2020 trading, drafting and list management: players and personnel

[Markwebbos]

Don’t we need Hickey to cover for Naismith as #1 ruck, a role Sinkers is not really qualified for, despite his efforts?

Would allow Sinkers to play second ruck/fwd and give us another (albeit limited) tall FWD option.

My understanding is neither the club nor AA want to have to use him in the ruck next year.

I am hoping that Cox and the clubs list management team are reasonable judges of who to trade in. But the recent acquisitions suggest otherwise.

I’d also hope we’ll try and get a younger ruck option as well as Hickey.

[Syd76]

Hickey is a giveaway. He's a backup to the backup ruckman. And I'm giving him the benefit to the doubt. A pick in the 50s is too much. The most I would offer is a 4th round pick.

I hope we're waiting to see if we can do a deal for someone else.

Totally agree

[Ralph Dawg]

Don’t we need Hickey to cover for Naismith as #1 ruck, a role Sinkers is not really qualified for, despite his efforts?

Would allow Sinkers to play second ruck/fwd and give us another (albeit limited) tall FWD option.

My understanding is neither the club nor AA want to have to use him in the ruck next year.

I am hoping that Cox and the clubs list management team are reasonable judges of who to trade in. But the recent acquisitions suggest otherwise.

I’d also hope we’ll try and get a younger ruck option as well as Hickey.

From what I've seen of Hickey, I doubt he would be much of an upgrade on Cal. Also, would you play Cal and Hickey together? Forward line of Buddy, Sinclair and Reid would be as mobile as 3 statues in a museum.
Cal played partially busted for most the year. If we can't get a player who would be an upgrade on him (when fit), we should just back him in with support.

[Syd76]

I think people are a being a bit harsh on Sinclair. He was really a forward who could fill in as a second ruck. If we had the luxury of playing him in that role I think he would have kicked a lot of goals and taken the pressure off Buddy.
As it is, he's been the number one ruckman where he's given the Swans 100% of his effort every week.

Don't rate Sinclair as a ruckman. He is a bit too soft. Love the Mumford/Nankervis type. Though Sinclair does show something every now and then, but generally against poorer teams

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From what I've seen of Hickey, I doubt he would be much of an upgrade on Cal. Also, would you play Cal and Hickey together? Forward line of Buddy, Sinclair and Reid would be as mobile as 3 statues in a museum.
Cal played partially busted for most the year. If we can't get a player who would be an upgrade on him (when fit), we should just back him in with support.

I'd probably tend to agree though I think that Hickey is a better ruckman than Sinclair. Not as "good" going forward though

[Captain]

From what I've seen of Hickey, I doubt he would be much of an upgrade on Cal. Also, would you play Cal and Hickey together? Forward line of Buddy, Sinclair and Reid would be as mobile as 3 statues in a museum.
Cal played partially busted for most the year. If we can't get a player who would be an upgrade on him (when fit), we should just back him in with support.

Exactly, total waste of time getting Hickey.

I would actually have Sinclair ahead of him as a better player.

[barry]

I would actually have Sinclair ahead of him as a better player.

So would I. Sinkers plays as No.1 ruck in an AFL side that didnt finish last. Hickey has played 3 sparodic games.
Sinkers has the runs on the board.

[SwanSand]

I am sure Hickey was not the first choice ruck that we were looking for. But there arent a lot of tried and tested rucks in the market who want to come to us and would be affordable. If we had a fit Naismith and Cal, we could have easily chosen a developing untried ruck like Knoll but the circumstances currently are that we need someone who can be our primary ruckman.
We can choose to not get anyone ... but then risk losing Aliir etc because players played out of position means that a lot of other clubs get interested in luring them away. For eg Dunkley.

I think Hickey will be a reasonable acquisition under those circumstances, not a first choice for me too but atleast he is better than who we had on our list - Knoll. He is not going to burn the house down but He played 20 games for Eagles in 2019 and did OK.

[Markwebbos]

If Sinkers was so good, why did AA spend so much time in the ruck?

[TheBloods]

List is in dire straits.

Can't get a forward if our lives depended on it. Midfield collectively is poor. Putting our future in the hands of a bunch of unproven players. And now we're replacing one mediocre 30 yr old ruckman with another mediocre 30 yr old ruckman.

Not much to be confident about going into next year.

[Ludwig]

List is in dire straits.

Can't get a forward if our lives depended on it. Midfield collectively is poor. Putting our future in the hands of a bunch of unproven players. And now we're replacing one mediocre 30 yr old ruckman with another mediocre 30 yr old ruckman.

Not much to be confident about going into next year.

1. We have the best forward in the game, when he's fit.
2. When you draft players, they are by definition unproven until they play enough games to prove themselves. Our list is at this stage of development.
3. Hickey would not be a replacement for Sinkers, but rather a backup. I don't approve of it, but just making your comment more factual.

Our list is far from perfect, but dire straits is a gross exaggeration. We know we're in a rebuild and I think it's going pretty well.

[Markwebbos]

1. We have the best forward in the game, when he's fit.
2. When you draft players, they are by definition unproven until they play enough games to prove themselves. Our list is at this stage of development.
3. Hickey would not be a replacement for Sinkers, but rather a backup. I don't approve of it, but just making your comment more factual.

Our list is far from perfect, but dire straits is a gross exaggeration. We know we're in a rebuild and I think it's going pretty well.

