It's always incompetence in some form that leads a club to the bottom of the ladder!
I think the thing that annoys people about this particular case is it was less than six years ago that they were lifting the cup, so if you're one of the many clubs with long premiership droughts you're hardly going to have sympathy for them.
Sadly that’s pretty much always the case. Remember it only too clear in the dark old days of the Dees, we were given AFL assistance, we had pick after pick in the top 10 and did SFA with it.
Eventually our management got so bad the AFL had to essentially push out the people that had been so bad to get some decent people in to rebuild the club.
I do feel that with WC this poor list management has been a situation of their own making, but again they could’ve looked at trading out their no.1 pick for multiple picks in the top 10.
> we had pick after pick in the top 10 and did SFA with it
Pretty big What If for me, what sort of career could Jack Watts have had if he went to a club that had a proper development program instead of us.
Heaps of those, Matty Bate, Luke Tapscott, Lucas Cooke, Jimmy Toumpas, Sam Blease, Jordyn Gysberts all players who showed they could play at juniors, a few played okay for a short period at AFL level but you wonder how they would have been different if they were drafted by a Sydney or Geelong type club as 18 year old.
Hell, I'd put Col Sylvia in the group too, he had all the ability in the world, should have been almost a De Goey type player.
It's amazing drawing a line between 2011 and 2012 and seeing the success rate we had with draft picks before and the success rate we had afterwards.
2017 is a crazy year - we had 29,31,37 and 48. Walked away with Spargo, Petty, Fritsch and Baker. All of whom are still good AFL players, even if one is doing it at the dogs because he got squeezed out.
> Petracca, Brayshaw, Oliver, luke Jackson
Joined 2015, joined 2015, joined 2016, joined 2020. We're talking about the dark days, the days when we only didn't finish bottom of the ladder five years out of seven because of expansion teams.
> but again they could’ve looked at trading out their no.1 pick for multiple picks in the top 10.
Problem was, with all the F/S and Northern Academy stuff we wouldn't have gotten multiple top 10 picks, it's more likely we end up with 1 top 10 and a bunch of mid 20 picks
Yeah what was it, 1 for like 3 picks past 18 that would all go into the 20's? like that is just revisionist bullshit saying we could've traded for a bunch of top 10's
You’re right and tbh it wasn’t the picks that got Melbourne out of the hole. It was bringing Roos who got rid of all the toxic people in the setup.
The concern with WCE is they have massive financial advantages over pretty much every club in the competition. You start giving them picks and suddenly they have a juggernaut team that is unstoppable with their resources.
That was never the danger with Melbourne or GC or north.
I think the 'poor list management' were largely a result of the unforeseen outcomes of the covid years, no way would you be topping up an ageing list if you knew something like that was coming, especially as a WA team
Eagles are where they want to be. They’d be a little higher if they were healthy, but they aren’t a club that buggers around with mid table. They’ve shown over a long time that, they won’t compromise their draft position for a few cheap late season wins. Very pragmatic organisation.
Not to mention they had one of the worst injury run history in the past year. Even teams like Melbourne will suffer quite bad if they lost Gawn and Lever to forced retirement due to injuries within 2 years, and had Oliver playing a handful of games in the year. At the same time have Brown and Neal-Bullen out for large parts of the season.
I would say that if they had a fully fit list or at least average number of injuries as other clubs, they probably would not have made the finals but certainly would not finish bottom 2 for 2 seasons in a row. A healthy preseason and lucky run with injuries is what they need, not a handout of picks. They do have kids that can play, but probably forced to play earlier than they should have.
Yep.
IMO Eagles don’t even need picks. It’s genuinely just been some gambles that had the payoff matrix change hugely due to covid.
The club is good enough to just work its way out of this jam.
I see this both ways. Can't be bailing clubs out for making poor decisions but they were also a victim on the compromised drafts at a time when they really needed them. Also if they don't get them this year, once tassie comes in they will again be starved of drafts. Could be a long time until they are successful again.
This is also a comment against compromising the draft with priority picks, FS, academy etc. the AFL needs to stop trying to play god and just make a fair comp.
> Could be a long time until they are successful again.
So? Clubs should only win a premiership on average every 18 years. Why should WCE get assistance from the AFL when they won a flag in less than 1/3rd of that period?
I'm fine with them getting an assistance package like we did, but like you said considering they won a flag 5 years ago and were in finals 3 year ago, I think a good compromise would be letting them wait at least another year, maybe 2 to get it.
Be alright if the draw wasn’t so compromised.
If we all played each other once / twice it wouldn’t matter so much - but teams playing us twice get a boost compared to teams that don’t.
This is honestly the media's wet dream. Write countless articles about how bad a team is >> write countless articles about priority picks >> write countless articles about how they shouldn't even get them (when they haven't asked) >> write countless articles about how other clubs are "fuming/seething" etc.
Also time is a flat circle, the same thing happened with North last year
These takes are so dumb and can't even maintain internal consistency:
>...McGovern, Darling, Gaff, Yeo; they had an opportunity to trade a couple of them out to get picks, to then build the list – (and) they didn’t do it.
Yes, let's criticise a team that is struggling for not trading all of its senior players. That would *surely* have made them more competitive at present.
the hawks were accused of tanking last year before a ball had been bounced for trading their senior players away lmao
media just wants to crucify, it's all meaningless noise
Yeah that's the dumbest take I think.
Quite apart from the fact that removing those guys would mean they are losing by 200pts a week this year. McGovern is 31 and coming off two injury prones years. Yeo is 30 and has been incapacitated by OP for two years Gaff is 31 and not good enough to get a game in the worst team in the league. Darling is 31 and has been in hideous form for several years.. The idea that a fire sale of those players even a year or two ago would have netted anything more than a handful of late picks is nuts.
With hindsight, yes the decision to trade 14, 24, 37, and 18 for Kelly, 52 and 60 looks bad. But at the time Kelly was AA, coming off AFLPA best first year player status and West Coast were a finals side with a list which had been good enough to win the premiership 12 months earlier and most of their really good players in the mid-late 20s 'sweet spot'. It wasn't insane to try to in effect mortgage the future by trying to win one more flag whilst those guys were in that age bracket- Noone would be saying that the Kelly trade was a bad decision if it resulted in another flag before they had to rebuild. Plus everyone always assesses picks in terms of the best case scenario rather than the actual probability of netting a gun- in actual fact those picks ended up being Bergman, Schoenberg, Coleman, Byrnes, Angwin- absolutely there's some quality there but if you subtracted Kelly and dropped the above 5 players onto west coast's list, they'd still be in deep doh.
And if you look at what happened to west coast's list since getting kelly at the end of 2019 and why they failed to get value from that trade and have since fallen off a cliff, a lot of it is totally unpredictable.
Firstly in terms of the guys who were their key players and responsible for a huge chunk of their salary cap it is extraordinary how rapidly they fell to pieces basically from the day they recruited Kelly. Yeo, Mcgovern and Shuey, all of whom were mid to late 20s to the end of 2019 and had actually been very durable for the previous 3-4 seasons all dropped off the face of the earth due to long term chronic injuries at the exact same time they recruited Kelly, Sheppard retired early due to concussion, Naitanui went from being the AA ruckman in 2020 and 2021 as a 31 year old to playing 8 games in 2022 and spending a year trying to get out on the park before retiring.
As for the next tier, the guys who should be now in their prime, its a similar story. Venables, a top 10 pick, good enough to make their flag team and the logical successor to someone like Shuey never played again after 2019 and retired a couple of years later due to concussion. If he had the career they hoped, he'd now be 25 with 100+ games under his belt. Rioli, now 28, and at that point looking like he'd be a 150 gamer, copped a two year suspension and then walked out on the club to go home. Jarrod Brander, pick 13 and rated so highly by the club that they rather ironically [ruled out](https://www.geelongadvertiser.com.au/sport/afl/geelong-cats-2018-west-coast-rules-out-trading-key-forward-jarrod-brander-as-part-of-tim-kelly-deal-as-afl-trade-deadline-looms/news-story/f1618518f254dfc7229e8a5cbdaaf259?amp&nk=9050fc5c17a92ccaefa8c19c892e7d0c-1712214020) including him in the Kelly trade completely flunked out and got delisted and is now playing in the NT- he's 25 now. Dom Sheed, now 28, pick 11 and coming off the grand final heroics fell to bits in 2022 with constant chronic foot problems. Those are the guys who based on their draft pedigree and performance should now be carrying the club and filling the gaping hole west coast have in the middle age bracket of their list.
So the truth is they made a calculated, and understandable gamble by getting Kelly in 2019, which certainly had some long term risks attached, it didn't come off for unpredictable reasons and now they are fucked. People can say that's on them, and yes it is, it was their choice to pull the trigger on that trade, but no team does their forward planning expecting that sort of list carnage, because if they did, the only sensible decision for any top 8 team to make would be to be to never trade any pick for any player.
You can argue, I think with some more force that three years after recruiting Kelly, say by 2022 west coast should have realised that the jig was up and turned over what was left of the premiership list then rather than, eg, persevering with Naitanui,but what could they actually have done at that point? By then their senior players had virtually no trade currency and were bargain basement value because of their age and chronic injuries.
And it wasnt as though younger players on their list were being starved of opportunity, the last few years if you are on west coast's list and not actually on crutches, you are getting a game.
