Analysis Hawthorn rebuild: are they tanking?

[hk89]

No you can't, we tried to bring in multiple big FA's and failed. We bought in Scully, Patton, Hartley Brooksby, Minchington and played those duds over youth. Lewis and Moore we dominating the VFL and couldn't crack the senior team.

Scully was at the end of the 2018 season. I'm talking about the end of the 2019 season and what we did from that draft onwards. End of 2018 was with hindsight a shitshow of mistakes from a "should have starting rebuilding" point of view, and Scully was not anywhere near the biggest of those problems. Bringing in Wingard in exchange for a young player and our first rounder was a big mistake (although I didn't hate it at the time, given we'd finished top 4 that season). We did get Scrimshaw for a bag of chips that 2018 draft. Scully and then Patton the next year were free hits given what we paid for them in trade. Paton wasn't even taking a spot most weeks given he played a total of 6 games for us. Paton just happened to be available, the more important decision that draft was using our first pick on Day, and I'm going to stick to the idea that this was the turning point of mature trades over young talent.

 

[T2B_]

I guess unlike some of my brethren I do very much rate the Hawks at the moment. That's nothing new, I was saying as much before they were even winning games. They just have that "it" about them.

Calsher Dear is a good example of the side as a whole, young raw and might have up and down weeks but you can just tell he's gonna dominate in a couple years, but may even come on quicker than you assume.

I don't relish potentially being their bunnies again but you have to respect their process.

 

[sr36]

You have a very, very shit coach

No coach is getting that group to a flag.

Outstanding spine, but no runners or ball users around them.

 

[SSSSSS]

No coach is getting that group to a flag.

Outstanding spine, but no runners or ball users around them.

It's incredible how soft they are when they have a leader like Cripps.

Really feel for the bloke. That man has bled for his jumper like few have ever. He deserves a flag and sadly will likely never get one as a Blue.

 

[sr36]

It's incredible how soft they are when they have a leader like Cripps.

Really feel for the bloke. That man has bled for his jumper like few have ever. He deserves a flag and sadly will likely never get one as a Blue.

I don't think they're soft - they've got the worst group of runners and flankers in the league. So they have to play a tight grind, because if the ball gets into space it's good night.

 

[theiaofseed]

I don't think they're soft - they've got the worst group of runners and flankers in the league. So they have to play a tight grind, because if the ball gets into space it's good night.

Even before the injuries the Carlton players were out of gas, Hawthorn just sliced them into pieces with run.

 

[blue harvest]

I mean, finals was well and truly on the cards for Hawthorn according to one fanatical Hawthorn poster

No it was aspiring to play finals. And remains a real possibility with 2 games to go.

 

[RCAB]

Talking about making no sense.



I thought the content was straight forward, I'll try my best to make as simple as possible if that post was too confusing for you.

When the brown and yellow's rebuild supposedly started is of no interest to me hence why I don't think I've posted this thread in years, if ever.

But seeing so many brown and yellow fans up and about in a similar fashion as to when they were a contender, piqued my interest hence why I dropped by this thread.

In response to the poster's question of why I'm in this thread, it's because like I said I've recently noticed many brown and yellow fans on BF running their mouths about other teams after being relatively quite for several years and more or less carrying on like the rebuild/tanking period is basically over. So I decided to to chime in by saying that it's about got damn time.

After being and irrelevant losing team for so long, it's no big achievement that the brown and yellow is finally coming good. Hawthorn should have accumulated enough talent via the draft or trades in those years at the bottom to become a decent team much much sooner given their time spent at the bottom.

Hope that is clear enough for you and anybody else struggling to understand.

Based on their age profile, if the Hawks were to make the finals this year, they're a year ahead of their development.

 

[blue harvest]

Uh oh, we're into receipt collecting territory already.

Can collected receipts be handed back?

 

[blue harvest]

Just take the L, dude.

Yeah nah.

 

[sr36]

Even before the injuries the Carlton players were out of gas, Hawthorn just sliced them into pieces with run.

They just play too many big bodied mids - it's half their team - they're all either great in Cripps's case or good solid players, but it's just so unbalanced and means it's all contests and down the line to move the ball, as none of them are top kicks either.

 

[Chadwiko]

Yeah nah.

You quoted a post, from six~ months ago, that wasn't even a reply to you.

 

[SSSSSS]

Care to make a friendly wager?

Which team out of Hawthorn and North wins a final first?

If North wins a final first, you agree to have Chief suspend/restrict your BF account for a period (two weeks? 1 month?)
If Hawks win a final first, I'll do the same in reverse.

 

[blue harvest]

I haven't seen a takedown so comprehensive since Hamish McLachlan opened a wikipedia account and BigFooty found out...

Embarrasing for SYL. Hard to come back from that.

I have.
Strapping Young Lad was bang on!

 

[blue harvest]

You quoted a post, from six~ months ago, that wasn't even a reply to you.


View attachment 2076508

Take the L, dude.

