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If I'm going to have a vent, it's how our location impacts the old timers. Those Hawthorn players above seemed to be able to keep going for longer than our veteran champions apart from Mundy. The travel factor has such a huge impact for career longevity. For the most part we are looking at roughly 30 years old as about the maximum before our players fall apart, whereas the east coast clubs can get good years from their players out to say 32-34 years, even longer for the odd exception
I agree with this paragraph.

It’s why the whole “we are young, no need to panic, plenty of time left yet” thing irks me so much.

Andy Brayshaw is 26 in 2025. Caleb and Youngy are 24 in 2025.
They are young…ish, but like you said the chances of all of them playing top level footy to 33 out of WA is very low.
It’s entirely possible that Andy has just 5 seasons of top level, A grade football in him. The law of averages suggests that’s the case.

If they were playing 17 games a season in Melbourne it would be different. History has shown that over and over again with both west coast and ourselves. David Mundy is an outlier. The lifespan of Stephen Hill, Walters, Fyfey is much more reflective of reality. Same with Yeo, Gaff, shuey and co. They are still there in body at 31 years old, but only bit part role players, pale shadows of their peak selves.

Any decent football we get beyond the age of 30, maybe 31 at a push for stars should be considered a bonus.
Hell - there’s some substantial evidence that Sean Darcy is ALREADY starting to break down at the ripe old age of 26.

This is why I can’t stand the old let’s just wait till next year attitude. We missed a huge opportunity this year to play finals. Thats one year less in our window. A year of finals experience we don’t have.
Missing finals again next year is just unthinkable for this group. The whole project and rebuild would be under a terminal threat if that happens.
 
They’ve been rebuilding the same length of time as us.

Similar errors with a top up mentality instead of committing to the rebuild.

They’re about to play in the same number of finals as we have since that period. 1.

Let’s see if they end up with same number of wins.

They’re also about to sell the farm for a cooked Barrass and Josh battle. Have re-signed Gunston and Breust.

Hawks and us are on the same path. We’ll know in 2 years time who made it out better.
They're rebuilding the same as us but are in the finals playing fantastic football while we're not in finals playing football that is just not good enough against good teams.
And the Hawks have 4 flags since 2008 in their back pocket while we have nothing.
And how did they get Hodge and Mitchell? They famously moved on very good players (Croad did not want to go) in order to get the players they knew they needed to be a successful club. They went on to win 4 flags in 7 years. Collingwood moved on Treloar, Stephenson and Grundy. Key players who on paper you'd be mad to lose, but they won a flag.
I'm not trying to focus on individual players but the mentality of the clubs making those decisions. We have to get better at making tough decisions that benefits the club and our chances of winning a flag.
It's not only Hawks who I'd be watching out for, it's Essendon too as they're making the type of decisions that I'm talking about.
 
They're rebuilding the same as us but are in the finals playing fantastic football while we're not in finals playing football that is just not good enough against good teams.
And the Hawks have 4 flags since 2008 in their back pocket while we have nothing.
And how did they get Hodge and Mitchell? They famously moved on very good players (Croad did not want to go) in order to get the players they knew they needed to be a successful club. They went on to win 4 flags in 7 years. Collingwood moved on Treloar, Stephenson and Grundy. Key players who on paper you'd be mad to lose, but they won a flag.
I'm not trying to focus on individual players but the mentality of the clubs making those decisions. We have to get better at making tough decisions that benefits the club and our chances of winning a flag.
It's not only Hawks who I'd be watching out for, it's Essendon too as they're making the type of decisions that I'm talking about.
"Playing fantastic football" built on near witch hat opposition.

I mean they barely scraped over the line against us in their fortress of Launy (Launy! for goodness sake).
 

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"Playing fantastic football" built on near witch hat opposition.

I mean they barely scraped over the line against us in their fortress of Launy (Launy! for goodness sake).
Well they best us and winning is how sports participants are judged.
I would agree that we have strong 'witches hat' tendencies and that is one of our many problems.
 
Well they best us and winning is how sports participants are judged.
I would agree that we have strong 'witches hat' tendencies and that is one of our many problems.
Really? I'm not sure results would back up us being witches hats (the few times we got spanked could be framed within extenuating circumstances, however deep you want to look into it).

Certainly the last three games against Top 4 sides were, to say the least, fairly torrid affairs for the opposition, where we were in each one unto the death.

Port losing after playing us too, follows a familiar pattern for the year.

Would love Hawkfawn's draw, but not sure how they'll fare coming off a gap week (bathing in the glazing) up against more experienced opposition. Nevermind how they'll go, uniquely for them, playing a night game with their gamelan.
 
