Smack was awesome on Friday night and it will hurt us that he’s out but i’ve never known a player that only performs well 1 in every 4 weeks to get so much praise.
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Well done smack, you took one for the team and helped us get the win. Respect!!
Hooker has to go forward when he comes in
Hurley can take hipwood
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He was very good in most games he played in the second half of last year
Last week he presented and marked well but didnt convert
He was very good on Friday night
Since mid last year he has given his all and cant be faulted imo. He is clearly, clearly our second best tall forward imo and I hope people start to realise this. It took him a while, but its clicked with smack now. Hes a good player
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Smacks career has been stalled due to the Essington development program.
For the majority of his career with us he was used as an undersized Ruck who drift forward and was primarily played that way in the VFL.
It wasn’t until they recognised he had a great set of dukes and above average athleticism for a big guy that they started playing him forward. Once started playing exclusively as a forward in the VFL he was clearly the best key forward at that level.
By then though they were using Hooker forward so he became redundant again.
It wasn’t until Hooker went back that Smack came in last year and he showed that he was most definitely an AFL level forward. Not a world beater due to being a confidence player but still very dangerous and incredibly important to our structure.
If Hooker doesn’t hit the ground running then I see us regressing again very quickly.
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You make some good points in favour. I certainly can see why others rate him. I remember saying to my son last season ‘I can’t believe I’m saying this but we are really going to miss him’.
Yeah fair call. All good points. I think i just get frustrated with him because he can be brilliant but struggles to string it together. He also seems to be really physical in some games which i love and then others he has no presence.
It’s a shame he can’t get continual game time because i think the more matches straight he spends on the park the better he gets. This injury could see the end of his season though.
Ours?
As has been pointed out across the board clubs are more conservative with their management of soft tissue injuries.
Instead of missing 3 and having half the players redo the same hammy within a fortnight (missing another month) they’re giving them an extra week or 2 to reduce the risk of reoccurrence
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He’s got great hands. Needs to kick 2-4 every week.
Would be even better for the team when Joey is fit.
He gets a lot of praise every month.
Does anyone know if its the same hamstring he did last time. Hopefully its not on the same side.
Without our development program his career would be on the scrap heap.
The only reason he was on our list was to be a backup ruckman.
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I can’t recall the exact reasons behind his recruitment.
Dodoro has always had a very good eye for talks but it hasn’t necessarily meant we have developed them in the correct positions.
Apparently not important enough to make the injury report on AwFuL Game Day, Rockliff minor concussion more of a story. Stewart to come in, bit of a shame Laverde injured as well. Very mobile forward line this week
We got him as a rookie because we only had Bellchambers and Giles as ruckman on the list.
And he went past Giles in the pecking order very quickly.
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Yeah fair enough.
It was painfully obvious he wasn’t going to make it as a ruck.
He just doesn’t have the smarts.
His “development” in Essendon has been pretty good compared to Adelaide.
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It was his tank, imo.
Being a smaller ruckman who relies on their leap to compete, requires a lot more effort to ruck for 4 quarters.
He’s had patches where he’s rucked pretty well (his tap work is decent) but he runs out of steam, and that’s when the free kicks start.
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The biggest thing for me was all the frees given.
Having said that I just think that’s the typical umpiring bias against Essendon.
That aside that automatically gives the opposition first possession from the centre of the ground and puts you at a huge disadvantage.
It actually only happened in a few games, maybe 3 or 4 out of 15 or so games he rucked.
But when it did happen (like the Goldstein night) it happened really, really badly, and it hurt the team.
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But what about the Bruce Reid ‘auction’ anecdote by a poster on here where Smack only had a 1 week hammy?
I much preferred that version.
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Didn’t McKernan miss the 2nd half of last year with a hamstring?