- Dec 19, 2015
- 2,489
- 4,970
- AFL Club
- Geelong
I accept a lot of what you are saying here, and you are right, based on the performance of the club we should back them in....Dw mate, I'm usually the one who fights the fight - so I'm no stranger to it, haha. Been defending Bruhn for a year since we thought about trading him in. Been defending Jhye for a year over Phillipou and Ginbey since it was apparent we were going to select him.
I honestly think we hang way too much s**t on our own sometimes on here. Nothing wrong with critique, but it always seems to be a 'grass is greener ' attitude with some about our players - despite not having the same access to high end talent...but yet being the most successful team of the modern era.
We can't change who our players are, they're at our club and we love our club - so we should love our players and back them and the club in. 16 years of relative success should allow us to trust in those that are much more qualified to judge than we are.
It's just a bit harder with drafted players if you follow them and form an opinion pre-draft that isn't in line with the club. I back the club and support the players but when following this draft I was pretty keen on phillipou and ginbey for our pick. I didn't dislike Clark and thought he'd make an AFL footballer but I thought Phillipou in particular could be elite (I accepted Ginbey could be a flight risk).
So going forward, I try to back the club but when the decision making contradicts your own (even though I'm just a flog on big footy) it makes it harder to accept without questioning.
Same goes for last year, I know Sanders didn't make our pick but I would've traded hard to get him, that's how highly I rated him. Then once that shipped sailed, I thought Curtin looked elite. Again I know he went before our pick but Adelaide traded up and we could've too. If Curtin ends up being a jet, it's hard as supporter to dismiss your own thinking and not question the clubs actions.
Outdated thinking now but I always hated that we took Thurlow over Grundy, and it was hard to accept without questioning.
On the flipside I really wanted to take Zac Taylor instead of knevitt in 2021, and Taylor is yet to fire a shot, and instead of taking Conway (who I'm now very excited about) I would've traded up like Sydney to take Sheldrick.
Again, I'm just a flog on big footy and not saying I've got any idea but if you do form an opinion about a player you think we should draft (or not) and then the player you thought starts looking handy, it very hard to dismiss your own thinking.