I agree with this paragraph.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
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.