1. He's coming back from serious injury, he's playing with some pain, its going to take another pre-season and work on his conditioning before ANY real assesment can be made to where he is at.
2. Box Hill's midfield is shocking, and for a player who goes on searching leads, if his team mates can't hit a target then it becomes virtually impossible for Dowler to get a lot of the ball. Would suit AFL as a link player across half forward to start with IMO.
3. Its ridiculous to judge players so young on the basis that players like Franklin are doing well. Its widely said it takes 3-5 years for young key position players to develop and be judged, yet people still take pot shots at a guy who we drafted for the long term, who is coming off serious injury in his first full season (last season he came back but was only on 1/10 of his athletic capacity in terms of fitnes). I just don't get it.
But it'll probably fall on deaf ears no doubt .
not on deaf ears. i read it looking at the structure of what you wrote hoping for a clear explanation, and yet its just more arguments that are as weak as beau's running ability.
for your first point, i said in my other thread that you cannot say you're happy with having a guy selected so high and requiring such meticulous and uncertain conditioning. it just does't give any confidence at all.
for your second point, i agree that bh midfield is trash, yet thorpe showed quite a bit, and so did roughead.
and on your last point, with what i just said about the other two kp players, i would compare these two more so than buddy. reason being is that buddy is a freak, and more like a flanker than kp in his play. if i were to compare the other 2, thorpe showed more in 1 game than beau's shown in all games, and roughie is pretty much at afl level, it was just team balance that left him out. roughie gets heckled for underachieving at being no.2 pick, but i think that beau has shown almost nothing and was best vic kp player and no.6 pick. forget the one yr difference, cos rough in his 2nd yr was doing well in the back as a kp player.