2018 Free Agents

Football Discussion Trade week Duursma head in
1

Surprised Libba and Dahlhaus are unrestricted, I guess that’ll happen when you’re paying Boyd a million a year.

WESTERN Bulldogs premiership stars Tom Liberatore and Luke Dahlhaus – already both in the news this week – are the standout names on the AFL’s unrestricted free agents list.

League headquarters have released this year’s 51 free agents, 11 of which are restricted, including Adelaide’s Rory Sloane, Gold Coast forward Tom Lynch and West Coast’s Jeremy McGovern.

Players must serve eight years at the same club to become a free agent and those paid in the top 25 per cent at their club are restricted free agents.

An unrestricted free agent can move to the club of his choice without any hurdles, whereas clubs can match any offer a restricted free agent agrees to.

One report this week suggested the Dogs offered Dahlhaus as trade bait last year and also mentioned that rival clubs were of the belief Liberatore and teammate Clay Smith were ‘gettable’.

Coach Luke Beveridge vehemently denied the story in an exclusive interview with AFL.com.au.

Making Dahlhaus’ and Liberatore’s unrestricted status more interesting is that fellow Bulldogs Jordan Roughead and Mitch Wallis are restricted free agents.

Clubs’ ability to front and back-end contracts to suit their salary cap situation also muddies the waters.

Tom Boyd’s monster deal to join the Kennel from Greater Western Sydney a year after being the No.1 pick in 2013 is understood to be heavily front-loaded.

Jason Johannisen re-signed at the Bulldogs last year on a lucrative five-season deal, while superstar Marcus Bontempelli comes out of contract next year and will be a priority signing.

North Melbourne speedster Shaun Atley and West Coast ruckman Scott Lycett were surprises among the restricted free agents.

The AFL will award compensation in the form of a draft pick to a club that loses a player through free agency if that club has not gained a player the same way.

Restricted

Rory Sloane (Adelaide); Cam Guthrie (Geelong); Tom Lynch (Gold Coast); Tom McDonald (Melbourne); Shaun Atley (North Melbourne), Bachar Houli (Richmond); Andrew Gaff (West Coast), Scott Lycett (West Coast); Jeremy McGovern (West Coast); Jordan Roughead (Western Bulldogs); Mitch Wallis (Western Bulldogs)

Unrestricted

Richard Douglas (Adelaide); David Mackay (Adelaide); Andy Otten (Adelaide); Rohan Bewick (Brisbane); Ryan Lester (Brisbane); Marc Murphy (Carlton); Kade Simpson (Carlton); Jarryd Blair (Collingwood); Alex Fasolo (Collingwood); Tyson Goldsack (Collingwod); Ben Reid (Collingwood); Tom Bellchambers (Essendon); Hayden Ballantyne (Fremantle); Michael Johnson (Fremantle); David Mundy (Fremantle); Aaron Sandilands (Fremantle); George Horlin-Smith (Geelong); Daniel Menzel (Geelong); Jarrod Harbrow (Gold Coast); Michael Rischitelli (Gold Coast); Shaun Burgoyne (Hawthorn), Taylor Duryea (Hawthorn); Paul Puopolo (Hawthorn); Ryan Schoenmakers (Hawthorn); Brendan Whitecross (Hawthorn); Neville Jetta (Melbourne); Scott Thompson (North Melbourne); Sam Wright (North Melbourne); Justin Westhoff (Port Adelaide); Reece Conca (Richmond); Shaun Grigg (Richmond); Sam Gilbert (St Kilda); Heath Grundy (Sydney); Jarrad McVeigh (Sydney); Nick Smith (Sydney); Mark Le Cras (West Coast); Eric Mackenzie (West Coast); Luke Dahlhaus (Western Bulldogs); Tom Liberatore (Western Bulldogs); Dale Morris (Western Bulldogs)

2

Cannot see the AFL letting Lynch leave the Suns easily. Expect some dodgy brown paper bag stuff.

If not and he goes… see ya Suns

1 Like
3

Liberatore would be an awesome pickup as a FA.

1 Like
4

Lynch is going to retire an incredibly wealthy nobody spending his entire career at GC.

1 Like
5

Would love him to leave and for them to just totally collapse

1 Like
6

My priorities would be Sloane, Gaff and Wallis. Not sure about Libby and Stringer both here.

I’d also love Jetta if he wanted out for any reason (eg Dees miss finals) and didn’t cost too much. Perfect back pocket replacement for Bags.

1 Like
7

Wallis I cannot see leaving the Dogs.

Gaff and Sloane would have every club chasing them if they even think they are within a sniff of the pair leaving their respective club

8

I wonder if we’d consider McGovern?

1 Like
9

We’ll know a lot more about our needs by the end of the season. My personal suspicion it will still be for inside mids and defenders. The problem with McGovern is whether or not he would be worth the price. Getting him out of WC would cost a big chunk of coin, and although he’s clearly better than anyone except Hurley, is the improvement worth that much coin?

10

:face_with_raised_eyebrow:
7 years
50 games
Top quarter of paypackets at WCE
Uhhhh

3 Likes
11

Feels a bit like when geelong couldn’t match sydney’s offer to Mumford because they’d contracted Mark Blake

12

Liberatore’s price took a hit on the weekend. ACL.

1 Like
13

Could be a Josh Kennedy (swans) (Hawks favourite son) moment if Libba leaves Dogs to come to us and becomes a superstar inside mid…also could be a Brent prismall moment player comes to us never gets back to best after knee injury.

14

He won’t leave.

15

Wouldn’t surprise me if we were into him at all.

1 Like
16

There are some massive numbers being thrown around for McGovern and while the best intercept marker going around would be pretty frikken awesome, we need to control games through the ‘mid-arc’ region a hell of a lot better than we currently do.

Gun midfielder. Always.

Or at least just once before we hit 2 decades of absolute mediocrity and utter failure.

17

goddard out gun midfielder in throw kitchen sink at

18

wat?

19

Yesterday, McGovern was hanging his shoulder with a stinger…but I feel like I have seen this before? Perhaps on various occasions throughout the season?

Dodgy shoulder is a bit of a problem, for a player whose standout quality is intercept marking…

20

goddards last year…surely we have money to get the best available mid …