- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
One can’t really assess an AFL draft class for the quality of players selected until around five years later.
Five years after being drafted by the Eagles in 2001 Chris Judd was a Brownlow Medalist, premiership captain and one of the most exciting young prospects football had ever seen – not to mention a verified superstar. Yet five years after being drafted by Richmond Jarrad Oakley-Nicholls, one of the biggest draft busts the game has seen, had been delisted by the Tigers and was struggling to get a game at his second team.
By the age of 23 or 24 you can see whether a player is in his team’s future plans, and how his paying abilities have made it so far at an elite level. The 2019 season will mark five years since the class of 2014, and while some players like Melbourne’s Christian Petracca, Angus Brayshaw and Jake Lever or Collingwood’s Jordan de Goey have lived up to and even exceeded their junior hype, many high picks from the class are entering a prove-it year that will be crucial in determining their AFL futures.
Games played: 35
Goals scored: 34
St Kilda was in a terrible period around the time of the draft, with a lack of young talent anywhere on the list. Looking to help forge an identity for the team, the Saints used their prized No. 1 pick on Geelong Falcons key forward Paddy McCartin. Up to this point he has looked nothing like the Nick Riewoldt replacement he was meant to be.
Averaging not even nine games a season due to various injuries and seven concussions in his short AFL career, McCartin has also not averaged a goal a game in the 36 contests he’s played. In the 2018 draft the Saints used their fourth pick on another highly touted key forward prospect, Max King. There is the likelihood that the two could be paired in a future Saints line-up, but all signs point to King being groomed to be St Kilda’s tall forward.
In his fifth AFL season the pressure is on McCartin to stay healthy and prove the haters wrong before he goes down as a tremendous draft bust. The Saints, who have been in a hole for so long, need their former prized prospect to step up.
Games played: 17 (all with Carlton)
Goals scored: 8 (all with Carlton)
A highly touted forward-midfielder hybrid of the kind that is all the rage in the modern game of footy, Pickett has flopped so far in the AFL. The pick ahead of fellow forward-midfielder hybrid Jordan de Goey, Pickett was traded for scraps in the 2016 off-season, and in two years at Carlton Pickett has looked nothing like the prized draftee he was just five short years ago.
In 2017 Pickett played only ten games for an abysmal Blues team that won only six games all year. Before the 2018 season he broke his wrist, playing only seven games that season, and in late December he ruptured his patella tendon in a scary training injury. Carlton is stacked with young players looking to make a breakthrough, and with Pickett to miss most of 2019, somebody could very well take his spot in an emerging line-up.
Nobody batted an eye when GWS traded Pickett for nothing after 2016. With his once-promising career slowly being derailed by injuries, it’ll take a miracle comeback for Pickett to look like the star he was at South Fremantle as a junior. Time is running out for him.
Games played: 11 (all with North Melbourne)
Goals scored: 3 (all with North Melbourne)
Another ballyhooed GWS top-ten pick who was meant to help put them over the top, Ahern is now biding his time with the Kangaroos. Luck is not on Ahern’s side, tearing his ACL twice in his time with the Giants before the Roos traded chicken feed for him just two years into his career.
Ahern finally debuted in 2018, playing 11 games and showing some promise. After many luckless years to the point the Giants just gave up on him, these little flashes are awesome, and Ahern was one of the best stories from the 2018 season. But if he wants to earn a bigger role in a promising young North Melbourne side, staying healthy and getting in a full off-season would be a great start.
Paul Ahern of the Kangaroos. (Adam Trafford/AFL Media/Getty Images)
Games played: 49
Goals scored: 64
‘Two-metre Peter’ was a highly touted key forwar-ruck prospect coming from the Calder Cannons TAC Cup team entering the draft, and while he has been a productive goal-scorer in his time up north, like so many guys on here inconsistency and injuries have marred his time in the AFL so far.
