Future forecasting: From The Notebook, Round 18 2024

A lazy day on the couch watching two of the bottom three teams triggered a few thoughts about list management strategies and where each team can move in the short to medium term.

This week’s Notebook will delve into the lists of West Coast and Richmond and figure out what’s there for the next Eagles’ coach to deal with, and what’s available to Adem Yze when there’s less than half his group injured at all times.

Ideally this is less an opinion piece and more an outline of the facts through demographics, positional types, and the like, before concluding with potential next steps…

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West Coast

The Round 6 Notebook talked about the value of West Coast’s veterans in shepherding younger players through tough times, and that’s still the case.

In an ideal world the veterans would be gradually phased out by those in their mid-20s, but the Eagles’ issue is having so little in their cupboard of slightly pre-prime players – i.e. the early 20s age group.

Only 16 percent of West Coast’s minutes this year have come from players between their age 22 and age 25 year*, an anaemic number and comfortably the lowest in the league, albeit slightly deflated by Oscar Allen missing 12 of the first 13 games.

(*age <number> year refers to how old a player turns during the year, a way of covering for birthdays in a season instead of saying 21-year-olds, 22-year-olds, etc)

But 25 percent of their minutes have come from players between their age 19 and age 21 year, only narrowly behind Hawthorn for most in the league. So unless there’s a massive recruiting spree or the Eagles are happy spending another three to four years at the bottom, the veterans need to be phased out rather than cut off with one swift blow. There’s little else behind them to hold the fort.

A look at list demographics indicate as much…

…although it doesn’t look like there’ll be wholesale change immediately. The list of out of contract players mostly take care of themselves, with few exceptions:

Personal opinion: the short-term key for West Coast is picking the right veterans to keep and which ones are surplus to requirements for either delisting or selling. Getting it wrong, cutting too deep – or both – can set a list build back years (he says from experience on a blog called The Shinboner).

Using the midfield as an example, Tim Kelly and Elliott Yeo are vital to keep while building starts around Harley Reid and the next generation.

But down forward, with Oscar Allen and Jake Waterman as established players – plus the potential of a second ruck as the third tall – Jack Darling’s role is arguably less important.

The difficulty for the Eagles is if they do opt to farewell a handful of their expendable experienced players, most won’t get the return needed to fast track their list rebuild.

It’s especially relevant because as it stands West Coast don’t have much in the way of draft capital this year. They have their own pick in Round 1, 2, and 4, with their third-round selection in Richmond’s hands and it’s what makes the Liam Baker speculation so interesting.

The Tigers would undoubtedly prefer picks in return if Baker does depart, while the Eagles are surely hesitant to concede any this season with the list’s need for continued rejuvenation.

It leaves West Coast in an awkward spot. Unless they go truly scorched earth and trade their most valuable assets, they don’t have a heap of draft picks to quickly build a young core. But there’s also little in the existing mid-20s age group to keep performing at a passable level.

So they’re relying on current youngsters to progress quickly, or the veterans able to contribute for perhaps a little longer than originally anticipated, holding the fort until reinforcements arrive in the form of a more balanced list.

The list management team will earn their keep figuring out the best way forward. But the advantages West Coast have over other teams are their vast resources and patience in backing coaches; three of the last four coaches at the helm for 240+ games each.

There look to be three routes for West Coast to take, with a bit of overlap between each:

1: Stay the course, rely on youngsters to progress quickly and veterans to hold the fort
2: Look to bolster the mid-20s age group as quickly as possible through trades and free agency
3: Scorched earth, basically start again and stockpile as much youth as possible

A mix of 1) and 2) would be the ideal way forward, but the room for landing it is small.

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Richmond

The injuries are an easy excuse to hand wave most of the issues away, and to be fair they do excuse quite a bit of what we’ve seen from Richmond this year. Everyone knows this list, although clearly not top six quality, isn’t a 2-15 list with a normal season of availability.

Since Opening Round, there’s only been two games where all of Jacob Hopper, Tim Taranto, and Dion Prestia have played together. Neither of those saw all three finish the game uninjured, thanks to Prestia’s hamstring in Round 1 and Taranto’s concussion on Sunday.

Tom Lynch has played just four games for the year – indeed, four games total since Round 4, 2023. If just Lynch and the midfield trio had played 10-12 games together this year, the conversation would be very different.

Because when a team is trying to transition a list from era to era, it’s tough enough to do even if it all goes smoothly. It’s easy enough to envision a world where Lynch stays fit and Noah Balta plays off him as a roaming forward (even though his best position is still back), they get enough supply from the main midfielders, and then around that core the inexperienced fringes get used to what’s required at AFL level.

The defensive half of the ground is proof of how that works. Despite ACL injuries to the key position players, the rest of the back seven has been relatively settled, allowing Tom Brown Tom Brown (not a typo) to contribute each week.

Something similar could have happened in the midfield too, rotating players around the main core to see what they’re capable of. Instead it’s turned into scrambling whatever’s been available week to week and living with the results.

Now with another year and a couple of soft tissue injuries into Prestia, it’ll be tough to rely on him for anything substantial in 2025. This year should have shown some steps forward for when he goes, but the on-ball glimpses have been sporadic elsewhere – because of availability, largely – and Thomson Dow failing to take his extended opportunity.

So the lens turns to what’s next. At time of writing there are 21 players out of contract this year with Hugo Ralphsmith’s new deal not yet reflected in the following graphic…

…and there is still a more than solid core of mid-to-late 20’s players…

…which is what makes their next list management step arguably the most intriguing of any team.

The first, second, and third priority has to be sorting out the key forward stocks; that much goes without saying.

But there’s an avenue where Richmond, if they have a good injury run – or maybe just less than 15 injuries at any time – hover around the lower reaches of mid-table for a season or two, nail a handful of draft picks and trades around the edges to then soar back up the table when the 25-27 group in the above graphic are in the 29-31 columns; almost like Port Adelaide’s demographic from a few years ago where they were very much youth and veterans with little in between.

Or they could go the other route. In addition to Baker’s potential departure (in either case I’m assuming he’s going back to WA), they move on a few of their most valuable pieces. Maybe they decide a potential haul for Shai Bolton is more valuable to kick start a refresh, Gold Coast come knocking for Dan Rioli with a dream offer as rumoured, then bid farewell to some of their experience as well, and happily stockpile even more draft capital over the next season or two.

If all that happens it could be a fistful of first rounders available to play with for a couple of years before Tasmania’s draft concessions arrive, providing the core for sustained success in the late stages of this decade and early in the next.

That would be the easy – safe – option, buying plenty of time with a supporter base probably more understanding than most given the three flags still relatively fresh in the memory.

Each route has its pros, each route has its cons. It’ll be a fascinating watch, starting with these last six games to see which players get time to shine and which ones already have a line through them.

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For those who have missed previous Notebook entries, here are links to the last five editions:

Playing ‘too safe’: FTN, R16
Carlton’s next step, Port’s system faults: FTN, R15
Brisbane’s movement shift, Bulldogs midfield rotations: FTN, R14
A mid-season stocktake of win predictions:FTN, R11
The unique part of Jordon’s role on Walsh: FTN, R10

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