McGrath: Well, I would have picked differently, but I’ve got plenty wrong before. He is a very, very good player and you can almost lock him in for 200 games. At the very, very least (barring career-ending injuries and the like) you have the guy who’ll be the best small defender in the comp for a long time - everyone talks up his midfield potential, but for a top draft pick to have the ability and team-mindedness to go back when necessary and completely blanket a dangerous forward like Ainsworth or Stephenson (while still getting 25+ touches himself) is a really, really rare thing. More likely, he’s a dynamic, creative, aggressive midfielder for a long time. basically ready to go - he can play and contribute from round 1 next year. His game is a lot like Zerrett’s imho, buzzing around, accumulating, involving himself in everything, both attacking and tackling. Fast hands, attacking mindset, clutch 4th qtr performer. As is true with almost every #1 pick in history, someone drafted after than him will probably turn out to be the better player (yes, I still believe that McCluggage is a more naturally talented player and can do things McGrath will never be able to do), but nonetheless he’ll be very very good and is a much surer bet of reaching his full potential than McC is I reckon, even though McCs ceiling might be higher.
Ridley is one I’ve seen basically nothing of. I attended only a couple of his games this year (one quarter vs Calder in a smacking, and a game against Nth Ballarat when i wasn’t watching him…) and he kinda got lost in the crowd of identical light-brown-haired 185-190cm Oakleigh running utility/mids. Stats tell me he was used as a designated kicker. Large number of handball receives, very high kicking efficiency.
Begley is our annual upside pick. Very limited exposure at the top level due to coming into the TAC program late and drastically out of shape, fits our 2nd round drafting philosophy perfectly. Following in the footsteps of 2nd round upside picks like Steinberg, Zerrett, and Morgan, so that 2nd round philosophy has its conspicuous successes, conspicuous failures, and some which are as yet undecided! I was at approx 1 and 1/4 of his games, and have to admit I didn’y particularly notice him at all. Bear in mind though, the 1/4 was the final qtr of the Ranges last final, and by all reports his lack of conditioning means he runs out of gas early at this point, so I probably missed the best of him. He kicked 2.2 and was named in the best from that game, according to the stats.
Mutch I’ve only seen a little of, but what I did see I liked. Honest as the day is long, big-bodied inside guy. Hocking is an EFC comparison I’d make. Hard worker, slightly weird hunched way of running, can rack up the ball, disposal by foot is ok but certainly nothing special. I rated him higher than he went - from what i saw he was one of the Allies’ best performers at u18 champs level, even matched up very well against guys like Brodie. I’m not sure he’s got the extra time/space that you look for from the very best inside guys, but he seems to have solid instincts and a good knowledge of where his teammates are. Inside mids are the type of player I personally find hardest to judge - which ones are going to be able to translate their game to the next level up and which aren’t. Even though he’s a big kid he doesn’t seem to get by entirely on body size, which is a good sign as far as I’m concerned.
Clarke I find hard to evaluate. I actually saw more of him last year than this year, but it’s like talking about two different players. 2015 edition Clarke was a dominant presence across half back. Intercept marking as a 3rd tall (you can play 3rd tall at 187cm in the TAC Cup…), run and carry and rebound. 2016 Clarke was a dominant coalface inside midfielder with a kicking accuracy problem. The reasons he’s pick 60something while Brodie and setterfield are top 10 is partly the aforementioned kicking, but partly the quality of his clearances. A high-quality clearance gets it to your man running forward in plenty of space. A low-quality one involves a short handball to a teammate under only slightly less pressure than you (though actually, being the recipient of this sort of handball is one of McGrath;s strengths) or a blind high snap around the corner to nodody in particular. Clarke’s clearances tend towards the low-quality. As mentioned re Mutch above, inside mids are the type I find hardest to evaluate. Personally, I think if this guy manages to add his 2015 self to his 2016 self we’ll have an exceptional prospect on our hands. If not, I suspect his kicking and clearnace quality might be a serious issue.
As for the might-have beens - yeah, I’d have taken McC at 1, but I’ve spoken about that exhaustively elsewhere. It looks to me like the recruiting team was acting under instruction to find an inside mid and spent several picks on that. The strategy was probably fine - Watson, Goddard, Hocking, Howlett, Bird, and even Stanton aren’t getting any younger - but the opportunity cost concerns me a little. I’m a bit wary when a club spends an entire draft trying to find a player of type X - there’s a tendency to pick guys who are just lesser players simply cos they play the right position. Carlton’s 2010 draft when they spent every single pick stocking up on talls which were then delisted within 4 year is the obvious example of this. True, it was a very thin draft for talls, though, and the ‘sliders’ all of us on here were hoping for (Venables, Florent, Simpkin) predictably never happened. But (and without knowing much about Ridley) I would have been more confortable if we;d picked more of a diversity of types. I may just be being paranoid of course - I’ve hardly seena thing of Begley or Ridley and don’t know what they have to offer, but barring pick 1 there’s no pace in our draft at all, and barring the slightly middling Ridley, no height either. The most gaping hole in our list is obviously ruck depth, and i expect that to be addressed next Monday (probably via Smack) . But that;s really y only concern, and I’m not sure what we could have done differently with later picks to fix that anyway. I’m a fair bit less hyped than some about the quality of this year’s draft tbh, and given that, it makes SENSE to simply pick whatever best players you can regardless of position.