2021 trading, drafting and list management: players and personnel

[Aprilbr]

The reality is that if a player is out of contract then you have a poor hand at the trade table though at least Adelaide do not have pick 1 in the PSD.

I’d expect that the Crows second round pick and a later pick swap in our favour is the best we can hope for.

Will be interesting to see if we try and keep Hewett or bank the cap space with an eye on the future and try and use the money to tie down Logan.

That's a depressing thought, WF. A second round pick for one of the best young players going round!

[0918330512]

Morris cuts though the spin. Despite the legion of supporters on here saying that he and Edmund have no credibility, they have predicted this.

I want to know if Parker getting paid is a factor? I think Swans supporters should analyse this question. Were Parker’s demands met over Dawson’s demands?

I will await Tom Morris’s analysis.

In my opinion the next four years of Dawson were going to be better than the next 4 years of Parker. I’m a keen follower of American sports and I know the decision that would have been made with this scenario.

I’m getting déjà vu all over again

[mcs]

The reality is that if a player is out of contract then you have a poor hand at the trade table though at least Adelaide do not have pick 1 in the PSD.

I’d expect that the Crows second round pick and a later pick swap in our favour is the best we can hope for.

Will be interesting to see if we try and keep Hewett or bank the cap space with an eye on the future and try and use the money to tie down Logan.

As always, there is a fair bit of 'game theory' like thoughts that those in the trading room will have to think through.

Worst case scenario you may be right - but I sense for once, we hold more power in negotiations than usual when dealing with a player out of contract.
- It would be a massive risk for Dawson to think he would get back to SA if we don't get a suitable deal out of Adelaide or Port and he goes through to the PSD. If there was only 1 club before the Crows in the PSD line, maybe. But with 3 clubs in there - surely not likely (I'll let Barry come up with a probability percentage for that ). Even though none of the three clubs line up with his desirable location, we know 2 of those would likely comfortably have the salary cap space to take him (LoL@Norf and the Suns) even with the very best $ Adelaide can throw at him. He could take the punt and 'win the jackpot' in that situation and get through to Adelaide, or he could end up at a cellar dwellar in a city just as far away from where you want to be or further even.

The alternate if a trade deal isn't done is that he could wait 2 years (or even 1 in theory and seek a trade again next year), earn similar money to what he would of got in Adelaide, play in a team that may well challenge seriously for a premiership in that time, and then be able to name his price. I may well have irrational tendencies at times, but I konw what I'd be choosing in that circumstance, even if I was doing myself out of $100K a season for the next couple of years.

- We may well say 'all bets are off' now he has asked for a trade in terms of any future at the Swans, but as we saw with Papley not long ago, I doubt we will do that - because then we do risk losing him for zilch. The statement of the club, while I felt clearly showing genuine frustration, wasn't a "burn all bridges" effort.

The club might consider that circumstances will improve for Dawson over those 2 years, an opening up Australia (the biggest if of them all) may reduce the desperate "go sort of home" factor (Robe is after all not that close to Adelaide!), and we might well find a way to keep him (success on field would help too).

On that basis, I think we can play relatively hard ball at the trade table, even though neither Adelaide nor Port have a great hand to play with.

If there are no players involved, I suspect a reasonable price we could be able to extract is:

Adelaide - 1st rd pick next year + a swap of 2nd rounders this year (23 for 31) or 2x 2nd round selections (23 this year + their 2nd rounder next year).
- They won't give up Pick 4 for him in any shape or form in my opinion.
- I do think we could squeeze out their 1st rounder next year potentially alongside potentially a swap of 2nd rounders this year (23 for 31 would be my guess) - there will be a desperation from the Fruit Tingles to make a 'big statement' at trade time (especially if Port does win the flag), and we could use that to our advantage to get what I would call a 'reasonable bordering on good' trade outcome.

