By the end of the year I’m hoping we’ve at least brought in Dea in place of Kelly. We need to try and slowly phase out the older players if we can.
No, I don’t want to delist Redman actually, but unfortunately every club has to make at least 3 list changes each year and I’m struggling to think who it might be at this stage. To be honest, I forgot about Morgan who would go before Redman at this point in time (in my book). Seriously, you tell me three delistings for the end of this year. It’s not that easy. At the end of last year I don’t think many people would have been shocked by the delistings.
Contracts don’t mean much these days either.
Contracts ensure that a player gets a certain amount of dollars for a certain amount of years. That could be served at any club, only locked in for the first year signed.
We can off load people like Redman, like we did with Giles or demote to Rookie. It’s all very flexible.
I think we’ve tried J Merrett everywhere and I don’t see a spot for him. Morgan’s been unlucky but his time will be up if he doesn’t get a serious run at it. And one of the older guys will probably go - I’m guessing Kelly or Jobe.
On a different note. They were saying Hopper from GWS wants to return to Melb (that’s where he schooled). Martin’s obviously looking around.
With Jobe and Goddard nearing the end. Myers body being unreliable and Hocking probably not the elite answer. Some size in the midfield to help Heppell would be good.
As for the ruck - Sam Draper. Just got a feeling he’s going to turn out well.
You are correct Henry, and EFC will be planning for future needs right now. I see nothing that suggests short-term thinking from Worsfold and the Essendon Board are all very much forward thinkers.
There are all sorts of contingencies though, because while you can plan to attract Patton or Martin, nothing is assured. Who would have thought that Kelly can be an even better player than his last years at the Cats, and some would have written BJ off.
Picking up 6 players to make your best 22 in a year is impossible, so changes need thought and a program. Both Geelong and Hawthorn have done it well, with a lot of luck and not so many injuries.
I would love Dodoros job.
Not with that attitude.
I dont believe afl would like the script if we won it this year so will be very hard.
I think we have a lot of A graders now.
Zerrett, Heppell, Watson, Hooker,Hurley, Kelly
And enough B graders to get the job done
Daniher and Fantasia are set to go to another level.
Absolutely can win the flag with a good injury run and our fwd line clicking which is very much a work in progress. How quickly the group can learn to play with each other the issue, but so far so good.
People worried about our older players probably missing the fact we almost have as many teenagers on our list as Blues and Bris who’ve been at the bottom of ladder for a number of years rebuilding.
We won’t be doing a St Kilda where side falls off a cliff due to no real thought around development of kids and just trying to eek out a flag.
We actually have the personnel young player wise to cope with a changing of the guard and that’s not factoring in further drafts/trade/free agency.
Goddard - LAV/Redman
Stanton - McKenna (prefer him on a wing)
Kelly - McGrath
Baguley - McNeice
Watson - Langford/Begley (& Myers in short term)
I expect we will very much be a free agency destination club from now on. The club. The coach. The state of our list. The freeing up of salary cap via the inevitable moving on of older players.
If Fyfe was to up and leave & Freo aren’t looking great, I think we’d be very much in picture. If Watson doesn’t go on, that’s $800k freed up.
Fyfe. Hep. Zerrett. Parish. Oh boy.
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Welcome back HAP.
I think natural attrition will take care of many of your concerns, but right now I think we’re a very well balanced squad. My expectation is that come the end of the year there will be retirements and other changes - Kelly will be gone, and possibly Goddard too, and my own view is that Watson won’t choose to go on next year. I think it’s likely that one of Bird, Hocking, and Howlett will be elsewhere, as will be Jerrett. And I think Stanton will be looking at his options.
On top of that good chance there’ll be a surprise trade. So, I think there’ll be a healthy turnover of the list and the opportunity to trade-in/draft some good talent - but in the meantime having those experienced players there gives us a hard edge and the space for the younger players to do their thing and learn the ropes.
I think we’re on the right track and I don’t doubt that Worsfeld will make the hard calls. And, I think we’re a smoky this year too, just for the record.
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At the end of the 2015 season I argued strongly that we needed to rebuild. From what I thought our best footy was in 2013 we had lost Ryder, Crameri, Winders, Carlisle, Melksham and Fletcher, Belly and Myers were always injured, Demps looked done and BJ, Stanton, Watson, Bags were the wrong side of 30 or approaching it. We had no ruck or KP depth and a lot of the youngsters had real queries. I couldn’t see how we would get out of the hole while the oldies were still around, and then you would have a Hurley/Hibberd/Hooker age problem.
