2023 and onwards/depth and draft strength

[Freomaniac]

I’m comfortable enough with where our depth sits. It’s not perfect but depth players are reasonably easy to find compared to best 22 players.

We’ve got one A Grader atm (Serong), maybe two at best (Darcy). Walters may play like an A Grader every second week - that’s about it.

Good teams have 8-10 A Graders and a bunch of very solid B Graders. Most of the team selected this week and a handful of guys either in the emergency list or injured are capable of being B Grade at the very least and have shown they can do that at AFL level.

I’d be much more worried about developing our best 22 and getting underperforming players back to their best before we start worrying about depth too much.

Poor team selection where we fail to select a second KPF over Bailey Banfield doesn’t exactly help the appearance in terms of depth but that’s pure stupidity not a depth issue. Corbett is AFL quality but for some bizarre reason isn’t getting a look at it and so is Taberner when properly fit.

We have an interesting Playing list.... Not even compared to our 2012-15 finals side Under Ross Lyon. That 2012-15 finals side had depth everywhere but not in the KPF stocks. Barely anything out side of an Ageing Pavlich.

But Looking at the Dockers 2017-20 side... That had depth in the backline. Alex Pearce is 198 cm. Logue, Cox, Taylin Duman, Joel Hamling and Tobe Watson were all 190-194cm.

Yes... Dockers could of played guys like a 190 cm tobe watson and 192 cm taylin Duman at CHB despite their skinny frames. That 2020 season, Alex Pearce and Joel Hamling didnt play one minute of the 2020 season, Logue played the 1st 4 or 5 games and was injured for the rest of the 2020 season.

Midfield was solid but the yonger talent needed games.

The forward line had talent and experience in Taberner, Lobb, Walters and Schulz, but for some reason, we couldnt get the structure right.


Now we look at the 2021 side until now under Justin Longmuir. Back line when fully fit and in good form is easily good enough to make freo a finals side. Last season proves that. The key is not have any of those blokes injured. Losing either Alex Pearce or Brennan Cox to injury hurts more than most people think. Dockers dont have any other 190 cm talls to cover those 2 except Joel Hamling. Unless you wanna throw 188 cm ethan hughes or 186 cm luke ryan at CHB.

General small and medium defenders we are fine with. Hughes, Ryan, Walker, Clark, Aish, Walker can all full any non KPD spots on a back flank or back pocket.

As for Midfield.... the Talent and depth is there. We made finals in 2022 where Fyfe missed most of the season with injury. So guys like Brayshaw, Serong, Will Broadie, Jaeger O meara, Erasmus, Matthew Johnson can play as inside mids. Frederick, Schulz, Walters, Coyler, Nathan wilson are all short blokes that can play as wingers or forward flankers.

Sean Darcy is the main ruck. Luke Jackson and Reid and Knobel can ruck too. Brennan Cox and Josh Traecy can pinch hit.


Forward Line.... We have so many talls and smalls that we can poke a stick at. I love Taberner, but sadly he has had injuries. He was a solid Full forward that could be double teamed when fit.

Amiss and Traecy are in the Squad. Luke Jackson is 198 cm and can kick goals. As for the smalls.... I love Michael Walters like everyone on here. He is 32 years old. But fortunatle we are not as over reliant on him like in Years past....

Michael Frederick, Lachie Schulz, Sam Switkowski are all rotated in those forward pockets and forward flanks.

Short term the whole team is fine even when Walters and Fyfe are gone at the end of 2025. But Priority for me is tall defenders.

 

[Freomaniac]

Can this side win a premiership in 2026? Apart from Fyfe, Pearce and Walters, they are all under 30 and in prime years.

Walker (23) Pearce (31) Draper (22)
Young (25) Cox (27) Clark (25)
Worner (23) Johnson (23) Noddy (23)
Freddy (25) Jackson (24) Switta (30)
Shultz (28) Amiss (23) Kuek (25)

Darcy (27) Brayshaw (26) Serong (25)

Int. Fyfe (34) Chappy (24) Erasmus (23) Walters (35)

Not a bad squad.... But I want Another 190-194 cm defender on freos list as depth. You could throw Nathan Chapman in the side if Pearce or Cox gets injured.

 

[pK75]

Not a bad squad.... But I want Another 190-194 cm defender on freos list as depth. You could throw Nathan Chapman in the side if Pearce or Cox gets injured.

We have Davies on the list as well, he’ll be 22 in 2026 like Draper. I’m more concerned about next year, but I guess if Cox or Pearce are injured it will just fast track one of those two by playing them early.

 

[dominguez]

We lack depth and our better players are struggling

We chose to move on our best wing in Acres. Yes some people think he's a spud but if that's the case then how about the rest of the possible replacements?

Henry has been dropped on form, NOD is unfit and Hughes is confused how to play the position properly.

