Coaching Staff Former Coach Ben "Truck" Rutten - Sacked for real this time - 21/8

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From what I've seen of the pair, they do go when it's their turn. McDonagh just sucks, basically DVU except a great kick.

Lord's only a kid, but just looks the opposite type to me - it's very early and not suggesting he won't be good, just doesn't seem to suit what we're apparently going for.

The McDonagh situation is just weird - I think they just made a blue. I'm extra harsh because I'm still salty they gave him a spot on the list over Clarke - who somewhat ironically seems like the hard-working type you'd think Truck would appreciate.
 
Lord's only a kid, but just looks the opposite type to me - it's very early and not suggesting he won't be good, just doesn't seem to suit what we're apparently going for.

The McDonagh situation is just weird - I think they just made a blue. I'm extra harsh because I'm still salty they gave him a spot on the list over Clarke - who somewhat ironically seems like the hard-working type you'd think Truck would appreciate.

We lack line breaking speed and/or kicking off half-back, both offer something on that front.

Clarke simply wasn't AFL standard, he tried hard and would be a great VFL player, but lacks the 'something' at the next level.

McDonagh has a great leg on him, well and truly AFL standard, and Lord is lightning fast, again, well and truly AFL standard.

I think McDonagh was the right idea, but maybe not the right player. Lord is a longer term project, but his draft profile is a guy who's quick, agile, has a great tank and is a good user, and only turned 18 on draft night so is quite young still.
 
Lord's only a kid, but just looks the opposite type to me - it's very early and not suggesting he won't be good, just doesn't seem to suit what we're apparently going for.

The McDonagh situation is just weird - I think they just made a blue. I'm extra harsh because I'm still salty they gave him a spot on the list over Clarke - who somewhat ironically seems like the hard-working type you'd think Truck would appreciate.
McDonagh is the same as Clarke attitude wise. They took a punt on a bloke who had a red hot crack at getting himself onto a VFL list so he could have a crack at his AFL dream. He is blue collar. Looks like he may be a miss but it happens. Clarke was the hard working team player but they could not do anything to improve his kicking. Giving the ball back to the opposition is also an issue for us.
 

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When the assistant who will be the boss next year has standards, but the current boss tells you to play with flair… who do you follow? The one that tells you what you want to hear and then request a trade when he leaves, or do you muck in and uphold the standards that will be in place going forward?

I mean it seems to be like herding cats at the moment, the last three years is just this weird structure vs flair thing going on where some players were brought in or brought up on the old flair model and they’re still our best players so you can’t exactly drop them but the structure only works when everyone does it so then like half of them do it at a time and the other half think they’re Dusty Martin.

And I mean even the internal review found that they needed more structure and direction from the coaches when they looked into 2020 and the hubs.

I'm replying late to this, but wish I could like this post more than once. It does feel very much like some players are buying into the team stuff, but not everyone. And when we have a few of the good team players missing (Snelling etc) it falls to pieces because too many are doing their own thing.

Take Parish for example, he looks great when he has great team people around him. He can still run around doing his own thing, but there are others who can cover for him. But if we want to be good enough to be top 4 eventually can we afford to have any players that don't buy into the team game plan? And what message does this send to other players (like Shiel for instance) when they're told they have to conform, while others are free to play however they want to.
 
Rutten backs Shiel, bemoans Bombers' lack of a 'hard edge'
ESSENDON coach Ben Rutten says Luke Parker's taunt to Dylan Shiel was representative of the Bombers' lack of a 'hard edge' across the team than an attack on Shiel.
While I hope behind closed doors that Truck has set a hard line about selection (I have trouble believing he has), I do like what he's done here. Changed the tone and telling everybody that Parker was mocking all Essendon players. It seems his attempt to get an angry response from all his players.

Our history with this group shows it might work for this week, then they'll get lazy again, but I do like how he's changed the framing of this story.
 
Rutten backs Shiel, bemoans Bombers' lack of a 'hard edge'

While I hope behind closed doors that Truck has set a hard line about selection (I have trouble believing he has), I do like what he's done here. Changed the tone and telling everybody that Parker was mocking all Essendon players. It seems his attempt to get an angry response from all his players.

Our history with this group shows it might work for this week, then they'll get lazy again, but I do like how he's changed the framing of this story.
combine it with the vision of Caldwell.
To avoid A, do B.
 
I'm replying late to this, but wish I could like this post more than once. It does feel very much like some players are buying into the team stuff, but not everyone. And when we have a few of the good team players missing (Snelling etc) it falls to pieces because too many are doing their own thing.

