Draft Strategy

I don't get this slider bullshit that everyone goes on with. Just because the stupid media or some wannabe experts on big footy think a bloke should go at a certain point in the draft, doesn't mean he's actually worth taking if he's still on the table 10 or 20 picks later.

You may want to stay away from the biggest slider and bolter thread that has been created then.

I don't get this slider bullshit that everyone goes on with. Just because the stupid media or some wannabe experts on big footy think a bloke should go at a certain point in the draft, doesn't mean he's actually worth taking if he's still on the table 10 or 20 picks later.

Media bullshit???

We’re talking a Jackets’ special or two “I can’t believe he was still available at pick 20/29”, in his post draft presser.

After Zerrett, Langford, Laverde and Redman (there is still time for Morgan), wash your mouth out!

Essendon

List needs

  1. A contested-ball winning beast through the midfield - (Alongside Jobe Watson, someone with similar size and power at the coalface is required to pair with Dyson Heppell and the club’s young, developing midfield group)

  2. Elite young outside midfielder - (Brendon Goddard and Brent Stanton are nearing the end and lack obvious successors)

  3. Second high-quality key forward to pair long-term with Joe Daniher - (ex-Giant James Stewart may be good enough but optimally Daniher should have a second star key forward to pair with, allowing Cale Hooker to play back)

  4. Young ruckman to develop and eventually succeed Matthew Leuenberger and Tom Bellchambers - (with Gach Nyuon delisted, a second young ruckman would be beneficial)

  5. Crumbing small forward who can kick 30+ goals in a season and heap on the forward pressure (Orazio Fantasia is a talent but needs more support in the front half)

Draft picks: 1, 20, 29, 41, 68, 95, 113, 131

Who should they draft?

Hugh McCluggage with the first pick overall is a great list fit both through the midfield and up forward.

Hugh McCluggage poses for a portrait during the 2016 AFL draft combine. Scott Barbour/Getty Images
Around picks 29 and 41 there are likely to be some strong-bodied midfielders still available with Jonty Scharenberg, Dylan Clarke, Jack Graham and Willem Drew among a larger group Essendon may consider with one of those selections.

Through the ruck, under-18 prospects Sean Darcy, Jordan Sweet, Jeremy Goddard and Peter Ladhams if there late draft or as rookies would be suitable list fits and may be developable young ruckmen. Otherwise next year there are lots of talented rucks who may feature towards the top of the draft.

As small forwards, late draft or as rookies, Tyson Stengle, Kym LeBois, Sam Fowler, Dan Allsop, Kyle Kirby and Willie Rioli are some names who may be considered.

As a stop gap key forward, Essendon would benefit from considering Brett Eddy.

From Knightmare most recent article

So ideal world

  1. Clug
    20/29. Drew, Clarke, Graham and best available maybe HBF
  2. Quality small forward
  3. Eddy

Buckley’s chance Marshall is available at 20. He’s the best tall forward in the draft and if he was consistent he would be in the number 1 talks. Plenty of clubs would kill for a good FF, and yet people think practically every club will pass him up?

Convert that to Games played and percentile as compared to the rest of the competition and you might have something, else those stats are not worth much.

[quote=“Henry_s_Angry_Pills, post:335, topic:3761, full:true”]

He’s been here all of 18 months and been injured for 9? of them

I don’t really know what else to say. He was rated inside the top 40 of his draft, it doesn’t make sense to chop him at the first opportunity. Not like we’ll have much of a squeeze for spots.

Also I’d love to know the hit rate for 3rd+ round rookie picks to even play 1 game.
[/quote]](#14 Jordan Ridley - Riddle me this)

Rookie and PSD picks from the beginning of the Rookie Draft in 1996/97.

