at the end of the day is he making the right decisions so this club can become strong again?

Forget weekly games -this is carlton's single most important issue.

This year we finally have some room inthe cap - Sticks told me himself people wouldn't believe how close we are to being over again - this with a crap side!!! - make no mistake Pagan has had little room to move, from the end of this year he does. His job (with Collo and the board) is to fix the entire system that was as riddled as a dead carcass with maggots. When this is fixed we can begin to worry about weekly games, until then weekly games are not the issue, the long term health of the club is.

For me that is why we won 10games last year and the Wizzfizz cup this year. the state of the club demanded some things for people to hang their hats on.

Pagan delivered.

Now we are back to long term planning. And it will be long term. too many players on this list would not be in a strong side. It will take time and that is why Pagan is the man - a young coach does not have time - he has a season or two and then the pressure builds.

Look at hawthorn, the new kid on the block has this year and next and then things better start to happen or he is gone.

We are talking longer than two years at carlton.

_________________
This type of slight is alien in the more cultured part of the world - Walsh. Its up there with mad dogs, Englishmen and the midday sun!

Well as i have stated before 4th Chicken everyone is open to have an opinion you have some valid points in there but i still belive long term over the next 3 years is the time to judge Pagan.

Firstly if we had retained Britain for an extra year this team would have been a complete basket case as well as loosing some key players ie Fev to name one. You can argue that perhaps Fev we could have afforded to loose but as has been stated he is the best potential forward we have when on song he is in the top 5 forwards .... From marketing he is very popular with the kids.. whats the most popular number on most kids jumpers (25). So i would argue at the end of 2002 to retain Britain in the situation we have got ourselves in would have been suicide.

Okay he delisted / Traded the following
Beumont - hasnt changed and from all accounts will be delisted by Hawks end of this year.
Murphy - Hot n Cold at Bombers but would be lucky to remain at years end
Allan - Still been injured has barely played much since leaving the Blues
Freeborn - Hadnt played for cronic injuries he retired himself
Hotton - Dunno what ever happened to him he certainly wouldnt be on the list now as ge would be 33 years old ?
McCormick - i hardly classify him as a true player and i certainly didnt rate him and if he is as you say a true player surely he be playing in another team.

OKay Inclusions
Martyn - Well was i believe to bring some experience in and i give you that one didnt work but was for what Pick 150 or somthing lol
Banister - Well was servicable last year this year hasnt done much so prob will be gone
Kenna - Tried as a crumbing forward failed but now we have Betts who i think will definately work out
Deluca - May still come good havnt finished on my opionion of him as yet.

You Say Dennis should have picked up young kids in the draft i dont think he could do more than he has done in the regard

2002 - Picks 45 / 60 / 72 / 79 / 84
* no other team even bothered with a pick after Pick 70 DP certaily had a lot to play with
Simpson - May still get through still dont know (Was a Kid)
Fisher - We all believe he will be a great talent (72)
Croad - Was taken as he was brother to Trent in the end just had no desire for AFL was a punt i guess
Norman - Would have worked out if the guy could actually keep his life in order ... Pagan has tried to do everything to fix it up .. Ability yes .. mental state somewhere in kindergarden
Martyn - Was designed to assist our Key backs didnt work in the end

2003 - 2 / 57 / 63 / 69 / 72 / 75
Again not really playing in the right side of the draft
Walker - Potential Gun
Deluca - Mobile ruckman forward has been servicable needs to get to next level for sure
Kenna - tried as crumbing forward gone - failed
Banister - Good pickup was good in 2004 but suffered in form in 2005
Bowyer - Has played some good matches been given second chance but maybe not up to it ... was a punt.
Mott - Attempt to pick up a Second string Ruckman - Failed unfortunatley

2004 - 9 / 25 / 41 / 73 / 77
Russell - should be good been allowed to develope
Hartlet - Injured but again should be good prospect
Blackers - Has skill / ability allowed to develope
Raso - Picked up 1 year in advance to get a future potential talent
Bryan - Another attempt to pick up a Backup Ruckman maybe average ruckman but we have found a great Kick and maybe used in other roles.

