Unfair – Sticking Up For the Little Guys

HB Meyers·
AFL Drafts and Trades

It’s a funny thing, listening to people after the draft.

Teams, their representatives, and supporters seem content, almost thrilled to exploit some aspects of the AFL National Draft, but they’re not too pleased when another team manipulates the system to bolster their own ranks. It’s okay when it benefits us… not so good when it benefits others.

On Monday evening, four of the 29 first-round picks (what a joke… 29 picks in the first round) fell to the Gold Coast Suns. This, despite the club not possessing a single first-round pick when the selections commenced. Jed Walter, Ethan Read, Jake Rogers, and Will Graham all caught the eye of opposition teams, but given where these kids came from – the Northern Academy of the Suns, Gold Coast were easily able to cover the required price to leap up the order and claim their prizes, particularly after North Melbourne bid on Walter at Pick Three, instead of at Pick Two as most expected.

The Suns saw this all coming, of course, and prepared for the interest in their developing kids by trading down to amass later picks… and a heap of “points”. For the first time in the history of their club (and this is not meant to be a shot at them, by any stretch), the Suns were ahead of the game and came out of it all looking like the absolute winners of this draft.

And then came the complaints.

Early reports indicated that West Coast, Geelong, and Collingwood expressed concerns over the way the Suns were able to work the numbers and emerge with four highly-rated talents from the first round.

It seems clubs are fine with Gold Coast acting as the AFL’s nursery for the kids they might eventually want to poach, but when they get their hands on kids they’ve developed and nurtured themselves… nup, they don’t like that.

They all like Gold Coast as the losers, but they’re afraid they may just win.

This is something that the clubs should have been addressing with the league two or three years ago. Sure, they complained about the way the Dogs were able to jump the queue and access Jamarra Ugle-Hagan, but they kind of held out a bit of hope that they might be able to do the same at some stage, so the protests were subdued.

Still, the AFL catered to their whining, and adjustments were made to the draft that prevented teams from slipping in and drafting their NGA talent within the top 20 if they were bid on. However, in classic AFL style, they had some caveats that saw some teams treated that way, and other teams differently. They allowed for different rules for the Northern Academies.

Was it a mistake?

You’re damn right it was, because they lumped two existing and strong clubs in with two expansion teams. We saw Sydney snag Braeden Campbell at pick five, and Errol Gulden with this academy luxury at pick 32. The bloke almost won the Brownlow this year.

These types of decisions are always going to come back to bite the AFL. I knew it, you knew it, the clubs knew it, and it seems the only bunch of idiots that didn’t know it was the AFL. And now, they’re learning the hard way.

Again.

But on the topic of Gold Coast and the clubs complaining about what they were able to do, there is a level of hypocrisy that has to be pointed out.

You know what the Suns (plus the Giants, and even Freo, for that matter) have not had the luxury of doing? Not ever?

Picking up a father/son prospect.

They have zero players on the list that have come via the avenue that has paved the road to premierships for Collingwood, Geelong, and West Coast. You don’t think so? Tom Hawkins and Gary Ablett Junior at Geelong, Ashley McIntosh and Ben Cousins at West Coast. And just this year, two boys named Daicos, and one named Moore ran out there and played in the winning Grand Final team. All came via the father/son exception.

But the other clubs are okay with that because… screw Gold Coast and GWS. Can’t you guys just draft kids and keep them for three years until we draw them away with promises of big crowds and glory? We’ll look after the father/son picks, pass them off as “the most romantic part of footy” and you guys can get bugger all.

Sound fair? Of course it’s not fair, so when one of these clubs makes food on their academy selections, I find it hard to begrudge them their success.

Both Gold Coast and GWS, being teams that do not have a storied history and a pathway for father/son recruits for at least another ten years, deserve the kind of leg up the Northern Academy rules grant them. It makes up for the fact they get nothing from father/son selections. The sticking point, for me, at least, comes in the form of Sydney and Brisbane having the same access as the expansion teams. They already get plenty of love from the offspring of their players (Will Ashcroft and Jaspa Fletcher at Brisbane, and Tom Mitchell at Sydney). They have the team history the expansion teams don’t enjoy.

There were no cries of foul when Brisbane picked Ashcroft, or Collingwood snagged Nick Daicos in consecutive years because the serial complainers all get access to the father/son prospects. They’re not going to point out issues they could exploit, themselves.

All except GWS and Gold Coast, of course. They’ll happily point it out when it benefits those guys.

The outcry from the clubs means that the AFL will once again change things. They’ll once again be reactionary because that’s what they do. They’ll pare back the way the Northern Clubs get an advantage in the draft and bring them back into line with the rest of the league.

Yes, the academy picks need to be addressed. Yes, the value of these late picks is way too high and the Suns exploited that. And yes, we will likely see changes as a result

And you know what you won’t hear a peep about?

The fact that neither the Giants or Suns have a father/son prospect on the horizon.

But who cares about them, anyway, right? They’re just expansion teams.