Take Parish for example, he looks great when he has great team people around him. He can still run around doing his own thing, but there are others who can cover for him. But if we want to be good enough to be top 4 eventually can we afford to have any players that don't buy into the team game plan? And what message does this send to other players (like Shiel for instance) when they're told they have to conform, while others are free to play however they want to.
I don't think Merrett, McGrath, Shiel, Parish are inherently unable to tackle or apply physical pressure. They've all done it before. It's just the consistency, the synergy between them, so that you know who is getting off the chain and the rest are doing the team stuff at any given time, otherwise you look like a bunch of auskickers playing bee swarm footy. That may purely depend on match ups for any given day too (e.g. we tagged Oliver so Petracca got off the chain, another day it might be the other way around).

I think as far as personnel, we need more hard nosed smaller players on the list (by which I mean anyone not playing as a KPP). Whether that's short term pain for long term gain with a cupboard full of twigs, or if it's list cuts coming to bite, idk. But if we had some luck not to lose Snelling, Langford, Stringer, Smith, and Walla all at once, or the foresight to invest in some mature blue collar depth, we would be a lot better off.

At the moment we have Hobbs, Caldwell, Perkins, Durham, Martin, Waterman as the fill ins... they're kids and they're going to be inconsistent, but as a team it doesn't exactly work at the moment. They're front running as much as anyone.

It's just compounding problems.
 
I'm replying late to this, but wish I could like this post more than once. It does feel very much like some players are buying into the team stuff, but not everyone. And when we have a few of the good team players missing (Snelling etc) it falls to pieces because too many are doing their own thing.

Take Parish for example, he looks great when he has great team people around him. He can still run around doing his own thing, but there are others who can cover for him. But if we want to be good enough to be top 4 eventually can we afford to have any players that don't buy into the team game plan? And what message does this send to other players (like Shiel for instance) when they're told they have to conform, while others are free to play however they want to.
I don't think Merrett, McGrath, Shiel, Parish are inherently unable to tackle or apply physical pressure. They've all done it before. It's just the consistency, the synergy between them, so that you know who is getting off the chain and the rest are doing the team stuff at any given time, otherwise you look like a bunch of auskickers playing bee swarm footy. That may purely depend on match ups for any given day too (e.g. we tagged Oliver so Petracca got off the chain, another day it might be the other way around).

I think as far as personnel, we need more hard nosed smaller players on the list (by which I mean anyone not playing as a KPP). Whether that's short term pain for long term gain with a cupboard full of twigs, or if it's list cuts coming to bite, idk. But if we had some luck not to lose Snelling, Langford, Stringer, Smith, and Walla all at once, or the foresight to invest in some mature blue collar depth, we would be a lot better off.

At the moment we have Hobbs, Caldwell, Perkins, Durham, Martin, Waterman as the fill ins... they're kids and they're going to be inconsistent, but as a team it doesn't exactly work at the moment. They're front running as much as anyone.

It's just compounding problems.
Missing Stringer and re-incorporating Shiel and Caldwell (plus Hobbs) into what we did last year was always going to be tough.

One of the things Rutten is dealing with is working his plan around a list that isn't exactly the same shaped plug.
 
McDonagh is the same as Clarke attitude wise. They took a punt on a bloke who had a red hot crack at getting himself onto a VFL list so he could have a crack at his AFL dream. He is blue collar. Looks like he may be a miss but it happens. Clarke was the hard working team player but they could not do anything to improve his kicking. Giving the ball back to the opposition is also an issue for us.
You’d class him as blue collar? Genuinely asking, to me he looks a bit lost out there. I’ve only watched 3 games, but I can’t believe how bad of a defender he is. Has a shoe on him, but no other real weapons.

His draft story seems more blue collar than the way he plays, if that makes sense.

Misses do indeed happen, especially toward that end of the draft. Just seems a strange selection to me still - but he obviously isn’t the player they imagined when they drafted him.
 
Should have done this a few weeks ago


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Should have done this a few weeks ago


View attachment 1404008
Article co-written by McClure, who apparently said this the other day:
McClure on footy classified saying the club has made an internal concession that the game plan isn’t working and they’ll need to scale it back. Not entirely a decision made by Rutten but “several” sections of the club.