Wright’s draft profile told us of his strong overhead marking and elite goal-kicking abilities. While he has also shown flashes of this, apart from scoring the winning goal against the Eagles in Round 11, 2017, to give the Suns their first-ever win over West Coast, Wright has mostly just been a background figure who isn’t mentioned much by the casual fan. Part of that could be playing on the Gold Coast, but numerous calf injuries have also held back the promising young tall man.
With Tom Lynch leaving the Suns, Wright will likely be filling his shoes, and the pressure is on for him to succeed in 2019.
Games played: 54
Goals scored: 61
The son of dual Brownlow Medalist Peter Moore, expectations were high coming in on Darcy Moore as the Magpies named him a father-son pick on the night. The 203-centimetre player has shown flashes of stardom as a utility big man – though he is best utilised as a key forward– but injuries have limited Moore’s career up to this point.
Moore’s weakness up to this point has been hamstring injuries. Hamstring injuries limited his 2018 campaign and prevented him from playing in Collingwood’s losing grand final effort against the Eagles.
He was very close to signing a mammoth deal with Sydney at the end of 2018, but Moore repaid the Collingwood faith in him and signed a two-year deal with the Magpies, where he will have more opportunities to show he belongs in a terrific Collingwood side that will be contending for a premiership yet again in 2019. Stardom is in his reach if he can get on the field.
Darcy Moore of the Magpies. (AAP Image/Julian Smith)
Games played: 34
Goals scored: 25
A solid draft bolter at the time from the NT Thunder, Cockatoo was somewhat of a surprising pick by Geelong at Pick 10, taken maybe a little higher than most analysts or mock drafts had him. Cockatoo has shown flashes of being an excellent player, but the problem has been that he hasn’t been on the field enough to show what he’s made of.
Averaging eight games a year so far, the speedy midfielder has been hampered by multiple hamstring and knee issues, and in a stacked Cats midfield, time is running out for Cockatoo to prove he can be worth the high expectations that came on him from his draft spot. Luckily so far this offseason – according to Cats football manager Simon Lloyd – Cockatoo has reportedly been increasing his volume of running and looks destined for a great preseason.
Geelong has one of, maybe even the best, midfield groups in the competition, and Nakia Cockatoo can show in 2019 that he can add to that group.
Games played: 27 (all with Richmond)
Goals scored: 7 (all with Richmond)
Somewhat of an underachiever at Richmond who failed to consistently make the team as other players were, frankly, better than he was. On the Gold Coast he will have a fresh start and the chance to challenge for a consistent spot in the best 22.
Games played: 28 (17 with Gold Coast, 11 with Carlton)
Goals scored: 15 (10 with Gold Coast, 5 with Carlton)
He showed flashes of pace and brilliance up north, being nominated for goal of the year with an outstanding goal against Geelong in his first year, but he left the Suns to return home to Western Australia for family reasons after two years. He made a return to join Carlton in 2018m abd the livewire forward and skilled outside runner is hoping to be a consistent member of a young Blues side.
Games played: 9
Goals scored: 1
Touted as an outstanding 198-centimetre defensive prospect from the SANFL, Durdin was projected to go as high as Pick 10 to Geelong and was regarded as a steal for North Melbourne. But from a fractured tibia and a concussion to injuring his finger with a knife just a few days ago to put him out for up to ten weeks, this make-or-break season has not gotten off to a good start for Durdin. He needs to get on the park to have any chance of improvement.
Games played: 10 (all with St Kilda)
Goals scored: 1 (with St Kilda)
The second cousin of Brendon Goddard is going to have to do a hell of a lot of work to even come close to matching his cousin’s lofty standards. A 196-centimetre key defender-forward prospect, a ruptured Achille’s ended Goddard’s 2016 season prematurely and it all went downhill from there, failing to cement a spot in the Saints line-up. At Carlton he will have to prove he is still at AFL level if he wants any hope of matching what the other Goddard has done in the league.
Who’s in your ultimate team? Pick the best team and compete with other fans for daily prizes on Draftstars. For the best odds on the game try out Aussie bookmaker PlayUp. Think. Is this a bet you really want to place? Set a deposit limit.
Old mate summing it up better than anyone possibly could!
Not Jake Kelly's finest moment!