Really? I'm not sure results would back up us being witches hats (the few times we got spanked could be framed within extenuating circumstances, however deep you want to look into it).

Certainly the last three games against Top 4 sides were, to say the least, fairly torrid affairs for the opposition, where we were in each one unto the death.

Port losing after playing us too, follows a familiar pattern for the year.

Would love Hawkfawn's draw, but not sure how they'll fare coming off a gap week (bathing in the glazing) up against more experienced opposition. Nevermind how they'll go, uniquely for them, playing a night game with their gamelan.
laying fantastic football" built on near witch hat opposition
This your your quote.
They beat us.
So the teams they beat, according to you, were withches hats.
They beat us. So according to you, we must be witches hats.
Unless of course, the teams they beat weren't witches hats.
Or we could be a good team, who they beat, and so they did/are in fact playing good football because they beat a good team/s.
Which is it? You can't have it both ways.
It's mental gymnastics to think that we're a good team that loses while they're a poor team that wins.
 
This your your quote.
They beat us.
So the teams they beat, according to you, were withches hats.
They beat us. So according to you, we must be witches hats.
Unless of course, the teams they beat weren't witches hats.
Or we could be a good team, who they beat, and so they did/are in fact playing good football because they beat a good team/s.
Which is it? You can't have it both ways.
It's mental gymnastics to think that we're a good team that loses while they're a poor team that wins.
How do you extrapolate that with any sort of reasonable logic? It's definitely not what I said and it's be hard to see that being twisted into what you define it as being done with any attempt at a serious discussion.

Yes they've built their form with witches hat opposition, which we clearly weren't since we were in front for most of that match and they won by a few goals in their fortress.

But yes, beating up on Richmond, North & the WC (ie witch hattery at it's finest) was where they could really build a feel good about themselves (and in the Vic media). Also copping Cottonwool and Carltoon at near their lowest points was nice for them too.
 
This your your quote.
They beat us.
So the teams they beat, according to you, were withches hats.
They beat us. So according to you, we must be witches hats.
Unless of course, the teams they beat weren't witches hats.
Or we could be a good team, who they beat, and so they did/are in fact playing good football because they beat a good team/s.
Which is it? You can't have it both ways.
It's mental gymnastics to think that we're a good team that loses while they're a poor team that wins.
Oh and are you saying playing Geelong, GWS & Port is the equivalent of playing Richmond, the WC and North?
 
Paul Keating once famously said, in relation to cross-media ownership, you can be the prince of print or the queen of the screen, but you can't be both.

Here's a vent borrowed from Paul, you can be the freo board's chief happy clapper, or you can be a mod, but you cna't be both.
 
It's not only Hawks who I'd be watching out for, it's Essendon too as they're making the type of decisions that I'm talking about.
I'm sorry, this is the vent thread and you do you but surely we draw the line at taking notes and being weary of the club that hasnt won a final for 20 years...
 
I'm sorry, this is the vent thread and you do you but surely we draw the line at taking notes and being weary of the club that hasnt won a final for 20 years...
These are the decisions that clubs who go on to have success make. Essendon have been a basket case, run very poorly. Same as us apart from a few great years under Ross. The post I was responding to was saying we should wait 2 years to see who performs better out of us and Hawks. I'm just adding Essendon into that mix.
 
Paul Keating once famously said, in relation to cross-media ownership, you can be the prince of print or the queen of the screen, but you can't be both.

Here's a vent borrowed from Paul, you can be the freo board's chief happy clapper, or you can be a mod, but you cna't be both.
A) There are no rules for how positive or negative a mod can be, what a weird assertion
B) Drago is at most the vice vice happy clapper. A few names have him beat comfortably
 

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I agree with this paragraph.

It’s why the whole “we are young, no need to panic, plenty of time left yet” thing irks me so much.

Andy Brayshaw is 26 in 2025. Caleb and Youngy are 24 in 2025.
They are young…ish, but like you said the chances of all of them playing top level footy to 33 out of WA is very low.
It’s entirely possible that Andy has just 5 seasons of top level, A grade football in him. The law of averages suggests that’s the case.

If they were playing 17 games a season in Melbourne it would be different. History has shown that over and over again with both west coast and ourselves. David Mundy is an outlier. The lifespan of Stephen Hill, Walters, Fyfey is much more reflective of reality. Same with Yeo, Gaff, shuey and co. They are still there in body at 31 years old, but only bit part role players, pale shadows of their peak selves.