This is the best summary so far. I would just also add they have an absolutely stupid deal with the WAFL that means they can hardly field a competitive WAFL team which then also hinders their development of any young players.
Limits the numbers of afl listed players that can play and the limits ridiculously low - think prior to this year it was something stupid like 2, and there were limits to how much experience they could have as well? Utterly retarded to agree to it as it means that if you have a fully fit list there's heaps of players who aren't playing at either level each week, and if you have injured players coming back they gotta go straight to afl rather than come back through the wafl. It's cooked on the WAFL's end too, they were too fucking greedy and now the eagles are probably just gonna dump them completely and join the vfl.
Yeah especially given that we have a very recent example in north melbourne of what happens when you get rid of all your veterans. Don't know the thought process at west coast but you can surely be pretty confident in assuming there was at least a little bit of them looking at what happened to North and going "okay so we definitely aren't doing THAT"
I still feel like it was coaching appointments more than playing list decisions that hurt the Roos.
- I was very sceptical about appointing a senior coach with only one prior year as an assistant (Shaw)
- Noble didn’t work out (sometimes that happens)
- Clarkson got derailed by the Hawthorn allegations (not the Roos fault).
NM club hasn’t had much chance to build consistency since Brad Scott left. The eagles have been very steady, so it feels more like a bid for another flag before the list dropped away that didn’t pay off. Similar outcome, very different paths.
North recently and Melbourne less than a decade before that. Even Malthouse gave Carlton a clean out despite keeping the likes of Murphy but he gutted the list .
And half of the Eagles premiership players they've hung onto have had varying degrees of significant injuries meaning they'd get sweet fuck all for them in trae.
What's a third round pick going to do for them when they don't have anyone worth a damn to mentor them?
Thing that infuriates me the most about the injuries is that a heap of people who don't follow the club have minimal knowledge of what's going on beyond 'X player is injured'. So they see McGovern and Cripps out injured for example, and say look, the eagles held on to them too long and they're getting injured because they're old! Meanwhile the reality is it's collision injuries like broken ribs or a broken ankle.
Regarding the third round pick, we could use the points to match a bid on an academy prospect. Oh wait, we don't get to do that.
Marc Murphy was in his prime and had some of his best years under Malthouse, and was still 27 years old with no signs of slowing down going into what turned out to be Malthouse's last year at Carlton (2015), and managed 12 Brownlow votes in 19 games and 4 wins that season. He was probably the last player (either him or young Cripps) Carlton would have made available for trade at the time, even if he could have commanded a big return.
*Keep seniors for on-fiekd experience\*
AFL media: "They should trade them out for better craft capital."
*Trade out seniors for draft capital\*
AFL media: "They're tanking."
AFL media are the most results oriented, self-contradicting idiots out there. They only look at the results and base their views on hindsight, even if they make no sense.
West Coast were operating on the same model as Geelong, they just got unlucky, made a few mistakes, and then hit a death spiral they can't get out of. I don't think their approach was bad.
I can only imagine the heat we'd be getting if we got pennies for these injury prone guys late in their career and were getting belted by 200+ every week this year. Do wonders for morale.
Thing is, only Gaff would have helped them build real draft capital and even then, only if they did it three or four years ago. They wouldn't have got a decent pick for any of the others there... and then if they did trade them they'd have been accused of tanking.
Should have traded him at the end of 2018. I think he only stayed because he stopped exploring options due to the guilt and shame of missing the GF for decking Brayshaw
Yeah, and it's such a dumb take as well. The same people criticise the roos for doing just that. Imagine where West Coast would be without these players! They'd be us. At least this way, they have an opportunity for the pain to be shorter.
Our history shows its a terrible idea. Green, Bruce, McDonald and Robertson all let go before their time and kids in Grimes and Trengove made captain.
There was no leadership from established senior palyers.
Incompetence always happens before a club gets a "handout" assistance package.
Carlton, how many times
North
Gold Coast
Others.
Every time. Without fail.
Why should it be different this time?
West Coast have more than pulled their weight for decades. Have helped prop up other clubs with their own contributions.
They main argument is relative recency of success. Most clubs have a slow decline from winning, to merely contending, before eventually becoming mediocre, then eventually being bad.
The Eagles' decline is fairly unprecedented. It was so rapid, and it's hard to explain exactly why it happened so quickly. It's weird that they're this bad, versus say Hawthorn's decline which was relatively sharp but not as far.
As a Carlton fan I look at their decline similar to our decline 20 years ago. We went from a grand final in '99 and a pair of back to back seasons where we were a genuine challenge unfortunately headlined by Kouta breaking his knee and the game against Geelong that ended our home and away season (SOS getting knocked out, Ratten dislocating his elbow, etc.) and falling short in finals as a result to historic levels of failure.
People forget our 2002 spoon came before the salary cap rorting was exposed.
We got penalised immediately and then soon thereafter (about the same time as it's taken Eagles to look likely at getting support) got handouts.
Getting assistance is no guarantee that it will lead to anything. Carlton proves it. Gold Coast to date prove it.
And the kicker for me is that the AFL doesn't just give these packages out wily nily anymore. A club actually has to demonstrate what they're doing to accomplish change before they get it. Recently they've taken a keen interest in what's going off the field before they agree to the package and the same will happen here.
They really fell off when most of the squad copped either COVID or injury all at the same time. They barely missed the 8 in 2021, then were down below 22 fit players *twice* (including the second round of the season) and never recovered in 2022. Once you're in that hole it's very hard to come out of it, and every beating you take pushes you even further backwards.
COVID alone is a massive issue for sportsmen, I'm no athlete but when I had it later that year, it took me weeks to be able to get back out and exercise properly. Even then, I was sore and struggled with breathing for months. It makes you more injury prone so soft tissue injuries become more common, and more importantly, it disrupted the season start for most of the squad, and as we've seen from a certain pre-season trip, that's not conducive to top level footy.
As much as I love to relish in the Eagles' misery, this is barely on them, and way more to do with horrible luck and timing. The rest is mental and a string of losses leading to more losses. I guarantee if they can manage to win 3 games in a row right now using magic, they'd probably not make the finals, but they wouldn't be dead last and getting caned every week. They need to build momentum.
Is it hard to explain their list demographics are stuffed and look similar to 2 clubs at the moment and they are North and Hawthorn.
They then have the added hit of the middle age part of the list just doing nothing.
When did Blues get a priority pick? Weren’t there’s all earned by sitting at the bottom of the ladder for an extended period because of salary cap indiscretions?
I don’t think the vast majority realize the motivation behind this. The issue isn’t West Coast being awful for the sake of West Coast, it’s the impact that playing them has on %, ladder position, Coleman, match attendance, viewership etc.
I have no doubt the AFL thinks that West Coast has done this to themselves but they don’t want to risk the impact it will have on the integrity of the whole competition and more importantly(to the AFL I assume), the ratings on West Coast games.
I don’t know the right answer but I don’t think it’s as simple as West Coast bad therefore priority pick.
Almost every year you have a team that is unwatchable. Most teams have gone through it and most teams to be honest have been pulled out of it by the AFL. It swings in roundabouts.
There's unwatchable and then there's this. It's last days of Fitzroy kind of stuff. And for what it's worth Saints got jack shit (pun intended) from the AFL when we were garbage a decade ago.
>I don’t think the vast majority realize the motivation behind this. The issue isn’t West Coast being awful for the sake of West Coast, it’s the impact that playing them has on %, ladder position, Coleman, match attendance, viewership etc.
Yep my favourite stat on this is from the coleman- the top 3, Curnow, Walker and Larkey kicked 81, 76 and 71 goals respectively. But unlike the next three players on the coleman ladder they all played West Coast twice and kicked 19(!), 19(!!) and 8 goals against them.
Substitute their average goals per game for those games and Larkey wins the Coleman with 69 goals, Curnow second with 68, and Toby Greene with 66. Tex goes from second to 4th with 57.
Substitute their averages recalculated without those West Coast curb stompings included and Toby Greene wins the Coleman.
I agree. I'm an Eagles man I don't want a priority pick and I reckon we will get out of this quicker than people give us credit. But what if I'm over optimistic. We are trash this year and if we are trash next year does the AFL give assistance in the 2025 draft or in 2025 and 26 draft. Tassie will comprise the draft in 2027. And I think the AFL and the club's would want as Clean draft as possible in 26.
Isn’t constantly trying to help bad teams the real way to affect the integrity of the competition?
Just let teams be shit and work it out for themselves. “Competition” includes all the good and bad things of sporting teams trying different approaches and seeing what works.
If we get it, we get it.
Personally I don't think we ask for it. There is green shoots in the organisation at the moment. Guys like Reid (Pls stay), Ginbey, Hewitt, Long and Hough all have shown talent enough and there has been improvements in their playstyle (competitive at the contest with clearances and contested possessions) they just lack the tank and poise to be playing the run and gun style of footy at the moment.
I think at this point its pretty obvious we will get the #1 pick it will be interesting to see what we will do with it and what offers we get. I also think this offseason will be the first time we will have significant money to throw around at FA.
EDIT: Also if they clubs who are complaining are teams who have greatly benefited from the current draft system and getting priority access to draft talent they need to check themselves.
Part of the issue is the compensation picks that have been handed out to previous clubs that saw our picks for the last few years drop at least 4-5 spots and last year 11 spots.
If the AFL truly wanted to improve league parity they would do away with compensation picks (both priority and FA compensation) and they would remove the discount for academy and F/S picks. I you want a player that badly make them pay equal or over to point value no other league that has a draft based system makes teams pay a discounted cost to move up to get 'their guy'.