So not much more he could do in getting kids do you think if DP had more picks in the 1 - 40 category he would not have used them after 40 its just a punt a possible kid who may do something or a second chancer who might grab the next chance as if it was there last. If he had more low picks i am very sure he would have used them.

Coaches
Worsfold - I have always rated him he was good at the Blues only reason that Britain would have had a win .. would have been happy for him to be the blues coach but i reckon he would always want to get back to WC
Britain - dont rate him never did was overseen by Parkin / then had Worsfold who i rated in 2002 was left by himself failed end of story
Clarkson - done some good things but after last nite go to hawks website they want another coach already lol
Laidly - dont rate i reckon he is on limited time thats IMO anyway
Watson - Failed
Neil Craig - Didnt know much about him but seems to be doing well so obviously worked out for Adelaide
Rhode - Complete utter failure prob worst AFL coach ever appointed
Roos - Well has kept the Swans a float very good player person but there lack of draft similar to the Blues but without penalties may cost them big time in next 3 years predict a big decline but who knows they are AFL pet project they prob help them out.
Conelly - With the list he has should be doing much better hot n cold at best has a hard gig being a East coaster in a West Aussie team
Thomas - How many knives do you want from the man that he has put into people backs to get the job done. good player manager ... poor coach best list in the league should have had a flag by now but 2005 albiet yes injuries Saints still not setting world on fire .... appointed by his best buddy Butters say no more.

So only 2 possible untrieds have been able to get a pass mark so far N Craig and Worsfold. And i do rate Worsfold as being a very good potential coach.

Membership i will look at only the Blues as not relevent for other teams as there are varying factors ie Adelaide / West Coast always high due to 2 Team City

So Blues lets looks at Figures Pre Pagan
1999 - 25719 - Played off in Finals
2000 - 27725 - Fell away
2001 - 27571 - Further decline
2002 - 26385 - Bottomed out

Post Pagan
2003 - 33,525
2004 - 32,445
2005 - 33,534 YTD Second highest Vic Club

So to answer membership Pagan has had a big influence in how our membership has risen i would also argue he has helped to gain sponsers due to his public profile so not sure why you say Pagan wasnt an influence in Membership i can only go with the last 7 years and it shows a increase since Pagan has been coach


I prob left out other things 4th Chicken but as i said we all have opinions i still back Pagan and am more interested to see what he does 2006 - 2008 then i will be judging him on what he does and the list he creates not on 2003 - 2005 where he has just had to pull this club out of the Mud and assist in getting the Blues out of there off filed dramas as well as have countless penalties and issues on filed.

precisely wolfe! at 2008 i will judge Pagan as a coach (bet he is trembling at the thought).

2018 I'll judge his influence (and collo's) at getting this club back on track.

we are talking long, long term.

_________________
This type of slight is alien in the more cultured part of the world - Walsh. Its up there with mad dogs, Englishmen and the midday sun!

You dont get much long term improvement from retreads (well rarely). That is why kids were better. And as for a completely teenage side - I never said that. What I said was that it was unnecessary for pagan to clean out so many experience/older players in one go - he would have been better served retaining a few of them for an extra year or two. Everyone talks about the murphy (who I would have kept), beaumont, allan etc - but we tend to overlook players like hotton, freeborn, mccormick. These players are not that far removed from many of the retreads we have brought in - so in that respect there was no need to bring in the retreads - it would have been better for team stability to retain at least a couple of these players. A couple of the older players were also prematurely retired - christou (who had finally got his body right), hickmott, ratten, mckay, manton, even bradley. I'm probably missing a few players from the list, but had 3-5 of these guys been retained rather than going for pure retreads, then team stability would have been better, and the 18yos would be 19,20, 21 yos when they became senior players.

