AFL trade 2023: Latest trade, contract news and analysis
The Blues have limited cap space, and any offer they put to Tom De Koning will likely be dwarfed by rivals. Here’s how they can keep him.
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Carlton has the cap space to offer Tom De Koning a two-year deal of around $600,000 as it continues to hand him the No. 1 ruck role.
While that is a hefty pay packet for an emerging ruckman with only 42 games under his belt it could be dwarfed by rival offers.
Sydney and St Kilda would be likely to offer deals between six to eight years, while Geelong is also interested but traditionally hasn’t paid overs for rival stars.
On form industry sources say De Koning would normally be rewarded with a deal of around $450,000 a season but the Blues will have to better that to keep their man.
Their tight cap will preclude them matching massive offers, so it will be up to De Koning how much he wants to sacrifice to stay at the Blues.
SUNS MAINSTAY’S SELFLESS ACT
David Swallow has made the selfless decision to take a significant pay cut on his lucrative contract in the wake of the Gold Coast’s jettisoning of Jack Bowes.
Swallow was due up to $1 million in the next two seasons after signing a massive five-year contract in 2018 at a time when co-captains Steven May and Tom Lynch had just left the club.
But the Herald Sun understands Swallow, midfielder Brayden Fiorini and forward Alex Sexton have all been handed an extra season in return for significant pay cuts.
The Suns were criticised for handing over pick 7 to Geelong in a deal that saw the Cats absorbing his $800,000 wage for 2023 and 2024.
But that decision was another reminder to Suns players how tight the cap was and in the subsequent months the club was able to off-set all three deals to improve its salary cap.
Swallow, seen as one of the Suns’ most loyal and beloved players, will take a pay cut of up to $200,000 in each of the 2023 and 2024 seasons.
He will be paid around $800,000 until the 2025 season and while it is still a healthy wage it highlights the premium the Suns have paid in the past to secure their stars.
Fiorini and Sexton were both due over $500,000 for the 2023 season, with a trade falling through for Fiorini at Collingwood when Tom Mitchell emerged as a gettable player.
Both will get an extra year through to 2025 but Fiorini now has the next two seasons to break into the senior side while playing for less than $300,000 in both of those seasons.
BATTLE OF THE BRIDGE HEATS UP OFF-FIELD
Sydney’s determination to be active in the trade market has them registering interest in cross-town swingman Harry Himmelberg.
Himmelberg took a mark of the year contender in the Giants’ round 1 victory over Adelaide but has been used back since the halfway mark of 2022 despite his unerring accuracy as a forward.
GWS is keen to keep him and believes he is seriously considering staying.
But given his free agency status clubs like Adelaide and Sydney will assess his market worth.
The Giants would not match a deal worth well over $700,000, which would also trigger first-round compensation.
Richmond’s first-round pick is already in the Giants’ keeping so if Himmelberg left they would have three top-15 picks in an upcoming superdraft.
But they would far prefer securing Himmelberg given his unique skillset at a club that has much of the salary cap tied up in elite midfielders.
SA CLUBS CIRCLE HAWTHORN RISING STAR
Both South Australian clubs have strong interest in Hawthorn’s utility Will Day as the 21-year-old holds off contract talks until later in the season.
Hawthorn is keen to give the West Adelaide midfielder serious midfield time this year but he is such a versatile player that he has been played across the ground early in his career.
While rival suitors see his massive potential since arriving at Hawthorn as a No. 13 draft pick the Hawks could point to the fact he doesn’t have high best-and-fairest finishes so far.
So the Hawks might have to pay him on potential given the extreme interest across the competition as he works through the biggest decision of his young career.
“We all know he has talent and he is important for Hawthorn and they aren’t making any secret of that,” his manager Anthony McConville said.
“For Will it is about seeing himself fitting into the team and what role he plays. We will see how it unfolds along the way. He has had a few injuries along the way but he wants to be the best version of himself. It will all play out but he just wants to play good footy.”
ROOS LOCK AWAY RISING STAR AS KEY PILLAR PREPARES TO RETURN
North Melbourne’s prized No. 4 draft pick George Wardlaw is preparing to return to football this weekend as Rising Star nominee Harry Sheezel locked away his future.
Sheezel on Tuesday signed a two-year extension through to 2026 that will secure his future at the club for his first four seasons.
The Roos had their No. 1 overall pick Jason Horne-Francis flee back to Adelaide after a turbulent first season, with a trade allowing the Roos to secure picks two and three in the 2022 national draft.
While Brisbane matched a bid for Will Ashcroft to turn those picks into three and four, they secured Victorians Sheezel and Wardlaw to help boost their midfield stocks.
Sheezel secured 34 possessions on debut in a blinding performance from half back and Wardlaw has finally ticked off his rehab after eight weeks of strengthening exercises on his body.
He had battled hamstring issues across his final junior year and had again suffered some issues across the summer.