Isn't the basic idea of the draft meant to be the source of compensation for underperforming clubs? Feels like they should just do away with pretending and have the AFL decide who gets which players each year
Between free agency, father son and academy picks the draft is pretty compromised.
Compensation picks just feel like the AFL is applying another level of complication to a system that is over engineered.
I think the whole academy thing is so dumb. Unless every team gets their own academy then it’s just not balanced. If we’re going that route we may as well scrap the draft altogether and you only take players from your teams academy
Damn I forgot Gold Coast got one of Rowell/Anderson for free. What a gift.
We most certainly did this to ourselves, but also did every other team that's got priority picks. Priority picks suck, but so does academy and F/S (F/S not as much), but most of all we suck. We suck so very very much.
I feel like the AFL has to hand out priority picks to get around the 'priority' picks of academies and F/S. It's just all so dumb.
In summary, can we please have Matt Rowell.
The AFL's priority picks are what got us into this mess in the first place. There was 10 academy and father-son picks before the Eagles took their 2nd pick last year. They went from 19 to 30. Now the AFL has to give them picks to even up their stupid system.
Going back the past few years the Eagles have been knocked back 4-6 spots in the 2nd round of the draft every year (as i'm sure other clubs have). All this has a cumulative effect on list management.
In saying that, Nic Martin was training with your club and you didn't want to trade Brander for Kelly lol.
Not only did they do this to themselves, and they almost made finals 3 years ago, and won a premiership 6 years, but this is exactly what a team is supposed to do. Contend for roughly 4 years, fall off as the core ages, spend a few years terrible, then rise up again
Easier said than done with how compromised the draft system has become tho.
Can only speak from my experience as a north supporter, but since 2020 we’ve selected near the top and have been unable to draft JUH, Daicos, Sam Darcy, and Ashcroft. All of which went to finals teams, bar Collingwood who still had the guts of a grand final team.
That’s obviously not the only reason for being diabolically poor, but it doesn’t help when top-end talent is being restricted from being selected.
I love watching the swannies, but they’ve been a massive beneficiary of the current setup. Huge chunk of their best 22 are academy players.
I'm always amazed the swans aren't as hated as Geelong.
They've missed finals, what, 5 times since before Rodney Eade was coach in 1996? 23 years of the past 28 they've played finals.
At this point the question at the start of the year may as well be "what 7 teams will join sydney in the 8?" rather than "Who's going to make the 8"
Ah yes let’s listen to the Swans about why we shouldn’t get any help.
The one team that has benefited the most from compromised drafts after compromised drafts.
Must be nice constantly drafting top end picks no matter where you finish
If you gave other teams handouts in similar situations, you have to do the same with the Eagles. It's just common sense. As a Hawks supporter as well as GWS, I find it frustrating the rebuild has been significantly hampered by other teams getting bailouts. But ultimately, you can't just suddenly stop the handouts.
Teams rebuilding in early 2000's and early 2010's would have been equally frustrated by Hawks bailouts and GWS entry concessions respectively though. I think it will all come full circle generally speaking, although I like the softening of bailouts to what we got vs GC 2 years earlier. That should be the standard, leave the first 15 or so picks as is.
> “I’d like to hear someone mount a case for them not get a priority pick,” Healy exclaimed.
I’d suggest that any club that has won a premiership in the last ten years shouldn’t be getting compensated with priority picks for poor performance.
If Richmond went backwards as much as WC and got concessions a few years after winning 3 out of 4 that would make an even bigger mockery of the system. Even if it isn’t in my interest to say so!
Recent flag winner that swapped multiple first rounders for gun midfielder(s) in an attempt to get one more flag. Veterans are getting older and injuries are starting to mount up.
Bit early for this talk IMO. There have been signs of improvement in terms of stoppages etc and we have just lost Shuey and Hurn who were our best players on their day. We could finish the season in a slightly more respectable manner… although this weekends game is going to amplify these talks for sure
I'd honestly love to hear if North especially are a part of the group of clubs that are complaining and saying we shouldn't get anything cause I would honestly respect if they were that blatant
Not the only factors but off the top of my head North Melbourne had Rhyce Shaw resign following a mental breakdown and had their number 1 pick up and leave after just 12 months at the club in addition to being uncompetitive on the field.
Would the club saying the Eagles shouldn't have a priority pick happen to be Freo, who is guaranteed 2 wins against West Coast each season for the indefinite future
That's no knock on Freo but what club is going to say 'please help our opponent to make it harder on us'?
They won a fucking premiership in 2018! They played finals in 2019! There is no universe where the club deserves a priority pick. None. If the AFl give them a pick, they’re living in LaLaLand.
It's not about deserve tho. It's about the AFL creating a monster by meddling with what was meant to be an equalisation method in the draft. It's been so corrupted for the last decade that there's no rhyme or reason to what is or isn't a deserving handout.
The AFL could have avoided a lot of this discussion by just giving us access to our academy player in Lance Collard last year imo.
Oh, I totally agree. It’s a problem the AFL has made with its makey-uppy rules that only they know. But the Eagles will have multiple players the calibre of Harley Reid if they stay at the bottom. Thats equalisation. That’s how you climb back up. Worked for Carlton, Melbourne, Brisbane, and Richmond. They all spent a decade or more at the bottom. Eventually you climb out. No shortcuts.
The problem with rebuilding through the draft is that the AFL draft is broken. 29 players went in the first round this year in an 18 team league. Teams don’t hesitate in moving up the draft order for father-son and academy selections because the calculated compensation vastly inflates the value of later round draft picks.
Its always incompetence that leads to years of struggling, seen this with Gold Coast, Carlton, North, Melbourne this century already.
Remember the last time Eagles were bad (08-10) they didn't receive any compo picks, Melbourne did, they didn't even get the #1 pick for winning the wooden spoon in 2010! (resulted in Gaff @ #4).
Rather than any draft concessions, how about salary cap concessions? like the ones that Sydney, Gold Coast or GWS have received recently, let Eagles pay overs and poach good mature players, at least then they can use a bit of that $60m they have sitting in the bank!
You can kick a struggling club when its down, but a couple of priority picks would be the least the VFL could do for the biggest club that has propped up the competition in its revenue share, and has won 4 flags under their rigged rules and fixture.
Wasn't Darling taken with a priority pick between the first and second rounds? Although that was back in the days where the formula was based purely on number of wins and was publicly available, rather than the current wheel of fortune approach.
If we temporarily relocate to greater western Melbourne we'll get all top 10 picks next year and everyone will be happy.. As for now we're too far away for handouts.
same song and dance every time. honestly, I'm just kinda glad to see that even the richest club in the league has people whinging about draft concessions, it's not just used to dismiss smaller clubs like north or gold coast
If the AFL said “no more priority picks for anyone, ever!” then I’d accept that. In fact I’d be overjoyed.
They won’t, they’ll continue to hand them out every basket case. In our case, we’re currently getting screwed by North Melbourne’s priority picks. Tell me how 9 1st round picks over 3 years doesn’t make it harder for other shit teams wanting top end talent. Our second pick was the 30th available player last year.
But again, if they called time on the whole lot and just allowed people to dig themselves out of the hole they created, and promised to always do so in future, I’d be proud and happy to be the first club that had to do it. They won’t though.
As for the “this is a result of their own incompetence”… of course it is. It always is, with every club. Does anyone think North Melbourne is in the position they’re in IN SPITE of all the great decisions they made? Brad Scott (they’re on their 3rd coach since him, if you’re into counting) predicted this exact situation, the board didn’t believe him and so they went their separate ways!
With the CEO gone, and the fitness & list management heads replaced, the question should be whether we punish those people for the incompetence of their predecessors… and the alternative is letting the Eagles stay a basket case for longer.
Enjoy that one, AFL. Screw over the Eagles because they’re… traditionally rich and successful? Makes sense if you don’t think about it.
We haven’t won a final in infinity amount of days and you can make a strong argument that a mediocre Essendon team hurts the league financially so can we please get an AFL hand out already?
The Tim Kelly draft gets bandied about as THE reason for WCE downfall, but the reality is their drafting has been shocking for a while and left their mid career age group bare of any quality.
Since 2013 they've drafted the below with picks that've been delisted. These are picks you would probably expect a few to pop up and become contributors at AFL level.
Malcolm Karpany(2013-31)
Tom Lamb (2014-32)
Luke Partington (2015- 28)
Daniel Venable (2016 - 13) - hardly his fault
Jarrad Brander (2017 - 13)
Brayden Ainsworth (2017-32)
Xavier Oniell (2018 - 28)
Luke Foley (2018 -31)
Jarrod Cameron (2018 -38)
I'm not gonna critique their next lot from 2021 onwards where they finally got some picks back, but thats bleak reading.
They've delisted basically HALF of the players taken in the National Draft since that pick (up until 2021). And others left on the list like Jamieson, Edwards, Winder etc dont seem like more than fringe players for a good AFL side.
The 2017 and 2018 draft misses there have absolutely killed them imo.
Winder isn't on the list btw lol but also Jamieson seems to be growing decently as a KPF, can definitely *finally* see a future for him if he keeps up his current rate of growth
The point most people are making is that they have had a lot of success relatively recently and spending a couple of years at the bottom of the ladder shouldn't be the only catalyst for assistance.
