GWS - inability to land players

[IanW]

It seems they are stuggling to attract quality experianced players with more than a cuople of years left. Sure tey can keep the money aside to pay the kids ad keep them there but whp says they won't want out as well in future. I'm tippiong they would have loved to have snagged a couple more and now they seemingly can't they will talk about paying and keeping the kids.

Again, the comparison is Melbourne's signings for the season we just had.

Thank you, but I'd prefer to stick with getting games into our kids rather than the likes of Rodan, Dawes and Gysberts - yes, Clark was a good get, but it's a hit rate of worse than 50%.

Finally, as kids leave, we'll trade them out, getting more draft picks to keep rolling the dice.

There is a role for free agency, but it's to fill specific gaps - including renting leadership, the way we did with James McDonald - but not to try and build a team.

 

[mcgarnacle]

Undesirable location is utter garbage.

Why do they have to live where they train??

How many Hawks players live in Mulgrave, Saints players live in Seaford, Essendon players live in Tullamarine etc

GWS has chosen to go the kids, will it work long term...wait and see

When you're a sought after free agent, you can pick what you want to do. There's no doubt he will want to live some where East of Anzac parade. It's practically the most sought after patch of real estate in the country And getting to Moore park is much easier and pleasant than the daily traffic mired journey out to Olympic park.

GWS ain't GC. Unless players are from the area, they will struggle to attract anyone but drafted kids and 3rd tier talent looking for a game.

 

[IanW]

It seems they are stuggling to attract quality experianced players with more than a cuople of years left. Sure tey can keep the money aside to pay the kids ad keep them there but whp says they won't want out as well in future. I'm tippiong they would have loved to have snagged a couple more and now they seemingly can't they will talk about paying and keeping the kids.

Again, the comparison is Melbourne's signings for the season we just had.

Thank you, but I'd prefer to stick with getting games into our kids rather than the likes of Rodan, Dawes and Gysberts - yes, Clark was a good get, but it's a hit rate of worse than 50%.

Finally, as kids leave, we'll trade them out, getting more draft picks to keep rolling the dice.

There is a role for free agency, but it's to fill specific gaps - including renting leadership, the way we did with James McDonald - but not to try and build a team.

 

[Colonial]

When you're a sought after free agent, you can pick what you want to do. There's no doubt he will want to live some where East of Anzac parade. It's practically the most sought after patch of real estate in the country And getting to Moore park is much easier and pleasant than the daily traffic mired journey out to Olympic park.

GWS ain't GC. Unless players are from the area, they will struggle to attract anyone but drafted kids and 3rd tier talent looking for a game.

What a joke, no player "lives" in the local area of the bloody stadium. We wont struggle attracting players, but the club has done something I hope they would and that is to draw a line in the sand.

 

[Kenno27]

Boyd will be cheaper now.

 

[IanW]

You completely ****** up with Adams.

GWS kept delaying contract talks and just kept saying "we'll wait and see what Buddy does". He cracked it at the way he was treated and requested a trade. Had GWS got their shit together and treated their kids right, they wouldn't have lost one of their best mids.

Yep. Thats one of the reasons I was grumpy at the whole pursuit of Buddy - and as soon as Cameron showed that, yes, he was one of the best youing forwards in a long time, we should have pulled the plug.

 

[FrancisX]

GWS probably don't care about losing Buddy... They can recruit Boyd now.

 

[FrancisX]

Thank you, but I'd prefer to stick with getting games into our kids rather than the likes of Rodan, Dawes and Gysberts - yes, Clark was a good get, but it's a hit rate of worse than 50%.

Part of what was so dumb about Melbourne's recruiting was they gave up good young and established players to get a hold of those players mentioned above. There was no logic to it, and the should have tried to hold on to Pettard.

 

[Big Kahuna Boot]

What dribble. We have had no players knock us back. The Swans offered more than what we were prepared to offer so we pulled out of the race. That's hardly a smackdown on the club or location.

..Buddy doesn't seem like the type that was willing to do all the extra publicity work to 'earn' the AFL marketing bonanza atop the giants wage, so he wants for the swans where he just does his footy for top dollar, and can relax outside of footy.. ..leaving melbourne to get away from the football bubble..

..but yes, good players have knocked back offers from GWS, especially in their start up year when they targeted plenty of players.. ..your claim that no-one has knocked back the giants is false..

 

[interestedoz1]

What other player has the star power to fulfil the marketing demands at GWS?

