What if Melbourne is Good?

What if Melbourne is Good?

GuyWhoLikesSport

Conventional wisdom can go too far and be far wrong.

From Galileo to Ben Affleck, history loves a comeback. In the early 2000s, Affleck was written off for flops like Gigli and tabloid drama with J.Lo.

He stepped behind the camera for Gone Baby Gone, then made his full return as a leading man in The Town.

Could this season be Melbourne’s The Town?

Even though Simon Goodwin is inflexible, this is still a talented team who haven’t lost what made them good previously.

Like Affleck, they also added some pieces in their fallow period that they can use to their advantage.

For Affleck it’s added grizzliness. For Melbourne, it’s Caleb Windsor.

Even in a year from hell in 2024, Melbourne’s biggest strength remained elite.

Despite Steven May and Jake Lever each missing at least a month, the Dees still allowed the fewest goals, the fewest scoring shots, and third-fewest shots per inside 50.

Even with some slippage from May, particularly when he had to move, he’s still a good player and a beast in 1v1 situations. With Lever just 29 and Harrison Petty playing defence again, this is still a “whose car we taking” group of henchmen in the back six.

Now come the problem areas for the Dees in 2024, and where improvement should come in 2025.

Between 2021 and 2023, Melbourne was never worse than top-6 in clearances, contested ball, or inside 50s.

Last year, the Dees were tenth in contested ball, 16th in clearances, and 14th in inside 50s.

That feels like exception more than rule.

Max Gawn, Christian Petracca, Clayton Oliver, and Jack Viney are all still there. Then you add Trent Rivers, Caleb Windsor, and sixth overall pick Harvey Langford and I see a good midfield forming now and moving forward.

Obviously, there are still question marks – Petracca and Oliver.

For Petracca, the question is whether he’s done a Dougie and lost the stomach for it.

For Oliver the question is less existential. Did he do another Jordan Belfort impression this offseason?

The word is that he’s training the house down, but I’m old enough to remember when Jake Stringer did that every year, only to rediscover the pie.

Even if they’re down from their usual selves, their lack of output last season should mean that whatever slack they leave is picked up by players who have already experienced live bullets. The big one is Rivers, who looks primed to break out.

This could be a bit of a Tracy Jordan trying to recreate “smooth move Ferguson” type midfield, but there are enough points of difference where they aren’t just reheating their own nachos.

Now for the forward line.

Even in the good times, this was bad.

From 2021-2023, they were seventh, fourteenth and fourteenth for goals inside 50 and still finished top 4.

That’s not a compliment, but it does shows how good Melbourne can be without a functional forward line.

That’s a relief because the forward line doesn’t figure to be much better this year, with one possible exception.

If Goodwin decides against ruining Jacob van Rooyen by making him the second ruck and lets him play as a key forward, I could see him being their first real avenue to key forward production since the 2021 Ben Brown Event.

JvR took about two marks per game inside 50 last year and has kicked 1.5 goals a game for his career. Last year he got 2.5 shots per game, which is nothing to sneeze at for a second-year player.

You can’t build the house on the assumption that van Rooyen will kick 100 goals, but with more supply, Kozzie Pickett at his feet, Bayley Fritsch as chief support, there is a middle-of-the-pack unit in the range of outcomes.

That’s particularly true if Petracca spends time as a forward.

I still have issues with Simon Goodwin’s inflexibility, particularly going forward. I cannot fathom why he’s as attached to repeated bombs inside 50 to no key forwards as he is.

But even if they don’t improve their entries, which Goodwin has shown no capacity to do, he always has an elite defensive structure and has stars around the ball again.

The forward line will probably still be bad, but the other two lines should be good enough for Melbourne to significantly improve.

They’re probably not going to win the premiership, but couldn’t they have an L.A. Rams type of season?

Couldn’t they finish sixth and be the definition of the team that you don’t want to see in week 1 of the finals?

I could see it.

 

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