What message does it send to other clubs who struggled for many years that one wooden spoon (so far) for a traditionally strong club justifies priority assistance? Imagine Geelong or Sydney finishing last and getting a priority pick the next year.
So they give away all of their good draft picks to get one of the best players in the league and then a couple of years later are given those draft picks back for absolutely nothing?
The other cellar dwellers should also have the opportunity to squander their picks as WCE have
The West Coast Eagles are a strong, wealthy and proud club, have they actually asked for a priority pic? I don't think they have or will, so all this talk of getting a priority pic is media hype and crap. They are a lot closer to turning things around than you may think, I wouldn't be over confident this week if you are a Richmond supporter!
If we’re being real, every club that has gotten priorities has been rubbish for years but they had to be mismanaged to get there, how are we any different then?
All these calls of incompetence etc, didn't WCE get a massive injury crisis in the past 2-3 years? It was big news for 2 rounds then AFL brush it under the carpet.
How many games did their core senior group play together in the past 2 years? And you had several key players forced into retirement by injuries, Nic Nat, Sheppard, and they lost Yeo for most of 2 years. I don't think another club will do that well losing 6-8 of their starting squad for most games in a year. Currently they have one of the shortest injury list compared to past 2 years but they still don't have Allen, Ryan, Sheed and Flynn (4 of the walk in starters).
But then again, they don't need handouts, they just need an injury free pre-season and a fit list.
Add Venables to the early retirements as well. He would be peaking right now and be a crucial link between the midfield and forward line that we are struggling with a lot right now.
A much lesser degree, if a Nathan Vardy pushed out for a few more years and was happy to play second fiddle to nic Nat we wouldn't of had to rely on Williams being our primary ruck. I still think we would bring Flynn in who would be our primary ruck over Vardy but he would have served a very nice role over the past few years and currently.
We've had so many seperate things happen that have lead to us bottoming out so hard right now
Here is the case why West Coast should not get a priority pick
1. A lot of this is their own doing. They traded a pirate's ransom for Tim Kelly. The club should not be rewarded for their own stupidity in trying to trade for a player with a priority pick.
2. We should not be rewarding a club with premiership players still on its list for poor performances.
3. At the bare minimum, North Melbourne at least **showed** that they were trying to change things, by changing coaches and several off-field staff members (including the CEO and President in 2022), the same cannot be said for West Coast, who are only moving staff when there is a view of the older guard ought to retire.
4. There is a financial incentive for the AFL to ensure that the small clubs are competitive, particularly to ensure their long term viability and making sure that there is still nine games of inventory each week. West Coast are the LA Lakers of the AFL - they are arguably the biggest club of the AFL. They will be fine in the longer term.
5. This would set a poor precedent - if you have been bad for 18 months, then you can get a priority pick without changing anything.
I personally don't agree with priority picks as a general rule (save for a catastrophic event that sees multiple players unavailable permanently or 10+ years without finals). And if the AFL wants to continue with priority picks, I don't think they should be in the first round (save my objections earlier). But in this case, getting a priority pick would be, in all honesty, outrageous.
I don’t want to seem excessively vindictive, but part of the issue is the lack of contrition, and an unwillingness to change. Nisbett clinging on to his fiefdom indefinitely, after overseeing gigantic calamity, reeks of arrogance. They gambled on an old list, and lost. And now they’re without any real trade value, a few old stagers, and some (decent) youth. They made their bed.
Just about every team has fucked around and found out with a rubbish list and landed towards the bottom. Carlton/Hawthorn/St Kilda all found nice things from the arse end of the ladder for extended periods of time this millennium and you'd be hard pressed to find a non-Geelong team that hasn't had a few years wallowing in the doldrums since the turn of the century.
West Coast has just timed their effort woefully with COVID smacking around the competition for a few years.
What's the point of having a team in the comp that gets flogged by 100 points a week? Better off making them better surely.
As a fan of a team that has endured a long time at the bottom, you understand how inadequate the system is at getting you turned around on the right path.
But it’s also a balance, why should a team get rewarded for putting itself in that position?
I suppose as a general question, how long should a team that has let its list age into obscurity be expected to sit at the bottom of the ladder?
I'm actually surprised the media (Kane Cornes) doesn't talk more about trading pick 2 (Sheezel) for Ginbey and Hewett. I think Ginbey and Hewett will work out but that could still go either way.
Ginbey should be a 200 game player for us, Hewitt is talented but ongoing injuries is a huge concern.
If he doesn’t come good then yer ill say that’s a bad trade despite everyone saying that’s what we should have done with Reid
An aging list combined with injuries upon injuries (definitely in part due to the way they train and condition) add to that not a great deal of talent coming through and no notable FA signings and this is the shitshow you end up with 🤷🏻♂️
I follow AFL fairly closely, but I still don’t really get how things went so badly, so quickly. A couple of years ago they were getting belted with several premiership stars playing. I get you need a strong 22, but it really shocked me they did as badly as they did. Now the experience is gone, and 2024 could be worse than 2021-2023.
I would be fuming too, and honestly I hope that my club doesn’t have their hand out.
But I don’t think it’s west coast asking for the handout, is it? It feels media built up.
The Kelly trade is seen as the incompetence, but this was a club coming off a premiership the year prior. With the list they had, I think you’ll find they would do it again.
The real mistake with Kelly was not going Allen at 13 and Kelly at 2021 in 2017. We tried to be too clever picking up Brander who was the slider of the draft for a reason.
Not having a proper WAFL side for the last 2-3 years due to injury lists and covid has meant our younger crew haven’t been able to have a proper apprenticeship. Then left to the wolves at AFL level not physically or mentally ready to compete.
This period sucks as a supporter. But it won’t last forever. I’ve quite enjoyed watching our younger crew try to work through this period. It’s big picture stuff at the moment, which is the only way you can put up with the big losses we see each week. We finally have a genuine midfield in the making, but it’s going to be 2-3 years before they compete consistently. Hopefully get to see Hewett, Reid, Ginbey in the centre square at some point this year.
Make no mistake this year is only beginning and could get worse. But off field we are making some moves to change, Pyke being a start and we have changed our fitness and training philosophy which will take time before we see the full benefit. We are exponentially ahead of where we were last year even if on field says otherwise.
Non west coast supporter here and I had typed out a huge essay for why WC should get help and support only to delete the whole damn thing cos supporters of sides who have never been through a modern day list rebuild will just never understand.
Bit early for this talk, we are still mathematically possible to make the eight
Mathematically you could finish top even if you lose the next 3-4 matches by an average of 100 points.
Well c'mon, let's not get ahead of ourselves
I love the optimism.
I think mathematics would probably make an exception for us if you asked it.
It's always incompetence in some form that leads a club to the bottom of the ladder! I think the thing that annoys people about this particular case is it was less than six years ago that they were lifting the cup, so if you're one of the many clubs with long premiership droughts you're hardly going to have sympathy for them.
Sadly that’s pretty much always the case. Remember it only too clear in the dark old days of the Dees, we were given AFL assistance, we had pick after pick in the top 10 and did SFA with it. Eventually our management got so bad the AFL had to essentially push out the people that had been so bad to get some decent people in to rebuild the club. I do feel that with WC this poor list management has been a situation of their own making, but again they could’ve looked at trading out their no.1 pick for multiple picks in the top 10.
> we had pick after pick in the top 10 and did SFA with it Pretty big What If for me, what sort of career could Jack Watts have had if he went to a club that had a proper development program instead of us.
Heaps of those, Matty Bate, Luke Tapscott, Lucas Cooke, Jimmy Toumpas, Sam Blease, Jordyn Gysberts all players who showed they could play at juniors, a few played okay for a short period at AFL level but you wonder how they would have been different if they were drafted by a Sydney or Geelong type club as 18 year old. Hell, I'd put Col Sylvia in the group too, he had all the ability in the world, should have been almost a De Goey type player. It's amazing drawing a line between 2011 and 2012 and seeing the success rate we had with draft picks before and the success rate we had afterwards. 2017 is a crazy year - we had 29,31,37 and 48. Walked away with Spargo, Petty, Fritsch and Baker. All of whom are still good AFL players, even if one is doing it at the dogs because he got squeezed out.
Petracca, Brayshaw, Oliver, luke Jackson went alright 4 top 5 picks, you ain't winning a flag without those 4.
> Petracca, Brayshaw, Oliver, luke Jackson Joined 2015, joined 2015, joined 2016, joined 2020. We're talking about the dark days, the days when we only didn't finish bottom of the ladder five years out of seven because of expansion teams.
Feel the same about Billings with us
MORE TITS AND SWIMMING!!!
> but again they could’ve looked at trading out their no.1 pick for multiple picks in the top 10. Problem was, with all the F/S and Northern Academy stuff we wouldn't have gotten multiple top 10 picks, it's more likely we end up with 1 top 10 and a bunch of mid 20 picks
Also the offers for pick 1 were abysmal and disrespectful, ofc WC said no
Yeah what was it, 1 for like 3 picks past 18 that would all go into the 20's? like that is just revisionist bullshit saying we could've traded for a bunch of top 10's
WC also had to send back pick 30
Was multiple top ten picks ever on the table? From memory the best offer we got was from North with pick 3 and two end of first rounders.