As a final say on Membership that comes on a very poor history point in the Blues finishing 2nd last 2003 / 10th in 2004 / Expected last in 2005
SO i can only imagine what membership would be like if we become successful under Pagan and get into finals again. ANother issue the Blues had was the OO move which threatened to kill off membership as well and seems like Pagan has helped in keeping the figures up and there was a lot of resistance by Blues supporters to no renew or keepe membership as well.

Figures Pre Pagan
1999 - 25719 - Played off in Finals
2000 - 27725 - Fell away
2001 - 27571 - Further decline
2002 - 26385 - Bottomed out
Post Pagan
2003 - 33,525
2004 - 32,445
2005 - 33,534 YTD Second highest Vic Club

I also have read another comment from Gerry Attric which i semi agree with i would like Pagan to get in some new blood in the assistant coaching box .. I see this as an area of improvement maybe in getting in someone out of left field... And we also need to steal a skills coach from Port or west Coast that would be something that could help us out a lot as it is plainly obvious that we are deficient in the skills area

4th Chicken wrote
[quote]Everyone talks about the murphy (who I would have kept), beaumont, allan etc - but we tend to overlook players like hotton, freeborn, mccormick. These players are not that far removed from many of the retreads we have brought in - so in that respect there was no need to bring in the retreads - it would have been better for team stability to retain at least a couple of these players[quote]
I have already listed an opinion and none of these players you have suggested should be in the line up.. you can debate who has come in after them but not one ofthem would be or should be in the Blues and thats preciselly whats happened

Murphy maybe the only one and it seems like he has been to a few clubs including the blues twice so you ask for stability he not going to give you that long term
The rest of them well i have said none of them will be playing AFL in 2006 so i think not having them was prob a good decision

I'm sure many of you saw Hawthorn last night

That's what we'd be like if we had've drafted kids instead of the mature age recruits. They'd be getting smashed by 17 goals every week. Imagine what that would do to membership and sponsorship

Effes, understand completely why we recruited the older bodies, but I think it had more to do with lack of access to the draft than anything. And even after last night we have a worse percentage than the Hawks and have suffered a series of horrible record breaking hidings over the last three years.

Anyway you look at it we have been shocking for four seasons now (despite some good wins last year we suffered a lot of drubbings) we have a poor list, but that hasn't saved a lot of coaches. Maybe DP is like Barrass when he came back to Melb. A brilliant coach with a dreadful team. The judgement on Barrass then was that he was past it, and perhaps no longer in touch with the way the game had evolved. The next 3 years will be interesting. A lot of North people will be more than happy to undermine his performances at North, tho to get to the prelim final 6 years in a row is a pretty fair effort, but I think he has three years and the worst list to write his legacy. If he gets us to the finals and to a point where we can aim for a flag, he'll be a genius, if we're still down the bottom he will be judged harshly. But whovever coaches us in 09 may have a decent side to work with. I actually think Wayne Hughes is the most important person at the club. If he drafts really well, not just with the high picks but also the middling ones - a Matt McGuire in the 20s would be handy, then we will be a good side. We have a young side that are mainly battlers if we draft and develop some genuine Judd/Ball/Riewoldt like talent over the next three years, we might be a chance.

