2024 Draft Thread.

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🎯 Draft Period, November 20–21
  • Round 1 of the National Draft: Wednesday, November 20
  • Round 2–end of the National Draft: Thursday, November 21
  • Rookie Promotions: Thursday, November 21, after the National Draft
  • Delisted Free Agency Period (3): Thursday, November 21, after the National Draft
  • List Lodgement 3*: Friday, November 22, 10am (optional; required for those participating in the PSD)
  • Pre-Season Draft: Friday, November 22, 3pm
  • Rookie Draft: Friday, November 22, 3.20pm
 
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SteeleSaints said:
I have no doubt RTB has premiership/s in mind during his tenure. But he is also realistic understanding the list needed a huge overall, which he was transparent with Bassat before taking the job. Its a credit to him and the coaching group that we have mostly remained competitive over his first two years.

IF we can finally snag an elite midfielder or two next year as a free agent or otherwise then we will be away. LDU given his age and capacity would be the perfect fit, I hope the club are relentless in their pursuit with arranging a big 3rd party contract for him. We probably have the kids now to take us forward we just need exceptional players in that 24-28yo thresh hold.

I must add after being on the wrong end of another club poaching one of our key players this year, I do feel for clubs losing FA's chasing the big $$$ or sucess.
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Our midfield is pretty average but I really don't think it's as critical as some think. If Macrae can take up where Crouch left off our outside brigade is where our best assets sit. Nas, Sinclair, Hill, Wood, Wilson, Henry etc would be as good a group of outside run and transition players in footy. I reckon Shoenmaker could end up elite there too.

We were hit with an extraordinary amount of injuries to mids and forwards last year. We might not set up as congenitally as others but it doesn't make us uncompetitive. Richmond won flags with a pretty minimal midfield set up.
 
stfan said:
Cordy, parting gift from our former List Management Team. Hopefully we as a club can stop making stupid offers like the one we gave Cordy.

"Zaine Cordy will join St Kilda as an unrestricted free agent on a three-year deal."


Should have only been a one year deal. Three years was just a farce.
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Not as bad as the 2 year extension to Allison.
 
Joffaboy said:
Sent this via PM to a poster whom used to post here but I am still in touch with

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Yes, Lyon worked out what he believes is the way to win flags in this era.

He has right from the beginning of this stint talked about run. He would not have taken the team on if the basis of the list was not able to run and have a tank.
The training standards from Ratten to Lyon are remarkable.

Lyon got together what he wanted as assistants, first the feel good factor with Lenny bj and Harvs, however while both bj and Lenny were fairly inexperienced, Harvey had extensive experience. He also retained Corey Enright the only assistant coach to be kept as he could see the quality of the guy.

Now Lenny is part time, bj shipped off to Sandy and Lyon has brought in Rivers and another ex head coach in Bolton.

At the same time he purged list management bringing in SoS, Misson, Dalrymple, getting rid of Gallagher and Toce.

This cleanout has been echo'ed by Bassatt first ruthlessly dumping Ratten, then seeing off both Finnis and Lethlean.

The club off the field has completely changed in just two years and the list has been totally revamped.

Phillipou, Van Es, Hotton, Keeler, Wilson, Collard, Hastie, Garcia, Shoenmaker Travaglia, Tauru, Barrat, BoxShall, Dodson, Said.

Two have already been cut, but the rest (the latest batch I can only go from reports and highlight reels) can run like the wind, can transition, and have excellent foot and hand skills, an absolute minimum for a Lyon trained team in the 6 6 6 and stand era.

Couple that with the likes of Jones, Howard, Webster, Stocker, (Wood?) only getting one year deals, and Cordy's final year, we have extreme pressure on these guys to perform or their careers are over.

The above 12 are in the short term competing for about 6 spots, but all of those draftees are very young with half a dozen still only just 18.
So medium to long term more than 6 may be first 23 starters.

Then we come to the recruits. Dow, Henry, Hall, Macrae, Caroll. Only one not an absolute mid is Henry who can run through the mids.

The big call this draft was mids, mids, mids, which I preferred, but when the top 6 were gone the strategy changed on night one to best available. Night two changed for need and we traded up twice for two more mids.

So say our starting midfield is Steele, Macrae, Clark and Dow. Look above who can run through the mids at any time, there is about 13 others.

Gringo has got it right in my view that a team can't carry too many pure mids in this era and they have to be able to play in a few positions, the Starting four above (Steele, Macrae, Clark and Dow) would be pure mids but apart from them the rest can really play in a number of positions.

The training staff look professional, the recruiting staff have shown since '21 our drafting has been good, our recruiting has been pinpointed for need and I have a feeling we have an LDU or a Callaghan locked in for 2026

The admin has been sorted and training standards are increasingly high. I think the club has gotten things correct off field, so exciting and hopeful times ahead.
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I want long term contracts for Pou, NAS, Wilson etc
 

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stavro#4 said:
Yet supporter expectations are that we are in the 6-8 bracket and if not,RTB should be under the pump.
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I guess largely bc with a lot of injuries, some incredibly close losses and no Crouch the entire year we did pretty well second half of the season.

