The salary cap debacle, offering Mark Mercuri (who was never the same player after his brother died) a ridiculously long and lucrative contract, the failure of the club to invest in player development (which is why Mark Harvey left, as he and Kevin Sheedy have confirmed), injuries ruining the careers of the very talented forward duo of Scott Gumbleton and Courtney Johns, Adam Ramanauskas getting cancer and the spate of soft tissue injuries caused by playing at Docklands (with the underlay of the surface being concrete) were also significant factors. The salary cap (debacle) induced exodus of Justin Blumfield, Chris Heffernan and Blake Caracalla was also made much worse by the fact that Essendon (not expecting such an exodus) had in the couple of years leading up to it let go a number of talented fringe (and still young) players such as Judd Lalich, Chris Ladhams and Andrew Ukovic. Losing Michael Prior and then Danny Jacobs at the end of 2000 and 2003 respectively made the situation even worse.
mate agree with everything other than Courtney Johns was an absolute, unequivocal hack and only remained on the list because he was Kevin's pet project aka next Dean Wallis (who we love).
@@chrisferguson237 Interestingly, he was given Dean’s old number, after Danny Jacob’s left, which supports the view that he was one of Kevin Sheedy’s pet projects. Kevin always placed a lot of significance on the numbers he gave to players.
Lastly, Kevin Sheedy’s plan for the end of 2007 was to trade Matthew Lloyd (for Chris Judd) and play Scott Lucas at full forward. By this time, Lloyd’s effectiveness as a forward had diminished (whilst his self-regard had only grown) and Scott had become more suited to the full forward role. As it was, even the useless Matthew Knights soon tired of Lloyd’s behaviour.
@@richardwood9177 Lloyd didn’t want to play that role. Knights tried to get him to play a supporting role, rather than be the focal point, and it resulted in his retirement.
@@richardwood9177That is not how Lloyd saw it. There is an interview in which he complains about Knights not wanting him to play full forward and it leading to his retirement. Carey and Hart were also the focal points for their teams. Carey, especially after Longmire’s influence diminished, tended to play between both positions. Both Hart and Carey were more mobile and better athletes that Lloyd.
I think you nailed it overall. Except for number ten. Dodoro got us Stringer, Martin, Duursma, and Durham. Given the hand he had to play immediately after the Saga he did as well as anyone. You said yourself, what could Perkins be if he had been recruited by Geelong. I'm not saying he got it all right but he did get a lot right. His tenure coincided with bad coaching decisions and lousy player development, as you pointed out. He was in place though out, but correlation is not causation. My number one, is poor board and senior management appointments. That was why we left the MCG and all the other reasons you list begin with the people at the top, who over the years have made a successsion of bad decisions. I Think we have got that right now, andI to think Brad Scott is a good appointment.
When our good players want to leave our club for whatever apparent reason & then play next season in finals for our opponents, that is telling me that our players are not on the same page & we are not an enjoyable environment ! Some recent examples are Daniher, Saad, McKenna
Really good video. You can add several other reasons as well of course. One of my bugbears is this whole 1 good season, heres a massive 5 year contract approach, then for the vast majority of these situations you see the player (whether its a Mcphee, a Wright, a Hurley, a Parish etc etc, the list is endless), go on to drop away over that time from A or B grade down to struggling to get a senior game.
