How Dogs and Demons built their grand final teams
This year’s grand finalists have built their lists in a very similar fashion. The basic template is:
- Nail top 10 draft picks in consecutive drafts
- Have some father-son luck
- Develop some mid-range draftees
- Boldly trade out a brilliant but high-maintenance player with market value
- Fill holes by trading experienced players into the side
- Don’t waste a crisis
- Leave St Kilda fans exasperated (this last one is inadvertent).
Melbourne’s Christian Petracca.Credit:Getty Images
Getting those early picks right
For varying reasons, Cale Morton, Jack Watts, Tom Scully, Jack Trengove and Jimmy Toumpas departed Melbourne well before the Dees contended for this premiership. If you are poor enough for long enough, you will keep getting early picks, and eventually Melbourne had a run of early selections that they nailed. The jewels here are clearly Christian Petracca and Clayton Oliver, but Christian Salem and Angus Brayshaw have also become important cogs, with Salem taking his game to another level this season.
The Dogs didn’t plumb the sustained depths Melbourne did. They didn’t waste years of early picks because they were preliminary finalists three years running from 2008 to 2010. But the Dogs’ two best players in 2021 were top-five draft picks in consecutive years: Jack Macrae and Marcus Bontempelli.
Bulldog family: Tom Liberatore.Credit:Getty Images
Thanks dad
The Dogs enjoyed a charmed run with father-son selections. To have access within five years to Tom Liberatore, Mitch Wallis, Lachie Hunter and Zaine Cordy (older brother Ayce didn’t quite make it) is up there with the best paternal runs in VFL/AFL history. The Dees didn’t quite have the quantity to match but getting Jack Viney with a second-round pick in 2012 meant Melbourne effectively got another top-10 draft pick who is close enough to be peaking at the same time Petracca, Salem and Oliver are also in their prime.
Good value: Bayley Fritsch.Credit:Getty Images
Digging deep
Building a list cannot entirely be about top-10 picks. Certainly those early selections are critical, but to build a support cast clubs need to find some diamonds in the rough. The most glittering of those diamonds is Max Gawn, 208 centimetres and most definitely rough around the edges but a selection deep in the second round who has worked out brilliantly. The Dees have a host of later or rookie picks who have worked out well: Tom McDonald, Alex Neal-Bullen, Bayley Fritsch, James Harmes, Charlie Spargo etc. The Dogs have had success in this regard too, dating all the way to Easton Wood with pick 43 in 2007 and Jason Johannisen as a rookie at the end of 2010. A premiership captain and a Norm Smith medallist. Handy.
Finals surprise: Josh Schache.Credit:Getty Images
Make the gutsy call
The Dogs and the Dees have in the past four years both relinquished one of their most talented but enigmatic players. Only a year on from the 2016 premiership the Bulldogs offloaded Jake Stringer to Essendon at a time when “The Package” should have been theoretically coming into his prime. It was a risky call and no doubt Stringer would’ve been useful this year, a season in which he reached new heights. But from that trade the Dogs found one of the picks that helped them gain Josh Schache, who has come from the clouds to play a key role in this finals series.
It was Melbourne’s turn a year later. Jesse Hogan had been built up to almost messianic proportions when signed via the mini-draft at the end of 2012. He won the Rising Star Award in 2015 and the prospect of him returning to Western Australia one day loomed as the Dees’ doomsday scenario.
And then it happened. And the world didn’t cave in. In fact, Melbourne managed to effectively turn Hogan into Steven May, who after a shaky start has become one of the Demons’ pillars. They also gained the draft pick that netted Tom Sparrow, another senior regular. Hogan was gone from Fremantle after just two years. He remains a threat at Greater Western Sydney but the Dees have come out of this series of deals very well.
Melbourne’s Ed Langdon.Credit:AFL Photos
Experience counts
The cream of both grand finalists came via early draft picks. But both have also done good business at the trade table in recent seasons. The Dogs lured Alex Keath and Josh Bruce in 2019 while still keeping their first pick, which they used on Cody Weightman. Last year it was Adam Treloar, Mitch Hannan and Stefan Martin. From earlier years, Hayden Crozier, Schache and Taylor Duryea have also been helpful acquisitions.
Melbourne have been similarly successful. Jake Lever has been instrumental to their success, so too May. Ed Langdon was acquired for a very reasonable price, while free agent Adam Tomlinson played an important role this year before going down with injury. The Dees then turned back-up ruckman Braydon Preuss into Ben Brown at the end of 2020.
