Former #4 Jobe Watson

It’s not surprising the Jobe and Hep were down after last week’s slogfest. They had 30 disposals (and 8 tackles) and 28 disposals (and 10 tackles) respectively. I’m sure they did a lot or running last year but you can’t train for the crash and bash of last week’s game.

Jobe’s TOG was down to 67% - the lowest on the field other than Jake Kelly who was injured. Clearly it had an impact.

The guy is a warrior - we should cut him some slack.

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Melksham was mostly horrid for 7 seasons at Essendon.

So looks like a year off has had zero effect on his performances!

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H[quote=“Jamac, post:4285, topic:220, full:true”]
It’s not surprising the Jobe and Hep were down after last week’s slogfest. They had 30 disposals (and 8 tackles) and 28 disposals (and 10 tackles) respectively. I’m sure they did a lot or running last year but you can’t train for the crash and bash last week’s game.

Jobe’s TOG was down to 67% - the lowest on the field other than Jake Kelly who was injured. Clearly it had an impact.

The guy is a warrior - we should cut him some slack.
[/quote]

That is a really really good point. Not sure how’s the Carlton mids went but no surprises that some of the in and unders from last week were a bit flat.

I reckon they have also hit a fitness plateaus where their bodies cannot carry on the way they did and need more rest.

We’ve seen them all play well and Jobe especially at multiple times this year but he hasn’t pulled it together in one go.

He will in time. He is after all a Brownlow medalist and a champion of the club.

Form is temporary, class is permanent.

I look at it at the perspective that Parish is playing alongside them look a bit worse than what it is.

I thought his disposal today was horrid and he often seemed to put his teammates in a bad position. He was hurt early so hope that was the reason.

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I fear it’s not. I really don’t know what to think about him and that worries me.

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We owe him. I think we’ve got to give him till at least mid year to get his touch back.

I remember he did an interview the day he returned to training (the FEMINIST incident) and he said that he hadn’t touched a football in nearly 12 months. That statement worried me then and it worries me now given his poor touch / disposal.

However despite that we owe him the chance to turn it around.

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not sure the doubts? saw him involved in a fair majority of our scores and was throwing his weight around in a very overly aggressive non jobe like crazy man fashion in the last that stopped collingwood dead

seemed a coaching stroke of genius putting him hf because if you watch our dominance in the 4th you’ll see jobe flying in from out of the square and having massive impact

thing is he tries these cute dinky kicks that if he pulled them off they’d be champion moves but they’re not hitting the mark like they did years ago, they’ll come back he’s getting his touch more every game, thing is, you see Merrett and Parish duff these kicks too

Doesn’t deserve the nay sayers, not one bit, been in our best 5 4 of 5 games.

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you’d think he couldn’t get near the ball acc to the reactions here - must have watched a different game…
he was huge in the 4th, getting to many contests, holding opp players up, etc. he had a lunge after running around a player where he punched the ball forward whcih was worth a few quality touches alone (was it the one that led to Tippa passing to Raz before the 1/2siren?
He hasn’t been as clean with the ball as he’d like and isn’t doing himself favors trying to be cute at times ( noticed it in the 1st half of the Hawthorn game, but hey - the team is NOT carrying him like it has been Zaka, Stants, and some youngsters - like Francis today, Langford at times, etc.
calm down boys, she’ll be right.

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On checking his stats, I was surprised how many he racked up, … but he’s not hitiing targets up yet like the Jobe we know,… but then neither is Hepp.

It will come, for both of them. And as I said in Stants’ thread, & others above iterated. there’s nought to say (or fret over) til after half way IMO.

Not as much improvement from him as others , but it’s still an upward trajectory.

wheres the 40m handpass gone??!?!?!?!??!?!

His kicking has regressed 10 years.

Can still find it, can still dish off decent handballs, can still read the ruck contest and get a clearance.

But the kicking…

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Has it got that much worse or was it that bad to begin with. Perhaps with the passing of time and 18mths off we’ve forgotten how bad it actually was?

Hepp’s game yesterday was massive, was literally everywhere on the bottom of every pack and did the really tough things all day. Lost count of the amount of times he created opportunities for us.

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Yeah, Heppell looks to be on the come back. Hurley and Hooker are building. Hopefully Jobe’s disposal starts to catch up with the rest of his game next game.

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Jobe is fine. His kicking is not where it used to be and his fitness is not there yet. However he’s tackling harder as even, his hand balling is on point, he is making key assists and he’s at the pace of the game.

He just needs more game time. He will be fine.

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Yeah it’s a massive shame for a bloke who is otherwise still going OK. Hasn’t kicked as poorly since probably 2008-09.

Watched the replay last night and it improved my opinion of his game. Thought he was solid despite some rancid disposal at times and is still taking a half second longer than he would have in tight at times but looks to be building rather than regressing. Got a feeling it’s going to click sooner rather than later and the lethal sharpness around the contest will return. Wouldn’t be dropping him in form for next round but off a five day break wouldn’t be surprised to see him rested.

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Hooray! Somebody else has noticed. What this team is seriously lacking is that long release handpass. Instead we have all these stupid little 1m handpasses back into the the congestion to a player facing into the congestion. Given how bad our ball handing skills are (especially in the wet), this isn’t a smart option. Clear the ball out - create width.

I noticed Jobe do 1 of these long handpasses yesterday to good effect.

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Yeah he just going at the moment for me. Disposal poor by foot but also no where near as strong, his ability to drive through the stoppage with the ball and dish off to an open player is lacking.