There's lots of things that I agree with here. Every single word that you said about Bomba Thomson being the head coach and James Hird being his eventual successor... is ten trillion and ten percent correct. What you said about the Adrian is also entirely correct. One thing that I thought was worth a mention though, that you didn't touch on... have been the Presidents coming and going. Also, what was that guy's name who had the job for 24 hours and then was gone? The religious guy? That entire episode was horrible. There's an ancient Chinese saying: Dead fish rots, from the head first. If you don't understand that, look at the management mess of Essendon IN the past 20 years. Even Craig Vosso now, as the perfect example. There has never been a single "Welcome to Essendon" video on Craig Vosso. If anybody wants to know anything about Craig Vosso, you'd have to Google him... because there's not a single mention of him or even a photo of him sitting at his desk holding his pen with a cheesy grin. There's absolutely fucking Nothing on him or about him. And he's supposed to be the ... what is he? He's the CEO or he's the something. Does he do anything? Has he improved the club since he's been in his present position? I've no clue, I know absolutely nothing about him... and I'm not gonna Google him because wouldn't you have thought that the Essendon Website would have had something on him? Guess what... there's nothing on the bloke. Absolutely nothing. Also, what you said about the club not investing enough time in developing the younger players. As evidence of this, I could sum all the evidence up that you need in two words. Massimo D'Ambrosio. If I could use another two words, I could use "Patrick Voss." Patrick Voss never got a run, at all. Why wasn't Anthony Munkara given more support? Bloody hell, it just gets worse the more you think about it. Anthony Mosquito, my God. All these kids I've mentioned could have been "anything," though they weren't... they're all gone. One thing that Fly has done at Collingwood that's been really beneficial, especially since they won the flag... was that they've continued to blood young players. Collingwood bled seven first year players the year AFTER they won the flag, last year Brad only gave two kids a run for the first time... and then Archie Roberts only got two games. Please may I give my two cents worth on Brad Scott? I'll be honest with you, I'm not sold on Brad yet. He says that he doesn't want a short term fix of sugar coating wins (or something or other, whatever that means) my question Now is: What's wrong with winning now? Why does he not seem to have any type of enthusiasm about winning sooner than later? This eight year plan he's got won't mean anything if he gets the bullet in a year from now because we keep loosing, will it? I say Brad needs a talking to already, the sooner the better... they just gotta find someone with the balls to say it to him.
Well said mate - I can’t argue with a single point - especially sacking the CEO on his first day because he went to a Christian church! Imagine sacking a Muslim or a Jew because they went to a mosque or a synagogue? This actually was the straw that broke the camels back for me and I cancelled my over a decade long membership the next day because I was so appalled about it and I won’t consider rejoining as a member until our rotten president is gone (talking of fish rotting from the head!).
I agree with those reasons (I would have liked discussion around the influence of coterie groups) And while looking back the way you have, with calm and reason is important so we can move fwd. too many Essendon fans only look back and refuse to learn or look forward. I have more confidence in the clubs direction than I have in years. I have been a fan for more than 40 years, but lost my love in the late 2000s and early 2010s. I have been as frustrated as everyone else. But finally I can see the sun poking out of the clouds.
@daniel Bombers spent ten years trying to get athletes and make them football players Geelong recruited football players that turned in to athletes Remember sheeds speed speed speed That was biggest problem I think
Hindsight is a wonderful thing. The facts you gave are on todays knowledge, which would have been unknown back in the early 2000's. Dodoro was considered one of the best recruiting mangagers at the time, and i think you have to base his tenure on a year to year basis rather than a 20 year span. Every recruitment manager has wins and loses and how much different would the decisions another manger have made to the ones Dodoro made, they could have been worse. Going to Marvel stadium was a fantastic deal for the club, possibly didnt turn out right, again hindsigt. I have no doubt watsoever that Hird would have been a great coach if it wasnt for the drag saga and Bomber a great assistant. I think the number 1 reason is "lack of development" this was (and still is) the no 1 coach killer, all those coaches you mentioned where probably good appointments at the time, but you have to assign some blame to the players, because they are the ones that couldn't execute on the field. The hardest part for me, was the fact when we had made the finals, we went into the next such high hopes only to be bitterly disappointed.
Great point about contesting tribunal decision. I think the club has been overly timid about pushing back against the AFL since the supplements scandal. On that point why didn't Dank ever face and charges but multiple players lost their careers?
Great video. On the Hird issue I'm yeah, nah. I think his coaching potential will remain untapped, but he could've been brilliant. But the drug saga brought that out of the realms of possibility.