The Roos confirmed on Tuesday night Wardlaw would play three quarters in the VFL in his first official minutes as a Kangaroo.
He will take the field alongside former top 10 pick Tarryn Thomas in a Saturday VFL game, with Thomas building fitness and yet to be approved by the AFL for a senior return.
Meanwhile McKay gave the most positive outlook on his future on Saturday on Triple M when he made clear he had never been happier at the club.
The Herald Sun reported this year he was likely to wait until the season got under way to consider his future, with Port Adelaide a likely suitor.
But he said he hoped the contract would “sort itself out” with the club.
“I think first and foremost I am really happy with where things are at. I have had good conversations with the club. And it is a conversation between my family, my manager and myself to keep in-house but I am loving the club.
“The last three or four months has been the best I have had in my seven years and the changes we have had with Clarko (new coach Alastair Clarkson) and Todd Viney and the maturity of the group has been really good from a holistic perspective and I understand the talk but I am really happy and it will come to a point through the year where it will sort itself out but for now I am pretty happy.”
Roos list boss Brady Rawlings said the club was ecstatic to sign up Sheezel past his initial two-year contract.
“We are thrilled to have both a player and person of Harry’s calibre commit to the club for a further two years,” Rawlings said.
“Harry is clearly an exciting talent and has shown the potential to play several roles for the club, whether it’s up forward, in the midfield or off half-back.
“His debut against the Eagles was only a small preview of what Harry has to offer, and we look forward to seeing what more he is capable of as he gets more games under his belt.”
TRADE ANALYSIS: HOW RIVAL COULD POUNCE ON FYFE
Nat Fyfe might just be surplus to requirements at Fremantle after all.
Only six weeks after he had the Dockers captaincy gently taken off him, he was just as roundly ignored on the football field on Sunday.
In Fremantle’s humbling loss to St Kilda, he didn’t play a single minute as a midfielder.
Even ruckman Luke Jackson attended two centre square bounces as a pure onballer ahead of dual Brownlow Medallist Fyfe.
And as a key forward he was targeted only three times inside 50 despite Fremantle’s 65 inside 50s for the match.
Fyfe was always aware that his first six or eight weeks as a key forward might be rocky given how little he has played in that role.
The question if he cannot change his fortunes is how dramatically it shapes the contract talks that were set to kick off in coming months had Fyfe’s forward experiment gone as seamlessly as Justin Longmuir hoped.
When the smooth-moving David Mundy was patrolling the midfield the Dockers could be forgiven for pushing contested beast Fyfe to the fringes.
But Fremantle have replaced him with Fyfe Lite.
In Jaeger O’Meara they have another contested ball animal who doesn’t use it particularly well, the ex-Hawk winning 19 disposals but going at just 50 per cent by foot.
Yet Fyfe wasn’t even used as a break-glass-in-case-of-emergency mid as St Kilda held on late, instead spilling a chest mark on the lead in the final 130 seconds as the Saints held on.
Fyfe was poor – just nine disposals, only three of his seven kicks effective, just a single point from his two shots at goal.
The inaccuracy shouldn’t surprise given his 6.26 in 2021 meant from the last two seasons he has the second-worst accuracy of the top 150 forwards.
In a week when Brodie Grundy flourished at his new club and Todd Goldstein learned how brutal selection can be for over 30s, Fyfe might be a square peg in a round hole.
Fremantle will counter that moving the ball so slowly never gave any of the Dockers forwards a chance.
The players were crestfallen post-match that they had played into the hands of the Ross Lyon-coached Saints by moving the ball with such little dare.
But as David King told Fox Footy’s First Crack: “This Nathan Fyfe thing at full forward is not going to work. He’s an absolute superstar midfielder, he’s a walk up Hall of Famer. We love Nathan Fyfe. But he’s not a forward.”
Clearly that contract would factor in a huge pay cut given he was in the top three earners across his six-year $7 million deal.
Fyfe might well bounce back by tearing North Melbourne apart but if it is apparent early in the season he won’t work as a forward, neither party needs to engage in those talks quickly.
Fyfe is 32 in September so if he left for a rival club the free agency compensation would be scant.
But the Dockers could secure an extra $500,000 or more in salary cap space to get them into the Kysaiah Pickett sweepstakes.
They might need to offer the kind of mega-contract that got Luke Jackson home, but Pickett would reunite with his great mates Jackson and Liam Henry.
At 21 he would be exactly the kind of highly talented small forward who would grow alongside 21-year-old Jackson and 19-year-old Jye Amiss in the Dockers forward line.
A premiership contender could secure Fyfe as a free agent aware he only needs to win a final as a bash-and-crash midfielder to justify the expense.
All of it is just spitballing so early in the season and yet Fremantle is resolute that Fyfe’s future lies in a position up forward far away from the midfield where he made his name as a champion.
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Originally published as AFL trade 2023: Latest trade, contract news and analysis
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