Lobb was kicking regular goals and we have lost him and our other full forward Tabs is always injured.

We didn't get much for them as far as drsft positiongoes.

Logue (who would be playing every game in his natural position this year) plus Tucker.

Jackson cost us two firsts and a second.

We ended up with no first round picks for last year and now this year. Other bottom teams will be collecting top 5 picks while Freo have slim pickings.

What the fk can we do to get out of this poor list management model we've created?

We didn't choose to move on Acres (or Logue) but the club thought it was better to invest those $$ in Young, Chapman, Serong, Brayshaw, Darcy, etc, etc. They got offered more money elsewhere and chose to move but the club offered them both contracts for 2023 and beyond.

Those guys would have definitely improved our list this year but longterm it was the right call IMO.

 

[dominguez]

Not a bad squad.... But I want Another 190-194 cm defender on freos list as depth. You could throw Nathan Chapman in the side if Pearce or Cox gets injured.

This offseason I'd like to see us bring in an Aish type, a role player in his mid-20's who can play multiple roles with around 100 games AFL experience.

I'd also like to see us draft the best 22-24 year old key back in the WAFL/SANFL/VFL with a late pick. A Sam Collins/Alex Silvagni type will be very handy on our list next year and beyond.

 

[Scham]

Fill the gaps for our 2025 premiership attempt.

Highly doubtful now that Sturt, Banfield, Reidy, Switta, and Corbett are going to make it, so current listed candidates we've got that are still a chance or unproven: Davies, Draper, Hughes, Knobel, Brodie, Williams, O'Driscoll ,Emmett, Stanley,

B. Chapman Pearce? Walker
HB. Clark Cox Young
C. ???? Serong Johnson
HF. ???? Treacy Schultz
F. Jackson Amiss ????

R. Darcy Brayshaw Erasmus

Int. Henry, ????, Fredrick, Worner

Sub. Ryan


We've also got 2 trade and draft periods between now and then to find extra talent.

 

[Dockeroo]

Fill the gaps for our 2025 premiership attempt.

Highly doubtful now that Sturt, Banfield and Corbett are going to make it, so current listed candidates we've got that are still a chance or unproven: Davies, Draper, Hughes, Knobel, Brodie, Worner, Williams, Henry, O'Driscoll ,Emmett, Stanley, Switta...

B. Chapman Pearce Walker
HB. Clark Cox Young
C. ???? Serong ????
HF. ???? Jackson Schultz
F. ???? Amiss Fredrick

R. Darcy Brayshaw Johnson

Int. ????, ????, ????, Treacy

Sub. Erasmus


We've also got 2 trade and draft periods between now and then to find extra talent.

I’d say whoever we select with pick 21 this year should reasonably be expected to be in the 22 by the end of the 2025 season, unless it’s a KPP which it seems unlikely to be.
I would hope at least one of Fyfe or Walters will be contributing in 2025 still..
NOD if he can recover some form takes one of those wings surely

 

[go_the_dockers]

B. Chapman Pearce Walker
HB. Clark Cox Young
C. ???? Serong ????
HF. ???? Jackson Schultz
F. ???? Amiss Fredrick

R. Darcy Brayshaw Johnson

Int. ????, ????, ????, Treacy

Sub. Erasmus

Amiss is the only player can expect to kick 30 goals a year.

We probably need another 3, plus 1 or 2 mids who kick 20 goals a year.

 

[Scham]

This is how I currently see it for our 2025/26 premiership attempt. Admittedly there's a fair bit of guesswork on how certain players will develop and or age.

Highly doubtful now that Sturt, Banfield, Reidy, Switta, and Corbett are going to make it as AFL premiership players, so current listed candidates we've got that are still a chance or unproven: Pearce, Davies, Draper, Hughes, Brodie, Williams, O'Driscoll ,Emmett, Stanley, Aish...

B. Chapman ???? Walker
HB. Clark Cox Young
C. ???? Serong Johnson
HF. ???? Jackson Schultz
F. Knobel Amiss ????

R. Darcy Brayshaw Erasmus

Int. Henry, Treacy, Fredrick, Worner

Sub. Ryan


We've also got 2 trade and draft periods between now and then to find extra talent.

We've got plenty of candidates that could possibly fill the vacant wing and FB positions, so I don't see that as a need coming into this year's trade and draft period. We definitely need to trade in a mature age KD, and then draft small and medium forwards and a big bodied mid (I don't see Jackson as the answer). Converting Chapman to a mid is possible and then if so we'd need to replace him as 3rd tall defender.

 

[Dale147]

Depth tested

 

[Freomaniac]

did we fix our problems in this draft?

 

[theGav56]

did we fix our problems in this draft?

I don't think we have big list problems. In terms of this draft both Simpson (wing/high half forward) and Delean (small forward) could debut in their first year.