My Two Cents: Rawlings is right to slam AFL’s ‘distasteful’ mid-season draft | Andrew Capel
It’s not just the state footy clubs that pay the price when the AFL sets out on its mid-season talent raids, writes Andrew Capel.
Opinion
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Jade Rawlings hit the nail on the head.
The Norwood premiership and SANFL state coach did not hold back when quizzed on his thoughts on the AFL’s contentious mid-season rookie draft, describing it as “distasteful’’.
“It really annoys me this time of year,” Rawlings said as the draft looms.
“We get appointed to try and pull together a team to try and win it (the premiership), and then they want to pick our team apart. I get really frustrated at this time of year.’’
Rawlings, who has the Redlegs flying on top of the SANFL ladder at 6-0 and on Sunday led the SA state side to a 63-point thrashing of the WAFL in Perth, might as well have been speaking for all eight standalone SANFL club coaches, although some of them are reluctant to publicly criticise the AFL.
The mid-season draft - to be held this year on Wednesday, May 29 - is wrong on so many fronts.
Sure, it might throw an unexpected AFL lifeline to a player from another league, but there are enough drafts during the year - the national, pre-season and rookie, along with the pre-season supplemental period - to do that without the potential of ruining a club’s finals or premiership aspirations during a season.
This is Rawlings’ point.
“They don’t know the full reality of what it does to your club,’’ he told SEN’s Sportsday SA.
“Sturt the other year (in 2021) lost Jed McEntee (to Port Adelaide) and Ash Johnson (Collingwood) in the one draft.
“You look at that and go, competitively it’s an advantage for Norwood and other clubs, but while it’s great for the individuals, it’s bad for the club.
“I’m pretty passionate about it and totally disagree with it (the mid-season draft) and believe the AFL is about being a marathon and having a list that is reflective to deal with the marathon.
“To try and pick holes out of competitions and clubs mid-year is unfair. People’s livelihoods can be affected by their win-loss (record) due to losing their best, or even a couple of players, mid-season.
“It’s great for the clubs to develop a player to get to that level but it doesn’t help with the win-loss and boards get a bit shaky when the win-loss isn’t going so well.
“I will be clear, I’m very supportive of young men achieving their dreams but I think to assemble a list in the off-season to try to give yourself the best chance of winning one (a flag) for your club and then have the big brother just take away part of your list at will, with minimal communication as to our thoughts on that particular player and what they are planning on doing, I find that a bit distasteful.’’
Seventeen SANFL players have been selected in the four mid-season drafts since its re-introduction in 2019 following a 26-year absence.
There was no mid-year draft in 2020 because of Covid and the late start or suspension of some leagues.
In 2019, South Adelaide’s Michael Knoll, Glenelg’s Lachie Hosie, West Adelaide’s Will Snelling and John Noble and Port’s Cam Sutcliffe found their way to AFL clubs.
In 2021 it was Johnson, McEntee, Norwood’s Jackson Callow and the Eagles’ Cooper Sharman.
The following year, the Crows struck the SANFL first by taking Brett Turner from the Tigers, who also lost Sam Durdin, ruining their premiership hopes.
They were among six players taken at the 2022 mid-season crapshoot, along with West’s Josh Carmichael, North Adelaide’s Jacob Bauer, the Eagles’ Zane Williams and South’s Jye Menzie.
Last year, Eagle Mitch Hardie and Tiger Matthew Coulthard found AFL homes.
While the SANFL is not certain to lose any players to the AFL next week, plenty of spots are opening up on AFL lists through season-ending injuries and concussion retirements.
SANFL players mentioned as potential pick-ups include Central District’s Jez McLennan, who won the Fos Williams Medal as SA’s best player in both state games this year, Sturt trio Snelling, Will Coomblas and Flynn Perez, Glenelg’s Riley Holder and Jake Walker, the Eagles’ Luke Beecken, the Panthers’ Noah Howes and the Bloods’ Will Patton and Kobe Ryan.
Rawlings said he was “aware that one of our players met with one club’’.
“I thought that club might have given me a call to let us know, but anyway, that’s a little gripe of mine,’’ he said.
Rawlings hates what losing a key player can do to a SANFL club just a third of the way into a season while also questioning the devastating impact it can have on players if they last just a few months on an AFL list.
He has seen first-hand just how badly they can be affected if they are picked up and then unceremoniously dumped.
Some mid-season draftees are only initially given a six-month contract - they can nominate six or 18 month deals - before being flicked.
“I’m big on trying to push our players to get as far as they can in their careers, I just disagree with it philosophically that they can go for six months and then not get the full AFL experience,’’ Rawlings said.
“I was lucky enough to have quite a number of years in the system (playing 148 AFL games for Hawthorn, Western Bulldogs and North Melbourne from 1996-2006 and then being an AFL assistant and senior caretaker coach) and know how much young, inexperienced players need the fullness of two years to get the two pre-seasons, to understand their game, the demands of the competition, possibly move interstate.
“If nothing else in my life, I know very well how to deal with a delisted young AFL player within two years.
“I’ve got so many of them at Norwood it’s not funny, I had experience with it at Casey Demons (VFL). They come to you beaten up, they come to you having lost confidence, deflated, (thinking) that was their chance.
“There are so many parts to it and they have to rebuild their lives as much as their mindset towards footy.
“That’s the challenge we accept and I enjoy trying to get them back and feeling good about themselves and footy.’’
Turner and Williams were both psychologically scarred after being delisted within six months of having their AFL dreams realised and then not playing an AFL game.
They have urged other mid-season draft prospects to nominate 18-month contracts.
“I blame the system. You’re only there for six months and then you get the flick, it’s lucky I didn’t go interstate, it would’ve been so much worse,’’ Turner said.
“Anyone who asks me about the mid-season draft, do not do it unless you’re nominating 18 months. If clubs want you badly enough, they’ll get you at the end of the year.”
Williams also called for a change to the rules for mid-season draftees, saying he didn’t get long enough to prove himself with the Cats.
“I think I had eight (VFL) games to prove myself,’’ he said after he was cut.
“I was nowhere near a fully finished product, you’d like a pre-season just to prove yourself, get used to a new system and be given time to develop your body and all that. Unfortunately I wasn’t given that.’’
NUMBERS GAME
12
Total points that Collingwood has beaten Adelaide by in their past four encounters.
17
Disposals for Port Adelaide’s Zak Butters in the final quarter of the one-point win against Hawthorn.
QUOTES OF THE WEEK
“We play a lot of soccer at training. Sometimes people might think we play too much but, gee, we got a return today in a really, really important second.”- Port Adelaide coach Ken Hinkley on Darcy Byrne-Jones’ last-second matchwinner against Hawthorn
“We’re still working our way through that (development) and learning from these experiences, but we’re sick of learning. We’re ready to take that next step.’’- Adelaide coach Matthew Nicks after the four-point loss to Collingwood
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