Wolfe
1. Brittain - I think its misleading to say that another year would have left the list as a basket case. Brittain was pretty much in control in 2000/2001. Both years were good years and barring a couple of very key late season injuries we should have gone deep into the finals. 2002 was a horror year for injuries - every other club with injuries to the extent that we had in 02 would have struggled regardless of the coach.
2. Fev - is the sort of player who needs a kick in the butt to kick on. Being almost delisted/traded was what got him to where he is now - not pagan. The 'next' step to become the 100 goal kicker will probably require another kick (being shopped around etc). Also, we tend to overlook the Fev isnt exactly a spring chicken - he is 24 this year, 25 by the time next season starts. People love to talk about him as the next great FF in the game but unless he does it soon he will miss the opportunity. The talent is there, but how long does one hold onto potential? By the time Fev kicks his ton he might be 28 or so - in which case he would end up as a very good FF at best, certainly nowhere near a great one (career goals tally). Contrast that to loyd who is 3 years older and but has kicked around 500 more goals. We get obsessed with what Fev might be and in doing so overlook what he is - a talented but erratic FF with questionable application (both mentally and on the training track).
3.
2002 - Picks 45 / 60 / 72 / 79 / 84
Simpson - one that I have no problems with - was always going to be a project player. and I would be prepared to give him at least another year to bulk up to see if he can make it. IF I were really picky, than perhaps simpson should have been picked up much later given that we needed more developed players
Fisher - One of the few good picks
Croad - Pagan often talks about the importance of character for players. There have been reports that croad was always questionable in this area (according to his under 18s coach etc). Was proper due diligence performed? or did Pagan overlook the character requirement. A bad pick
Norman - Again similar to croad - well documented questions with respect to background, mental application/state. Another bad pick
Martyn - Everyone in the football world was convinced martyn was past it - and had been for several years. We had a young FB in livingston (confidence player) who did a servicable job in 02 and was progressing ok. We also had manton and beaumont who though undersized had both had success against some FFs previously. To recruit an over the hill martyn sent the wrong message out to the players on the list (ie I have no faith in you guys). To then continually play martyn when he was clearly below fitness and had knee problems whilst other players were available on the list left a bitter taste in people's mouths. The whole martyn episod turned into a farce when martyn prompty retired following his 300th game because his body just wasnt up to it.
2003 - 2 / 57 / 63 / 69 / 72 / 75
Walker - Potential Gun - agreed
Deluca - less than servicable player - 202cm R/F who averages around 4 marks a game and 1/2 a goal over 30 odd games despite having significant game time and opportunities. As a forward, he would be attracting tertiary defenders (3rd/4th defender) and on average would stretch his opponent by at least 10cms - 1/2 goal/game just isnt good enough. As a ruckman shows less than prendergast. Also given his age has very limited upside. Was worth a punt (given form at VFL level) but should never have been persisted for that long.
Kenna - questionable/bad pick. Lappin/houlahan would have remained servicable options in the forward pocket whilst we rebuilt other areas of need (ie midfield or KP). Given Kenna's size/history was always going to be a specialist FP. FP is hardly ever high on the priority of rebuilding teams priorities so it was a poor selection.
Banister - bad selection. In essence sporn, wiggins, mcgrath, prendergast have all been used as taggers. Why do we need so many taggers on our list? Our weakness has been not being able to get the ball - bannister has never been able to do that (historically). The pick would have been better used on an 18yo midfielder.
Bowyer - most people will tell you that its hard to get back to elite level sports and perform well if u have missed a couple of years. Its harder if u werent an elite player in the first place. Age, questionable skills, limited upside means he was a bad pick.
Mott - Again, we decided to overlook the character requirement for draftees for some unknown reason

2004 - no problem with the draftees

On picks 1-40 - they are great but you can pick up players outside 40. We have shown that previously, as have other clubs. Of the youngsters brisbane played the other night, 2 picks were in the 40s (44, 45), there were 3 rookie listed players and 1 PSD draft pick. It can be done if you are prepared to have faith in some of the kids

You also fail to analyse the trades though


4. coaches - I think you have overlooked a few there - u miss coaches like daniher and thompson Also supporters are amazingly fickle - at the start of 04, cats supporters were calling for thompsons head. You might say that I'm similarly fickle but there is a slight difference - I'm NOT calling for Pagan's head but saying that we should have greater scrutiny on his performances given that it goes largely unchecked.

5. Membership - you ignore the effect of the change in administration - elliot was always membershps not important. Collins is membership driven.

Lets see how many such losses they have this year - will it be as bad as 2003 was for us?