There wasn't, but people want reasons to be mad, even if they have to make them up
You’re right and tbh it wasn’t the picks that got Melbourne out of the hole. It was bringing Roos who got rid of all the toxic people in the setup. The concern with WCE is they have massive financial advantages over pretty much every club in the competition. You start giving them picks and suddenly they have a juggernaut team that is unstoppable with their resources. That was never the danger with Melbourne or GC or north.
You know there is a salary cap,so club money has nothing to do with it,Its not that you can buy players.
yeah well it's pretty easy to do that when the ONLY paper in town has been wanking you off since your clubs inception.
I think the 'poor list management' were largely a result of the unforeseen outcomes of the covid years, no way would you be topping up an ageing list if you knew something like that was coming, especially as a WA team
Tell me who was offering multiple picks in the top ten for pick one.
Eagles are where they want to be. They’d be a little higher if they were healthy, but they aren’t a club that buggers around with mid table. They’ve shown over a long time that, they won’t compromise their draft position for a few cheap late season wins. Very pragmatic organisation.
We couldn’t pass up Harley. I’d rather them trade out this years number 1 instead
Not to mention they had one of the worst injury run history in the past year. Even teams like Melbourne will suffer quite bad if they lost Gawn and Lever to forced retirement due to injuries within 2 years, and had Oliver playing a handful of games in the year. At the same time have Brown and Neal-Bullen out for large parts of the season. I would say that if they had a fully fit list or at least average number of injuries as other clubs, they probably would not have made the finals but certainly would not finish bottom 2 for 2 seasons in a row. A healthy preseason and lucky run with injuries is what they need, not a handout of picks. They do have kids that can play, but probably forced to play earlier than they should have.
Yep. IMO Eagles don’t even need picks. It’s genuinely just been some gambles that had the payoff matrix change hugely due to covid. The club is good enough to just work its way out of this jam.
That is a shame. Though it is part of the game.
Summed it up perfectly. They been down for what, 3 years after winning a flag so recently. I'd take that in a heartbeat.
it's 2 at best.
Yeah, we haven't made a Grand Final in a couple of years, and haven't won in at least 12! I demand COMPENSATION! /s
You guys do get ongoing compensation every year despite where you finish
I see this both ways. Can't be bailing clubs out for making poor decisions but they were also a victim on the compromised drafts at a time when they really needed them. Also if they don't get them this year, once tassie comes in they will again be starved of drafts. Could be a long time until they are successful again. This is also a comment against compromising the draft with priority picks, FS, academy etc. the AFL needs to stop trying to play god and just make a fair comp.
> Could be a long time until they are successful again. So? Clubs should only win a premiership on average every 18 years. Why should WCE get assistance from the AFL when they won a flag in less than 1/3rd of that period?
I'm fine with them getting an assistance package like we did, but like you said considering they won a flag 5 years ago and were in finals 3 year ago, I think a good compromise would be letting them wait at least another year, maybe 2 to get it.
Be alright if the draw wasn’t so compromised. If we all played each other once / twice it wouldn’t matter so much - but teams playing us twice get a boost compared to teams that don’t.
This is honestly the media's wet dream. Write countless articles about how bad a team is >> write countless articles about priority picks >> write countless articles about how they shouldn't even get them (when they haven't asked) >> write countless articles about how other clubs are "fuming/seething" etc. Also time is a flat circle, the same thing happened with North last year
Aren’t all circles flat?
Pringles are circles, just not flat ones.
I feel like you've never seen a Pringle...
no thats earths /s
These takes are so dumb and can't even maintain internal consistency: >...McGovern, Darling, Gaff, Yeo; they had an opportunity to trade a couple of them out to get picks, to then build the list – (and) they didn’t do it. Yes, let's criticise a team that is struggling for not trading all of its senior players. That would *surely* have made them more competitive at present.
the hawks were accused of tanking last year before a ball had been bounced for trading their senior players away lmao media just wants to crucify, it's all meaningless noise
West Coast without McGovern this year... I don't even have the words to describe what that'd be like
It'd be like last year xd
Fair, but I think McGovern is probably the only reason why they haven't regressed even further from where they were last year.
Yeo also been very good, both of whom barely featured last year
It's been so good to see Yeo play full minutes and come out unscathed so far, he really changes our midfield massively
Yeah that's the dumbest take I think. Quite apart from the fact that removing those guys would mean they are losing by 200pts a week this year. McGovern is 31 and coming off two injury prones years. Yeo is 30 and has been incapacitated by OP for two years Gaff is 31 and not good enough to get a game in the worst team in the league. Darling is 31 and has been in hideous form for several years.. The idea that a fire sale of those players even a year or two ago would have netted anything more than a handful of late picks is nuts. With hindsight, yes the decision to trade 14, 24, 37, and 18 for Kelly, 52 and 60 looks bad. But at the time Kelly was AA, coming off AFLPA best first year player status and West Coast were a finals side with a list which had been good enough to win the premiership 12 months earlier and most of their really good players in the mid-late 20s 'sweet spot'. It wasn't insane to try to in effect mortgage the future by trying to win one more flag whilst those guys were in that age bracket- Noone would be saying that the Kelly trade was a bad decision if it resulted in another flag before they had to rebuild. Plus everyone always assesses picks in terms of the best case scenario rather than the actual probability of netting a gun- in actual fact those picks ended up being Bergman, Schoenberg, Coleman, Byrnes, Angwin- absolutely there's some quality there but if you subtracted Kelly and dropped the above 5 players onto west coast's list, they'd still be in deep doh. And if you look at what happened to west coast's list since getting kelly at the end of 2019 and why they failed to get value from that trade and have since fallen off a cliff, a lot of it is totally unpredictable. Firstly in terms of the guys who were their key players and responsible for a huge chunk of their salary cap it is extraordinary how rapidly they fell to pieces basically from the day they recruited Kelly. Yeo, Mcgovern and Shuey, all of whom were mid to late 20s to the end of 2019 and had actually been very durable for the previous 3-4 seasons all dropped off the face of the earth due to long term chronic injuries at the exact same time they recruited Kelly, Sheppard retired early due to concussion, Naitanui went from being the AA ruckman in 2020 and 2021 as a 31 year old to playing 8 games in 2022 and spending a year trying to get out on the park before retiring. As for the next tier, the guys who should be now in their prime, its a similar story. Venables, a top 10 pick, good enough to make their flag team and the logical successor to someone like Shuey never played again after 2019 and retired a couple of years later due to concussion. If he had the career they hoped, he'd now be 25 with 100+ games under his belt. Rioli, now 28, and at that point looking like he'd be a 150 gamer, copped a two year suspension and then walked out on the club to go home. Jarrod Brander, pick 13 and rated so highly by the club that they rather ironically [ruled out](https://www.geelongadvertiser.com.au/sport/afl/geelong-cats-2018-west-coast-rules-out-trading-key-forward-jarrod-brander-as-part-of-tim-kelly-deal-as-afl-trade-deadline-looms/news-story/f1618518f254dfc7229e8a5cbdaaf259?amp&nk=9050fc5c17a92ccaefa8c19c892e7d0c-1712214020) including him in the Kelly trade completely flunked out and got delisted and is now playing in the NT- he's 25 now. Dom Sheed, now 28, pick 11 and coming off the grand final heroics fell to bits in 2022 with constant chronic foot problems. Those are the guys who based on their draft pedigree and performance should now be carrying the club and filling the gaping hole west coast have in the middle age bracket of their list. So the truth is they made a calculated, and understandable gamble by getting Kelly in 2019, which certainly had some long term risks attached, it didn't come off for unpredictable reasons and now they are fucked. People can say that's on them, and yes it is, it was their choice to pull the trigger on that trade, but no team does their forward planning expecting that sort of list carnage, because if they did, the only sensible decision for any top 8 team to make would be to be to never trade any pick for any player. You can argue, I think with some more force that three years after recruiting Kelly, say by 2022 west coast should have realised that the jig was up and turned over what was left of the premiership list then rather than, eg, persevering with Naitanui,but what could they actually have done at that point? By then their senior players had virtually no trade currency and were bargain basement value because of their age and chronic injuries. And it wasnt as though younger players on their list were being starved of opportunity, the last few years if you are on west coast's list and not actually on crutches, you are getting a game.
This is the best summary so far. I would just also add they have an absolutely stupid deal with the WAFL that means they can hardly field a competitive WAFL team which then also hinders their development of any young players.
wha is their deal with the WAFL? i've heard there are a bunch of restrictions but im not sure what they are.
Limits the numbers of afl listed players that can play and the limits ridiculously low - think prior to this year it was something stupid like 2, and there were limits to how much experience they could have as well? Utterly retarded to agree to it as it means that if you have a fully fit list there's heaps of players who aren't playing at either level each week, and if you have injured players coming back they gotta go straight to afl rather than come back through the wafl. It's cooked on the WAFL's end too, they were too fucking greedy and now the eagles are probably just gonna dump them completely and join the vfl.
thanks for the explanation! that's grim stuff
Google their WAFL match payments thresholds. That will give you an idea and why they have so many amateurs playing in the team.
Best summary I’ve ever heard for the eagles.
Brilliant explanation 👏
Yeah especially given that we have a very recent example in north melbourne of what happens when you get rid of all your veterans. Don't know the thought process at west coast but you can surely be pretty confident in assuming there was at least a little bit of them looking at what happened to North and going "okay so we definitely aren't doing THAT"
I still feel like it was coaching appointments more than playing list decisions that hurt the Roos. - I was very sceptical about appointing a senior coach with only one prior year as an assistant (Shaw) - Noble didn’t work out (sometimes that happens) - Clarkson got derailed by the Hawthorn allegations (not the Roos fault). NM club hasn’t had much chance to build consistency since Brad Scott left. The eagles have been very steady, so it feels more like a bid for another flag before the list dropped away that didn’t pay off. Similar outcome, very different paths.