 

[Colonial]

..Buddy doesn't seem like the type that was willing to do all the extra publicity work to 'earn' the AFL marketing bonanza atop the giants wage, so he wants for the swans where he just does his footy for top dollar, and can relax outside of footy.. ..leaving melbourne to get away from the football bubble..

..but yes, good players have knocked back offers from GWS, especially in their start up year when they targeted plenty of players.. ..your claim that no-one has knocked back the giants is false..

Who?

 

[Colonial]

What other player has the star power to fulfil the marketing demands at GWS?

Jezza is getting better and better, is a young player and has a long future (fingers crossed) at the club. If he can get more service he will be huge. Especially if Boyd and an injury free Patton fire.

 

[interestedoz1]

Hi Ian - not disputing Cameron's future trajectory in the game will continue to skyrocket - just wasn't the AFL desparate to get an established superstar to the club to enable immediate marketing blitz as well as getting experience into the team? Buddy would have been amazing IMO - just can't think of who else could add as much...

 

[CF]

I don't think GWS has a problem attracting players per se. Buddy is a different kettle of fish to other players, he is a marquee player. So attracting a marquee player to a side that looks like being a bottom 4 team for another 3 years is difficult. That I agree with. I think GWS should be looking at players like Shaw, Chappy, J Hunt, etc that might be able to give them a few years while their young blokes continue to develop.

 

[Tiger2709]

Players play in Adelaide, Geelong and Perth, so I don't see West Sydney as being undesirable compared to those places (I personally would add Melbourne as well, but I kind of get why people would want to live in Melbourne ahead of West Sydney).

Playing for GWS is still a gamble. Everyone will line up when we are knocking on the door of finals football with a group of 22-23 year olds.

Also, look what has happened to Gilham and Thorton, you need to be better than nearly whole generation of 18-20 year olds to keep your place in the team.

Cant believe you are comparing Perth in the same sentence as Geelong and Adelaide and thinking GWS is any where near as nice as Perth which is one of the fastest growing areas in the country, you really have no idea.

 

[Colonial]

Cant believe you are comparing Perth in the same sentence as Geelong and Adelaide and thinking GWS is any where near as nice as Perth which is one of the fastest growing areas in the country, you really have no idea.

I cant believe you are comparing Perth (where the growth has started to drop like a rock in a lake) to the open relaxed growing greatness that is Western Sydney... You obviously have serious issues.

 

[IanW]

Hi Ian - not disputing Cameron's future trajectory in the game will continue to skyrocket - just wasn't the AFL desparate to get an established superstar to the club to enable immediate marketing blitz as well as getting experience into the team? Buddy would have been amazing IMO - just can't think of who else could add as much...

Jarryd Hayne did two thirds of stuff all for Parra.

First you get the wins. Then you get the crowds. Then you get the money.

 

[Tas]

It will be a tough for a year or two until the kids balls drop and they are a bit more competitive. It was why they were better off trading for some decent senior players at inception.

 

[doppleganger]

When you're a sought after free agent, you can pick what you want to do. There's no doubt he will want to live some where East of Anzac parade. It's practically the most sought after patch of real estate in the country And getting to Moore park is much easier and pleasant than the daily traffic mired journey out to Olympic park.

Point being he could live somewhere like Paddington or Double Bay and be 20km of Olympic Park.

This is no different to a player living in South Yarra and commuting the 25km out to Waverley Park.

 

[IanW]

It will be a tough for a year or two until the kids balls drop and they are a bit more competitive. It was why they were better off trading for some decent senior players at inception.

Like Fremantle did ? My, but was that a recepie for success !

And that early Brisbane Bears side ? Full of decent senior players.

Oh, or maybe we should look at how Melbourne went trading high picks for experience this year.

Again, I'd like flogs who run this line to say exactly what deals we rejected - I can pull up pages worth of players who GWS approached, but they all got locked away, after Gold Coast proved with Ablett, Bock and Rischitelli that good players would go to an expansion club.

 

[Tas]

Like Fremantle did ? My, but was that a recepie for success !

And that early Brisbane Bears side ? Full of decent senior players.

Oh, or maybe we should look at how Melbourne went trading high picks for experience this year.

Again, I'd like flogs who run this line to say exactly what deals we rejected - I can pull up pages worth of players who GWS approached, but they all got locked away, after Gold Coast proved with Ablett, Bock and Rischitelli that good players would go to an expansion club.

I said decent.

Most were contracted but GWS in particular was given two mini drafts to sell off four top of the line kids, could have used those to get good quality mature bodied mids, a couple of good tough inside mids.

