have easily sat back and just relied on all the concessions the AFL gave Gold Coast yet he still worked out that there was a loophole in the concessions which gave Gold Coast a licence to print draft picks at will.

Look I understand some supporters have a problem with the idea of not going out to win every game but I didn't create a draft system that penalises a bottom 4 side for winning 5-6 games a year as we have done from 2009-11 compared to 4 wins. List management decisions and planning affect your list for the next decade afterwards. You can't afford to be just ok at it. I'd doubt the Pies can be accused of having a loser mentality when they tanked to get both Thomas and Pendlebury in 2005. It was all part of a calculated and well-thought out plan that is paying off now big-time for them.