But since then we’ve added Walla, Parish, Hartlett, Leuy, Dea (who I rate), Green, Brown & Stewart (good KP depth) and Kelly (temporarily). Zerrett has gone to elite level, Fantasia is on his heels, Ambrose is a revelation in defence and a number of kids look promising (Langford, Laverde, McKenna). Also due to the sanctions and Hibberd leaving we got some real quality in the 2016 draft.
So my views have changed. I think we have a base now to go for it, especially if we can get s good FA this year. I think we’re also blending development. Neither Howlett or Hocking played last week.
It’s still a work in progress.
Here are the players we need to begin find replacements for over the next few year (or if we’ve drafted well enough, from outside our best 18)…
Mark Baguley - we don’t really have a lock down small defender. McGrath is the closest to it, but would it detract from his attacking qualities? I’d also prefer to see McGrath switched into the midfield soon. You could also argue Dea would be a replacement, but again, I see him more of a third defender than playing on smalls (even though he does seem to play on them here and there).
We need to address this list weakness very soon, be it by trade or through the draft.
Goddard - He should be retiring either this year or next year. I don’t think we have anyone outside our best 22 who can step into his role in the team. Langford could do it, but general consensus is he’s groomed to be an inside mid. Something that could be a big option is to push Fantasia into the outside midfield role and stick with Tippa and Green as small forward options while we find the right replacement (Razza is too valuable as a forward).
Cale Hooker - We have time, but it usually takes a few years to develop a key forward / key back. I think the Stewart pickup was shrewd in that by the time Hooker is regressing, Stewart might be ready to step in straight away and contribute. If Stewart doesn’t make it, then Mitch Brown would be a good stop gap while we find the answer.
James Kelly - Should retire by the end of this season. His replacement could be rather seamless as Gleeson would take on Kelly’s role (neither are there to lockdown their opponent) and Dea takes the medium sized forward.
Looney - He’s a ruckman and at his age, he should be at his peak but given his history of injuries, he’s an above average ruckman who is a few year away from being needing urgent addressing. McKernan could be a handy stop gap while we find the right ruckman. Sam Draper could be anything, but it’s not assured. The rookie list is where to develop a ruckman but the strike rate is tougher than first thought. If Tim English slid to our pick, we’d have been rapt with it as he would be perfectly ready to step in as a replacement for Looney. Unfortunately that didn’t happen. Hopefully we address this list weakness.
Brent Stanton - We have some time and in theory, he could switch to the backline once Kelly retires, but long term our outside mid stocks are rather thin. Zaka is decent, but he just hasn’t taken the next step. We need an outside mid somewhere in the next few years. As with Goddard, we could switch Razza and delay the issue, but that would a last resort.
Jobe Watson - While his value to the team is undoubted, I think we have a few too many inside mids so when he decides to retire, I think we’d either have inside mids to cover the issue (Langford, Mutch or Clarke). What we lose when Jobe decides to retire is the morale and leadership. Hep doesn’t have it yet and Zerrett is too young for it, but Jobe inspires by both his actions and vocally in a very similar way to how Hird, Bomber Thompson and Terrry Daniher did before him. That’s what will be tough to replace.
Of the young up and comers…
We have Langford, Laverde, Stewart, Francis and McKenna all who would be expected to take a big step in the next few years.
That’s a nice group of players to replace some of our aging players. We could add Redman, Mutch and Clarke, but I think we need to see more of them (in particular at AFL level) before knowing where they fit in the grand scheme of things.
These guys are outside our best 22 and are just treading water…
Tom Bellchambers - To me, he’s a list clogger. Big time. Not in our best 22 and he’s missed too much footy to suddenly play at his peak performance. By the time he reaches his peak (assuming it’ll take two years), he’ll be 29. That’s around the time ruckmen can fall off the cliff and disappear from footy.
Craig Bird - He’s not a list clogger, but handy depth. At some stage, we need to decide whether he’ll be any better than the 21st or 22nd player picked.
Heath Hocking - I thought he’d just sneak into our best 22 but it doesn’t look like it. Like Bird, we need to decide whether he’ll be any better than the 21st or 22nd player picked.
Ben Howlett - He’s in this week, but like Bird and Hocking, we need to decide whether he’ll be any better than the 21st or 22nd player picked.
David Myers - He’s best 22, but we have a heap of insider mids and with the emergence of Parish and Zerrett, do we really need Myers? Fully fit he’s great, but we don’t get it often enough due to injuries. We don’t need to make the call just yet as there are many ahead of him, but at some stage we need to decide whether he does enough across a whole season.
