Roast Full house clean required

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bottom 4 next year , get early picks before Tasmania come in.
We dont really have much of a choice. Our youth is diabolical and its looking like by the time we have another premiership contending list put together taranto and hopper will be 30. We need to magic up some top end talent from late picks but you cant rely on that as a strategy.
 
Love to see a couple of big bodied kp players that attack the ball in the air, split open packs.
We have Lynch and Balta. Lynch injuries are concerning.
Not sure how or where we find a couple of ready to go kp without giving away picks/ players , that’s the hard part, but badly need this type.
Miller is not the answer,Gibcus more a 3rd tall, Young 50/50. A real focus in the draft and trade for this type. The spine is where the rebuild needs to start
 
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Perhaps we keep the current recruiters but only allow them to pick from say round 4 or 5 onwards to the rookie draft.

Then get new recruiters to focus on the early rounds.

MSD Has been ok (Pickett of course Bauer & Coulthard show promise) but Parker was a pointless pick, Tresize meh -we needed a KPF.

SSP gave us Stack - a massive talent hit but even bigger personality miss. Bradtke right idea at least but a big reach -guess that's what it's for. Mansell -ok depth but average.
Recruiting will be done by AI in a few years.
 
Dunno about a total clean-out but certainly we need to rip the big manky crusty band-aid right off now...

Jack and Trent just need to announce this week that they will retire and we can have a "tribute" game for them at the G in 2 weeks v North.
Whether or not they travel to Adelaide in round 23 I dunno - I would probably prefer they did not.

Friday nights efforts (or lack of) really surprised me - how we could be very competitive for 7/8 of a cracker of a game the previous week v the Demons only to come out with horrible intensity in a must win game v Dogs was telling - leaders rested and the rest of the team seemingly less than fully invested reflects poorly on the caretaker sadly and the other 'senior' players.

It feels like we have just rolled over now and accepted our mediocrity - after the coaches presser on Friday there has been nothing really from the club - I did not see or hear any player interviews - no expressions of disappointment or ownership of the lacklustre performance.

& then a vanilla game in the VFL - just to add to the bleakness.

Even though we have a mathematical chance to slide into the 8 this year I would prefer we concede now - keep our younger players in and bring in 2 or 3 others.

We certainly could not be accused of 'tanking' as we don't own any early picks anyway :oops:
 
Most of the personell that got us a flag have left.

There's nobody left to trust
That is not true. We still have plenty of people from that time + that gets passed on to the next era of people too.

Also just sad that we won a flag in 2020 and in 3 season you now no longer trust the club? Why? Because we aren't a contender? Your expectations are just unreasonable. No team is sitting at the top forever.
 
Love to see a couple of big bodied kp players that attack the ball in the air, split open packs.
We have Lynch and Balta. Lynch injuries are concerning.
Not sure how or where we find a couple of ready to go kp without giving away picks/ players , that’s the hard part, but badly need this type.
Miller is not the answer,Gibcus more a 3rd tall, Young 50/50. A real focus in the draft and trade for this type. The spine is where the rebuild needs to start
The problem is we have no Draft picks and no cap room till the Dusty & Lynch contracts expire. I dont think theres anything on the open market worth pursuing at the moment at AFL level. I agree Miller has been a disappointment this year up forward, so much so teams can afford to double team poor Riewoldt. We've got a huge problem with no short-term solution right now.
 
For those of you suggesting that we trade away a lot of our older blokes or retire off some who are maybe going on a year longer than you believe they should go, are you going to be happy when we're a bottom 4 side winning 3-6 games a season, while we throw the kids to the wolves?
I get your point, but right now we are a bottom 6 side playing the oldies so it's not much better.
It's not about throwing the kids to the wolves, rather intelligently cycling them through and giving them games to benefit our future.

Finals aren't happening, we have 3 golden opportunities to give a game (or games) to Brown, Sonsie, Miller, Ryan, Bradtke, Biggy, Dow, Ralphsmith, Clarke, etc.