Any decent football we get beyond the age of 30, maybe 31 at a push for stars should be considered a bonus.
Hell - there’s some substantial evidence that Sean Darcy is ALREADY starting to break down at the ripe old age of 26.

This is why I can’t stand the old let’s just wait till next year attitude. We missed a huge opportunity this year to play finals. Thats one year less in our window. A year of finals experience we don’t have.
Missing finals again next year is just unthinkable for this group. The whole project and rebuild would be under a terminal threat if that happens.

It's not about having plenty of time left though.

It's about the list dynamics simply not being good enough yet.

You can't go in to a top 4 clash and deep in to finals when your key position players are:

FB: Draper 19 years
CHB: Cox (playing injured)
Ruck: Reidy 2 games total
CHF: Voss 20 and under 10 games
FF: Amiss 21 years
F/Ruck: Jackson 22

Your keys are the most important positions, and the ones that need to be older and stronger.

Like I said it's not about having time left, it's that we are only starting to scratch the surface of this lists capabilities, it's just too early.
 
Hawks are playing fantastic footy.
Well it sucks cause now I have to hope they fulfil more Vic media glazing by beating Port.

It does fire up questions on the best run into the finals. Pounding crapola teams vs the hard honest road.

Certainly Hawkfawn played well, Dogs were pretty shite by the same token. The Bulldogs haven't played the MCG well for a while and have proved pretty flaky.

But all on board the fawn train next week!
 
Sick and tired of all the ****ing hindsight heroes popping up after every good Meek game explaining why we should have traded away our 23 year reigning b&f ruck who had played like 3 full seasons in a row so that we could have kept a 24 year old who had played a dozen games for us.

Also the same people that think we traded Meek to get JOM when Meek would have ended up at Hawks even if JOM had stayed.

Honestly surprised there haven't been more people sooking that we let Lobb leave and he's turned into a very solid Key Defender.
 
Sick and tired of all the ****ing hindsight heroes popping up after every good Meek game explaining why we should have traded away our 23 year reigning b&f ruck who had played like 3 full seasons in a row so that we could have kept a 24 year old who had played a dozen games for us.

Also the same people that think we traded Meek to get JOM when Meek would have ended up at Hawks even if JOM had stayed.

Honestly surprised there haven't been more people sooking that we let Lobb leave and he's turned into a very solid Key Defender.

I am glad someone else said it. I had a long post full of expletives calling those people every name under the sun but chose not to post it. The hindsight hero whinging has reached annoying as **** levels.
 
Sick and tired of all the ****ing hindsight heroes popping up after every good Meek game explaining why we should have traded away our 23 year reigning b&f ruck who had played like 3 full seasons in a row so that we could have kept a 24 year old who had played a dozen games for us.

Also the same people that think we traded Meek to get JOM when Meek would have ended up at Hawks even if JOM had stayed.

Honestly surprised there haven't been more people sooking that we let Lobb leave and he's turned into a very solid Key Defender.

I am glad someone else said it. I had a long post full of expletives calling those people every name under the sun but chose not to post it. The hindsight hero whinging has reached annoying as **** levels.

And I’m sick of tired people talking about hindsight heroes, when there are numerous posts calling out our list management, selection, and coaching fumbles at the time that they happen.

The idea that our coaches and management just couldn’t possibly have the foresight to make smarter decisions is laughable.
 
And I’m sick of tired people talking about hindsight heroes, when there are numerous posts calling out our list management, selection, and coaching fumbles at the time that they happen.

The idea that our coaches and management just couldn’t possibly have the foresight to make smarter decisions is laughable.
Seriously? Darcy had just won the Doig after back to back seasons of 21 games. Meek had only played 12 games and was behind him and Lobb (then Jackson) in the pecking order. Sure people were saying Meek should have played more games but he had only played 12 when we traded him.
The mistake was trading in JOM and not backing Brodie, Erasmus and Johnson to fill the Mundy sized hole in our midfield. But Meek was always going to go and nothing could have stopped that.
 
Seriously? Darcy had just won the Doig after back to back seasons of 21 games. Meek had only played 12 games and was behind him and Lobb (then Jackson) in the pecking order. Sure people were saying Meek should have played more games but he had only played 12 when we traded him.
The mistake was trading in JOM and not backing Brodie, Erasmus and Johnson to fill the Mundy sized hole in our midfield. But Meek was always going to go and nothing could have stopped that.

I'm not talking about the Meek trade specifically, I'm neutral on that one due to the circumstances at the time but I'm aware some did have reservations about that. But it's being told that everything is easy in hindsight, for the clubs many fumbles that could have been avoided. Agree on the JOM/Brodie/Erasmus one
 

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