Player Watch #12 Ben Miller

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He is averaging the most defensive 1v1's in the league with 6 per game. He's losing 16.7% of them, which puts him ahead of players like Pearce, Buckley, McKay, De Koning, McCartin, Andrews etc etc. Only 6 players that have faced more than 10 1v1's have a better loss rate. Incredibly Sam Taylor is yet to lose a 1v1 in 19 contests so far this year.

The silver lining of injuries....
 

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Miller has a 1v1% loss of 16.7. 7th in the comp for those with more than 10 1v1's. That's similar to what Young was doing for us last yr.
Miller provides more with run and link up work with other defenders. Young is just a spoil and nothing really much after that.
 
Sounds like what we were saying about Grimes 10 years ago lol
i certainly wasn't as i saw a lot of him at Coburg. Grimes just couldn't get over those annoying Hammy injuries. His closing speed was amazing with excellent ball reading ability.
 
i certainly wasn't as i saw a lot of him at Coburg. Grimes just couldn't get over those annoying Hammy injuries. His closing speed was amazing with excellent ball reading ability.
Not having a dig at you TI just saying a lot of supporters back then said he would only attempt to spoil the ball and that was it.
 
Not having a dig at you TI just saying a lot of supporters back then said he would only attempt to spoil the ball and that was it.
Didnt Grimes have about 10 games or so in his first 30 where he was really close to the spoils record? Didnt he ping his Hammy against Essendon with like 2 spoils away from the record?
 
Didnt Grimes have about 10 games or so in his first 30 where he was really close to the spoils record? Didnt he ping his Hammy against Essendon with like 2 spoils away from the record?

Maybe but there was a period of time (mid 2010's) when some posters ( i say some not all) were having a go at Grimes for not getting it enough and even some had a shot Astbury saying we wouldn't win a flag with those 2 in our backline. Even Batchelor was rated higher by some.

Quite comical in hindsight.

Edit: I found one of the old threads but I won't link it because we have a few posters here still. I dont think its right to rehash an old thread.
 

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Young seems to work harder to provide linkage out of defence now that Miller is down back. With Brown they have been the real positive for the team
I still worry about Young at ground level, but I'm happy to continue to develop him as the three make up a very inexperienced BL so time is needed for them to gel together.
 
Maybe but there was a period of time (mid 2010's) when some posters ( i say some not all) were having a go at Grimes for not getting it enough and even some had a shot Astbury saying we wouldn't win a flag with those 2 in our backline. Even Batchelor was rated higher by some.

Quite comical in hindsight.

Edit: I found one of the old threads but I won't link it because we have a few posters here still. I dont think its right to rehash an old thread.

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I think your points about speed are correct. Not sure we can afford Grimes to retire mid season unless he is totally shot. We are 1-2 tall defender injuries/suspensions away from the cupboard being completely bare at the moment. Our VFL Key Defenders are not AFL listed players. We have Gibcus LTI and possibly Fawcett as well. You don't need more than 1 or 2 picks in the MSD.
Not a fan of having Grimes playing in the reserves "just in case" someone gets injured. If he is not best 22 anymore i think we should let him retire mid-season and still pay him anyway. He has been an incredible servant, deserves everything he gets
 
Unrestricted free agent. Time to sign him up for a couple years.
I said we should have tied his contract up 2 weeks ago ... Would have got away with $1 million over 3 years ... his agent would be taking lots of calls now ... Matty Clarke and West Coast probably having dinner with his parents tonight... Chol got $3 million over 5 in the same position ... Can't see anything less than 1.5 over 3 getting the deal done now ... 24 year old 197cm defenders ranking elite for 1v1 wins that won agility and goal kicking at the draft combine and ran 20m in 2.83sec just don't exist.
 
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Not a fan of having Grimes playing in the reserves "just in case" someone gets injured. If he is not best 22 anymore i think we should let him retire mid-season and still pay him anyway. He has been an incredible servant, deserves everything he gets
Or maybe he is the sort of bloke that would thoroughly enjoy going out with a VFL premiership medal ... would be a gun at VFL level and would thoroughly enjoy developing the youngsters in Mutaz, Kaleb Smith, Banks and Ralphsmith this week at Werribee
 
You might forget that Young played VFL in 2022 ... Brown Banks Young and Miller have played a fair bit of footy together in the VFL
true, but Miller was more forward /ruck last year and he was in out of both teams and never had any consistency or time to settle .
 
true, but Miller was more forward /ruck last year and he was in out of both teams and never had any consistency or time to settle .
Young and Miller played together in the backline in 22 ... Ben played 12 VFL games and 10 AFL games including the GABBA final with Brown and Banks in that backline group too though both missed games with injury ... clearly has helped the cohesion because we have had Banks, Grimes, Tresize, Gibcus (and did Broad miss one too) come in and out of that defensive unit ... the group is playing at an incredible. level for how unsettled it has been
 
I said we should have tied his contract up 2 weeks ago ... Would have got away with $1 million over 3 years ... his agent would be taking lots of calls now ... Matty Clarke and West Coast probably having dinner with his parents tonight... Chol got $3 million over 5 in the same position ... Can't see anything less than 1.5 over 3 getting the deal done now ... 24 year old 197cm defenders ranking elite for 1v1 wins that won agility and goal kicking at the draft combine and ran 20m in 2.83sec just don't exist.
I wouldn't get too carried away. He has played 30 games in 7 years. If he's offered a 2 year deal he should take it.
 

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Player Watch #12 Ben Miller


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