It's not more beneficial over the next few weeks to play the Pickett, Graham, Macintosh, Cotchin, Riewoldt (retire them both vs North and save them the AO trip), both of Soldo and Nank, and by rotating those guys out we could play a heap of the kids with a game or two.

But I bet you we don't and all those guys play and we beat North and lose the other 2 games, might beat the Saints as a consolation, and it will mean **** all except a wasted chance to develop for 2024.
 
'Dunno about a total clean-out but certainly we need to rip the big manky crusty band-aid right off now...

Jack and Trent just need to announce this week that they will retire and we can have a "tribute" game for them at the G in 2 weeks v North.
Whether or not they travel to Adelaide in round 23 I dunno - I would probably prefer they did not.

Friday nights efforts (or lack of) really surprised me - how we could be very competitive for 7/8 of a cracker of a game the previous week v the Demons only to come out with horrible intensity in a must win game v Dogs was telling - leaders rested and the rest of the team seemingly less than fully invested reflects poorly on the caretaker sadly and the other 'senior' players.

It feels like we have just rolled over now and accepted our mediocrity - after the coaches presser on Friday there has been nothing really from the club - I did not see or hear any player interviews - no expressions of disappointment or ownership of the lacklustre performance.

& then a vanilla game in the VFL - just to add to the bleakness.

Even though we have a mathematical chance to slide into the 8 this year I would prefer we concede now - keep our younger players in and bring in 2 or 3 others.

We certainly could not be accused of 'tanking' as we don't own any early picks anyway :oops:
We need to look at the year of what it actually is. We've had a caretaker coach for more than half a season and we lost our best forward for the season in round 4. We are not winning a flag this year. Really as soon Lynch went down that hope was gone, we just didn't realize he would be out for the year at the time.

The lack of effort Friday was surprising, but I think the team is just cooked physically. Since Mini came on we've been fighting hard and half a dozen close wins that have required a lot of effort. We took it up to Melbourne for 3 quarters and had the better of them, but then just could not keep going in the 4th and then have to back it up in 5 days. Meanwhile the Dogs lost a game where they were 6 goals up and came out trying to make amends and we were caught flat footed.

Post the first quarter it was an even game. Without Dusty, Cotch, Grimes, Lynch and losing Hopper to concussion early / Rioli hobbling after multiple contests / I saw Cumberland grab his hamstring on multiple occasions / we've got an incredibly inexperienced backline with Young and Banks.
Its really not the end of the world and I dont know why people feel the need for players and coaches to publicly apologize when they have a bad game. Do you want to be crying on the field? Screaming at each other? They can be disappointed without doing those things. And you can also be disappointing while also accepting the reality of the situation.

Saying leaders being rested reflects is just a bunch of bs. They wern't rested because they're a little tired, they were rested because they physically were not fit to play. They weren't specific injuries, but its the same thing. They were unable to play, not rested for the fun of it. Just imagine they are listed as 'injured' instead of 'rested'

I find it incredible that people think we are accepting mediocrity because we're not in tears about not having a chance to scrape into the 8. Last year it was a bit of, 'if we scrape we can do damage and maybe go far' but without a forward line it would be 'we can scrape in and maybe make it to week 2'. It would still be nice, but its horrendous to miss out on. Its not this giant missed opportunity.
 
The whole idea of stripping back the club to its bare bones is both antiquated and dangerous. We tried to do that in the past, selling off and retiring experience to make way for recruited talent and it failed miserably. With any successful transition, you need to educate, protect, develop and groom the younger players. This is also true with new staff, board members and leaders. The most successful organisations introduce people into a successful culture, teach them the systems and expectations. Enable them to learn with strong support, make mistakes, build on a stable platform of success.