That seems to be the way the old guard feels.

 

Father/Son Selections on the lists

ADELAIDE – MAX MICHALANNEY (2022)

BRISBANE – WILL ASHCROFT (2022) JASPA FLETCHER (2022)

CARLTON – JACK SILVAGNI (2015)

COLLINGWOOD – DARCY MOORE (2014), JOSH DAICOS (2016), NICK DAICOS (2021)

ESSENDON – ALWYN DAVEY JR (2022), JAYDEN DAVEY (2022)

FREMANTLE – NONE

GEELONG – TOM HAWKINS (2006), JED BEWS (2011), OSCA RICCARDI (2022)

HAWTHORN – WILL MCCABE (2023), CALSHER DEAR (2023)

MELBOURNE – JACK VINEY (2012), TAJ WOEWODIN (2022)

NORTH MELBOURNE – LUKE MCDONALD (2013), BAILEY SCOTT (2018), JACKSON ARCHER (2021), COOPER HARVEY (2022)

PORT ADELAIDE – JACKSON MEAD (2019), JASE BURGOYNE (2021)

RICHMOND – MAURICE RIOLI JR (2020)

ST KILDA – NONE

SYDNEY – NONE

WEST COAST – JAKE WATERMAN

WESTERN BULLDOGS – TOM LIBERATORE (2010), RHYLEE WEST (2018), SAM DARCY (2021), JORDAN CROFT (2023)

 

Like this content? You could buy me a coffee – I do like coffee, but there is no guarantee I won’t use it to buy a doughnut… I like them more. And I am not brought to you by Sportsbet or Ladbrokes… or Bet365, or any of them.

 

 

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7 Responses

  1. Let’s face it – the AFL should be renamed the VFL. The competition is run by the big Melbourne clubs and whenever they complain, the rules are changed accordingly.
    They tell us that they want everything to be equal. What a joke. Collingwood play 14 games at their home ground. Cost of living in Sydney is over 20% more expensive than Melbourne. Interstate teams have to fly 12 times a year compared to around 4 times for Victorian clubs. The AFL turn a blind eye to Geelong’s rort of the salary cap. NGA players being so solely due to the fact that they have 1% aboriginal heritage or a parent was born overseas. The fact that they’ve been playing AFL since they were 10 is irrelevant. The amount of money clubs spend on these NGA kids is minimal compered to the $1M+ Sydney spend every year on their academy. NGA picks were introduced solely to appease Eddy after the Swan’s had a successful year with their academy.
    The expansion teams were nothing more than a training venue for the Victorian clubs who had great pleasure in just bringing the best of them back to Melbourne.
    Isaac Heeney made it quite clear that he would have played NRL if the Swans academy had not been in place and I would suggest that this would apply to a large number of those who have been selected from the northern academies.
    You speak of Gulden’s selection at 32 being a joke. It wasn’t the Swans fault that he went that late. Most other clubs considered him too small and hence didn’t want to place a bid on him earlier. Sydney expected a bid much earlier than 32.
    I’d suggest the one aspect that the AFL should consider with the academy selections is that the points allocated to the top 20 should be significantly higher than what it is now hence making it far more difficult to select multiple first round players.

    Reply

    1. While I appreciate Max Michalanney is an F/S, he is the Crows first (and likely only) SANFL F/S.

      He nearly wasn’t allowed as they had a time frame since club inception (I think 20 years) to pick up a SANFL F/S, but that was removed a few years back.

      The SANFL F/S rules on SA are/were brutal.

      As far as draft goes, remove the 20% discount, allow matching, and make clubs no. Picks in draft tied to senior list positions free at the time of the draft (an old rule).

      So higher picks are not devalued as much, and placing a restriction on the number of picks that can be used to match.

      That would fix most of the issues except the rich clubs whinging.

      Sounds like the AFL will force clubs to use a pick in the same round (AFLW announcement). It will just cause new issues.

      Reply

  2. I don’t disagree with some of your points about the hypocrisy of clubs when it disadvantages them. But surely it is incredibly unfair that 4 clubs get to pick their academy players within the top 40 while every other team doesn’t. This seems like a very easy fix, just make it consistent across the board. Either clubs can pick their academy players any time, or perhaps outside the top 20 so the real top end of the draft is protected. And while they are at it, make clubs pay more for father son selections, never mind any discounts.

    Reply

  3. ThanksHB for making a stand on behalf of the newer teams.
    I haven’t noticed any of the Melbourne clubs or media whinging very much about Nth Melbourne given priority picks; They had 5 picks in the first 20 selections.

    Academy and Father/son (and not too long Mother / Son) selections should all be placed at the end of the draft.
    Everyone knew that Gold Coast were going to select their four Academy players. They had been selectively trading draft points in order to do so.

    What really distorts the draft process are the clubs who deliberately select these known players, forcing the other team to make matching bids and thus distorting the entire plyer selection process – but they still get to make their selection.
    Last week because of this nonsense the GWS selection 6 wasn’t realised until much later in the first round.
    I am sure that GWS weren’t the only cub, so affected.