Without looking at your video yet, these are my ideas. 1. The drug saga caused a lot of issues. 2. Losing Sheedy created a massive gap, as the club relied on him too much. 3. There was division amongst employees and a disconnection with the board. 4. some staff had been there too long and they had a negative impact due to their temperament and way of relating. 5. Poor recruiting 6. A period of continued success from 1980s to 2003 with the club relying on open chequebook and a very zone. Once the zones stopped and the salary cap took hold, then they didn't have the structures in place to make them successful.
I feel we’re definitely rebuilding now you can see we have a path of rebuild via the draft, I fully agree with multiple points especially the challenge the suspensions it shows the player and the supporters that they have our backs.
Great analysis. I agree that the sum total of all your points has equalled mediocrity. Recruiting has been the biggest issue. We have just got nice guys through the door. Hopefully Matt Rosa is a breath of fresh air! Hard nuts! Presently we need to stay the course. Dave Barham needs to remain because change takes time. At board level we need to see it through. Past players of 40 years + need to assist in other ways. The future needs to incorporate your points. However, its from now, not the past.
I don’t think it was recruiting. We recruited players that were expected to be picked at that point. Development had a bigger role than the recruiting itself.
Bomber Thompson only wanted to be the assistant, as he was 'burnt out' as a senior coach at the time of Hird being appointed. If that wasn't the case, then yeah, appointing Bomber with Hird as an assistant wouldn't have been such a bad idea.
Kevin Sheedy should have been offered a new contract in 2007. Essendon was rebuilding and heading for the finals at the time the decision was made. Kevin knew how to build premiership teams.
No room for all of the Days of our Shitty Lives kind of drama at the Board level in the top 10? We have had and continue to have crap leaders at Board level. Evans was a complete Demetriou/AFL Bum-boy. And worse yet, in 2017 they made the AFL stooge a life member of the EFC. I was at the annual meeting and when I saw that I stopped being a member. And as for Adrian, you claim not to blame any one man, but you end up blaming one man.
At the end Sheeds could see the writing on the wall and he was trying to top up the list while we still had some of our greats there. Massive error, Justin Murphy, Mathew Allan, Richard Cole .... mistake, mistake, Mistake!!!! Then to top it off the powers to be selected Mathew Knights as coach be couldn't build anything with Lego. Libba showed us what an absolute sook he was and Knights' team mates showed us how little they cared for him!
Barry Davis set up the list. Sheedy rode in his coattails and stayed too long. Let Brad Scott and Rosa build the next list. As Scott said, this an 8 year program. Merrett will be gone and a number of others. Trades? Build for the future? Don’t count it out. Rebuild. Look at what Hawthorn’s doing and Richmond in the draft.
If you contest a decision at the tribunal and lose, you're wiped out for more weeks, not the same which I think you imply in your comments. The club is a conservative club and a week off is better than two weeks or three, is why they dont challenge.
The fact that you kept positive Essendon play from the 90’s in black-and-white means that this video is not serious. No offence you haven’t been honest at all 🤷
![Felix "Unfair" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Oswujxm2Ag0/mqdefault.jpg)
The salary cap debacle, offering Mark Mercuri (who was never the same player after his brother died) a ridiculously long and lucrative contract, the failure of the club to invest in player development (which is why Mark Harvey left, as he and Kevin Sheedy have confirmed), injuries ruining the careers of the very talented forward duo of Scott Gumbleton and Courtney Johns, Adam Ramanauskas getting cancer and the spate of soft tissue injuries caused by playing at Docklands (with the underlay of the surface being concrete) were also significant factors. The salary cap (debacle) induced exodus of Justin Blumfield, Chris Heffernan and Blake Caracalla was also made much worse by the fact that Essendon (not expecting such an exodus) had in the couple of years leading up to it let go a number of talented fringe (and still young) players such as Judd Lalich, Chris Ladhams and Andrew Ukovic. Losing Michael Prior and then Danny Jacobs at the end of 2000 and 2003 respectively made the situation even worse.
mate agree with everything other than Courtney Johns was an absolute, unequivocal hack and only remained on the list because he was Kevin's pet project aka next Dean Wallis (who we love).