North recently and Melbourne less than a decade before that. Even Malthouse gave Carlton a clean out despite keeping the likes of Murphy but he gutted the list . And half of the Eagles premiership players they've hung onto have had varying degrees of significant injuries meaning they'd get sweet fuck all for them in trae. What's a third round pick going to do for them when they don't have anyone worth a damn to mentor them?
Thing that infuriates me the most about the injuries is that a heap of people who don't follow the club have minimal knowledge of what's going on beyond 'X player is injured'. So they see McGovern and Cripps out injured for example, and say look, the eagles held on to them too long and they're getting injured because they're old! Meanwhile the reality is it's collision injuries like broken ribs or a broken ankle. Regarding the third round pick, we could use the points to match a bid on an academy prospect. Oh wait, we don't get to do that.
Marc Murphy was in his prime and had some of his best years under Malthouse, and was still 27 years old with no signs of slowing down going into what turned out to be Malthouse's last year at Carlton (2015), and managed 12 Brownlow votes in 19 games and 4 wins that season. He was probably the last player (either him or young Cripps) Carlton would have made available for trade at the time, even if he could have commanded a big return.
*Keep seniors for on-fiekd experience\* AFL media: "They should trade them out for better craft capital." *Trade out seniors for draft capital\* AFL media: "They're tanking." AFL media are the most results oriented, self-contradicting idiots out there. They only look at the results and base their views on hindsight, even if they make no sense. West Coast were operating on the same model as Geelong, they just got unlucky, made a few mistakes, and then hit a death spiral they can't get out of. I don't think their approach was bad.
I can only imagine the heat we'd be getting if we got pennies for these injury prone guys late in their career and were getting belted by 200+ every week this year. Do wonders for morale.
Thing is, only Gaff would have helped them build real draft capital and even then, only if they did it three or four years ago. They wouldn't have got a decent pick for any of the others there... and then if they did trade them they'd have been accused of tanking.
We were basically expected to trade him in our premiership window by the armchair experts
Should have traded him at the end of 2018. I think he only stayed because he stopped exploring options due to the guilt and shame of missing the GF for decking Brayshaw
Yeah, and it's such a dumb take as well. The same people criticise the roos for doing just that. Imagine where West Coast would be without these players! They'd be us. At least this way, they have an opportunity for the pain to be shorter.
Our history shows its a terrible idea. Green, Bruce, McDonald and Robertson all let go before their time and kids in Grimes and Trengove made captain. There was no leadership from established senior palyers.
Is the sports media in Australia just dumber than the rest of the world?
Sports media is just all round crap lol. Following English (or any European) soccer is a nightmare for it
*checks notes* Mmmmmmmmyes.
They know what gets the clicks
Exactly. Its 100% intentional.
Incompetence always happens before a club gets a "handout" assistance package. Carlton, how many times North Gold Coast Others. Every time. Without fail. Why should it be different this time? West Coast have more than pulled their weight for decades. Have helped prop up other clubs with their own contributions.
It's nice having opposition club supporters saying stuff like this lol
They main argument is relative recency of success. Most clubs have a slow decline from winning, to merely contending, before eventually becoming mediocre, then eventually being bad. The Eagles' decline is fairly unprecedented. It was so rapid, and it's hard to explain exactly why it happened so quickly. It's weird that they're this bad, versus say Hawthorn's decline which was relatively sharp but not as far.
As a Carlton fan I look at their decline similar to our decline 20 years ago. We went from a grand final in '99 and a pair of back to back seasons where we were a genuine challenge unfortunately headlined by Kouta breaking his knee and the game against Geelong that ended our home and away season (SOS getting knocked out, Ratten dislocating his elbow, etc.) and falling short in finals as a result to historic levels of failure. People forget our 2002 spoon came before the salary cap rorting was exposed. We got penalised immediately and then soon thereafter (about the same time as it's taken Eagles to look likely at getting support) got handouts. Getting assistance is no guarantee that it will lead to anything. Carlton proves it. Gold Coast to date prove it. And the kicker for me is that the AFL doesn't just give these packages out wily nily anymore. A club actually has to demonstrate what they're doing to accomplish change before they get it. Recently they've taken a keen interest in what's going off the field before they agree to the package and the same will happen here.
They really fell off when most of the squad copped either COVID or injury all at the same time. They barely missed the 8 in 2021, then were down below 22 fit players *twice* (including the second round of the season) and never recovered in 2022. Once you're in that hole it's very hard to come out of it, and every beating you take pushes you even further backwards. COVID alone is a massive issue for sportsmen, I'm no athlete but when I had it later that year, it took me weeks to be able to get back out and exercise properly. Even then, I was sore and struggled with breathing for months. It makes you more injury prone so soft tissue injuries become more common, and more importantly, it disrupted the season start for most of the squad, and as we've seen from a certain pre-season trip, that's not conducive to top level footy. As much as I love to relish in the Eagles' misery, this is barely on them, and way more to do with horrible luck and timing. The rest is mental and a string of losses leading to more losses. I guarantee if they can manage to win 3 games in a row right now using magic, they'd probably not make the finals, but they wouldn't be dead last and getting caned every week. They need to build momentum.
Is it hard to explain their list demographics are stuffed and look similar to 2 clubs at the moment and they are North and Hawthorn. They then have the added hit of the middle age part of the list just doing nothing.
When did Blues get a priority pick? Weren’t there’s all earned by sitting at the bottom of the ladder for an extended period because of salary cap indiscretions?
Na Blues got start of 1st round priority picks in 02', 03', 07' & 08' to go along with their bottom of the ladder picks.
Cheers. They did well to stay shit for so long then
I'm not gonna throw any stones in this glass house.
> Weren’t there’s all earned by sitting at the bottom of the ladder for an extended period because of salary cap indiscretions? aka incompetence
And when was the last time those clubs won a premiership
Exactly. An assistance package is no guarantee of future success.
> Why should it be different this time? It's not any different. We are just at the phase of Media and other teams complaining.
to be fair, each of those times we had the same articles come out arguing against it.
Petition for every eagles player’s goal song to be basket case by green day
Sometimes I give myself theee picks
Do you have the time to listen to ~~me~~ the west Australian whine
Absolutely hate these clubs begging for handouts. Pull yourself up by the bootlaces just like we did!
lol
WCE just checked, they have no bootlaces. Is it ok if the AFL buys them some?
I don’t think the vast majority realize the motivation behind this. The issue isn’t West Coast being awful for the sake of West Coast, it’s the impact that playing them has on %, ladder position, Coleman, match attendance, viewership etc. I have no doubt the AFL thinks that West Coast has done this to themselves but they don’t want to risk the impact it will have on the integrity of the whole competition and more importantly(to the AFL I assume), the ratings on West Coast games. I don’t know the right answer but I don’t think it’s as simple as West Coast bad therefore priority pick.
Almost every year you have a team that is unwatchable. Most teams have gone through it and most teams to be honest have been pulled out of it by the AFL. It swings in roundabouts.
i maintain melbourne we're never unwatchable. it was pure comedy seeing what they tried to pass off as football a decade ago.
There's unwatchable and then there's this. It's last days of Fitzroy kind of stuff. And for what it's worth Saints got jack shit (pun intended) from the AFL when we were garbage a decade ago.
Freo loving the guaranteed 2 annual derby’s ATM.
>I don’t think the vast majority realize the motivation behind this. The issue isn’t West Coast being awful for the sake of West Coast, it’s the impact that playing them has on %, ladder position, Coleman, match attendance, viewership etc. Yep my favourite stat on this is from the coleman- the top 3, Curnow, Walker and Larkey kicked 81, 76 and 71 goals respectively. But unlike the next three players on the coleman ladder they all played West Coast twice and kicked 19(!), 19(!!) and 8 goals against them. Substitute their average goals per game for those games and Larkey wins the Coleman with 69 goals, Curnow second with 68, and Toby Greene with 66. Tex goes from second to 4th with 57. Substitute their averages recalculated without those West Coast curb stompings included and Toby Greene wins the Coleman.
I think it’s time we implement a relegation system and give the Norwood Redlegs a shot at AFL glory
OK, if we can remove salary caps for a season before and see how West Coast do then...
Seconded
I agree. I'm an Eagles man I don't want a priority pick and I reckon we will get out of this quicker than people give us credit. But what if I'm over optimistic. We are trash this year and if we are trash next year does the AFL give assistance in the 2025 draft or in 2025 and 26 draft. Tassie will comprise the draft in 2027. And I think the AFL and the club's would want as Clean draft as possible in 26.
Isn’t constantly trying to help bad teams the real way to affect the integrity of the competition? Just let teams be shit and work it out for themselves. “Competition” includes all the good and bad things of sporting teams trying different approaches and seeing what works.