The Rookie Draft has been going since the end of 1996 which divides into roughly equal Sheedy and post Sheedy era. In the Sheedy era (not including the 2007 draft) 14 out of 39 rookies played a senior game (36%) and as much as we loved them, all 4 of his PSD picks played senior footy, (Zantuck, Heffernan, Camporeale and Michael), and in the post Sheedy (starting from the 2007 draft) 17 out of 27 non recycled EFC playing rookies have played at least 1 senior game (63%) and 6 out of 7 PSD players have played at least 1 senior game, but the nature of the picks were quite different from the Sheedy days when the rules were different also (Hams, Hibberd, Hardingham, Skipworth, Williams, Bellchambers).

The players who were rookied after being on the senior list previously were John Williams, Anthony Long, Kurt Aylett, Jay Neagle, Tyson Slattery, Ariel Steinberg, Will Hams and currently Sean McKernan. These are all post Sheedy era and only the last 3 out of the 8 (37.5%) played senior football after being rookied, and perhaps Will was lucky with the sanctions increasing his chances. So it may be reasonable to conclude that we have mainly wasted picks with recycling rookie picks except where it was to cover a specific need like McKernan as ruck depth and Stein as KPD depth, both of which have been needed.

So were we much worse at recruiting rookies in the Sheedy era? I suppose we were clinging to the glory days of the of being a consistent finals side up until 2004 and Sheedy was more prone to picking his finals players and picking up recycled players (see PSD and a number of infamous draft picks) rather than the new blood amongst the rookies, is one way of looking at it, but we got worse and worse at picking rookies as the Sheedy era went on (post 2003).

By my reckoning, there are 7 players of the Sheedy era who made a significant contribution as best 22 players (in bold) who were from the Rookie draft and the PSD, and 9 players in the post Sheedy era who either have, would have (if we could have kept them) or are likely to make a significant contribution as best 22 players, and if Sam Draper makes it we could be averaging 1 best 22 player a year from the Rookie draft in the post Sheedy era, which is a pretty impressive strike rate. We currently have 7 promoted rookies / PSDraftees on our senior list at the moment (TBC, Bags, Ambrose, Heater, Bobcat, Walla and Conor), 5 of which are arguably best 22 and who play a significant role in the side.

Personally I think Dodoro needs a lot of credit for being able to spot upside that can be developed right down to the rookie draft

Below are those players originally picked up in the Rookie Draft and PSD who have played at least 1 senior game
(R1= Rookie pick 1 , R AP = Rookie Alternative Pathway pick, PSD 6 = Pre-season Draft pick 6)

2016
R AP Ben McNeice

2015
R22 Anthony McDonald-Tipungwuti

2014
R12 Shaun McKernan
R47 Jake Long
R62 AP Conor McKenna

2013
R26 Patrick Ambrose - he goes OK

2012
PSD 6 Will Hams

2011
R11 Dalgliesh
R37 Mark Baguley
R29 Dell
R78 Brendan Lee

2010
PSD 4 Hibberd
R12 Josh Jenkins (Adelaide)

2009
PSD 7 Kyle Hardingham
R 30 Ben Howlett
R 43 Stewart Crameri
R 55 Marigliani

2008
PSD 3 Skipworth
R 64 Michael Quinn (AP)

2007
PSD 5 John Williams
PSD 8 Tom Bellchambers
R 5 Rhys Magin
R21 Jarrod Atkinson

2006
Interesting to note the change in tone of drafting going back to the Sheedy years, only recycled players recruited via PSD and rookie draft played
PSD 2 Mal Michael
R33 Rama

2005
Sheedy strikes again
PSD 4 Camporeale
PSD 10 Heffernan
R20 Heath Hocking

2004
PSD 6 Zantuck
R27 Benjamin Jolley

2003
2 not bad rookie picks in 2003
R27 NLM
R42 Andrew Lovett

2002
Who could forget
R28 Courtney Johns

2001
R46 Ken Hall

2000
R32 Damien Peverill

1999
R14 Cory McGrath
R30 David Johnson (Mark’s brother - played for Geelong)
R58 James Podsiadly (Geelong, Adelaide)

1998
No PSD or rookie picks

1997
R3 Dean Rioli
R67 Mark Johnson (rare distinction re-rookied from the rookie list)

1996
R13 Mark Johnson
R45 Gary Moorcroft

4 Likes

100% on the re-rookie from the rookie list?

