Good topic retreads:

1. Jarusa's point re Sydney retreads is well made - you can't be rebuilding forever, at some stage you need to stop hiding behind rebuilding and go for success. Good clubs know that time - we screwed that up, most particularly in 2001.

2. You have to consider what you pay for a retread

eg) Is Saddington value at pick 55 or whatever he was?
Is Saddington better value than the bloke who was delisted to make way for him?

And finally is Saddington better value than the remaining players available to be drafted or rookied (difficult call given that trade is done prior to draft - imagine a scenario where we traded the draft pick that we acquired Kade Simpson with given that in his year Kade slipped through much further than we thought he would).

3. Somehow football departments need to come up with a way of rating a retread versus an 18 year old. I don't know who in a football club structure has an intimate knowledge of players from other clubs who can objectively measure them against the 18 y/o who may slip to number 60.

4. There are enough Josh Mahoneys, Craig Bolton's, Shane Tuck's around to justify someone on your football department who knows about these guys and what priority should be given to them according to a clubs needs.

5. Looking at Elwoods team, it is certainly an area we could improve on, and given that we are directing resources to people to watch U/18 football and become expert on it, surely it makes sense to recruit from there rather than speculate on retreads.

_________________
Get comfortable being uncomfortable

Robert Heatley wrote



OK Heatley, you've got the plot...now write the manual.

Brilliant.

_________________
Everyone looks good in Navy Blue

Dukes wrote



I agree Dukes

And honestly at the time, I didn't even realise it, it was unthinkable....and I would give 1,000,000 to 1 that anyone would have predicted such a fall from grace pre Pagan era....3 spoons....NEVER!!!

_________________
Everyone looks good in Navy Blue

If you have had your right leg amputated and the only desirable outcome is to get to the other side of the room you don't proceed to hack at your left leg with an axe whilst hopping around in circles.

_________________
Just because I'm offended, doesn't mean I'm wrong.

But it's only a flesh wound.

_________________
|♥♥♥♥♥♥| http://www.blueseum.org |♥♥♥♥♥♥|

......................................deleted......................................

_________________
Just because I'm offended, doesn't mean I'm wrong.

I reckon this article by Molsey is a pretty good summation of the reasons for what happened at the end of 2003 with the influx of retreads.

_________________
|♥♥♥♥♥♥| http://www.blueseum.org |♥♥♥♥♥♥|

Lets look at it another way.

At the end of 2003 this is what I reckon was the senior core of the team.

Scott Camporeale
Anthony Koutoufides
Brett Ratten
Matthew Lappin
Lance Whitnall
Simon Beaumont
Justin Murphy
Darren Hulme
Andrew McKay
Adrian Hickmott
Corey McKernan
Matthew Allan
Barnaby French
Glenn Manton

That is 14 players, which would be roughly what most clubs have as a 'senior group'.

So what happened to this group of players?

3 retired
Hickmott
Ratten
McKay

4 Traded
McKernan
Allen
Murphy
Beaumont

1 Delisted
Manton

Leaving 6 of the original 14 at the club
Camporeale
Koutoufides
Lappin
Whitnall
Hulme
French

Two of these were kept (not traded) because they were on long term backended contracts at the time. One player (Hulme) was delisted at the end of 2004, French was just finding his feet and Whitnall was in a slump.

There was ZERO leadership left.

From the original senior core of 14 in 2003 there are 3 left in 2006.

At the end of 2003 we had a playing group that within the last year had been asked to take substantial pay cuts (was it 15-20%?). The reports at the time at the end of 2002 were horrendous, the playing group were not happy that because of the administration of the club they would have to take substantial pay cuts. It was the senior group of players that had to take the bulk of the cuts IIRC.

Imagine how you would feel if you were told that you had to take a 20% pay cut because the boss had stuffed up and you had no way of changing jobs for the next year?

No wonder 2003 was such a terrible year!!

The senior playing group was stuffed at the end of 2003. Three retirees due to injury and 5 victims of the administration IMO left the club with the worst leadership group of any club by an absolute mile.

It was cleaned out and retreads replaced them, I can understand why, the leadership vacuum was immense. However, IMO it went 2 or 3 players too far, in hindsight we should have taken a chance on 2 or 3 more 18 year olds.

It is little wonder that now 4 years later the effects are still deep.

You cannot go from having a decent group of 14 experienced players to nothing and not pay the price.

_________________
|♥♥♥♥♥♥| http://www.blueseum.org |♥♥♥♥♥♥|

Thanks Bondi appreciate that you have read a pretty long post. Tried to succint it, but noteasy.

The more I think about it, it would be interesting to know how much the coaching staff know about player 25 on the Eagles list. I'm sure they study Cox, Judd, Cousins etc, but I bet they know bugger all about the fringe players, and some might say that reflects in our recruiting.

_________________
Get comfortable being uncomfortable

Great post Jarusa,

At the end of 2003 we had no option than to go for retreads however (as you stated) we could have taken a punt of 2 or 3 more 18 year olds.

If we had picked up Ben Hudson instead of DeLuca/Mott, Aaron Davey instead of Kenna, Buchanan instead of Bannister and Tuck instead of Bowyer peoples attitudes would be significantly different.

There is nothing wrong with "retreads" providing the correct ones are selected. Rice, Spalding and Hickmott were all fantastic for this club and Heath Scotland is great value for pick #38.

_________________
There is no footy god

Sorry Humpers but that is blatantly incorrect.
We did have options, we just chose the easy one.

_________________
Looking forward to seeing our potential realised.

You supplement your team with retreds like Port did with Mahoney, Hardwick, Carr... and fill in the missing bits...and like we did with Spalding, Rice, Clape and Pearce...you dont build a whole team out of them and expect sustained results.
You have to build your core base of players from youth and then add your retreds when you are ready to challenge for a flag....

_________________
"When you have the attitude of a champion, you see adversity as your
training partner."
- Conor Gillen

Players still at the club who'd played prior to Pagan's arrival:

Davies
Fevola
Houlihan
Kouta
Lappin (ex St Kilda)
Thornton
Whitnall
Wiggins

It's no wonder we're struggling.

that is a scary read. very ordinary

_________________
dane's trolling again