If you completely go scorched earth policy, everyone is starting from scratch. The administration and coaches need to bring in new, untried systems and policies. Young players have not protection on the field and not leadership to steer them when things inevitably go wrong. Even if the more experienced is not up to scratch, just by having them there, enables people time to grow into a role and learn as much from the older leaders weaknesses as much as their strengths.

Why I understand after such a Golden Era, waiting is now going to be frustrating. Bringing in talent and developing them with guidance, will give us a greater chance of leaping up the ladder quickly than a 'Full House Clean' will.
 
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I get your point, but right now we are a bottom 6 side playing the oldies so it's not much better.
It's not about throwing the kids to the wolves, rather intelligently cycling them through and giving them games to benefit our future.

Finals aren't happening, we have 3 golden opportunities to give a game (or games) to Brown, Sonsie, Miller, Ryan, Bradtke, Biggy, Dow, Ralphsmith, Clarke, etc.

It's not more beneficial over the next few weeks to play the Pickett, Graham, Macintosh, Cotchin, Riewoldt (retire them both vs North and save them the AO trip), both of Soldo and Nank, and by rotating those guys out we could play a heap of the kids with a game or two.

But I bet you we don't and all those guys play and we beat North and lose the other 2 games, might beat the Saints as a consolation, and it will mean * all except a wasted chance to develop for 2024.
...............we're 2 games behind 5th. Bottom 6 team means very little when the ladder is tight and that changes every week. We are part of the middle group of teams 5th-15th. Thats where we are.

Lets say Lynch doesn't get injured this year, do you think any of our results change? 1 point loss to Essendon. 10 points to Port. 5 points to Dogs. 18 to Demons. Swans game when it was equal at 3 quarter time. Only scoring 48 against the Suns.
I dont see us losing to Essendon for sure, and just 1 of those other 5 results swapping seems quite possible.
That one injury doesn't happen and its quite reasonable to say we would be a top 6 team instead.

And we have been playing the kids and cycling through them. The amount we have been doing is noticeable, you cans see the inexperience in our team. There is a balance which I really don't think we can push much further. You need leadership on the field and you need that structure that the kids can play within to be able to learn.

Like on Friday, with no Grimes, I don't think Banks and Young had a great time. They got punished and our backline was a mess. They have better opportunities to learn if they just have to play their own role in a set team rather than play with a bunch of other people that are trying to figure it out too. Even if Grimes isn't the player he used to be, he can tell them where to stand, he can tell them what to look for, to let them know when they're doing something wrong, to give them advice etc etc.

Its not as easy as just saying, 'PLAY THE KIDS', you need a balance between youth and experience. We've had a third to a half our team being inexperienced players all year. You really can't push it further than that.
 
With the skills we’ve got surely you’re not serious, how are we going to recruit with what picks 56 and 78?
We have our second pick still which is #25 currently. So its currently #25, #44 and #62 with the change of adding more with trades and compensation if we lost players.

Also I think we have shown a bit good out drafting outside the top picks. We have pretty damn good list of players that have shown a fair bit of talent in equivalent picks to what we will have this year.

National:
#25 - Balta
#29 - Bolton
#43 - Ross
#53 - Graham
#67 - Butler
#67 - Broad

Rookie:
#6 - Stengle
#11 - Short
#18 - Baker
#29 - Castagna
#46 - Lambert
#68 - Soldo

Mid Season:
#13 - Picket

How many flags between this group? I count 23.
 
The problem is we have no Draft picks and no cap room till the Dusty & Lynch contracts expire. I dont think theres anything on the open market worth pursuing at the moment at AFL level. I agree Miller has been a disappointment this year up forward, so much so teams can afford to double team poor Riewoldt. We've got a huge problem with no short-term solution right now.
Spot on.
It’s going to be tough, however I’d like to see us get the deal done with GC for their R1 and use it on a kpf. That’s looking long term
More immediately There’s got to be a big kpf in the state league’s that can play the role. I’m not after an A grader or even a b grader, just someone capable of playing alongside Lynch who can do some of the grunt work.
 