Have you seen Carlton?

Last on the ladder won 18 of 78 games with mature age recruits!

I think u miss the point - I'm not expecting the mcocmicks etc to be long term players - they are no different to many of our retreads who wont be long term (I'd say most of them wont be). Retaining them would not have changed team structure/performance that much - but it would have given a LOT more stability to the list and retained at least some players in the '24-28' age group that we bemoan the lack of. Why take on players for a couple of seasons who will do nothing more than what you already have? - to be seen to making change for the sake of it?

There would be 2 schools of thought - that we werent THAT bad as 02, hence gradual changes to the list, or we were really bad - in which case we should have rebuilt properly (ie take the 18yos and live with the occassional thrashing). Pagan seems to be somewhere in the middle - he cleaned out all the experience but didnt go all the way with youth - in fact, given the number of players turned over, he hardly went with youth at all (aside from this year). The 18yo taken in the 02 draft would now be 20-21 and would be building for a spot in the team - even if they didnt end up being sucesses, I'd be more comfortable watching someone try to establish his career at the club rather than watching an older retread go about it (due to age/potential upside).

What do you suggest Pagan have done scottopee

To try to pinpoint the reason for where we're at on just one factor (coach, players, admin, recruiting etc) seems to miss the point that there's a combination of factors contributing to our current ladder position.

Obviously we all lean in favour of a particular direction. I'm still of the opinion that it's next to impossible to judge a coach without a decent list and I'm also convinced we're a number of A grade players short of a decent list.

I suppose given that position I wonder how people think we'd fare if we had an immediate injection of three of the best/most promising players from any number of other clubs.

Imagine we had:

Jonathan Brown, Luke Power, Jared Brennan

OR

Luke Ball, Nick Dal Santo, Nick Riewoldt

OR

Chris Judd, Chad Fletcher, Michael Gardiner

OR

Matthew Scarlett, James Kelly, Gary Ablett Jr

OR

Cameron Bruce, Jared Rivers, Travis Johnstone

OR

etc etc etc

The thing is just about all these guys can turn games and nearly every club has a handful of them and they've all got 10 years or more left in the tank.

Some people might disagree with the choices I've made from the various clubs but that just underlines how many quality players most clubs have.

We don't have anything like this and until we do how the @#$%&! can you guage the performance of a coach when this is what he's coming up against week in week out?

I reckon given any of those groups of three getting Carlton into the finals would be a monty. Add a few B graders around them and you're thinking top 4 providing you have a decent coach.

Have we got a decent coach?

His long term record suggests we do.

Lets see what he does when we have a level playing field.

Damn....I'm drooling again...

$th CHicken you keep saying we should have recruited more 18 Year olds we do in the rookie draft do you propose we fill our list with 6-7 18 Year old kids picked up in 60+ which if you are lucky 1 or 2 just might sneak under the guard ie a Fisher.

The blues have been playing in the 60+ Draft area for way too long cant put blame on Pagan for that. I agree by the way that Pagan should be under scrutiny but would first like to see him at least have a half decent list instead of the Basket case he has inherited.

Veyr hard to rebuild from scratch when you have no proper draft selections and have no value to trade as nobody is interested in 80% of our list and of the ones they may be interested in do you want to trade the limited options we have.

To Trade you need to have something of value to get value or be very smart. Sometimes you can get away with a trade that advantages both parties but really we want most things we have very little to offer.

And for really rebuilding a list you have to bottom out ... well we did that and the 2 Year Pagan was there what did he get to play with Pick 2 and then a majority of picks in the 60+ mark i dont think i would be trying to rebuild a list based on those draft options. I have suggested in another thread some way the Pagan is thinking if he is it makes more sense to me.

If we bottom out we can finally start to rebuild and bring in some talent to off set our large in balance of Retreads as we like to call them.

