Carlton need to reassess their recruiting strategy

Ronan had an article recently about bias in commentary. The good thing about this article is you are open about your bias - you hate Carlton. The problem is that your bias so obviously reflects what you've written. Process: I have belief that Carlton's recruiting is crap, go and find some data that supports theory, present as fact. There is no point debating ( macca one day you'll work this out) as both sides are just gathering data to support their respective positions. And those positions are set based on an emotional response - love Carlton/ hate Carlton - can't argue with emotion. My personal view is that Carlton now has a good recruiting strategy and coaching team and success will flow soon. But no point debating as our bias determines our response.

Carlo, I take your point about development - and you are right. Adelaide had Mattner, Hawthorn had Kennedy, Richmond had White. They did, and are, thriving at their second clubs thanks to being used better and having more confidence shown in them. As an aside, we have the example of Richard Tambling. Taken, I believe, as a high draft pick by Richmond he played a hundred games but failed to really impress. Adelaide then took him and, presumably, they had a reason to do so. He made no impact at all at Adelaide which raises the question of their talent spotting and their development. He was a wasted pick, as things turned out. The question is, could he have performed better, at both clubs, if used differently. We'll never know but as things stand you do wonder what Adelaide saw - and what did they expect?

Dalgety, I reckon the AFL owes Freo a debt of gratitude. They were the first club to really ignore the model of drafting only teenagers and waiting three years for them to develop. They took a punt and it paid off. Now every club looks at mature age players in a different light.

Macca, I absolutely agree with your point about big kids dominating their age group. It's a big step up.

The point is Gene that Pods tried out for several clubs and was rejected....until Geelong took the punt. The same Pods Geelong liked, the other clubs did not. And yet Podsiadly is now a premiership player and a respected AFL footballer. He didn't suddenly come good after arriving at Geelong.

They both came in the same rookie draft Gene. Both started in 2010, Barlow was more immediately spectacularly successful, while Pods start was as a great second forward option. Broughton & Ballantyne were taken the year before as older recruits and were earlier indicators of the value of looking past the 18 & 19 year olds only model.

"Then Fremantle grabbed Barlow and an extraordinary thing happened – it turned out he could play. After that, of course, came Pods ..." Barlow was drafted to Fremantle Football Club with their first selection in the 2010 Rookie Draft Podsiadly was selected as a mature aged rookie by Geelong in the 2009 AFL rookie draft

Bayman - Great post and on Mattner and White we might just add Laidler to that list, Malthiouse refused to play him and tried to force him ot be a forward in the VFL despite some quite obvious value and now he appears to be a regualr for the Swans! The other thing about recruiting 18 years olds is recruiting 18 year KPP, a lot of these kids have been the biggest kid all their lives and when the get to AFL level or even playing against mature bodies in the VFL suddenly they find they need some extra tricks up their sleeve other than being big, especially when you have 190cm midfielders running around.

Im beating a drum as loud as Macca with the compromised draft, but getting them to the team is only half the fun. If your development sucks then there is almost no chance of getting a player to play to their full potential let alone beyond. It is not any coincidence that the clubs that are the best at picking up mature talent are the same ones that have a good draft record. It is development as much if not more than recruitment.

