Not exactly NGA, but Cat B and didn’t seem worth an entirely new topic. Wonder if we’re interested.
THE SON of an Australian basketball legend and Grand Slam tennis champion is set to join AFL ranks later this year.
Seventeen-year-old Austin Bradtke, the son of Mark and Nicole Bradtke, will decide by the end of May which club he will join as a Category B rookie.
It is understood at least half a dozen Victorian-based clubs are keen to recruit the former basketballer who has recently met with Geelong and Collingwood among other clubs.
Standing 205cm, Bradtke has resisted the temptation to play football since quitting in his junior days with East Sandringham to focus on basketball.
He last year won the under-18 National Championship with Vic Metro and has played for Melbourne Tigers.
Tipping the scales at 88kg, Bradtke turns 18 in May and is seen as a project player with standout agility.
Having not been registered to play football in the past three years, Bradtke is eligible to be recruited outside the draft, following the path of sport-hoppers Hugh Greenwood, Alex Keath and Mark Blicavs.
Despite the basketball exploits of his father, a three-time NBL champion and former NBA player, and mother, a dual grand slam mixed doubles champion, Bradtke is set on the AFL path.
Attending Haileybury College, Bradtke last year saw seven classmates drafted to the AFL, including three in the first round – Angus Brayshaw, Luke Davies-Uniacke and Aiden Bonar.
Former junior teammates and close friends, Max and Ben King, also exceed the two-metre mark and are expected to be drafted in the top-10 in the 2018 NAB AFL Draft.
I do think it’s a bit weird he qualifies as category B. He’s living in Victoria, clearly isn’t involved in any other elite sports program any more, and turns 18 this year. If he wants to play football he could just, you know, sign up to play football and go through the normal pathways.
Yeah, you’re allowed 3 category B rookies. We’ve only got one. We’re probably not the most tempting club though if he wants to get games. Compared to say the pies who basically don’t have talls.
We have something to work with for Mousa, played down back today and took a few kick outs, he tried hard and is pretty clean, still a rookie prospect but still a bit there to tap into
Firebrace is all energy up forward and kicking was the best I’ve seen it, still needs to find a way to impact contests more
Played football up to 15, then dropped it to play basketball. Then in March he said he wanted to play football and becomes eligibile as a Cat B rookie in November, so he’s agreed to terms with melbourne now and will sign a contract in November.
My contention is if he’s going to school with the King brothers and decided he wanted to play football in his draft eligible year before the freaking football season started, he can sign up to the school football team and go through the same process as everyone else.
This is why we need a basketball team. Pick some good talent at 15, tell them to play a bit of basketball in our “elite basketball pathway”. Then they can decide they want to try football when they are 18 and want to play at the bombers, of course. 4D chessssss
They can also happen to do some cross training with the AFL and VFL players as well, to develop their 360 degree awareness and physicality a la Matthew Dellavedova.
The Gillard kid for this years draft is a basketballer so presumably he is an alternate talent, not sure if he qualifies under indigenous or multicultural.