At a minimum, we should demand 2 second rounders - that would probably represent an 'okay' outcome. If split across the two years (1 this year, 1 in 2023) - that would leave us with 3 picks in the top 40 this year (in a year where I suspect we will use only 3 picks given it is said to be a shallow draft and no academy prospects), plus give us an extra 2nd rounder next year, in a year where we may either want extra points for academy players or currency to build points for the following year. It would leave us with decent flexibility, even if the return for Dawson was really just at the okay end of the spectrum. We might be able to package up our two 2nd rd picks this year to sneak up the ladder a bit further this year if we really think the draft is weak.

Port - 1st rd draft pick next year + some other steak knives of some form. They have a very weak hand - while they could give up their first rd pick this year, it would leave them pretty exposed they would then have to use 60,71,72 (assuming no players going out for trades in). That may not worry them at all perhaps, but that could easily result in a year of picking up zilch of AFL quality in the draft. I think we could extract their 1st rounder for next year, plus force them to get us a bit more from somewhere else (maybe some fringe trading etc might yield them a second rounder they could on trade - I don't know enough about their list to know that side of it).

I can't see any obvious 'available' players of interest that the Crows would offer up, but Port might have some options, so that is where it gets complex for mine.

This all assumes we won't bend over and just take a sub-price deal, which arguably we have done too often (I never want us to be like the injectors and their trade approach, but I'd like us to show a little more steel at the trade table more often).

If the best we can get is what you suggest wombling, then we should walk away, put a 2 year deal on the table for Dawson, and take the punt that he will sign that rather then play russian roulette in the PSD. Maybe Adelaide could manufacture a way to get him there through the PSD - good luck to them if they can. But its a big risk for him to take, and I think we would fancy our chances of keeping him at least for another couple of years.

- - - Updated - - -

I’m getting déjà vu all over again

Mamma mia, here we go again.

At least the agenda has moved on from forced worship of other gods for the moment

[TheBloods]

F ing disaster !

Disgraceful by Dawson . We were patient with him when he was out of shape that is a FACT !! Got reamed out by the coaches for an attitude problem after a hitout at Henson park in 2017 .. stuck fat with him and gave him opportunities , offered him a multi year big $$ contract and he turns his back on us ! What a sod . See ya later

Cant deny his talent though . This will hurt the team big time . We will go into next year with some steaming duds in our team while a STAR will probably be crushing it at Power ! What is happening !!

[Ruck'n'Roll]

Don’t quite see how Buddy’s contract has to do with it but I get your drift.

Robe is 4 hours from Adelaide, the whole "be with family" rationale looks particularly implausible on this occasion.

So it's a money decision, in which case - yes Buddy's contract is a factor. With a freer salary cap we could have renogotiated Dawson's contract 12 or 24 months ago when he broke through.

That's not disrespecting Buddy - just recognising that all recruitment decisions have implications, which need to be accepted. The glass is neither half full nor half empty - it's both.

In the case of Buddy, the implicatons continue to this day and will probably do so even after he retires.

[i'm-uninformed2]

The Buddy deal was not the issue.

It’s that no one could foresee the AFL was led by a bunch of goons who should be burned at the stake and would turn around and take COLA away as punishment for nicking him from under GWS’s nose

[KTigers]

Robe is 4 hours from Adelaide, the whole "be with family" rationale looks particularly implausible on this occasion.

So it's a money decision, in which case - yes Buddy's contract is a factor. With a freer salary cap we could have renogotiated Dawson's contract 12 or 24 months ago when he broke through.

That's not disrespecting Buddy - just recognising that all recruitment decisions have implications, which need to be accepted. The glass is neither half full nor half empty - it's both.

In the case of Buddy, the implications continue to this day and will probably do so even after he retires.