The truth is that all clubs need to be on top of their recruiting strategy in this modern age of the draft and salary cap. In days of old, clubs like Carlton were simply able to produce the cheque book and buy the best. When the Blues picked up Kernahan, Bradley and Motley in 1986 they were getting proven SANFL players, state representatives all, and still only about twenty-two years old. Kernahan and Bradley were also SANFL premiership players. Kernahan, of course, was also a Carlton fan when he was a Glenelg which made it a bit easier. Now, of course, it's more likely to be an untried eighteen year old who, despite impressive physical performances at the draft camp, is still something of an unknown at the highest level. The rankings of such players continues to fascinate me given these rankings are arrived at largely based on their form and performance against other kids their own age. For years AFL recruiters believed, and spread the mantra, that anybody not picked up by the age of nineteen or twenty was never going to be picked up. They were past it. Then Fremantle grabbed Barlow and an extraordinary thing happened - it turned out he could play. After that, of course, came Pods, Puopolo was picked up from Norwood (SANFL), Pike turned up from Canada of all places, etc., etc. Let's face it, who in Melbourne would have considered Poupolo as a potential AFL player, let alone a premiership player. Hawthorn did and they got the benefit. The other fascinating 'truth' is the idea that to be any good at all a player must be picked up in the top ten of the draft - top twenty at the outside. I've lost count of the number of players who have turned out to be absolute guns but came well after pick thirty. James Hird was pick 79. Think about that for a minute. What it shows is that beep test results probably come somewhere after character, determination, work ethic, willingness to listen and improve. It also shows that not all recruiters are the experts they would have us believe. Corey Enright was picked up from the SANFL at a pick somewhere in the forties. He won two Geelong B&Fs and both in premiership years. You'd take that any day of the week. The Barlows, Puopolos, Enrights of this world were not meant to be AFL stars. But they are and they are just a sample of what can happen with astute recruiting. The talent spotter at any club, if he's really good, is now just about the most important guy there. Equally, if he's no good and doesn't really know what to look for then he's a liability - regardless of the draft position. Identifying talent, however, is a risky business. The same club which spotted Puopolo let Kennedy go to Sydney where, suffice to say, he's been a gun. McGlynn, too, has been a Sydney regular since leaving Hawthorn and Sydney have been a power in that time. In other words, Kennedy and McGlynn are not now getting games in a lower ranked team. Kennedy has a Swans premiership to his name and McGlynn would have but for injury at the wrong time. So, for me, the fascination in each and every recruit for each an every club is this; what did that club see in that player......that another club missed? Adelaide let Mattner go after 98 games.....and he played over a 100 more at Sydney, including a premiership. White may well end up doing something similar at Port Adelaide after Richmond failed to keep him. My advice to any club is this; find the best talent spotter and buy him. The rest will take care of itself. The best off-field clubs are usually the best on-field clubs. Perhaps there's a reason Carlton have been down for awhile.

Carlton will never win a flag with sheep dogs getting cheapies out the back in Simpson and Gibbs. You don't have any "bulls" in your midfield. As a Collingwood supporter, I am loving the recruitment of Carlton. In all fairness, Carlton have sacked their recruiter at the start of this year. Go Pies!!

These rookie pundits will certainly look like a pack of mugs if the Blues keep on winning.

And you forgot to mention Melbourne has 12 flags to Geelong's paltry 9. Put that in your pipe and smoke it!

Well researched and informative article you write. Seems that Blues bashing is all the rage at the moment. Maybe you too should offer your 'indepth' knowledge and recruitment skills to the Blues recruiting department along with all the other experts.

"What is Carlton’s biggest need right now? it is Key Position Players, in the 2010 draft we drafted 3 talls Watson, Mcarthy and Mitchell. Of these three only Watson is still around and he is not exactly setting the world on fire." This goes to the heart of my compromised draft theory, when the compromised drafts came the blues needed to get a KPP and drafted 3 in 2010 (plus McInnes too I think) but none of them worked out - yes there were others in the draft that did and the blues could of taken them but the fact over 2010 and 11 the expansion teams swallowed up the bulk of the top KPP players and the blues best pick was waht would of normally been about pick 30 instead of around pick 8 or 9.

Dalgety - At the time of the trade I don't think the blues could of predicted what would happen to Fev after 2 years so at the time of their decision the thinking was sound. On Kennedy and Henderson, Kennedy is 27 in August while Henderson is 25 in December and Henderson can play both ends so while Kennedy would be great to have right now I don't think he is going to be that much better than the Fev/Henderson plus Lucas combo. And the blues got money out of those 2 years - they got some excitement for their supporters and W's on the board which got more sponsorship, better facilites and less debt. What have West COast got out of Kennedy?

"Collingwood are the only team in that ten-year period to recruit players that immediately helped bring a premiership, namely Luke Ball and Darren Jolly. But the Pies also added draftees and rookies into the mix." I know it's already been mentioned, but...wow. Sydney and, in particular, Hawthorn, have schooled the competition in how to recruit for Premierships...especially when you have a Norm Smith medallist called Brian Lake.

What did Carlton have to show for those two years? And who would you prefer Henderson or Kennedy?

Not sure but Fev kicked 188 goals in his 2 post Judd seasons at the blues and then Cartlon got Henderson and pick 11 or 12 for him so I don't think they made the wrong call if they did.

Didn't WC want Fevola for Judd, but Carlton turned them down?