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I get your point, but right now we are a bottom 6 side playing the oldies so it's not much better.
It's not about throwing the kids to the wolves, rather intelligently cycling them through and giving them games to benefit our future.

Finals aren't happening, we have 3 golden opportunities to give a game (or games) to Brown, Sonsie, Miller, Ryan, Bradtke, Biggy, Dow, Ralphsmith, Clarke, etc.

It's not more beneficial over the next few weeks to play the Pickett, Graham, Macintosh, Cotchin, Riewoldt (retire them both vs North and save them the AO trip), both of Soldo and Nank, and by rotating those guys out we could play a heap of the kids with a game or two.

But I bet you we don't and all those guys play and we beat North and lose the other 2 games, might beat the Saints as a consolation, and it will mean * all except a wasted chance to develop for 2024.
The issue is part of building a successful side is not simply handing out games because players are younger, they need to be better than the incumbent they are replacing.

We used to give games to players because they were young and then wonder why they failed to deliver on expectations.

The way we've done it since 2021 has been perfect. We've rewarded younger players who put up consistent performances by giving them an extended run in the seniors and some have taken that chance and ran with it, while others have had to go back and keep working on their games. What it has meant is that we've been able to remain somewhat competitive for the majority of the season with the odd blow out loss here and there.

What we don't want to become is the next WCE or North, where thumping become the a weekly occurrence, because once you get into that rut it's difficult to get out again.
 
i think the biggest failure from a Richmond point of view is our lack to recognize internally how close we were from being competitive and from falling down the ladder and yes the Lynch injury has hurt us this year. we are facing a year of further hurt and us fans not being understanding of mediocre performance due to the prior 30 years of mediocrity.

our last 4 years of domination 2017 - 2020 was built from the draft and smart selections and pure luck! We were lucky because someone also recognized due to necessity the moskito fleet and chaos ball. purely because we didnt have the traditional pillars other teams was building we found a way to win games the Richmond way - but teams have either now learnt to beat that(sic Collingwood the last couple of weeks) or further developed our game plan to work for them.

i can go further into the culture but what i saw pre-season has transpired into a true reflection of this year. i've seen senior players on the darts/vapes/piss 2 weeks our from regular season starting and i thought to my myself are these blokes truly on board!!
 
So when Dimma took over he had FOUR future GF Tiger Hall of Famers already on the list & he got 2 more with the 1st & 2nd rounder the former coach left for him.

Does the new coach have the same talent? We definitely have nothing even close to that U21 talent Dimma adopted & the new coach wont have either a 1st or 2nd rounder to go get a Dusty or Astbury? The list is in a dire situation.
I think Balta (Rance), Bolton (Dusty), Taranto (Cotchin) Rioli (Houli) and Baker (Edwards) are A grade talents heading in a promising trajectory to our ageing champs. Gibcus has the potential to join them, and Hopper too if he can get some continuity in his footy.

Where we're probably ahead of the build when Dimma took over is that we have a lot of youth already starting to come through as potential B grade talent, plus a much stronger culture built off the back of recent success.

The biggest area of concern with our list build by far is key forwards. They're still looking for a Jack replacement, when we should be starting to look for a Lynch replacement by now.
 
We have our second pick still which is #25 currently. So its currently #25, #44 and #62 with the change of adding more with trades and compensation if we lost players.

Also I think we have shown a bit good out drafting outside the top picks. We have pretty damn good list of players that have shown a fair bit of talent in equivalent picks to what we will have this year.