Now if the first one miraculously doesn’t happen, and the second switches to close wins and we now have McRae, I think we can get there.
6th is a stretch, but 8th, why not?

Oh, the optimism of a Saints supporter in the off season after what appears to be a decent draft haul 🤣
 
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Diehard Saint said:
Looks good, but tbh couldn’t understand a single word!
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Incredible wasn't it !!!!!!

I was pissing myself listening to it.

Nearly reached for my phone to use the translator app.

:):)
 
Mowman said:
Seriously you think they should put someone on even though no one is good for that spot ?

You seem to enjoy finding a reason to put the club down
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From what I gather and I don't think they're alone that it reflects poorly on the clubs character and integrity. Arguing semantics all you want but very few would place trust again in someone in their day to day life who went back on their word because it didn't suit them anymore.
 
SteeleSaints said:
Be interested as to what position the club see this new Irishman (Armstrong) developing into? I must say I have never seen too many completely bald head shaven 18 or 19 year olds running around. In the short video posted he looks to have an odd running gait but perhaps that is just his gaelic style.

He will get a shock when he arrives in Melbourne during summer for a pre-season, I hope he is used to wearing plenty of zinc!
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It’s Melbourne.
Way more likely to need a beanie.
 

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_Maximus_12 said:
I feel nothing for North Melbourne. They just spent their future first on pick 27 to acquire a bloke who doesn’t have one single ‘elite’ trait except for the fact he’s 2m tall.
Everything they’re experiencing is self inflicted
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You cant be very old as it wasnt that long ago and that was us in the same position. It takes a lot of good fortune for the minow clubs to work themselves out of it. I would take LDU in a heart beat but that is the ruthlessness of the competition, players like that rarely leave the bigger clubs.

The AFL is the golden child of capitism - the rich get richer and the poor get poorer and the AFL board wouldnt want it any other way.
 
Mowman said:
Seriously you think they should put someone on even though no one is good for that spot ?

You seem to enjoy finding a reason to put the club down
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i dont think they should have made the commitment to begin with.

once we committed to it we should have seen it through, yes.

it's valid criticism.

do you think it was a good idea?

do think it was good management to commit to something like this?

do you think its a good idea to renege on expectations you set publicly? particularly those involving stakeholders?
 
SteeleSaints said:
You cant be very old as it wasnt that long ago and that was us in the same position. It takes a lot of good fortune for the minow clubs to work themselves out of it. I would take LDU in a heart beat but that is the ruthlessness of the competition, players like that rarely leave the bigger clubs.

The AFL is the golden child of capitism - the rich get richer and the poor get poorer and the AFL board wouldnt want it any other way.
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Your not wrong there SteeleSaints.

I saw this morning that the Pies have announced an eye watering profit of $ 8.96M for 2024.

That would pay off our debt ....twice over !!!!!!!

And 110 K members to boot.

And.......the profit is on top of the $6 M they made last year if you don't mind.

That is what we are up against....and it's a huge hill to get up to catch the "bigger" money clubs.

The club is working damn hard to get our revenue streams up.

I hate hearing us referred to as a minnow club......but atm.....it is what it is.

If we can just jag that big shiny silver cup.....it will all change in a blink.

Dramatically.
 
gringo2011 said:
We should be aiming for finals and if Lyon doesn't make it happen or come close he should be under a lot of pressure. If the next challenge is without our older crew it will be a very long way off. Probably means 2030s before we are top 4 again and that's we can hold the side together.

Took over a side that sat on the fringes of finals and has been given everything we denied our last coaches and have a much better list. If at the end of his third year he hasn't progressed the side he probably needs to go for someone with some more energy and vision.

I like Ross and think he's a well above average coach but that doesn't give him a free pass.
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if you really want to distil it right down. if Lyon cannot improve the offense, particularly points for, he's in significant strife.

i say that because he has a trend now and its a long term one, of having a side that never really cracks the top 6 for points for.

we're in year 3 of Lyon, he's into how many years as coach. if he can't fix it, he will never win a flag and TBH it means his papers should be stamped. regardless of the whole fixing the footy dept or getting it into a state for someone else to take over.
 
Train12 said:
People need to go back to that pies game at the G where he had 6 centre clearances. He will be fine. Just needs to have a run at it.
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This! Windy getting very undervalued from what I'm reading, check out his early form before he got injured. Top 3 mid already and will guaranteed start in the centre in Rnd 1.
Injury free, goodness, I don't want to moz it up.
 
Having had the opportunity now to listen to some interviews, Trav, Viking and Draper are head and shoulders above the rest. Smilie and Langford both left me feeling dumber for the experience and never get to hear Lindsay.
I think we've done alright. The first 3 l have no doubts about, and the others are always a crapp shoot anyway.
 

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