I said the list declined in talent post 2000 as a direct result of Dodoro’s list management - you made the excuse that it was injuries & Jackson (which is ironic - I will get back to that later) not the players we brought in to replace retirements, trades etc. That to me indicates you believe our list management post 2000 wasn’t a factor therefore the list was as good. I’m still not sure how else to read your position.
So the list wasn’t good between 2004-2011, we can agree on something - is it possible that the drafting from 1999 played a significant part in that? Is there some other list manager, recruiting person during that entire time other than Dodoro? Can we possibly agree then that at least 13 years of his tenure the list he in some way contributed to supplying wasn’t good? Even if you think Winders would have been a star, I don’t think you can defend the actual picks from 2000 or most of the trades so how about we agree the list declined & our recruiting declined post Judkins - can we agree on that?
When I talked about post 2000 I meant that players like Davies, Harvey, Laycock etc were not able to replace the quality we lost. I’ve never blamed Dodoro in any way for the fire sale but I have pointed out time after time that it was his job to try to replace what we lost & he never came near getting back those mids. Now I have no issue at all in agreeing that replacing all time stars is difficult but would it be fair to say we didn’t even come remotely close?
Yes Ive agreed with you that we were building towards a better side when the saga hit. I still maintained then & now that our midfield was a weakness that was going to restrict our ability to go deep into the finals. Watson was at his best & possibly the most influential player in the league 12/13. Much like Dangerfield with some help from Sellwood can now carry Geelong a fair way I think Watson carried a big load. Goddard & Heppell had good years & I’ve been a staunch defender of Stanton but I simply will never believe a midfield with Howlett, Hocking, Myers, Melksham maybe Colyer or Jerrett in it bats deep enough to have challenged sides like Hawthorn, Swans or even Freo come finals time. We’ve just seen again a real example of how far off we are when it gets serious & while I believe its very possible we could have won a final in 2013 & should have beaten North in 2014 all we really have is what might have been with no real evidence the list was capable of any finals wins. Now you may counter with the possibility that given no Saga, Dodoro would have replaced ordinary mids with better players. Again this is a possibility but there’s no evidence to support it given we know that pre-saga his drafting hadn’t fixed the issues & nothing in his trading history suggested he could complete a big name trade.
Ok so we were building the list only from 2004 is that what you’re saying? the draft picks before that don’t count? What did we do differently post 2004? When was this phase until? Even if as you say we were meant to be primed in 2013/15, don’t you think 12 years to get primed is a little too long? I know people have joked about Dodoro playing the long game but come on. Should Richmond have given Wallet & Miller another 6 years???
Now your last bullet point “we’ve managed the list poorly since 2013” intrigues me. You’ve acknowledged the list till 2011 wasn’t really good & now that we’ve managed the list poorly since 2013. That only leaves 2012 as a year when you haven’t acknowledged the list was either poor or poorly managed. So basically you are saying only 1 year out of his tenure, our list &/or list management hasn’t been poor. Was he unfarkingbelievably awesome in 2012 & that somehow makes up for the rest of his career?
Now we are left with this question about what Dodoro is actually responsible for. I’ll ask again, if you can name the person or people who have been completely undoing his work for 19 years then I’ll join forces in calling for their heads. Till then I have to place at the very least some responsibility for list management on the list manager. Maybe he’s simply the patsy for the real list manager who’s too ashamed to put his name to the decisions - who knows.
Coming back to Jackson for a second, I was 1 of the few here calling for him to be replaced 10 years ago so the idea that I have singled out Dodoro as a scapegoat in nonsense. I was also front & centre of the calls to replace Knights. I don’t recall your support in any of those positions so it seems a little hypocritical now to be saying I haven’t acknowledged every other problem the club has had. Dodoro is not solely responsible for anything, he works in a club & works with others. He is however a manager & a figure that has been at the club for a long time. He has to be accountable for a lot of the list outcomes. It was Dodoro on draft day who decided at the last second to switch from Lobb to Zerrett, if we can agree that was a great decision then why can’t we agree the poor decisions fall to him as well? Even if he’s only part of a team he’s been the one constant in that team. At some point if the team remains poor through elimination you have to look at what hasn’t changed & again there’s the fact he’s the manager.