@@chrisferguson237 Interestingly, he was given Dean’s old number, after Danny Jacob’s left, which supports the view that he was one of Kevin Sheedy’s pet projects. Kevin always placed a lot of significance on the numbers he gave to players.
Lastly, Kevin Sheedy’s plan for the end of 2007 was to trade Matthew Lloyd (for Chris Judd) and play Scott Lucas at full forward. By this time, Lloyd’s effectiveness as a forward had diminished (whilst his self-regard had only grown) and Scott had become more suited to the full forward role. As it was, even the useless Matthew Knights soon tired of Lloyd’s behaviour.
@@JohnBolton-z5f They should’ve switched them and play Lloyd in a Matthew Richardson role.
@@richardwood9177 Lloyd didn’t want to play that role. Knights tried to get him to play a supporting role, rather than be the focal point, and it resulted in his retirement.
@ CHF is not a supporting role. Ask Wayne Carey or Royce Hart.
@@richardwood9177That is not how Lloyd saw it. There is an interview in which he complains about Knights not wanting him to play full forward and it leading to his retirement. Carey and Hart were also the focal points for their teams. Carey, especially after Longmire’s influence diminished, tended to play between both positions. Both Hart and Carey were more mobile and better athletes that Lloyd.
I think you nailed it overall. Except for number ten. Dodoro got us Stringer, Martin, Duursma, and Durham. Given the hand he had to play immediately after the Saga he did as well as anyone. You said yourself, what could Perkins be if he had been recruited by Geelong. I'm not saying he got it all right but he did get a lot right. His tenure coincided with bad coaching decisions and lousy player development, as you pointed out. He was in place though out, but correlation is not causation. My number one, is poor board and senior management appointments. That was why we left the MCG and all the other reasons you list begin with the people at the top, who over the years have made a successsion of bad decisions. I Think we have got that right now, andI to think Brad Scott is a good appointment.
When our good players want to leave our club for whatever apparent reason & then play next season in finals for our opponents, that is telling me that our players are not on the same page & we are not an enjoyable environment ! Some recent examples are Daniher, Saad, McKenna
@@iandalton9147 great point
Really good video. You can add several other reasons as well of course. One of my bugbears is this whole 1 good season, heres a massive 5 year contract approach, then for the vast majority of these situations you see the player (whether its a Mcphee, a Wright, a Hurley, a Parish etc etc, the list is endless), go on to drop away over that time from A or B grade down to struggling to get a senior game.
@@taxads7791 good point. We have already seen Parish drop away in output in 2024 (albeit he had injuries) after his big contract signing.
@Dan262626 as soon as the big long-term contract is signed, 9/10 players get injured or just turn into mediocre players
"Poor Recruiting". You forgot Adam McPhee.
Adam McPhee was a good recruit and won a best and fairest!
There's lots of things that I agree with here. Every single word that you said about Bomba Thomson being the head coach and James Hird being his eventual successor... is ten trillion and ten percent correct. What you said about the Adrian is also entirely correct.
One thing that I thought was worth a mention though, that you didn't touch on... have been the Presidents coming and going. Also, what was that guy's name who had the job for 24 hours and then was gone? The religious guy? That entire episode was horrible. There's an ancient Chinese saying:
Dead fish rots, from the head first.
If you don't understand that, look at the management mess of Essendon IN the past 20 years. Even Craig Vosso now, as the perfect example. There has never been a single "Welcome to Essendon" video on Craig Vosso. If anybody wants to know anything about Craig Vosso, you'd have to Google him... because there's not a single mention of him or even a photo of him sitting at his desk holding his pen with a cheesy grin. There's absolutely fucking Nothing on him or about him. And he's supposed to be the ... what is he? He's the CEO or he's the something. Does he do anything? Has he improved the club since he's been in his present position? I've no clue, I know absolutely nothing about him... and I'm not gonna Google him because wouldn't you have thought that the Essendon Website would have had something on him? Guess what... there's nothing on the bloke. Absolutely nothing.