I assume Hickey is meant to be an upgrade on Sinkers

[TheBloods]

1. We have the best forward in the game, when he's fit.
2. When you draft players, they are by definition unproven until they play enough games to prove themselves. Our list is at this stage of development.
3. Hickey would not be a replacement for Sinkers, but rather a backup. I don't approve of it, but just making your comment more factual.

Our list is far from perfect, but dire straits is a gross exaggeration. We know we're in a rebuild and I think it's going pretty well.

I'd hardly use Buddy as a pro on our list atm. He is 33 going on 34, has had injuries the last three consecutive seasons, and didn't play a game this year. The fairytale is over. He is an asset for his leadership and experience in guiding the developing players, but he can hardly be factored into our on-field plans going forward.

I do not deny that all drafted players are unproven, which is why it's all the more irresponsible that we are neglecting trades for proven talents that could improve our list and provide some assurance. Otherwise we're going forward under the assumption that, what, Blakey, McCartin, Rowbottom, Stephens, McInerney etc will deliver us a flag ? Sounds dodgy to me. How can we take any confidence from them when the group of DRAFTED players before them - Hewett, Heeney, Mills, Dawson, Florent, Hayward, Aliir - haven't taken off like we hoped they would? Who is to say the next lot coming through won't follow the same trajectory? I see potential for McCartin and Rowbottom to be elite players, but I thought the same of Heeney and Florent after their first few seasons too.

Can you understand why I am very cautious of the strategy of draft kids and become a developing team ?

Regarding Hickey, if true that he is simply a back-up ruck, then that makes it even more embarrassing. After finishing 16th, we've made the primary focus of our off-season finding a back-up ruck, who might not even play every week because he's behind Sinclair? Why? So that Aliir can play in defence, where he has been so dreadful at times he was lucky not to be dropped? Seems like a sound plan to me. /s

[Ralph Dawg]

I assume Hickey is meant to be an upgrade on Sinkers

So we're going to likely pay overs with a much needed pick, whether that be this year or next and be stuck with a third rate ruckman towards the end of his career for the next 3 years just so we can have a backup for our current ruckman who fits the above profile?

I'll reverse the situation - plenty of clubs looking for a ruck forward - any be happy to give Cal a 3 year contract and us a 3rd or 4th rounder?

[barry]

Hickey is at or below the level of Sinkers. We are getting him, so we can keep Allir, because Allir dont want to ruck no more.
The scary thing is, it means we may be playing Hickey and Sinkers in the same 22. That puts a lot of work on the other 20 to cover two average ruckmen.

Our better play would have been to get a potentially better ruckman such as Pruest or Cox. Then we could have played Sinkers/Reid as the backup ruckman.
I think the reason we didnt is because Buddy's contract is killing our salary cap. We may even be trying to pay overs to buddy this year, so it doesnt hurt us next year.

Long term contracts are bad, mmok

[Ludwig]

I'd hardly use Buddy as a pro on our list atm. He is 33 going on 34, has had injuries the last three consecutive seasons, and didn't play a game this year. The fairytale is over. He is an asset for his leadership and experience in guiding the developing players, but he can hardly be factored into our on-field plans going forward.

I do not deny that all drafted players are unproven, which is why it's all the more irresponsible that we are neglecting trades for proven talents that could improve our list and provide some assurance. Otherwise we're going forward under the assumption that, what, Blakey, McCartin, Rowbottom, Stephens, McInerney etc will deliver us a flag ? Sounds dodgy to me. How can we take any confidence from them when the group of DRAFTED players before them - Hewett, Heeney, Mills, Dawson, Florent, Hayward, Aliir - haven't taken off like we hoped they would? Who is to say the next lot coming through won't follow the same trajectory? I see potential for McCartin and Rowbottom to be elite players, but I thought the same of Heeney and Florent after their first few seasons too.

Can you understand why I am very cautious of the strategy of draft kids and become a developing team ?

Regarding Hickey, if true that he is simply a back-up ruck, then that makes it even more embarrassing. After finishing 16th, we've made the primary focus of our off-season finding a back-up ruck, who might not even play every week because he's behind Sinclair? Why? So that Aliir can play in defence, where he has been so dreadful at times he was lucky not to be dropped? Seems like a sound plan to me. /s

A lot of what you say is about how you rate our playing group. You are certainly entitled to your opinion, and there are plenty of others here that don't rate our players too highly as well. It's hard to argue a case rating how one sees a young player's development and future. We can only wait to see how things unfold.

Recruiting elite players at this stage of our development, even if it were possible, taking into account that we need draft picks this year to cover Campbell and Gulden bids, would undermine the 4 year rebuild we've been going through before it's been given a chance to show what it can do. It doesn't make sense to run 2 conflicting list management policies at the same time.

A couple of things I can dispute:

1. It's hard to recruit a top line key forward, simply because there aren't many available. Only Jeremy Cameron was on the market this year. I think we are paying Buddy 1.5 mil next year, which also limits what we do about recruiting an expensive player. And if you take the Cameron situation, an RFA who had his offer matched, we hardly have the draft picks to do that kind of deal. Perhaps we could get him for our pick 3, but is that really what we want to do? We have a key forward situation which is not dire if everyone is fit to play. McCartin and Blakey form a good base for the future, although I do agree, we will be in the market for another key forward at some time. Perhaps 2021 makes a bit more sense, as we can buy time to see how several uncertainties unfold.
2. Someone else posted that in 2018, before he was moved to the ruck (2019), Aliir was ranked the best or near the best key defender in the game in several key categories. I don't think using 'dreadful' is a word I would use for him.