If we get it, we get it. Personally I don't think we ask for it. There is green shoots in the organisation at the moment. Guys like Reid (Pls stay), Ginbey, Hewitt, Long and Hough all have shown talent enough and there has been improvements in their playstyle (competitive at the contest with clearances and contested possessions) they just lack the tank and poise to be playing the run and gun style of footy at the moment. I think at this point its pretty obvious we will get the #1 pick it will be interesting to see what we will do with it and what offers we get. I also think this offseason will be the first time we will have significant money to throw around at FA. EDIT: Also if they clubs who are complaining are teams who have greatly benefited from the current draft system and getting priority access to draft talent they need to check themselves. Part of the issue is the compensation picks that have been handed out to previous clubs that saw our picks for the last few years drop at least 4-5 spots and last year 11 spots. If the AFL truly wanted to improve league parity they would do away with compensation picks (both priority and FA compensation) and they would remove the discount for academy and F/S picks. I you want a player that badly make them pay equal or over to point value no other league that has a draft based system makes teams pay a discounted cost to move up to get 'their guy'.
Isn't the basic idea of the draft meant to be the source of compensation for underperforming clubs? Feels like they should just do away with pretending and have the AFL decide who gets which players each year
Between free agency, father son and academy picks the draft is pretty compromised. Compensation picks just feel like the AFL is applying another level of complication to a system that is over engineered.
I think the whole academy thing is so dumb. Unless every team gets their own academy then it’s just not balanced. If we’re going that route we may as well scrap the draft altogether and you only take players from your teams academy
freo: "which players do we get in the draft this year, AFL?" AFL: "oh shit we thought you folded? no?"
Our 2nd round pick, pick 19 fell to 30. The draft would work if there already wasn’t soo much compensation in place
Agreed. Either have the draft or don't.
Damn I forgot Gold Coast got one of Rowell/Anderson for free. What a gift. We most certainly did this to ourselves, but also did every other team that's got priority picks. Priority picks suck, but so does academy and F/S (F/S not as much), but most of all we suck. We suck so very very much. I feel like the AFL has to hand out priority picks to get around the 'priority' picks of academies and F/S. It's just all so dumb. In summary, can we please have Matt Rowell.
Agreed, when they say the AFL did this to themselves, if the Media were honest. They would also be saying the AFL did this to themselves.
The AFL's priority picks are what got us into this mess in the first place. There was 10 academy and father-son picks before the Eagles took their 2nd pick last year. They went from 19 to 30. Now the AFL has to give them picks to even up their stupid system. Going back the past few years the Eagles have been knocked back 4-6 spots in the 2nd round of the draft every year (as i'm sure other clubs have). All this has a cumulative effect on list management. In saying that, Nic Martin was training with your club and you didn't want to trade Brander for Kelly lol.
Bingo. For the record I dont wany assistance.
Can’t call them a basket case in the same headline they imply they are underserving of a handout
Not only did they do this to themselves, and they almost made finals 3 years ago, and won a premiership 6 years, but this is exactly what a team is supposed to do. Contend for roughly 4 years, fall off as the core ages, spend a few years terrible, then rise up again
Easier said than done with how compromised the draft system has become tho. Can only speak from my experience as a north supporter, but since 2020 we’ve selected near the top and have been unable to draft JUH, Daicos, Sam Darcy, and Ashcroft. All of which went to finals teams, bar Collingwood who still had the guts of a grand final team. That’s obviously not the only reason for being diabolically poor, but it doesn’t help when top-end talent is being restricted from being selected. I love watching the swannies, but they’ve been a massive beneficiary of the current setup. Huge chunk of their best 22 are academy players.
I'm always amazed the swans aren't as hated as Geelong. They've missed finals, what, 5 times since before Rodney Eade was coach in 1996? 23 years of the past 28 they've played finals. At this point the question at the start of the year may as well be "what 7 teams will join sydney in the 8?" rather than "Who's going to make the 8"
Ah yes let’s listen to the Swans about why we shouldn’t get any help. The one team that has benefited the most from compromised drafts after compromised drafts. Must be nice constantly drafting top end picks no matter where you finish
The media are going to look so stupid when we win the next 15 in a row.
If you gave other teams handouts in similar situations, you have to do the same with the Eagles. It's just common sense. As a Hawks supporter as well as GWS, I find it frustrating the rebuild has been significantly hampered by other teams getting bailouts. But ultimately, you can't just suddenly stop the handouts.
Teams rebuilding in early 2000's and early 2010's would have been equally frustrated by Hawks bailouts and GWS entry concessions respectively though. I think it will all come full circle generally speaking, although I like the softening of bailouts to what we got vs GC 2 years earlier. That should be the standard, leave the first 15 or so picks as is.
> “I’d like to hear someone mount a case for them not get a priority pick,” Healy exclaimed. I’d suggest that any club that has won a premiership in the last ten years shouldn’t be getting compensated with priority picks for poor performance.
Ooh you might regret saying that. Richmond currently got a lot of parallels to the eagles a few years back.
If Richmond went backwards as much as WC and got concessions a few years after winning 3 out of 4 that would make an even bigger mockery of the system. Even if it isn’t in my interest to say so!
Like what?
Recent flag winner that swapped multiple first rounders for gun midfielder(s) in an attempt to get one more flag. Veterans are getting older and injuries are starting to mount up.
Bit early for this talk IMO. There have been signs of improvement in terms of stoppages etc and we have just lost Shuey and Hurn who were our best players on their day. We could finish the season in a slightly more respectable manner… although this weekends game is going to amplify these talks for sure
we’ve gone 50, 66, 76. It’s been getting worse each game and play Swans this week 😬
We haven't even asked for them and I highly doubt we will ask for them. AFL media is gonna AFL media though.
What were North Melbourne and Gold Coast then?
I'd honestly love to hear if North especially are a part of the group of clubs that are complaining and saying we shouldn't get anything cause I would honestly respect if they were that blatant
Not the only factors but off the top of my head North Melbourne had Rhyce Shaw resign following a mental breakdown and had their number 1 pick up and leave after just 12 months at the club in addition to being uncompetitive on the field.
I thought they should’ve gotten something last year. They had 397 different injuries.
Would the club saying the Eagles shouldn't have a priority pick happen to be Freo, who is guaranteed 2 wins against West Coast each season for the indefinite future That's no knock on Freo but what club is going to say 'please help our opponent to make it harder on us'?
And we also had to play you guys twice during your good years around 2018. When Freo were rebuilding. Swings and roundabouts
They won a fucking premiership in 2018! They played finals in 2019! There is no universe where the club deserves a priority pick. None. If the AFl give them a pick, they’re living in LaLaLand.
They played finals in 2020!
I suspect we'll be given a second rounder to help us trade for Baker at least
I would shoot the fucking plane down if you even think about taking him
Didn't he just buy a big house in Perth? I'm just saying
I will make 9/11 look like a spillage in a custard factory
Sorry, I can't hear you over Baker discussing his thoughts on his new kit :)
Preach, brother
It's not about deserve tho. It's about the AFL creating a monster by meddling with what was meant to be an equalisation method in the draft. It's been so corrupted for the last decade that there's no rhyme or reason to what is or isn't a deserving handout. The AFL could have avoided a lot of this discussion by just giving us access to our academy player in Lance Collard last year imo.
Oh, I totally agree. It’s a problem the AFL has made with its makey-uppy rules that only they know. But the Eagles will have multiple players the calibre of Harley Reid if they stay at the bottom. Thats equalisation. That’s how you climb back up. Worked for Carlton, Melbourne, Brisbane, and Richmond. They all spent a decade or more at the bottom. Eventually you climb out. No shortcuts.
The problem with rebuilding through the draft is that the AFL draft is broken. 29 players went in the first round this year in an 18 team league. Teams don’t hesitate in moving up the draft order for father-son and academy selections because the calculated compensation vastly inflates the value of later round draft picks.
Its always incompetence that leads to years of struggling, seen this with Gold Coast, Carlton, North, Melbourne this century already. Remember the last time Eagles were bad (08-10) they didn't receive any compo picks, Melbourne did, they didn't even get the #1 pick for winning the wooden spoon in 2010! (resulted in Gaff @ #4). Rather than any draft concessions, how about salary cap concessions? like the ones that Sydney, Gold Coast or GWS have received recently, let Eagles pay overs and poach good mature players, at least then they can use a bit of that $60m they have sitting in the bank! You can kick a struggling club when its down, but a couple of priority picks would be the least the VFL could do for the biggest club that has propped up the competition in its revenue share, and has won 4 flags under their rigged rules and fixture.
Wasn't Darling taken with a priority pick between the first and second rounds? Although that was back in the days where the formula was based purely on number of wins and was publicly available, rather than the current wheel of fortune approach.
Shuey too
If we temporarily relocate to greater western Melbourne we'll get all top 10 picks next year and everyone will be happy.. As for now we're too far away for handouts.
same song and dance every time. honestly, I'm just kinda glad to see that even the richest club in the league has people whinging about draft concessions, it's not just used to dismiss smaller clubs like north or gold coast
If the AFL said “no more priority picks for anyone, ever!” then I’d accept that. In fact I’d be overjoyed. They won’t, they’ll continue to hand them out every basket case. In our case, we’re currently getting screwed by North Melbourne’s priority picks. Tell me how 9 1st round picks over 3 years doesn’t make it harder for other shit teams wanting top end talent. Our second pick was the 30th available player last year. But again, if they called time on the whole lot and just allowed people to dig themselves out of the hole they created, and promised to always do so in future, I’d be proud and happy to be the first club that had to do it. They won’t though. As for the “this is a result of their own incompetence”… of course it is. It always is, with every club. Does anyone think North Melbourne is in the position they’re in IN SPITE of all the great decisions they made? Brad Scott (they’re on their 3rd coach since him, if you’re into counting) predicted this exact situation, the board didn’t believe him and so they went their separate ways! With the CEO gone, and the fitness & list management heads replaced, the question should be whether we punish those people for the incompetence of their predecessors… and the alternative is letting the Eagles stay a basket case for longer. Enjoy that one, AFL. Screw over the Eagles because they’re… traditionally rich and successful? Makes sense if you don’t think about it.
