Are AFL draftees getting better and better?

The AFL draft class of 2022 looks like a seriously good crop. Harry Sheezel has justified North Melbourne’s use of pick No.3 and has dominated across half back this season. Father-son selection Will Ashcroft (Pick 2) has looked incredibly calm and composed throughout his first four games for the Brisbane Lions.

Mattaes Phillipou (Pick 10) has lit up a previously dour St Kilda forward line and contributed to the Saints’ unlikely 4-0 start to the season. Across the Nullarbor, Reuben Ginbey (Pick 9) has demonstrated great competitiveness in what is looking like a difficult season for the West Coast Eagles.

Each year, the AFL is experiencing greater on field influence from first year players. From the 2021 draft, Sam Darcy (Western Bulldogs – Pick 2), Nick Daicos (Collingwood – Pick 4) and Josh Rachele (Adelaide – Pick 6) looked immediately at home at AFL level.

From the 2020 draft, Jake Bowey (Pick 21) played in a premiership in his first year of AFL football. Daicos, seemingly a cut above the rest, has continued his brilliant form and currently leads the AFLCA coaches votes and Brownlow Medal markets.

The expectation on first round draft picks to hit the ground running heightened after the first years of the Blues’ Sam Walsh (Pick 1 – 2018 draft) and Gold Coast Suns duo Matt Rowell and Noah Anderson (Pick 1 and 2 – 2019 draft).

(Photo by Matt King/AFL Photos/via Getty Images)

Expectations have heightened since the early 2000s, when 17-year-old draftees were contracted as longer-term projects, with less urgency on their expected impact at AFL level. For example, the best player of the 21st century, Gary Ablett Jr., only played half of his first AFL year in the seniors at Geelong.

First-year players are getting better, but why is this? Firstly, they are more professional at an early age. Top-tier junior players identified at 12-13 years of age are now placed in elite high-performance weight and fitness programs that have been copied from AFL clubs.

Elite junior footballers are also provided scholarships to Australia’s best private schools, allowing for the AFL-level coaching and facilities that schools such as Melbourne Grammar or Scotch College can provide.

This means that when these youngsters turn professional, they are physically and mentally equipped to immediately endure the rigours of AFL football.

Secondly, numerous AFL clubs also offer academy programs now to local junior players. The Sydney Swans have effectively demonstrated this pathway via the drafting of local lads Callum Mills and Isaac Heeney. These academies allow players to be developed by AFL clubs at a far younger age, meaning that the leap to professional level from junior is not as large.

Due to concerns around concussion and greater tribunal scrutiny, the physical tactics imposed by players throughout AFL games has also changed significantly. Gone are the days where younger players were physically intimidated and targeted by older and more physically mature opponents.

For example, former No.1 draft pick Jack Watts was physically bullied in his first game for the Melbourne Demons by his more experienced Collingwood opponents. Why doesn’t this physical intimidation of younger players occur in 2023?

It will be interesting to see if the likes of Daicos and Sheezel attract more physical attention as the season continues.

The pace of AFL games has also changed over the last 10 years, with this change suiting younger players. The AFL is now a more agile and faster running-based sport, rather than a slower, more physical sport, with this shift potentially suiting the younger bodies.

Younger players playing in mud heaps at Moorabbin or Victoria Park in the 1980s or 1990s were less likely to have an impact compared to the men they were playing against.

Will the draft class of 2022 prove to be a hyper-talented exception? Or will future draft classes demonstrate that first year players are getting better and better?