    The clubs who engage in this frivolous selection behavior should have that selection sent to the end of the total draft list.

    Reply

  4. Re Draft and Academies 2.
    Thanks, Bandicoot, for your comments, too.
    I have just conducted an analysis of the playing lists for every club during the 2023 Season.

    146 AFL listed players had their origins in NSW or Queensland.

    74 players from NSW & Queensland made their AFL debut in other states eg Tex Walker & Tom Hawkins. It is interesting to speculate where these two players may have spent their careers if they had a different birth date or in the case of Tom Hawkins being a Father / Son selection for Geelong.

    72 players commenced their AFL playing careers at: GWS – 30; Sydney – 11; Brisbane – 5 & Gold Coast – 26.

    Many of these players from NSW & Queensland, as well as those drafted to NSW & Queensland, may have been recruited by other clubs and have made a successful playing career and many may not have done so well.

    As Bandicoot stated in regard to Isaac Heeney, the northern state academies have been vital in developing players from junior to senior levels and have created a larger player pool from which all of the teams have benefitted.

    Furthermore, over 456 players from NSW have played on VFL /AFL lists since the VFL competition commenced.

    Reply

    1. Leaving aside the Queenslanders, about whom I know SFA, I will wager that the vast majority of NSW origin players came from the Murray Valley with a few from Wagga and the Riverina. Very few from anywhere else.
      These areas are much closer to Melbourne than Sydney and allegiances are to Vic teams, not Swans or GWS.
      I grew up in the Riverina 471 miles from Sydney and 255 miles from Melbourne. It was all VFL in the 60s.
      Doubt it’s changed much.

      Reply

  5. I think some of the commentary here is a bit sulky, full of complaints which are irrelevant to the issues at hand.
    1. Valorising the ‘northern’ clubs for their great work in bringing young players into and through their academies ignores the fact that the preferential drafting rules have made the NGAs of the Victorian and other clubs not worth investing in. HB ignores the example of Mac Andrew, for example, who was being groomed by Melbourne in its NGA, but a knee-jerk rule change by the AFL (caused by the Ugle-Hagan controversy) in 2021 prevented Melbourne from matching any bids for him till pick 21; ironically, it was GC who took Mac at pick 5. The whole ludicrous system stinks, but it’s the two sets of rules that has riled other clubs and their supporters. At the core of the agitation is the belief that the preferential drafting for the ‘northern’ clubs has gone on long enough.
    2. One can’t justify the two sets of rules by pleading the hypocrisy of the other clubs, as HB tries to do, based on the equally ludicrous father-son rules. Some of the claims HB makes here are extreme generalisations. A glance through HB’s current list of F/S players shows that not ‘all’ clubs have benefited mightily from the rule, or benefited at all in some cases; not every club has a collection of sons like Moore/Daicos x 2, the Bulldogs’ collection, or what is likely to become Fletcher/Ashcroft x 2. Many of the sons playing are decidedly mediocre players, but we can’t see from the list how that mediocrity might have been reflected in the picks used. In any case, the F/S thing ought to be jettisoned altogether. Romanticism is one thing – although usually a contrivance, like any ‘romance’ – but favouritism is another. Why should a favoured son of a former player have the luxury of knowing exactly where he’s going to play via draft contortions, while another whose father never played in the AFL – or failed to qualify by achieving the arbitrary number of games played – might have to cross the country to play with whichever club drafts him? Drafted sons of ex-players should start their careers like the others, taking their chances in the draft, honouring the belief shown by the drafting clubs, and seeking to join the fathers’ clubs when contractually able; that is, if they still find that they actually want to leave the clubs which drafted them. The F/S rules further compromise the draft for all clubs and reward too highly the clubs which are lucky enough to have pre-emptive rights over certain top-flight youngsters. The ‘draft’ just isn’t a draft any more.
    3. The North Melbourne draft pick-fest has been mentioned. But I don’t see it’s relevant to the above issues; it’s simply the AFL making things up as they go along in order to ‘assist’ a lowly club. The #3 pick for Ben McKay was preposterous.
    The drafting rules parallel the AFL’s failure to run an equitable competition. The yearly ‘draw’ is as compromised as its ‘draft’. Collingwood haven’t played Geelong at Kardinia Park since 1999, and Essendon have played Geelong there only once (this year) since 1993 – compare that with teams like St Kilda, Melbourne, Bulldogs and yes, the ‘northern’ clubs, who are ‘drawn’ to play there every year or two! Or consider the inconsistency and conflicts of interest in the findings of the MRO and Tribunal. There should be no reason why the AFL can’t run a fair, uncorrupted season of football, or a straight draft of young players which is simple, clean, uncompromised, and reflects the principle of the way draft order is established. If academies are a good thing they should be a good thing for all clubs, and an equitable, workable solution should be found for their incorporation into the draft. The Father/Son thing should be scrapped.

    Reply

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