Favourite sons

[SCGonasunnyday]

Kelly, Kirk, Goodes, O'Loughlin, Crouch, Jude Bolton, O Keefe


Lockett, Williams, Maxfield, Davis, Ball, Jolly, Craig Bolton

Looking at those quickly cobbled together lists, probably not a hard and fast rule that the players who start with the Swans (and finish with the Swans) are the favourite sons of the club and the fans. But would the love for Kelly and Kirk be the same if they were recruited ready made champions at 24 from another club?

Best moment of 2008 for me, was the Brisbane game at home, joining with the crowd in excitement at Veszpremi kicking 4 goals [and picking up 2 brownlow votes we now know!]. I mean I was also cheering Henry Playfair's first goal for the Swans, but it is not quite the same.

I guess if we give up what we have to give up to get Kerr and he sets our midfield on fire and we win games I'll be happy and so will everyone else, but wouldn't it be nice to gamble with the draft in the chance of getting a 17 or 18 year old to the club that could play 250 games plus and be the next Kelly or Kirk??

[desredandwhite]

Well, it's a gamble, as you say.

I think the AVERAGE number of games that a 1st-rounder plays is about 50 or so (did a bit of digging about in stats this morning, and came out with that number, but that figure is from 2005

You have to weigh that up against the recruitment of a 25-year old of Kerr's class, who you could pretty reasonably expect close to 100 games from. From that perspective, the rumoured asking price of two first-rounders is not really that far off the mark.

While it is a nice romantic idea to draft and develop our own players, sometimes it works out that in a particular year the club will focus on topping up. Is this another one of those years? Who knows. I daresay we will have a go at any quality player on the market, but I don't expect us to pay too much over the odds for any of them.