Who will drop out of the top 8 in 2013??

[tesseract]

Ok man, would you prefer if we all just said North will be bottom 4 next year?

We made to finals and deserved to, we won when it mattered.
We beat Essendon, St Kilda, Richmond & Carlton, who at the time were in contention for the top 8.
It wasn't to do with having luck with injuries or a soft draw.
Many other teams had it just as ''easy'' playing Port, Melb or Bulldogs x2
I've never known a team to be ridiculed as much as North has for not getting many injuries.
We obviously have competent medical staff.

North supporters can post predictions as they choose, but they will be commented on, especially if they're outrageous.

I disagree that North making finals this year wasn't due to luck, for while North had some good wins, but I believe both Essendon and Carlton are better teams than North. North's draw has been soft. Indisputable when North plays those hapless teams twice. Given North supporters optimism during the last pre-season, 8th after the H&A games, in some cases, is modest.

Medical staff have nothing to do with injuries that occur on the field. All clubs have professional medical staff.

 

[dmc333]

Whoever gets the most injuries.

 

[Morris Major]

2 or 3 crucial players go down and anyone of 5 or 6 sides could miss the top 8.

West Coast: Cox, Kerr, Priddis - Miss
Fremantle: Sandilands, McPharlin, Fyfe - Miss

In fairness, WCE already missed LeCras for the season and Kennedy for a fair few games. Sandi + Fyfe only had 21 games between them. Both teams still made the finals.

 

[RooPower89]

North supporters can post predictions as they choose, but they will be commented on, especially if they're outrageous.

I disagree that North making finals this year wasn't due to luck, for while North had some good wins, but I believe both Essendon and Carlton are better teams than North. North's draw has been soft. Indisputable when North plays those hapless teams twice. Given North supporters optimism during the last pre-season, 8th after the H&A games, in some cases, is modest.

Medical staff have nothing to do with injuries that occur on the field. All clubs have professional medical staff.

We beat Carlton with their best 22 by 53pts
We beat Essendon with two of our best players down by 24pts
We made finals and they didn't I'd say North are better than them.
Outside of Watson, Hurley & Fletcher i think Essendon are overrated.

 

[tesseract]

We beat Carlton with their best 22 by 53pts
We beat Essendon with two of our best players down by 24pts
We made finals and they didn't I'd say North are better than them.
Outside of Watson, Hurley & Fletcher i think Essendon are overrated.

I did say North had some good wins. Does GC beating Carlton mean they're a better side than them? Not IMO.
I think North have a soft underbelly. They're capable of pulling off the odd win against better teams, and just as capable of losing what would seem the unloseable.
You can say North are better than them because North made finals, but that would be an oversimplified view of why North made finals. It doesn't take into consideration any other factors at all. No wonder North fans hype their team more than any other, for they don't base conclusions on external factors.

 

[exit]

Pretty much no-one had Adelaide in the 8 this year let alone top 2, despite knowing we had a soft draw. So we've obviously gone better than most expected. I expect Crouch to be ready to go and have a significant impact next year. I hope we have a tougher draw and do well just to shut some of you up.
I think North could drop out next year if anyone, to make way for one of Richmond, Essendon, Saints or Carlton.

 

[juzzo]

Think Carlton will come in for either North or Geelong.

 

[Eth]

I'd go Geelong, Fremantle, North Melbourne in that order of likelihood to slide out, with Carlton, Richmond and Brisbane (if they snag a key forward) in order to step up.

On Adelaide, they structurally have everything right so I'm surprised that they were brought up even with their fairly easy draw in comparison. Key forwards in Tippett and Walker, a great ruck in Jacobs, key backs in Rutten, Talia and probably Shaw as well and versatility from Jenkins and Henderson especially if Tippett isn't at the club in 2013.

They'll be top six next year IMO.

 

[PykeDream]

There's an element of truth in both angles.

I'm happy in the knowledge that we have a greater exponential improvement capacity than any other side in the top 8.

The is our real asset.

Goldstein, Cunnington, Ziebell, Harper, Bastinac, Atley, MacMillan, Wright, Hansen and Tarrant all have a shit load of upside.

8 of these players only became regular senior 22 players in 2012.

No other top 8 side has this level of potential upside.

McKenzie, Mullet, Black and Cam Delaney are expected to join that group in the next 18 months.

Majak Daw might even join them.

Of course they don't.

Any young club can say this about this side, but its neither tangible nor able to be disproven. I think teams like West Coast and Sydney for example could just as justifiably lay claim to having a similar number of players 'with upside'.

 

[Dangas]

Hawthorn, premiership hangover again?
Geelong get a year older, Scarlett goes along with some other older guys
Collingwood, disaster after Cloke leaves,
Adelaide, harder draw, reality check for 2nd year coach
Sydney, injuries. Goodes drops off
WCE, injuries
Freo, forget how to score
North, Harvey drops off, injuries etc etc

Nothing I'm convinced will happen, but I'm sure the 8 will change, somehow.