Problem is the clubs have unreasonable expectation, ie Freo trading Fyfe, not going to happen. However, you could have sold off O'Meara to West Coast, could have probably got Priddis plus some currency. Priddis wouldn't have lead the club to a grand final any time soon but he would have given you some real stability in the middle. Get another good quality inside for Crouch, plus currency. Then get some more mature strong bodied players for the other two.

The club exposed too many unprepared kids at the same time, especially in the middle, which is why they have struggled to be competitive.

Being competitive would not only make the club more attractive to lure players in but would make it easier to retain players, and for less if they buy into what is going on. Getting thumped almost every week would be demoralising.

 

[De Iulio2Wiggins]

Buddy would have been good for GWS based on exposure and entertainment - Fev was the only thing that kept Blues fans sane for eight years - but not getting him isn't the end of the earth. GWS will still struggle for the next three or four years, and having Buddy sulking in the goal square wasn't going to do much to change that.

 

[IanW]

I said decent.

Most were contracted but GWS in particular was given two mini drafts to sell off four top of the line kids, could have used those to get good quality mature bodied mids, a couple of good tough inside mids.

Problem is the clubs have unreasonable expectation, ie Freo trading Fyfe, not going to happen. However, you could have sold off O'Meara to West Coast, could have probably got Priddis plus some currency. Priddis wouldn't have lead the club to a grand final any time soon but he would have given you some real stability in the middle. Get another good quality inside for Crouch, plus currency. Then get some more mature strong bodied players for the other two.

The club exposed too many unprepared kids at the same time, especially in the middle, which is why they have struggled to be competitive.

Being competitive would not only make the club more attractive to lure players in but would make it easier to retain players, and for less if they buy into what is going on. Getting thumped almost every week would be demoralising.

Again, I'd like to know the deals we knocked back.

Check the various boards in 2010 about all the players we went after, and you'll find that teams locked them up and dint want to trade them.

So we've gone with a bunch of kids, and while I'd have liked one more goal against the Doggies, the Dees not to have their only good quarter in five years and maybe - just maybe - staying on our feet for 20 minutes longer against Collingwood, Im happy with how it's all gone.

But I think through this trade period, we'll sign a ruckman, get a half back flanker and have some more money to give Jeremy Cameron.

 

[Tiger_Of_Old]

Is Ralph Carr Buddy's agent?
If so
All is not lost yet:-Adel,Coll.Carl,Ess,Geel,Melb,Nth,Rich,Stk,Port,West Coast,Bulldogs.

 

[master bate]

Like Fremantle did ? My, but was that a recepie for success !

And that early Brisbane Bears side ? Full of decent senior players.

Oh, or maybe we should look at how Melbourne went trading high picks for experience this year.

Again, I'd like flogs who run this line to say exactly what deals we rejected - I can pull up pages worth of players who GWS approached, but they all got locked away, after Gold Coast proved with Ablett, Bock and Rischitelli that good players would go to an expansion club.

Melbourne made 2 trades of high picksfor experienced players in recent years. A pick 12 for Mitch Clark and a pick 20 for Chris Dawes. Used the rest on kids. Hawthorn have used more decent picks for experienced players than we have recently (Lake, Gunston, Burgoyne, Hale, Gibson).

GWS suffered in some ways with the locking away of good players that happened before and after Gold Coast started sniffing around. But you had 4 mini draft picks, around about 10 top 10 draft picks over the last 2 years and the ability to sign uncontracted players. Yet the best you could do was Ward, Scully and Davis.

Ward is a gun but the other 2 wouldn't have got a game in either grand final side on the weekend based on current form.

Of course you didn't want to be like Brisbane Bears or Freo and trade away all your picks for B graders. But Gold Coast established a competitive culture in year 3 by having Ablett, Bock, Rischitelli, Brennan, C. Brown, Warnock, Danny Stanley, Tom Murphy at the club. Now besides Ablett and Rishcitelli (who hasn't done a lot) most of those were on the way out of their former clubs but had some value and were the right age that they could contribute on the field in some way.

Compare that to Scully and Davis who are clearly still trying to find their feet and guys like O'Hailpin, Thornton, Gilham who can't even get games in the worst side in terms of pure performance in recent history and guys like Brogran, Luke Power and James McDonald who should only have been coaches since the start.

Kevin Sheedy thought he could recreate the baby bombers when its clear you just cant compete physically for a game with a team of kids. You better get Heath Shaw and you better get a few more role players who you have faith in to hold their spot in the team. Do that and the kids will actually improve and push them out instead of them floundering without physical support.