Re: Post Game Passion: AFL 2019 Rd 22: Carlton vs St Kilda
Reply #86 –
On the relative contributions of Bolton, SOS and Teague...
It's really something we need to wait a bit longer to determine.
We're having a bit of a euphoric period just at the moment and the blue goggles are working overtime...but consider this...
Teague's coaching abilities will be tested during a full season in different ways.
Everything so far has been positive and hopefully he is able to meet any challenge that comes his way.
One of those will be the use and development of our younger brigade because a reality of our current success is that it's not built on the back of our youth.
It's a combination of youth and experience and in fact the major movers, and most consistent, have been players like Cripps, Murphy, Kreuzer, Simpson, Jones, Levi, Thomas, Ed Curnow.
None of which were recruited by Silvagni, and many of whom are playing much better football under Teague than they did under Bolton.
Of the young ones the best of them like Weitering, Walsh, Curnow, Harry, SPS were early draft picks.
But there are successes further down the list with some trades and acquisitions now looking like they'll be good players.
Consistency of the young ones is probably what needs to develop.
When most of the old crew give way to the young ones in two or three years time that's when the success of Silvagni's strategy can be really judged.
In Bolton's case....Unfortunately he'll get little credit (apart from maybe a few hard core supporters) because the young player's best football is still ahead of them and Teague will get the credit for their performances.
BB, no doubt, imparted important defensive lessons... lessons that will serve all our blokes well for the remainder of their careers. However, he also played too many out of position and subjected them to a confusing game plan and failure on a regular basis (see Crippa's comments re almost giving it up) which was not good for the player or club.
If DT gets credit for future good performances then it is very likely that that will be deserved at he will have been the one to bring it out of said player; he will have created the environment and culture where maturing players can show their best. But we're getting ahead of ourselves - he's a long way to go to get us into serious contention.
The sentimentality toward BB is nice but misplaced. In hindsight he was probably ideal for two years, to transition the side, to limit hidings while SOS rebuilt the list. When he identified the need for an offensive layer at the beginning of last year, we played about 15 minutes of strong offensive footy in the first game, then when challenged we withdrew into our shells, to remain there until a different approach was undertaken a couple of months back.
If MM or Pagan or even Ratts had delivered the identical record to BB they'd have been sacked earlier than half way through this year. Because BB is nice and friendly with a lovely smile we cut him far more slack than a surly MM or Pagan. In reality, I strongly suspect that BB would make an excellent welfare director at a club (might seem like feint praise, but I'm actually serious).