*cough* Mark Johnson *cough*
Surely the contract terms would be nominated by the club, not Cousins. 1 year contract, base salary + a heavily performance related component. If a team could pick him up for next to nothing, the risk is lessened.
I suspect this is the driver. But I have the feeling he could play into mid-30's, Harvey style.
Anyone who doesn't think Cousins would bring value to a club on the field needs to have a rethink. He brings depth. He takes a key tag. The value of which can be seen in the WCE 2006 team vs 2008. Take some key depth out of it, and the rest looks comparitively ordinary (Kerr and Priddis). Which can be seen in the Cats 2007-2008 squads. You have guys like Corey, Kelly and Enright who would not be superstars playing a solo mid role in any other club; they'd be thereabouts. I'll even go as far as to say that Ablett and Bartel playing a 2008 Palmer like solo-role in an team would look well down on form (not ordinary, but not Brownlow material). You can see it now in the Blues - Murphy and Gibbs coming along in leaps and bounds with Judd and Stevens in. You can see it in the Hawks - Hodge, Mithcell, Young, Lewis - al starting to gel together, even in the absence of a ruckman who gives them first use.
Wrt Freo, and this is said a lot, if we could get Hase and Des out in the middle as well, we'd be a better squad. And it's true. Des looked a lot better when he was playing alongside the Lions midfield. Des would be playing better footy for us if we had similar midfield depth. Palmer will look even better with some good players around him. They will all look better. The whole will be bigger than the sum of it's parts.
This is what Freo needs to get it's head around at the trade table. We overpay to get a "gun" mid (Bell, Des, Carr), plonk him in our midfield where they are the shining light, and are surprised they don't look the same in our team. We overvalue them because of the players around them. We don't have a group of midfielders surrounding them that are all peaking at the same time - we have a mish-mash of old and new.
So for Freo. All this being said, I don't want Cousins. I agree he would bring value to our midfield, but I couldn't get over the hypocrisy if we did. He will be a valuable pickup for any team (eg Pies) that do though. Freo need to build a team, play them together for several years (a good midfielder with plenty of support can play consistent footy for 6-8 years), and resist this temptation to top up with a marquee midfielder. Draft Rich/Hartlett/whoever with our first pick. Draft 3 or 4 mids. Preferably from WA so we don't run the risk of them leaving after we develop them (if you don't have to take the risk, why take it?). Draft the ones with great disposal. Draft the mids who will work together to make the best unit (inside, outside...) - if we don't know what that is, bring someone in for assistance who does (Buckley, Hird). Give Sandilands a mid group he can grow with. Acknowledge we won't be Top 4 material in 1 year. Plan for the future, plan for a mid group who can deliver the ball to our forwards.