When was he ever "on" after his injury?

 

[Dangas]

I'd say the Cats, their dynasty is all but over

 

[theflea]

who would have predicted you needed 14 wins to make the 8?

 

[Hobbes]

Adelaide - new coach might take a while
Freo - injuries again?
North - North

Could have easily substituted different examples for each of those teams...

ROFL at Adelaide. The new coach has obviously been an issue for us this year.

 

[Hobbes]

Geelong feel like the biggest chance to drop out. Perhaps North and Collingwood next most likely.

Adelaide will be stronger next year - a VERY strong core of youngsters who will only get better. Hawthorn and Sydney will probably dip a little, but certainly not out of the eight. West Coast will probably challenge for the four. Freo seem to have figured out their game plan and are probably good for another year.

As for teams coming in, Brisbane seem most promising. Richmond ought to finish at least 9th and might even make the eight. Carlton might be whipped into shape. St Kilda might still be thereabouts. I'd be surprised if any of the bottom five challenge for the eight at all.

 

[StevenwellerHFC]

Freo - Turf toe.

 

[CrippsonBlue]

ROFL at Adelaide. The new coach has obviously been an issue for us this year

I am unfamiliar with this dialect.

 

[Ancient Tiger]

I think Geelong are more likely to be out than in.

Scarlett and Wojo likely gone. Pods, Enright, Chapman, Corey and Hunt all 30+ and close to being past it. Had a good run with injuries to key players this year as well.

Yeah but those guys hate losing so much, it's hard to write them off. Absolute champs!

 

[jonoman89]

We beat Carlton with their best 22 by 53pts

Wat.

We didn't have a forward line, our CHB was playing his first game, Murphy was playing his first game in 2 months and Walker did his hammy within the first few minutes.

You smashed us. And so you should have.

 

[Barnzy]

Ridiculous to make a call now. We don't even know what the 2013 lists look like.

 

[KeilorUnder9s]

North to win the next 76 flags due to them being the only team with young talent, they will start them breeding and just keep a steady supply of father sons rolling through the club for eternity.

 

[barmy44]

It's impossible making predictions before the draft/trading period. Someone might destroy the draft WCE '10 style or trade really well like Richmond did last year.

its impossible making predictions at any time. the top 8 now looks very different to how it was looking mid-way through the year.

look at essendon at 8-1... north looked like a bottom 6 team, and geelong looked like they would miss for a while. hawthorn had a sub 50% record at round 5.

a team always surprises, a team always implodes or fails to live up to expectations.

'09 hawthorn were many peoples bets for the flag. with a few rounds to go in '06 adelaide could not lose the flag. 5 rounds into '07 mark thompson was gone.

id say one or more of the following will drop out of the 8 next season - geelong, north, freo, sydney, hawthorn, west coast, adelaide or collingwood.

 

[The Speaker]

Can we expect at least a modicum of patience on BF?

Couldn't this have waited until after finals? Or after trade week? Or the draft?

 

[The Casey Cat]

LOL at people saying Geelong. Guess some just will just never learn. Won't miss the 8 next year. Just won't. As for not having injuries Varcoe, Menzel and Vardy (young but would have been a handy 2nd ruck and an upgrade on Walker or anyone else) missed the entire year beside one game each for the two Vs.

Our stars will get a another year older and Scarlo won't be there but the others while needing of careful management don't look like they are about to fall away. Harry Taylor is already starting to play a more roaming/loos 'Scarlo' type role where possible. Smedts, Duncan, West, Motlop, THunt, Hawkins, Christensen, Murdoch and Guthrie we could also expect further improvement from.

I can appreciate after years of being on top how sick of some are but I'm sorry we are just not going to quietly drop away. The club has been doing all it possibly can to avoid that happening since 2010 when Duncan and others started showing up.

 

[Magma]

this is presuming teams will be good enough to get in.

 

[WCEbrody]

There's an element of truth in both angles.

I'm happy in the knowledge that we have a greater exponential improvement capacity than any other side in the top 8.

The is our real asset.

Goldstein, Cunnington, Ziebell, Harper, Bastinac, Atley, MacMillan, Wright, Hansen and Tarrant all have a shit load of upside.

8 of these players only became regular senior 22 players in 2012.

No other top 8 side has this level of potential upside.

McKenzie, Mullet, Black and Cam Delaney are expected to join that group in the next 18 months.

Majak Daw might even join them.

Naitanui,Shuey,Scott Selwood,Gaff,Darling,Masten,Brennan,Sheppard - all these players are 23 or younger and are in our best 25.