Also, what you said about the club not investing enough time in developing the younger players. As evidence of this, I could sum all the evidence up that you need in two words.
Massimo D'Ambrosio.
If I could use another two words, I could use "Patrick Voss." Patrick Voss never got a run, at all. Why wasn't Anthony Munkara given more support? Bloody hell, it just gets worse the more you think about it. Anthony Mosquito, my God. All these kids I've mentioned could have been "anything," though they weren't... they're all gone.
One thing that Fly has done at Collingwood that's been really beneficial, especially since they won the flag... was that they've continued to blood young players. Collingwood bled seven first year players the year AFTER they won the flag, last year Brad only gave two kids a run for the first time... and then Archie Roberts only got two games.
Please may I give my two cents worth on Brad Scott? I'll be honest with you, I'm not sold on Brad yet. He says that he doesn't want a short term fix of sugar coating wins (or something or other, whatever that means) my question Now is: What's wrong with winning now? Why does he not seem to have any type of enthusiasm about winning sooner than later? This eight year plan he's got won't mean anything if he gets the bullet in a year from now because we keep loosing, will it?
I say Brad needs a talking to already, the sooner the better... they just gotta find someone with the balls to say it to him.
All great points. Thanks for your detailed feedback
Well said mate - I can’t argue with a single point - especially sacking the CEO on his first day because he went to a Christian church! Imagine sacking a Muslim or a Jew because they went to a mosque or a synagogue? This actually was the straw that broke the camels back for me and I cancelled my over a decade long membership the next day because I was so appalled about it and I won’t consider rejoining as a member until our rotten president is gone (talking of fish rotting from the head!).
@ yeah sacking the Christian was woke garbage, so typical of modern sporting organisations. Thanks for your feedback
Gee I love the bomers but they have been hard to watch for years now . At 71 the way we’re going I won’t see another flag😂
I agree with those reasons (I would have liked discussion around the influence of coterie groups) And while looking back the way you have, with calm and reason is important so we can move fwd. too many Essendon fans only look back and refuse to learn or look forward. I have more confidence in the clubs direction than I have in years. I have been a fan for more than 40 years, but lost my love in the late 2000s and early 2010s. I have been as frustrated as everyone else. But finally I can see the sun poking out of the clouds.
@daniel
Bombers spent ten years trying to get athletes and make them football players
Geelong recruited football players that turned in to athletes
Remember sheeds speed speed speed
That was biggest problem I think
I think they should go back to the MCG idk why they moved to marvel.
Let Scott build the list then pick a first time coach.
Hindsight is a wonderful thing. The facts you gave are on todays knowledge, which would have been unknown back in the early 2000's. Dodoro was considered one of the best recruiting mangagers at the time, and i think you have to base his tenure on a year to year basis rather than a 20 year span. Every recruitment manager has wins and loses and how much different would the decisions another manger have made to the ones Dodoro made, they could have been worse. Going to Marvel stadium was a fantastic deal for the club, possibly didnt turn out right, again hindsigt. I have no doubt watsoever that Hird would have been a great coach if it wasnt for the drag saga and Bomber a great assistant. I think the number 1 reason is "lack of development" this was (and still is) the no 1 coach killer, all those coaches you mentioned where probably good appointments at the time, but you have to assign some blame to the players, because they are the ones that couldn't execute on the field. The hardest part for me, was the fact when we had made the finals, we went into the next such high hopes only to be bitterly disappointed.
Great point about contesting tribunal decision. I think the club has been overly timid about pushing back against the AFL since the supplements scandal.
On that point why didn't Dank ever face and charges but multiple players lost their careers?