Edit: LLLLLL

 

[Mr Meeseeks]

I'd worry about making finals and then winning one before I started thinking that far ahead.

You might think that way.

But I'm a Hawthorn supporter.

 

[theiaofseed]

Has Yoda_ surfaced yet?

 

[Yoda_]

Has Yoda_ surfaced yet?

yep, actively said im envious of how well Hawks are going. Not going to stick my head in the sand

Popped my hand up and said I got it wrong after the facts of recent months

 

[black is White]

This is so dumb

Acting like game strategy happens at the start of the season and can’t change

Pies are old and injured, no strategy needed there

Not even relevant in this thread

Completely missed the point well done. Teams work out what teams did well over preseason making it harder to replicate the following year and see if they can profit from similar tactics. When the season starts they all see who's doing what and see what's working best and all focus on that alongside working on Matchday tactics ECT. Usually it's a particular team or 2 being focused on and this is evident throughout the years for example when flooding started to use these tactics. It's not like all the clubs come together and decide to use those tactics universally. Someone came up with the idea the club utilised it and the rest of the clubs followed suite and did it their way while trying to figure out how to defeat it. Right now I don't think teams know what works best on how to stop hawks at their best with their current system otherwise youd see teams systematically set up the same way most weeks to counteract what they are good at. That time will come and that's when you will see how great this hawks list is and what they may need to improve on. I feel the hawks fans here are just more upset thinking I'm telling them their going to be found out(which might happen but I don't think I've said that once) rather than trying to consider what's being said.

 

[Mercy Seat]

Not arguing when it became in full swing, talking about when it started. Unless you want a lot more angst than you need, then you don't want to be dumping all your old blokes at the start of the rebuild and suddenly playing all kids. I'm arguing the transition from "we are not far off, let's try to trade into a another flag" to "ok, we're not going to do it with this core group, let's start again with a new batch of kids" started in 2019. I'm not saying we went from an aging has-been list to a list of exciting young players in 2019-2020, but you can see the change of direction had occurred, and then accelerated from there (mostly off the back on getting and actually using our early picks over the period from 2019-2023). I agree that the rebuild was much more evident by 2021, but I still think you can trace back the beginning to 2019, which started the string of "keep and use our first founder". The next phase will be when we start to flip back to thinking about trading out first rounders to fill holes, which might be as soon as this season.

More, Jiath and Day all debuted under Clarko before 2021, as did Mitchell Lewis, Scrimshaw , Nash and Morrison. Clarko wasn't the type to throw games at players that were not ready, and IMO he kept giving games to some old favourites longer than he should have, but I think the club had definitely moved on from the 'top up again' plan. Will Day in particular would likely have played a lot more games under Clarko if it wasn't for injury.

Agree that 2019 was the first moves towards the rebuild, but it wasn’t til a year later that the club really decided the previous list management strategy wasn’t working. Club thought we were a genuine chance having a really good year in 2020.

We all know what happened and end of 2020 we moved on 12 players from memory and that was when the rebuild really kicked into gear.

 

[5minutes_of_Dew]

yep, actively said im envious of how well Hawks are going. Not going to stick my head in the sand

Popped my hand up and said I got it wrong after the facts of recent months.

This is how to do it. It takes a lot to acknowledge when we get things wrong.


Not like Randy, doubling, tripling and quadrupling down on his offended, head-trauma takes.

Is it '89?
Is it '08?
Is it '13?

Is it that 2 bacardi cruisers and access to Internet on your phone is too much Randy?

Hang up the boots mate, you're cooked.

 

[Strapping Young Lad]

Complete bottom out or not, just know your predictions will be way closer than “14 wins and finals” ever was.

Imagine being so cocky that you bet your account that a side won’t win 10 games, and then after you’ve had to go through with it, you also have to watch the team that ended your account end your clubs season.

 

[Mr Meow]

Imagine being so cocky that you bet your account that a side won’t win 10 games, and then after you’ve had to go through with it, you also have to watch the team that ended your account end your clubs season.

Wait he actually lost his account over this? Bloody hilarious.

Thank goodness Walshy had some sense and didn't take the bet before the weekend.

 

[Strapping Young Lad]

Wait he actually lost his account over this? Bloody hilarious.

Thank goodness Walshy had some sense and didn't take the bet before the weekend.

Yes, spent a large portion dunking on my posts that I made over summer where I stated the players and club would be aiming to win between 10-14 games for the season.

Some of the clowns in here got super excited by the losses column early doors and wouldn’t hear that there was still a lot going right for the Hawks. Then the wins started to come….

 

[Guardian Hawk]

Imagine being so cocky that you bet your account that a side won’t win 10 games, and then after you’ve had to go through with it, you also have to watch the team that ended your account end your clubs season.

As poetic as all of this is, he actually bet his account Hawthorn won't win 7 games. To think it may end up 14+ and the weekend we just enjoyed, it's more of a 'karma bus depot' at this point.