So which is it? Did Rutten and Mahoney make that decision and take it to the board per the article, or were they pressured by “several sections of the club”? And who are several sections… 🤔
 

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Article co-written by McClure, who apparently said this the other day:


So which is it? Did Rutten and Mahoney make that decision and take it to the board per the article, or were they pressured by “several sections of the club”? And who are several sections… 🤔
Maybe Mahoney suggesting to coach group( or in particular Rutten and Caracella) to pull it back
 
Article co-written by McClure, who apparently said this the other day:


So which is it? Did Rutten and Mahoney make that decision and take it to the board per the article, or were they pressured by “several sections of the club”? And who are several sections… 🤔

Would be disappointing for Rutten if true, he’s wanting to implement something more nuanced than what is essentially just a swarm and it’s become immediately clear that not enough of the playing group are capable enough to make it work and we don’t have the strong organisational presences to make it work.

That footage of Redman yelling at Shiel kinda sums the whole thing up, if we are playing a zone Shiel is not necessarily going to be tasked with following Papley all the way through. If there’s not enough understanding there it may be time to strip it back and go for more of a ‘play your man’ approach, despite the fact that it quite obviously won’t get us all the way to where we want to go.
 
I feel like this guy is changing the gameplan every week.

Also

Heppell on the couch: maaaate, lloyd can say we're soft but it's not about being hard we wanna be blue collar its about being ruthless when the ball's there to be won

Rutten next day: parker was right, they're all soft, piss weak, shiel stays in, get the gloves and mouthgaurds out, gotta come with a harder edge

The club isn't on the same page and it shows
 
Article co-written by McClure, who apparently said this the other day:


So which is it? Did Rutten and Mahoney make that decision and take it to the board per the article, or were they pressured by “several sections of the club”? And who are several sections… 🤔

If this isn't rock bottom for Rutten, I'd hate to see what is.

Scenario 1 - the board (for whatever reason) pushes Rutten into changing the gameplan - Rutten has lost control of the club - writing in on the wall, he won't last till the end of 2023

Scenario 2 - Rutten has changed the gameplan off his own bat because the players simply are not executing it - to extend his tenure at the helm - doesn't bode well for the long term success of the club

Scenario 3 - Rutten changes the gameplan because he has lost confidence in what he was implementing - has folded on it in a very public way - and is essentially taking all the blame for the failure, absolving the players

We're going to win more games with a less accountable style of football, the board can sit back and relax - and the circus can continue.
 
I feel like this guy is changing the gameplan every week.

Also

Heppell on the couch: maaaate, lloyd can say we're soft but it's not about being hard we wanna be blue collar its about being ruthless when the ball's there to be won

Rutten next day: parker was right, they're all soft, piss weak, shiel stays in, get the gloves and mouthgaurds out, gotta come with a harder edge

The club isn't on the same page and it shows
I think it also shows Heppells disconnect from our reality. Like his shock that there could be negativity over the parade 'me' moment before the game - that apparently he organised or pushed for. How many of us would have done the same thing? Let alone with a heap of kids in the team waiting to get hammered in Sydney (it only takes a modicum of self awareness to understand that whilst this was thanking others it was still about you). Its pure selfishness from your leader
.
It is easy to argue that these types of gaffs and disconnects are meaningless but I would suggest they say quite a lot - especially when they happen in full view of the supporters like these.

To me latest displays suggests there is a disconnect from a team first mentality and that Ruttens messages aren't sinking in or are being ignored/disregarded. How else could your captain not know the team expectations on flying the flag?

Add this to his parade shock and his interview was a poor indication of the culture at Essendon.
 
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Ruthlessly focused, team first culture takes time to develop. We’ve had to try to import that culture from other successful clubs because we are not a successful club.

The club that was successful existed over 20 years ago, and just happened to have a similar jumper.

Only hubris says otherwise.

Heppells self indulgent pregame self organised familial parade is absolutely a signal to his teammates as to where his head is at. I like and respect Heppell as a great bloke, but team standards have been worse in league under his captaincy. The rest of the leadership group has also failed to show the way.

Bringing it back to Rutten - this is what he has to work with.
 
If this isn't rock bottom for Rutten, I'd hate to see what is.

Scenario 1 - the board (for whatever reason) pushes Rutten into changing the gameplan - Rutten has lost control of the club - writing in on the wall, he won't last till the end of 2023

Scenario 2 - Rutten has changed the gameplan off his own bat because the players simply are not executing it - to extend his tenure at the helm - doesn't bode well for the long term success of the club

Scenario 3 - Rutten changes the gameplan because he has lost confidence in what he was implementing - has folded on it in a very public way - and is essentially taking all the blame for the failure, absolving the players

We're going to win more games with a less accountable style of football, the board can sit back and relax - and the circus can continue.
There’s also a scenario where they’ve decided this list with these injuries isn’t up to it, go back to repair the foundation of the game plan and rebuild confidence and wait for injuries and trade period to clean it up so we can move forward.