I think it’s fair to say that Jerrett is a certainty to be delisted if he doesn’t find his way into the team on form this season.
I think our list is in better shape than it was a few years back, but we need to start looking for small defenders, outside mids and a ruckman through either free agency, trade or through the draft at the end of the year and might even need to address it next year as well.
Whether it is a list suitable enough to make / win a grand final is debatable. A lot has to go right to be in that position and it usually begins by having a large core of players playing consistently together and having back to back uninterrupted pre-seasons. We won’t be at that level until next season by which our aging players might not be good enough. Regardless, we just need to keep continually building the list of young options and potential replacements for our aging players so that we don’t bottom out the way Carlton, St Kilda and Richmond seem to do every four or five years.
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If that’s the only move towards transition we’ve made I’ll be pretty disappointed.
I’ll get flamed for this, but - and this depends a lot on how we go this year - I would be pushing pretty hard at transitioning past Goddard and Stanton this year too.
Why Dea in over Kelly? Dea isn’t far off his peak and I dare say won’t improve much from here on in. If he’s going to replace Kelly we should do it now. Now, he’s obviously not going to end up as good as Kelly, so why not flick him and go hard at trading for (or drafting) someone who we think can actually do a really good job of replacing Kelly?
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I don’t disagree with you. I was one of the few that didn’t want Kelly this year, for me it’ll be one step forwards this year with him and then two steps backwards next year when we lose him and have lost a year of potential development into his replacement.
Not sure we’ll flick Dea considering he just won a contract based off of his performances last year. I suggested Dea because I thought had a good year last year, his marking in particular was impressive and I thought he showed a great mix of defence/offence under pretty much the worst midfield protection that we’ll ever have. For that I thought his efforts were especially impressive. Not sure Dea has peaked either, he’s only 25 (24 last year) and last year was his first proper year in our system and he was miles better than what he was at Richmond. I still think with a good midfield he’ll be a really good asset, and with his strong body the person will least cost us on field by removing Kelly for another player.
I agree that we should draft a great half-back (Johanisen has put off contract talks…) but how often does that happen? I think more likely we’ll have to develop our own, and it’ll probably come from McGrath, McNiece, McKenna or Ridley. I can’t see too many other options right now looking at our list, I think McNiece will be a must come end of year. McKenna I’m not convinced, he can run the ball but and as much as he’s improved he lacks defensive skills. I think depending on how we go by the halfway mark will determine if we bring in these players sooner or barely at all.
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Just thought about this a little, and realised the post I put in the review thread might be useful here as it sets out when the active players on list were drafted or recruited as Free Agents (FA), and shows the increased quality of Dodoro’s work over recent years.
It really helps that the players who went to other clubs who we got picks for resulted in the drafting of: Zerrett, Raz, Langford, Francis, Redman and Begley - for Crameri, Gumby, Judas, Carlisle, Melksham and Hibberd respectively.
In reality Zerrett is currently an upgrade on Crameri, Raz is a resurrection on Gumby, Langford combined with Leuey sort of covers Ryder’s loss (especially in a year or two), Francis looks to be a possible upgrade on Carlisle in a year or two and ongoing, Redman needs time to develop a body to see if he will cover Melksham (who probably wouldn’t be current best 22) and we hope Begley will cover Hibberd.
The best bit about these trades is they will strengthen us in the future when the players that were traded are no longer playing, which will prevent the hole which the draft sanctions could have left in our age profile. If we have 3 players who have 100+ game careers from one draft year that is a very good draft outcome. Looking at our draft and FA recruiting history though, what is more realistic is one or 10two successes
The below list are players who were drafted by EFC (listed in their draft year and the draft pick used next to their name) who are still on our list, those in bold were in our side Saturday night, players like Goddard, Leuey, Kelly, Dea, Green and Stewart are listed the year they came to EFC as free agents - which, come to think of it, are another major reason why we have covered the draft sanctions so well.
