"You get the feeling that like Monty Python's Black Knight, the Swans would regard amputation as merely a flesh wound."
I'd be surprised if Mitchell left to go to Carlton unless the gap in the money was huge. How many gun players leave top 4 clubs to go to bottom 4 clubs?
He reminds him of the guys, close-set, slow, and never rattled, who were play-makers on the team. (John Updike, seeing Josh Kennedy in a crystal ball)
reality is Mills and Heeney will be in the midfield asap - i would say 2017 they will feature strong minutes
"be tough, only when it gets tough"
If I was Tom's manager I'd be saying, "Get a decent deal with the Swans and sign for three years as I reckon your best chance of winning a flag in the next three years will be at the Swans. After that you'll still only be 26 and in your prime and then, if you want to and especially if you have a flag, we can still look at a big money 4-5 year deal under free agency if the Swans aren't close to the mark"
Who could they possibly be talking about?
What a great piece of imaginative journalism from the West Australian: Sydney Swan Tom Derickx kick starts viral White Shirt campaign - The West AustralianHe�s famous for his dry wit, good looks and prowess on the footy field.
Tom Harley can't focus on Tom Mitchell while this Tom is coming out of contract this year. I hear Carlton has tabled a big multi-year contract with his manager. If we lose him I'm really worried about our lack of depth in key position travelling emergencies.
Tom Mitchell is playing for a very good team in contention.
Carlton is a rebuilding team that is unlikely to rebuild into a top 8 side because by the time their current and future kids are becoming solid AFL level players, they will be losing their current best players to retirement meaning they need twice the drafting strike rate as already top sides like us. Carlton were an older side than us last week!
Why would you jump ship to a team that is an unlikely finalist whilst you are playing? Why would you go to a team where you will get tagged because you aren't surrounded by midfield guns like you are at the Swans? Mitchell won't be going to Carlton!
There will almost certainly be a massive rise in the cap from next year, Buddy will look cheap then, so will Tippett, we don't have cap problems to sweat about.
It is increasingly looking like we took a calculated gamble on the Salary Cap going north at a rapid rate from 2017 and you'd think we have nailed that bet.
As a result Buddy's deal will not look as outrageous as it seems. Try telling me that Fyfe won't be on $1.5m a year when he is out of contract at the end of next year.
The only disadvantage we'll have from Buddy's deal as I see it is that we might be carrying him on overs (if he plays at all) in seasons 8 and 9 of his deal.
It may simply come down to how great a gap there is financially- we know we've already had to offer Tom a sizable chunk of cash just to join us as a father/son selection instead of heading over to GWS, so as much as we'd like to think in a situation like this we have lovable Barry saying "stay put, boyo!" I think there's definitely a degree of shrewd, financial cunning in the Mitchell camp. Which is perfectly fine.
Whilst we're in a more attractive position than GWS, Treloar opted to move at the end of last year because of money- he publicly acknowledged that if GWS could come close to the other offers he would stay as he was happy there/saw a strong future, the club didn't and Treloar walked. From what I can gather the gap was quite significant both per season and in number of guaranteed years. If Tom was put in a similar situation with Carlton I really wouldn't be surprised if he took the offer- $300 k difference over a 4-5 year contract is a lot of money to leave on the table (I think that was roughly the Treloar difference, as an example).
I knew him as a gentle young man, I cannot say for sure the reasons for his decline
We watched him fade before our very eyes, and years before his time
The reality is that good players, especially from strong clubs, can just about always command better coin elsewhere.
In our favour Tom is probably aware he has been very well paid, quite possibly overpaid, to date and he does seem settled. Nevertheless I don't begrudge players setting themselves up because it is a brutal sport and a short career. Tom probably has a price like everyone else whereby he'd be tempted to leave, a six year $4.5m deal for instance would be hard to knowck back for a 23 year old. But I think overall we should be able to come close enough for a deal even if it is just to get him through to free agency because it would be highly unlikely for him to win a flag at Carlton and ultimately that will be an overriding factor
I knew him as a gentle young man, I cannot say for sure the reasons for his decline
We watched him fade before our very eyes, and years before his time
Bookmarks