National:
#25 - Balta
#29 - Bolton
#43 - Ross
#53 - Graham
#67 - Butler
#67 - Broad

Rookie:
#6 - Stengle
#11 - Short
#18 - Baker
#29 - Castagna
#46 - Lambert
#68 - Soldo

Mid Season:
#13 - Picket

How many flags between this group? I count 23.
Don’t disagree but I think the key is pairing those with Jack R Dusty Cotchin Rance Prestia Lynch etc Those players you have listed make up a team that makes finals but not top 4. Need plenty of top 20 talent to win a flag. That is our problem next 5 years plus - getting top end talent that is early to mid 20s
 
That is not true. We still have plenty of people from that time + that gets passed on to the next era of people too.

Also just sad that we won a flag in 2020 and in 3 season you now no longer trust the club? Why? Because we aren't a contender? Your expectations are just unreasonable. No team is sitting at the top forever.
Sometimes it gets passed on. More often history shows new people aren't as capable as executing or put a new spin on things, thinking they are improving.

Do I trust the club? yes and no. You can't implement the best ideas without the best people.
 
imho we still have too many premiership players who perhaps don't have the drive or hunger to climb up the mountain again. The club needs to find a way to phase out the premiership B graders and replace with kids and / or free agents. I am happy with TT & hopper trade, Jack ross is the real find of this season, Kmac, JGTI & pickett should not be best 22. We should atleast trade 2 of them.

Bolton needs to play midfiled more than forward. We need a jack replacement next season and a plan B for when lynch goes down again.
Ryan, miller etc will take a few more years to get to the required level (if at all)

Thankfully our defence is good. Balta, young,gibcus,vlas and broad! plus short & rioli

our fwd line is a mess and needs to be sorted. coulthard should play a full game to see if he's ready.
Mansell is depth, MRJ is looking like depth, cumbo is the unknown

Trust the club to make some moves this off season. if not, we'll be treading water for a long time!
 
Overall there is serious overreaction at the state of our list. Our forward line is DIRE for sure. Without its so bad that our entire team structure falls apart. We are relying on our midfielders to kick goals and we're not locking the ball in like we used which then puts our defense under pressure.

Defense: Our defense looks solid especially with Gibcus back. We then may play with Banks are Young in the forward or just have them as genuine backups so inuries in that line don't hurt too much.

Midfield: Our midfield is also decent and if we can get Hopper to his 2021 form then thats a genuine A grader there to add. With a proper forward line these guys can hopefully focus more on winning the ball and delivery rather than also trying to be our forwards too. Lets not forget it also takes time to learn a new team and a new system, Taranto and Hopper fully integrated will be a huge boost. Ross is took a huge step this year and is still 22 with only 60 games played. Players don't usually really hit their straps until 24/100 games ish.

Forward: Just having Lynch back in the forward line would make a huge difference. We need a second tall too which is the hardest part. But if we get Lynch on the park + a 2nd forward I think Jack is a solid 3rd option if he plays on again. I know people think hes cooked, but hes playing on the best defender + a 3rd man while also battling through injuries and not resting any games. If he takes the 3rd defender and rests once a month, I think he goes to being a 2 goal a game forward.
We need to find solid smalls but Mansell and Couthard have shown some signs. We need someone to take a genuine step liek Butler and Castagna did in 2017 to be locked 22 small forwards.

Our young end of the list isn't in a dire situation
: We've also got a reasonable list of low 1st round/high 2nd round young players that still could take that leap. We have 5 top #30 picks from 2021. Giibcus and Brown both lost this entire year with injury, those are 2 extra talents we will have next year that we didn't this year.
The other 3 we have are Banks with only 5 games played, Sonsie is still 20, Judson Clarke is only 19.
Its like Bolton was instantly good, it wasn't until his 3rd season when he took a leap and he still got dropped before the finals. So it wasn't until his 4th he was best 22. These 5 guys are just finishing off season 2.