Opportunity for Long.

1 Like

I’d also suggest the comment against 2006 was more a comment on the specifics of that draft. (And the fact that we took 6 or 7 draftees in the top 40 odd of the ND that year.)

(And still I thought Dean Dick had played 1 game, but apparently not)

Yes… he went prematurely

1 Like

2004, 2005, 2006 all had the flavour of Sheedy trying to prop up a sinking ship, picking Zantuck, Camporeale and Michael.

Rama was definitely a special case, which was Sheeds at his legendary best, and Heater the exception. Heffernan was another Sheedy welcome back, but since that time we have generally picked at least 1 decent player in the Rookie or PSD who has made a 100 game or at least realised that potential elsewhere, or, in the case of the more recent players, appear to have that potential given their strong attributes which they are already showing (Conor, Walla, Ambrose).

During the post 1996 Sheeds era our rookie and PSD recruiting was a lot more inconsistent in terms of long term players, but given it as also more successful period, when the likes of James Podsiadly didn’t get a look in, and some great players were picked, NLM, Andrew Lovett, Pev, Dean Rioli, Mark Johnson and Gary Moorcroft, perhaps I am being harsh. But those last 3 years had the tint of trying to prop up the side, in contrast to the current longer term view which Dodoro has been succeeding with against the odds.

Why is the PSD even being mentioned? They’re senior listed players, and nobody got delisted and returned via the PSD. I’m also not sure if playing a single game really matters, its if they made an AFL career. For example, Jenkins should really count as he was a great pick, we just couldn’t keep him. If we’re considering the opportunity cost of this approach you really need to know:

a) The players who made it (can be formed from what is written)
b) Our miss rate, so you need the rookie picks where the players failed
c) For re-rookied players, who was the senior listed player their removal made room for

Sorry, it was an interesting read and I appreciate you doing it. But I’m not sure it really helped solve the crux of the debate, is re-rookieing a player actually hurting us?

Excluding contracted players where there are cap considerations, there’s not a lot of analysis that needs to be done of the last decade surely? Who came on to the senior list is irrelevant, they were either going to be delisted or rookied.

In the last decade we’ve taken 24 new rookies. Howlett, Crameri, Jenkins, Baguley, Ambrose, Tippa gives us a strike rate of 25% (with Draper and Long undecided). Zero of the seven uncontracted re-rookies have had a meaningful career (with McKernan undecided) which, you might have to check my maths, is a strike rate of 0%.

So even if McKernan carves out a decent career from here, our re-rookie success rate is lower than our regular rookie rate (15% vs 25%). It’s lower if you include contracted players, but there’s other considerations there.

And for completeness, here are the rookies of note taken after our re-rookies (excluding zone picks, recycles, rookie B, NSW scholarship) for some indication on whether we missed out on anybody. After all, re-rookieing a player if there was no talent left is hardly a miss.
2007 - Didn’t re-rookie
2008 - Didn’t re-rookie
2009 - None
2010 - Jason Johannissen, Jeremy McGovern
2011 - Harry Cunningham
2012 - Taberner, Sinclair, Jake Lloyd, Hartigan, Rampe
2013 - Didn’t re-rookie
2014 - Melican (just wanted to list the Pelican)
2015 - None yet
2016 - None yet

The original task was to give an idea of “3rd+ round rookie picks to even play 1 game”, I gave an idea of that from showing which round rookie picks were taken from. The rest was more or less out of interest as I went along. I included PSD’s because they are often mixed up with the rookies, so at least I separated them out, but I take your point that they are on the senior list and historically are more akin to the modern delisted free agent where the player and club can directly negotiate now. So I take your point, it wasn’t a perfect analysis, but at least it was an “interesting read”.