All i have said is that i would like to see Pagan given a chance with a list he has more input in where he dosnt have to get retreads to plug holes in the list. So i will reserve my judgement post 2005 when the only excuse can be for himself and what he puts into place.

On the Membership the contrast shows to big a change to be determined by Admin change I do believe the big change is due to Pagan how long that goes for will be determined in how we finish this year ... how we recruit and if we see some bounce back... But the change from 26000 Membership is not due to Collo i dont give a stuff a bout Collo in fact he has a lesser profile than JE. The big change occurred with the signing of Pagan there is no doubt in my mind on that . Are you telling me supporters decided to become members because Our Admin changed from JE to Collo Or because of Britain to Pagan.. i think that answers itself.

Wolfe - Nominating this for POW - finally someone with a realistic attitude to the situation we find ourselves in. Dont have a standing ovation emoticon but if I had one I would use it.

_________________
"Hence you will not say that Greeks fight like heroes but that heroes fight like Greeks"?

Winston Churchill

My biggest blame for the Blues woes is Post 1995 what we where doing in these years Post our Last flag i have no idea but tis has a lot to do with why we are in the position today. Add to that to that the draft penalties which hit us when we were rock bottom just compounds how badly we have been in the past decade.

The draft penalties wouldnt be so bad if we had still a half decent team but we where a team in decline that no one pre Pagan had even bothered to really address so i guess we are looking at the Parkin / Britain / JE Reign and i think they just kept looking at the draft as if we where in Pre 1995 Drafting rules which was buy and get what you want. When we finally hit rock bottom we then have our pants dropped by the AFL so that our drafting history in the past 4 years makes Bribane look like it finished bottom 4 but as history shows they actually have 3 Flags. Why does a 3 time premiership team have better picks than the Blues beside the obvious with the Draft penalties they know how to keep invigerating the list trade players to get low picks ... players which may be good in there team but odinary in other teams ... Why didnt the Blues do this post 1995 because we didnt give a stuff on draft picks we thought we could let other teams get those picks and then just take the player 2 years after they started to develope which dosnt work these days

I really hope people look at our list enough of the kidding ourselves it is in its current form the worst list in the competition thats not to say a few tweaks and injections of Talent and trading wont make a big change to how we perform in the future. I think that if we do what the Tigers did last year we should come into 2006 much more optimistically and that the drafts and trades should allow us to perform better than the tigers did in 2005 so lets wait till 2006 and see what the crystal ball unfolds for the next stage of the Mighty Blues

Wolfe, agree with a lot you say. Have doubts about some aspects of DPs methods (as previous post) but he has got 3 years to get a team together, and from where we are that will be a huge job.

His recruiting strategy was clearly right as pointed out. Not only did we not have picks, but I don't think we could even trade for high picks. As has been stated often much of our current problem stems from poor recruiting in the late 90s so we have few experienced 23-28 yr olds.

Re membership, I think our 03 membership was a result of the revelation of the clubs precarious financial position rather than DP. I think a lot of supporters thought we might go under. I know I've bought a second membership the last three years because I thought the club was in such a bad position financially - a bit like Hawks fans rallying and getting a huge membership when the merge almost went through. DP built membership by giving people hope with wins in 04 and the Wiz this year, but people won't stay on board if we serve up the current crap for many more years.

Yep thats a better rationalle than saying Collo sold the club better than JE but i still think Pagan also contributed .. our finances wernt terribly good before Pagan arived in late 2003 but from 2001 - 2002 membership went down not up ... So i would say 2003 was a mix of finacial probs with the club coupled with Pagan who came on board which gave us a feeling of hope.

I still think he is working to a plan and that we are now in stage 2

Stage 1 has been the last 3 years just getting everything back on track. Stage 2 get back to recruiting and turn things around Stage 3 will be what happens over the next couple of years i hope finals but we will have to wait and see.
If you want my thoughts on Pagans plans Gerry these are what i thought
http://www.talkingcarlton.com/phpBB2/vi ... php?t=2927