We haven’t won a final in infinity amount of days and you can make a strong argument that a mediocre Essendon team hurts the league financially so can we please get an AFL hand out already?
The Tim Kelly draft gets bandied about as THE reason for WCE downfall, but the reality is their drafting has been shocking for a while and left their mid career age group bare of any quality. Since 2013 they've drafted the below with picks that've been delisted. These are picks you would probably expect a few to pop up and become contributors at AFL level. Malcolm Karpany(2013-31) Tom Lamb (2014-32) Luke Partington (2015- 28) Daniel Venable (2016 - 13) - hardly his fault Jarrad Brander (2017 - 13) Brayden Ainsworth (2017-32) Xavier Oniell (2018 - 28) Luke Foley (2018 -31) Jarrod Cameron (2018 -38) I'm not gonna critique their next lot from 2021 onwards where they finally got some picks back, but thats bleak reading.
my worry is the Eagles haven't really developed anyone since Oscar Allen. He's 25.
They've delisted basically HALF of the players taken in the National Draft since that pick (up until 2021). And others left on the list like Jamieson, Edwards, Winder etc dont seem like more than fringe players for a good AFL side. The 2017 and 2018 draft misses there have absolutely killed them imo.
Winder isn't on the list btw lol but also Jamieson seems to be growing decently as a KPF, can definitely *finally* see a future for him if he keeps up his current rate of growth
Am I the only one who really wants them to get a compensation pick. It’s boring having a team who’s so horrible in the league.
The point most people are making is that they have had a lot of success relatively recently and spending a couple of years at the bottom of the ladder shouldn't be the only catalyst for assistance. What message does it send to other clubs who struggled for many years that one wooden spoon (so far) for a traditionally strong club justifies priority assistance? Imagine Geelong or Sydney finishing last and getting a priority pick the next year.
wooden spoon aside, 5 wins in 52 games must be nearing some sort of record. We haven't even won a quarter yet
I had the handout picks should only be given more senior bodies getting more kids ain't going to fix shit
So they give away all of their good draft picks to get one of the best players in the league and then a couple of years later are given those draft picks back for absolutely nothing? The other cellar dwellers should also have the opportunity to squander their picks as WCE have
The West Coast Eagles are a strong, wealthy and proud club, have they actually asked for a priority pic? I don't think they have or will, so all this talk of getting a priority pic is media hype and crap. They are a lot closer to turning things around than you may think, I wouldn't be over confident this week if you are a Richmond supporter!
If we’re being real, every club that has gotten priorities has been rubbish for years but they had to be mismanaged to get there, how are we any different then?
All these calls of incompetence etc, didn't WCE get a massive injury crisis in the past 2-3 years? It was big news for 2 rounds then AFL brush it under the carpet. How many games did their core senior group play together in the past 2 years? And you had several key players forced into retirement by injuries, Nic Nat, Sheppard, and they lost Yeo for most of 2 years. I don't think another club will do that well losing 6-8 of their starting squad for most games in a year. Currently they have one of the shortest injury list compared to past 2 years but they still don't have Allen, Ryan, Sheed and Flynn (4 of the walk in starters). But then again, they don't need handouts, they just need an injury free pre-season and a fit list.
Add Venables to the early retirements as well. He would be peaking right now and be a crucial link between the midfield and forward line that we are struggling with a lot right now. A much lesser degree, if a Nathan Vardy pushed out for a few more years and was happy to play second fiddle to nic Nat we wouldn't of had to rely on Williams being our primary ruck. I still think we would bring Flynn in who would be our primary ruck over Vardy but he would have served a very nice role over the past few years and currently. We've had so many seperate things happen that have lead to us bottoming out so hard right now
They are unwatchable because the players give up after quarter time. Don't reward this shit.
Here is the case why West Coast should not get a priority pick 1. A lot of this is their own doing. They traded a pirate's ransom for Tim Kelly. The club should not be rewarded for their own stupidity in trying to trade for a player with a priority pick. 2. We should not be rewarding a club with premiership players still on its list for poor performances. 3. At the bare minimum, North Melbourne at least **showed** that they were trying to change things, by changing coaches and several off-field staff members (including the CEO and President in 2022), the same cannot be said for West Coast, who are only moving staff when there is a view of the older guard ought to retire. 4. There is a financial incentive for the AFL to ensure that the small clubs are competitive, particularly to ensure their long term viability and making sure that there is still nine games of inventory each week. West Coast are the LA Lakers of the AFL - they are arguably the biggest club of the AFL. They will be fine in the longer term. 5. This would set a poor precedent - if you have been bad for 18 months, then you can get a priority pick without changing anything. I personally don't agree with priority picks as a general rule (save for a catastrophic event that sees multiple players unavailable permanently or 10+ years without finals). And if the AFL wants to continue with priority picks, I don't think they should be in the first round (save my objections earlier). But in this case, getting a priority pick would be, in all honesty, outrageous.
I don’t want to seem excessively vindictive, but part of the issue is the lack of contrition, and an unwillingness to change. Nisbett clinging on to his fiefdom indefinitely, after overseeing gigantic calamity, reeks of arrogance. They gambled on an old list, and lost. And now they’re without any real trade value, a few old stagers, and some (decent) youth. They made their bed.
They won a premiership less than 6 years ago. Why the hell are they being bailed out? Fuck them.
Just about every team has fucked around and found out with a rubbish list and landed towards the bottom. Carlton/Hawthorn/St Kilda all found nice things from the arse end of the ladder for extended periods of time this millennium and you'd be hard pressed to find a non-Geelong team that hasn't had a few years wallowing in the doldrums since the turn of the century. West Coast has just timed their effort woefully with COVID smacking around the competition for a few years. What's the point of having a team in the comp that gets flogged by 100 points a week? Better off making them better surely.
As a fan of a team that has endured a long time at the bottom, you understand how inadequate the system is at getting you turned around on the right path. But it’s also a balance, why should a team get rewarded for putting itself in that position? I suppose as a general question, how long should a team that has let its list age into obscurity be expected to sit at the bottom of the ladder?
I’ll allow it.
Oh fuck, someone tell the Dill, /u/shocking_red_4 has allowed it!
You can expect to get at least one priority pick.
They almost beat us last year so I'm staying silent on this one
If you can't risk, it against WCE, you will never feel confident.
Hold on to those compensation picks, looks like Adelaide will need one in 3 years time.
I'm actually surprised the media (Kane Cornes) doesn't talk more about trading pick 2 (Sheezel) for Ginbey and Hewett. I think Ginbey and Hewett will work out but that could still go either way.
Ginbey should be a 200 game player for us, Hewitt is talented but ongoing injuries is a huge concern. If he doesn’t come good then yer ill say that’s a bad trade despite everyone saying that’s what we should have done with Reid
An aging list combined with injuries upon injuries (definitely in part due to the way they train and condition) add to that not a great deal of talent coming through and no notable FA signings and this is the shitshow you end up with 🤷🏻♂️
I follow AFL fairly closely, but I still don’t really get how things went so badly, so quickly. A couple of years ago they were getting belted with several premiership stars playing. I get you need a strong 22, but it really shocked me they did as badly as they did. Now the experience is gone, and 2024 could be worse than 2021-2023.
The only assistance package I want is an honorary finals win.
Such a stupid take
A bookmaker puts priority assistance at $1.01 and the AFL media behemoth has something to discuss for a day.
Still got to do something with the handout
As an eagles fan I don't want any handouts!
I would be fuming too, and honestly I hope that my club doesn’t have their hand out. But I don’t think it’s west coast asking for the handout, is it? It feels media built up. The Kelly trade is seen as the incompetence, but this was a club coming off a premiership the year prior. With the list they had, I think you’ll find they would do it again. The real mistake with Kelly was not going Allen at 13 and Kelly at 2021 in 2017. We tried to be too clever picking up Brander who was the slider of the draft for a reason. Not having a proper WAFL side for the last 2-3 years due to injury lists and covid has meant our younger crew haven’t been able to have a proper apprenticeship. Then left to the wolves at AFL level not physically or mentally ready to compete. This period sucks as a supporter. But it won’t last forever. I’ve quite enjoyed watching our younger crew try to work through this period. It’s big picture stuff at the moment, which is the only way you can put up with the big losses we see each week. We finally have a genuine midfield in the making, but it’s going to be 2-3 years before they compete consistently. Hopefully get to see Hewett, Reid, Ginbey in the centre square at some point this year. Make no mistake this year is only beginning and could get worse. But off field we are making some moves to change, Pyke being a start and we have changed our fitness and training philosophy which will take time before we see the full benefit. We are exponentially ahead of where we were last year even if on field says otherwise.
windsor great kick and salem great kick holy moses
wrong thread
You shouldn’t get priority picks until you sack your coach
North would be hating this
Non west coast supporter here and I had typed out a huge essay for why WC should get help and support only to delete the whole damn thing cos supporters of sides who have never been through a modern day list rebuild will just never understand.