We still have plenty of years left in some of our established talent: We're losing the top guys soon in Dusty, Cotch, Jack, Grimes etc, but we are not Hawthorn from a few years ago. We didn't ignore the draft for the previous 6-8 years. Balta is only 23, Bolton is only 24, Baker 25. These guys havn't even hit their prime yet

We've still got 2-5 years of: Prestia, Broad, Vlaustin, Mcintosh, Nank.
We've still got 6-8 years of: Short, Hopper, Rioli, Baker, Taranto, Graham
We've still got 9+ years of: Bolton, Balta

TLDR: Forward line needs fixing, but we'll be ok.
 
Time to admit it, Dimma ******* some ** in Gold Coast lockdown was also the ultimate ***** of the club. Lucky we got that circus flag but really we’ve been ****ed ever since.

All the good coaches left the club while we have been left with the s**t.

Recruiters are rubbish, fitness staff are rubbish and coaches. Time to clean our everyone and start fresh. Otherwise we are ****ed just like Hawthorn.

7/10 melt
 
The way I'd like to see us go about things over the remainder of 2023 is as follows.

Round 21 to Trade Period:
After the Saints game this Sunday win lose or draw I'd have Cotchin and Jack announce their retirements so that the Richmond faithful who can get to the MCG on the Saturday can farewell them in our last home game and likely last game in Melbourne for the year.

Offer club favorable contracts to the following players:

Bauer 2 years elevate to senior list
Bradtke re-rookie
Campbell re-rookie
Coulthard re-rookie
Dow 1 year
Graham 2 years
Mansell 2 years
McIntosh 1 year
Pickett 1 year
Ralphsmith 1-2 years
Trezise re-rookie

That would mean that list changes before the trade period would be: Castagna Cotchin Riewoldt & Tarrant all retired, with Nyoun and Colina delisted as they offer no trade value.

Some may ask why I'm re-signing everyone else, they're only staying on our terms. So if the likes of Graham McIntosh & Ralphsmith want to explore their options elsewhere they are welcome to. I wouldn't be trading Soldo unless we got a deal that was heavily in our favor as he provides idea coverage for Nankervis if he goes down again, which is possible given his history. As much as people don't seem to value Dow, I've liked what I've seen from him at VFL level and with our lack of young midfield talent coming through I'd give him another year under a new coach to see if he can step into a role that gets opened up by Cotchin departing. A 1 year deal on minimum money doesn't really hurt us in that regard. With regards the likes of McIntosh & Pickett I'd be keeping them around, but they're not going to be the automatic selections they seemingly are this year instead they'll become the depth that is back up to younger options coming through.

Trade/Free Agency Period:
As mentioned above anyone who doesn't want to re-sign on deals that suit the club or remain with the club are welcome to explore opportunities elsewhere. Hopefully we'd be able to work our deals that either get us players that fill list needs or get us good picks, either outright or by trading the player and our existing picks being upgraded. Outside that I wouldn't be getting involved in trade/free agency just for the sake of being involved. Whether we appoint McQualter as coach or not I see 2024 as a year where the new coach will look to implement their own style and game plan to the list which will mean a bit of trial and error as we adjust to them.

Drafts:
As has been our style over the last few years once again we draft the best available talent with our draft picks. I know everyone says we need KPF help, but we can't go reaching for players and that is where live trading could come into it. If someone we like is too far back from the pick that we're at, try and trade back, while adding additional picks to the 2024 draft. I wouldn't be trading out our 2024 R1 pick as it's quite likely going to be a top 10 pick, possibly even top 5 if the year goes really bad.

Heading into 2024 I believe the new coach be it McQualter or someone else, will start to turn to the youth a lot more than we've seen in 2023 and we've seen plenty this year. I can see a scenario where Martin Prestia Lynch Broad Vlastuin Nankervis & Short are the only players 28 or older in the side, which isn't necessarily a bad thing as we'll still have experienced types in Hopper D.Rioli Baker Taranto Graham Bolton Balta and Ross filling out the core of the side, but there will be plenty of youth getting it's shot and that could make 2024 quite exciting for different reasons than we've become used to over the last few years.
 

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