Some trivia on the 2006 super draft: Who are the only two players taken in the top 50 not to have yet played a senior game of AFL football?
Answer: Daniel O'Keefe and Daniel Currie (both Sydney Swans)
http://www.footywire.com/afl/footy/f...r=2006&t=N&s=P
I am not picking on O?Keefe and Currie and hope both can become good players for us, but it is instructive. The fact we only used two picks in the top 50 in that draft and neither have debuted sums up some of the problems we currently have in developing young players to replace the Halls, Kirks and Barrys.
Roos' drafting philosophy until very recently has been that outside the first round, the draft is a crap shoot. Roos bucked the AFL trend on this (almost the only one) by saying bottoming out had never been proven to win a premiership. He relied instead on his research of US sports with an emphasis away from the draft. With Hawthorn now having 'proved' the theory, Roos now appears to be backing away from his own theory at a hundred miles an hour. I interpret his post-Collingwood remarks about lack of class as an admission you need to rebuild via the draft, not via trading and rookie list elevations as the Swans have attempted to do. Let's hope it's not 3 years too late.
This isn't intended to be anti-Roos thread, but I want to contrast our recent drafting efforts with Adelaide, who we play this week. In 2005-06 the Crows and Swans had a similar list profiles and both clubs were inside their 'premiership window'. Of course, the Swans did win a flag and narrowly missed another (had we played Adelaide in those finals series we may not have achieved this given our record against them) while Adelaide missed out and began the rebuild. The Swans in contrast have tried to prolong their current run of finals appearances by trading away draft picks for the likes of Everitt, Mattner and Shaw and forgoing draft picks to elevate rookies (Brennan, Phillips, Simpkin).
Adelaide is now regarded as having one of the most exciting young lists in the AFL (three rising star noms already this year) while generally it?s accepted the Swans will struggle for a few years with little exciting talent coming through. Like us, Adelaide has not had access to a raft of early picks.
Two of the Crows? rising star nominations were taken with second round picks ? exactly the picks the Swans have willingly traded away in recent years to snare ready-made players. The Crows took Andy Otten at pick 27 in 2007 and Kurt Tippett at pick 32 in 2006. Both play positions the Swans desperately need: a key defender and key forward / ruck. This is only a cursory look at the Crows, I am sure there are similar stories at other clubs.
The Swans? spend more on the football department than any other club in the AFL. How much of this is spent on recruiting? Clearly not enough. The draft is only a crap shoot if you don?t do your research.
It?s worth having a discussion as the club begins to seriously looks at our playing list beyond 2009. My fear is that the 2006-08 drafts will go down lost years for youth development with not enough picks being taken.
There is a place for rookies, but they can?t be relied upon to develop a list. For every rookie elevated, the club forgoes a draft pick. Players who are not regarded as being in the top 50 or 60 in the country as a teenager will rarely develop into the top class players you need to build a premiership team around.
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