Thanks to @SplitRound for his adding clarity to the strike rates and what we “missed out on”.

I think Dodoro is pretty much nailing it these days with re rookie-ing for only very specific purposes, like ruck depth and honouring contracts to senior listed players while not taking up a senior list spot. It is one thing to miss out on a random player, another to meet an actual list need and another again to treat people well and give them a reasonable opportunity to reach their potential. Eades was a bust, but at least they tried, and we don’t seem to be giving too many Aboriginal players a chance these days. Hopefully we will go there again in the near future and try and get some more mid field x-factor.

That seems to me to be a pretty big assumption. You’re assuming that the clubs didn’t actually rate the players enough that if the choice was delistment or retainment without the rookie list, that they wouldn’t have been retained. You just have to look at players like NOB, KAV, Slattery and a host of others who kept staying on the list for years even though most here had major question marks on them.

This discussion began in the context of Morgan. I could easily see that the decision isn’t whether or not to keep him (after all, he’s been majorly injury prone and two years ago we rated him the 29th best prospect), but simply whether if we moved him to the rookie list will anyone else nab him? Since doing so frees up a senior spot for a higher draft pick and saves salary cap. And hell, next year he’ll even be able to play anytime if he comes on.

Finally, your list above is pretty skewed. For example, in 2010 the senior spots opened up via re-rookieing allowed us to nab Hibberd in the PSD. That seems like a win to me.

If the choice was delisting or re-rookie, and the re-rookies were (without exception) our last rookie picks, then the only available spots at that point were rookie spots. If you reject that assumption then the entire rest of the post is invalid, and I’m not going to bother defending it in the context of the assumption being wrong.

Fair.

The problem is of course we have no idea if that assumption is true or not. And short of inside knowledge, won’t be getting one.

Yeah, but at that point it’s completely impossible to discuss whether it’s a good idea or not. Was Hams re-rookied to free up a ND spot because we didn’t think Hartley would last, or was it to bring in Gwilt as a DFA onto the main list, or was it because we didn’t think there was any better rookie talent, or that he was the best player nobody else would pick up, or because he was the player willing to take a pay cut, or because of his personal situation, or because we really wanted to upgrade Ambrose, or because we didn’t expect him to carve a spot out the next year anyway, or because we figured if we copped suspensions our rookies would play anyway, or or or.

Is it hurting us? Who knows because every choice is completely different to every other choice and made for completely unknown reasons in unique circumstances so why bother even mentioning it, and why suggest it might be a good idea for a player this year having no idea why it was done in the past?

For the record, I think it’ll become more common now that there’s no playing restrictions on rookies, so why not do it?

1 Like

Yes, but also, and more importantly, no.

Eades would’ve had a 2 year standard first contract, unlikely he would’ve been delisted.

It’s not a decision made in isolation so you can’t view it in isolation.

No rookie-ing of Eades and McKernan means 2 fewer main list spots. Effectively means no (I can’t remember exactly who signed last but from memory) Stewart and Green - but we could take 2nd and 3rd round rookies*

*Quite likely exciting young talent like Brett Eddy, Alex Silvagni or Drew Petrie - only 4 new players have played a game, who were taken from the 2nd round of rookie draft onwards, it’s retread central.

I will point out my post started

Edit: I should have added after the list of “missed” rookies my opinion that it shows that in most years that we haven’t really missed out on anyone in the rookie draft. 10 and 12 maybe, if they’re the guys we would have taken.

But my overall opinion remains that, in the case of uncontracted players, it doesn’t achieve anything even if the alternative is something that achieves very little.

Edit edit: I should also apologise for my little hissy fit at @Ants.

Rule no 1: Fark Carlton

Rule no 2: Never apologise

2 Likes