Booney wrote:So, Simon, it seems you think anyone over 18 not playing league football or in the AFL system is on the AFL scrapheap and AFL clubs are not watching them. Is this correct?
Name one SA player aged over 18 (i.e. who's missed out in the draft period once) not playing SANFL league football who has been drafted or rookied. kickinit has conceded there isn't one; but if you can enlighten us, please do so. 'Scrapheap' is your word; the fact is that if you're going to push yourself back into contention, the very first step is to get picked at SANFL league level.
To claim
kickinit wrote:Your basing your entire argument on what's happened in the past. That would be fine but things have changed and there is something new and improved to the system.
there needs to be some actual rational argument to suggest that AFL talent scouts and clubs are going to act differently from how they have to date. 'Look! We call our SANFL reserves squad an
academy!' isn't such an argument. The selling angle 'you get to hang around and train at One Club, maybe run into an AFL coach and use the same weights equipment that Jay Schulz uses, and if you're under our noses and doing a good job your AFL dream is more likely to come true' has been an available argument to try to persuade players to come and play for the Port SANFL reserves side since 2011. It hasn't exactly produced a stampede. There's no change of substance at all, let alone a change so great as to completely alter the way that AFL clubs go about selecting draftees and rookies from SA.
The simple fact is, there is no evidence for the claim, 'join an AFL club (at no matter how pitiful a level) after missing out in the draft, and you're more likely to get drafted'. And there is plenty of evidence for the claim that once you are over 18yoa, you need to be playing footy that makes you stand out at SANFL
league level to be a chance of being picked up as a mature draftee. A talented 18yo who has missed out in the AFL draft, will know these things. All of this 'facts' and 'evidence' stuff is inconvenient I know, but just saying the word 'academy' or the phrase 'new and improved' doesn't sprinkle magical fairy dust on the way the system works.