Quote Originally Posted by Ludwig View Post
As much as I agree that the trade restrictions were totally unjustified, it is a different matter whether they had any significant effect on our team. I have yet to hear a single realistic trade, other than the Patfull one, that we might be blocked from making. The reality is that even if we could have signed Patfull, he is a 30 yo medium defender that plays a lot like Laidler, but has a proven record. He probably would have kept Laidler out of our side and I'm not sure that Patfull is playing any better than Laidler this year. In any case, it would not be of any great significance.

As for 2015, we can still trade in players in the 350 k range, which is probably about what Teg and Reg are getting. If we were looking for another key defender, Rance would have been nice, but he's not available and we couldn't afford his salary anyway. Generally speaking, any player that could improve our team via a trade is probably beyond our reach more because of the COLA phase out and salary cap issues than direct trade restrictions imposed by the league.

There's no point in looking outside the club for reasons for our current poor performances. Next year the trade ban and COLA issues will have reached their conclusion and we can then move forward in normal manner. We always new the COLA was going to end someday and there would be some consequences, so there's little point to keep going on about it.
As harmful as the trade restrictions may be proving to be (this year especially), surely it will leave us in a fairly strong position potentially at the end of 2016. It is what it is sadly - it is ridiculous policy from the AFL, but they have clearly shown in recent years that they are like a political party - reactive to the latest fads going around. We will see it again at the end of the season when they come up with a bunch of changes to try and combat 'congestion', when proper application of the proper rules (in particular the HTB rule) would solve the issue without major rule changes.