2016 (18-19 YO unless otherwise stated)
1 Andrew McGrath
22 Jordan Ridley
31 Joshua Begley
42 Kobe Mutch
63 Dylan Clarke
R1 Sam Draper
R MC Ben McNeice (25)
FA James Kelly (32)
FA Matt Dea (25)
FA Josh Green (24)
FA James Stewart (23)
2015 (19-20)
5 Darcy Parish
6 Aaron Francis
29 Alex Morgan (21)
30 Mason Redman
54 Mitchell Brown (26)
68 Michael Hartley (24 in June)
R22 Anthony McDonald-Tipungwuti (24 on 22nd April)
FA Matthew Leuenberger (29 in June)
T Craig Bird (28)
2014 (20-21)
17 Kyle Langford
20 Jayden Laverde
R12 Shaun McKernan (26)
R47 Jake Long
R62 Int Conor McKenna
2013 (21-22)
26 Zachary Merrett
55 Orazio Fantasia
R26 Patrick Ambrose (25)
2012 (22-23)
10 FS Joe Daniher
53 Martin Gleeson
FA Brendon Goddard (32 in May)
2011 (23-24)
31 Jackson Merrett
R37 Mark Baguley (30 in May)
2010
8 Dyson Heppell (25 in May)
(PS4 Hibberd, R12 Jenkins)
2009
26 Travis Colyer (25)
R30 Ben Howlett (28)
(10 Jake Melksham, 24 Jake Carlisle, R43 Crameri)
2008
5 Michael Hurley (27 in June)
23 David Zaharakis (27)
2007
6 David Myers (28 in June)
54 Cale Hooker (28)
PS8 Tom Bellchambers (28 in July)
2006
(42 Bachar Houli)
2005
R20 Heath Hocking (29)
(7 Ryder)
2004
(14 Monfries)
2003
13 Brent Stanton (31 in May)
2002
40 FS Jobe Watson (32)
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On the back of some absolutely outstanding drafting in a difficult situation, I think our list is in terrific shape. Over the next couple years we will look to replace Kelly, Goddard, Watson, Stanton and Baguley.
Of all those guys, only Watson is playing an integral role as our go to inside midfielder. Not discounting the importance of the others (they are massive for us) but just pointing out that Woosha has them playing roles in the pockets, flanks and wings…much easier positions to replace than your spine and core midfielders. I think this is a deliberate ploy from Woosha, and one that will allow us sustained success even after these 5 have retired.
With continued success in the draft, plus the fact that I now believe we are prime destination for free agents/trade targets again, we can be a team in the top part of the ladder for 4-5 years when the likes of Hurley, Hooker, Zaka, Luenberger, Bellchambers are getting on.
Attracting a free agent or 2 in 2017 and 2018 to fill some of these voids will be a key strategy IMO. By all reports we’ve got the cap space this year to attain Martin or even better Fyfe! Not to mention there currently being some attractive names available in the 2018 free agent list (Shuey, Sloane, S.Atley, Duncan, Brodie Smith, Isaac Smith, Nick Smith, Conca, Gaff, J.McGovern and Tom Nicholls if we need a ruckman).
Watson - Fyfe (FA)
Goddard - Gaff (FA)
Kelly - back flank/midfielder with our 1st/2nd/3rd round picks in 2017/2018
Stanton - ditto Kelly
Baguley - quality back pockets often found as late diamond in the rough draft/rookie picks
That’s not factoring in any of those who didn’t play last night - Laverde, Francis, Begley, Ridley, Mutch, Clarke, McKenna, Long, Redman, Morgan. I could conceivably see 5 of those names becoming best 22 in the coming years.
She’ll be right.
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Exactly SCarey. We have to build around the Heppell-and-younger generations.
That means persisting with kids like Langford and Gleeson and Parish and it will mean they have down quarters and make mistakes. But if we start dropping kids wholesale and bringing in journeymen? We go backwards. The only way we really improve is through youth.
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Nick smith? Conca?
Jeeeeepers.
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Nick Smith was All-Australian a couple seasons ago.
Before you laugh at this Conca passing comment just remember how many of you LOL’d at the prospect of getting Josh Green. Don’t be fooled by Richmonds ability to turn talent into spuds. Conca is a high draft pick who has been in and out of the team but overall I think he is a decent well rounded player in the right age bracket. Is attainable. Would fill a role.
A 28-29 year old back pocket?? Wild stuff.
And you’re far, far, far too late on asking me not to laugh at the Conca idea.
Sheedy sometimes got himself into trouble by chasing the guy we should’ve drafted after the fact- but chasing the guy we were clearly right to ignore? That’s a new one.
It’s not necessarily meant to be about who we cut. It’s more about framing who we should play, in the context of who we will be cutting in the next 2 years anyway.
To my mind it’d be real mid-00s Carlton/Richmond stuff to give another 35 or 40 games to guys like Craig Bird then cut them at 29yo. Worst case scenario. Not taking us up.
That’s his age? Ok I thought he was much younger than that. You can nit pick all you like, I merely rattled off some names that might be available in a couple years.
FYI the list is here - http://www.footywire.com/afl/footy/out_of_contract_players?year=2018