Finals star: Bailey Smith.Credit:Getty Images
The recession they had to have
It isn’t as though both clubs enter the decider on the back of long runs of making the finals. The Dogs won just eight matches in 2018, but that gave them the chance to pick early in the “super draft”, where they picked Bailey Smith, arguably the player of the finals to date. Melbourne finished second-bottom only two years ago but struck gold in the draft with Luke Jackson, Kozzy Pickett – acquired via a canny deal with North Melbourne – and Trent Rivers.
Max Gawn is one of many stars the Saints could have drafted.Credit:AFL Photos
Oh, when the Saints
Which brings us to St Kilda. Poor old St Kilda, who will again have the longest active premiership drought if the Dees salute. Saints fans hardly need reminding that their club bypassed each of Petracca, Bontempelli and Aaron Naughton, all of whom were taken with a pick immediately after a St Kilda player. It’s a brutal business, drafting in the top 10. Or even deeper, as former Saint Nick Winmar acknowledged on Twitter the night of the Dees-Cats preliminary final. Winmar, a distant relative of celebrated Saint Nicky Winmar, was taken at pick 32 in the 2009 draft, two spots ahead of Gawn. Winmar finished his AFL career unbeaten, but alas the sample size was two matches.
HOW THE LISTS WERE ASSEMBLED
Melbourne
2005
Nathan Jones (pick 12)
2008
Neville Jetta (pick 51)*
2009
Max Gawn (pick 34)
2010
Tom McDonald (pick 53)
2013
Christian Salem (pick 9)
Jack Viney (pick 26)
Jayden Hunt (pick 57)
James Harmes (rookie draft, pick 2)
2014
Christian Petracca (pick 2)
Angus Brayshaw (pick 3)
Alex Neal-Bullen (pick 40)
Aaron vandenBerg (rookie draft, pick 2)
2015
Jake Melksham (trade)
Clayton Oliver (pick 4)
Sam Weideman (pick 9)
Joel Smith (Category B rookie)
2016
Michael Hibberd (trade)
2017
Jake Lever (trade)
Charlie Spargo (pick 29)
Bayley Fritsch (pick 31)
Harrison Petty (pick 37)
Oskar Baker (pick 48)
2018
Steven May (trade)
Tom Sparrow (pick 27)
James Jordon (pick 32)*
Marty Hore (pick 46)
Aaron Nietschke (pick 53)*
Toby Bedford (pick 75)
Austin Bradtke (Category B rookie)
Kade Chandler (rookie draft, pick 14)
2019
Jay Lockhart (pre-season supplemental)
Adam Tomlinson (free agent)
Ed Langdon (trade)
Luke Jackson (pick 3)
Kysaiah Pickett (pick 12)
Trent Rivers (pick 32)
2020
Mitch Brown (pre-season supplemental)
Ben Brown (trade)
Jake Bowey (pick 21)
Bailey Laurie (pick 22)
Fraser Rosman (pick 34)
2021
Majak Daw (pre-season supplemental)
Deakyn Smith (pre-season supplemental)
Kye Declase (mid-season rookie draft, pick 15)
Daniel Turner (mid-season rookie draft, pick 24)
Western Bulldogs
2007
Easton Wood (pick 43)
2010
Mitch Wallis (pick 22)
Tom Liberatore (pick 41)
Jason Johannisen (rookie draft, pick 39)
2011
Lin Jong (rookie draft, pick 62)
2012
Jack Macrae (pick 6)
Lachie Hunter (pick 49)
2013
Marcus Bontempelli (pick 4)
2014
Toby McLean (pick 26)
Bailey Dale (pick 45)
Zaine Cordy (pick 64)
Roarke Smith (rookie draft, pick 5)*
2015
Josh Dunkley (pick 25)
Bailey Williams (pick 48)
2016
Tim English (pick 19)
Patrick Lipinski (pick 28)
Lewis Young (pick 49)
2017
Hayden Crozier (trade)
Josh Schache (trade)
Aaron Naughton (pick 9)
Ed Richards (pick 16)
2018
Taylor Duryea (trade)
Bailey Smith (pick 7)
Rhylee West (pick 26)
Laitham Vandermeer (pick 37)
Ben Cavarra (pick 45)*
Will Hayes (pick 78)*
Buku Khamis (next generation rookie)
Jordon Sweet (rookie draft, pick 22)
2019
Ryan Gardner (mid-season rookie draft, pick 6)
Josh Bruce (trade)
Alex Keath (trade)
Cody Weightman (pick 15)
Louis Butler (pick 53)
Riley Garcia (pick 62)
2020
Mitch Hannan (trade)
Adam Treloar (trade)
Stefan Martin (trade)
Jamarra Ugle-Hagan (pick 1)
Dominic Bedendo (pick 55)
Lachie McNeil (rookie draft, pick 11)
2021
Anthony Scott (pre-season supplemental)
*=subsequently delisted and re-rookied or transferred to rookie list
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