The reality is EVERY other player's contract is a factor. Buddy's deal takes up about 8% of the Swans total payroll. It's unfortunate Dawson
doesn't want to continue playing with us, but he doesn't. And presumably it will be for a mix of reasons. Dyed in the wool Sydneysiders
find it mindboggling that some people don't want to live in Sydney and want to go to weird little places like Adelaide, but they do.
And that of course is fine, it's a free country. Anyway, it is what it is and a positive will be that not paying Dawson whatever we hoped
he'd accept will free up cap space to retain other important players that we want to retain. He is just one guy, we have lots of good and
emerging players. That's why we won 15 games this year. It wasn't an accident.

[bloodspirit]

Good analysis mcs.

My earlier post about the PSD risk was misconceived. I had it in my head that the Crows would have pick 2 in the PSD (despite realising they had pick 4 in the ND). That they only have pick 4 is a significant improvement from our point of view.

Still, sending Dawson to the PSD is a bigger risk for us than for the Crows. The Giants won't have the cap space. The Suns might not either although they might be able to clear it if they knew he would be available.

The key for a bottom club with cap space, like Adelaide, to leveraging the PSD is to front end their offer so others can't match. Like Carlton did to the Suns with Jack Martin. The danger for Adelaide (and potentially saving grace for us) is that they still won't be able to shake off North. And North should seriously consider snapping him up if he's available.

Whether the PSD is a bigger risk for Dawso or us, depends on how much he cares about getting back to SA. Let's hope Dawson's desires aren't only about money.

[MattW]

It’s amazing how underrated Dawson is by some.

Losing Aliir has made us look stupid. That will be nothing compared to this.

I'm surprised so many posters on here are dismissing pick 4 out of hand. We should absolutely be seeking it, in my view. He's one of our best and most important players.

It's certainly not a second rounder. It's some kind of first round pick and it's a higher pick than we got for Mitchell (pick 14), who we weren't totally unhappy to see leave.

What does everyone think his value is in a flat pick sense. Pick 6? Pick 7?

As the draft order stands, if Adelaide swapped pick 4 for pick 31 the trade would be worth pick 10, which is more than fair for them.

[waswan]

From reports he is leaving for less money and even less duration.

We had 5yrs upto 700k at him.

Pick 4 is definitely going to be askes for

He may be from way outside Adelaide but his mrs might not

[707]

What's Jake Kelly like? Heard he was looking to leave Adelaide. Maybe he could be in a trade with Dawson?

Rubbish, turnover merchant.

[Auntie.Gerald]

For me the frustration is not just that I love having Dawso in our team and he won't be there in 2022 most likely ........but much worse is we are in a window and so is Port.

If Dawso goes to Port they have tremendously
weakened our list via AA and even worse they have massively boosted their chances in 2022/23

Hmmmm

It puts us back in the trade erena but it is a big loss unless we offer a huge contract to keep him

[The Runner]

Looks like we can put a line through any salary cap issues or list management. Any don't give any credit to Tom Morris etc.. they didn't predict this.

TB captures the emotion that comes with the club investing in a player, being patient in the development, having the hard conversations etc. It hurts to see this happen.

This is very different to Aliir. He was struggling to cement a position last year. It seemed like slight Unders at the time, and massive Unders in hindsight.

Dawson is a high first round pick or a comparable player. I didn't get to watch a lot of Adelaide this year (mostly by choice) but Jordan Butts seemed like a talented KPP defender. Could this be a chance for us to plug a hole down back?

[Captain]

From reports he is leaving for less money and even less duration.

We had 5yrs upto 700k at him.

Pick 4 is definitely going to be askes for

He may be from way outside Adelaide but his mrs might not

I don’t believe this at all.

But let’s say it’s true, that would imply he has picked a club already then?

[Nico]

It’s happened. Let’s get down to business.

Is the pre-season draft still an avenue for uncontracted players who are not free agents?

If Port or the Crows don’t play ball can the Swans say to Dawson that we’ll stick you in the pre-season draft and North will pick you up?

Could we then give Dawson the same choice as ROK following the 2008 season? It’s North or us because Port and The Crows are not providing enough.

Dawson could then sign a Swans contract to get him to free agency where he may change his mind.

One of the Adelaide clubs have already provided enough.