I’d be interested in Kyle Langford’s opinion of the game plan and why it isn’t being executed effectively, he’s a preseason insider and a season outsider sitting on the bench every week, so an interesting perspective. Snelling too, if he’s been watching.
 
There’s also a scenario where they’ve decided this list with these injuries isn’t up to it, go back to repair the foundation of the game plan and rebuild confidence and wait for injuries and trade period to clean it up so we can move forward.

I’d be interested in Kyle Langford’s opinion of the game plan and why it isn’t being executed effectively, he’s a preseason insider and a season outsider sitting on the bench every week, so an interesting perspective. Snelling too, if he’s been watching.

True, maybe I woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning
 
There’s also a scenario where they’ve decided this list with these injuries isn’t up to it, go back to repair the foundation of the game plan and rebuild confidence and wait for injuries and trade period to clean it up so we can move forward.

I’d be interested in Kyle Langford’s opinion of the game plan and why it isn’t being executed effectively, he’s a preseason insider and a season outsider sitting on the bench every week, so an interesting perspective. Snelling too, if he’s been watching.

I look at building the gameplan like building up a cake.

You add layer upon layer. At the moment it looks like they've tried to add a layer when the one below it isn't fully set. Perhaps that's due to injuries to key guys who help form the structure for what we do, or perhaps that jump to the next tier of expectations and complexity is too much for the current group who haven't 100% nailed down the first layer.

Peeling it back a step, isn't a sign of Rutten failing, or of the gameplan not working, or of the club not backing Rutten, or of Rutten looking to save his skin. It can simply be a sign that the playing group has tried and tried to get it down, but is failing to execute it each week for <reasons> and recognising that taking a step backwards to simply it now, will mean two step forwards in the future when those <reasons> are resolved.

Modern gameplans are complex, it's not just one layer of strategy (e.g. man-on-man) but multiple; where to run when you have the ball vs don't have the ball, where to run in x scenario versus y scenario when you have the ball, or z scenario or w scenario when you don't have the ball.

It gets increasingly complex, to handle increasingly more scenarios, until you're able to handle a sufficient number of scenarios to beat 17 other sides. Then those sides spend the off-season trying to come up with yet another lot of scenarios to beat your gameplan.
 
There’s also a scenario where they’ve decided this list with these injuries isn’t up to it, go back to repair the foundation of the game plan and rebuild confidence and wait for injuries and trade period to clean it up so we can move forward.

I’d be interested in Kyle Langford’s opinion of the game plan and why it isn’t being executed effectively, he’s a preseason insider and a season outsider sitting on the bench every week, so an interesting perspective. Snelling too, if he’s been watching.
Bombadeer's point is compelling though.

Are we going to change the gameplan anytime there are a few injuries? We don't have a Wayne Carey in our team who is so good we need to revert to a Plan B anytime they're out. We need a gameplan where (given we don't have any superstars) everybody pulls their weight in defence.

If we are going to revert back to what we already know doesn't work in high pressure games, then not only can we write this season off (which we will anyway) we can pretty much say goodbye to any kind of real success in the next five years.

You don't win premierships by playing it safe - even if you have an amazing list (think GWS).

When it comes to footy doing the same thing over and over actually can lead to a different outcome.
 
We can get the plan from 5 years ago. Desparate times call for Desparate measures. It's time to get the codes from the safe and hit the red button.

Sheedy to craft our new game plan.
 
Bombadeer's point is compelling though.

Are we going to change the gameplan anytime there are a few injuries? We don't have a Wayne Carey in our team who is so good we need to revert to a Plan B anytime they're out. We need a gameplan where (given we don't have any superstars) everybody pulls their weight in defence.

If we are going to revert back to what we already know doesn't work in high pressure games, then not only can we write this season off (which we will anyway) we can pretty much say goodbye to any kind of real success in the next five years.

You don't win premierships by playing it safe - even if you have an amazing list (think GWS).

When it comes to footy doing the same thing over and over actually can lead to a different outcome.

You can revert back to the last point it was working, then build up again.

It's not a throw everything out the window scenario.
 

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Coaching Staff Former Coach Ben "Truck" Rutten - Sacked for real this time - 21/8

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