Great video. On the Hird issue I'm yeah, nah. I think his coaching potential will remain untapped, but he could've been brilliant. But the drug saga brought that out of the realms of possibility.
Without looking at your video yet, these are my ideas. 1. The drug saga caused a lot of issues. 2. Losing Sheedy created a massive gap, as the club relied on him too much. 3. There was division amongst employees and a disconnection with the board. 4. some staff had been there too long and they had a negative impact due to their temperament and way of relating. 5. Poor recruiting 6. A period of continued success from 1980s to 2003 with the club relying on open chequebook and a very zone. Once the zones stopped and the salary cap took hold, then they didn't have the structures in place to make them successful.
@@BDub2024 all excellent points
I feel we’re definitely rebuilding now you can see we have a path of rebuild via the draft, I fully agree with multiple points especially the challenge the suspensions it shows the player and the supporters that they have our backs.
Great analysis. I agree that the sum total of all your points has equalled mediocrity.
Recruiting has been the biggest issue. We have just got nice guys through the door. Hopefully Matt Rosa is a breath of fresh air! Hard nuts!
Presently we need to stay the course. Dave Barham needs to remain because change takes time. At board level we need to see it through. Past players of 40 years + need to assist in other ways. The future needs to incorporate your points. However, its from now, not the past.
Let’s hope we have turned the corner
I don’t think it was recruiting. We recruited players that were expected to be picked at that point. Development had a bigger role than the recruiting itself.
Bomber Thompson only wanted to be the assistant, as he was 'burnt out' as a senior coach at the time of Hird being appointed. If that wasn't the case, then yeah, appointing Bomber with Hird as an assistant wouldn't have been such a bad idea.
"Burnt out" from all the ice?
I think we have thought of ourselves as being a couple of players short of being a contender
Sheedy should have been sacked after the 2001 season.
Kevin Sheedy should have been offered a new contract in 2007. Essendon was rebuilding and heading for the finals at the time the decision was made. Kevin knew how to build premiership teams.
No room for all of the Days of our Shitty Lives kind of drama at the Board level in the top 10? We have had and continue to have crap leaders at Board level. Evans was a complete Demetriou/AFL Bum-boy. And worse yet, in 2017 they made the AFL stooge a life member of the EFC. I was at the annual meeting and when I saw that I stopped being a member. And as for Adrian, you claim not to blame any one man, but you end up blaming one man.
We all know that there been shit for 20 years we know y just sit back and watch brad and matty fix it go the dons ♥️🖤
At the end Sheeds could see the writing on the wall and he was trying to top up the list while we still had some of our greats there. Massive error, Justin Murphy, Mathew Allan, Richard Cole .... mistake, mistake, Mistake!!!! Then to top it off the powers to be selected Mathew Knights as coach be couldn't build anything with Lego. Libba showed us what an absolute sook he was and Knights' team mates showed us how little they cared for him!
Barry Davis set up the list. Sheedy rode in his coattails and stayed too long. Let Brad Scott and Rosa build the next list. As Scott said, this an 8 year program. Merrett will be gone and a number of others. Trades? Build for the future? Don’t count it out. Rebuild. Look at what Hawthorn’s doing and Richmond in the draft.
Believe Scott’s bullshit at your peril .. in 8 years he’ll call for a total rebuild!
Marvel was bad but how many clubs can play at the MCG?
If you contest a decision at the tribunal and lose, you're wiped out for more weeks, not the same which I think you imply in your comments. The club is a conservative club and a week off is better than two weeks or three, is why they dont challenge.
Brad Scott is the right man for the job. Hird is at Port Melbourne. Good luck.
2 steps backwards 1 step forward mentality any wonder no recent success
The fact that you kept positive Essendon play from the 90’s in black-and-white means that this video is not serious. No offence you haven’t been honest at all 🤷
A decent video but and it hard to fully agree wth certain points.
Only 10 you say!
Mate...let it go
This is stupid.