That was that

That’s 2014 then, the first time we made consecutive finals since Gough Whitlam was in charge. And look what happened to him.

It was the best of times, the worst of times and everything in between.

Richmond's season was all things batshit: crazy, confusing, terrifying, frustrating, inspiring and amazing. Some weeks (Carlton round two and North round struckfrommymemory) it was all those things inside one game.

I’m not sure we will really know what 2014 means until deep into 2015. But I’m a fan of what they’ve done since Port did the nasty.

We managed not to get sucked into paying miles overs for a piss poor bunch of free agents (Ryder, Beams and Christensen aside - though they were never coming to Richmond anyway). We picked up Taylor Hunt to plug a Daniel Jackson sized hole. We went young and, more importantly, quick in the draft. And the Internet tells me we picked the next Tony Lockett, loose screws included, with pick 1439 in the draft.

That’s where my draft analysis ends as I’m already out of my depth and I suggest you head over to the Richmond Tiger Talk lads who put together a couple of great podcasts on who and what we picked up through the drafts.

Best thing that happened in 2014

Clear clubhouse leader: Anthony Miles

Quite simply, Miles breathed fresh air into a season that was teetering ever so close to being a complete write off. Richmond in 2014 went 9 and 4 with Miles in the side and 3 and 7 without him, raising more than a few questions about why it took until round 12 to get him in the 22.

No matter what the situation, even during the first quarter in the finals when everyone else was having the most ill-timed stop work meeting in history, Miles put his head over the pill. Releasing the pressure valve that was starting to strangle Cotchin and finding the 24 possessions a game, many of them contested, which we desperately needed.

To give some context, both Melbourne and Collingwood paid big (Josh Kelly and Heath Shaw) for far interior product from west.

In the mix:

The faux final against Sydney that ended up being our actual final.

What a day.

Capped off with this:

Alex Rance

For the first time in my lifetime we have the best player in the competition at his position. If Melbourne or the Dogs have any sense (they don’t) they’d be ponying up something very high in the six figure region to take him off our hands.

He was also pretty handy in the already referenced faux final.

I’ll be a much happier person when Rance joins his skipper as being tucked away for a few years to come.

Dustin Martin and Brandon Ellis

We’ve got ourselves a 23 year old goal kicking midfielder who wins games for fun. And a 21 year old possession machine who run as hard in the first minute as he does the 120th.

The next 10 years is going to be lots of fun to watch.

The fact that we don’t have any home grown talent left on this table.

Special mention to:

• Finding a pulse in general
• Brandon Ellis
• Trent Cotchin
• Ricky Petterd’s Superman spoil against Carlton
• Nathan Gordon
• Brett Deledio’s second half of the year

The worst bits

Clear clubhouse leader: The loss against Melbourne

What should have been a tribute quickly became a shambles.

When Melbourne want it more than you it’s time to have a think about things.

The fact we still don’t know who our second best key forwards is

I’m still #TeamTy but is it he, Griffiths, McBean or some rough as guts kid we just drafted from the clouds?

It could well be Maric with Hampson rucking, which I think we’ll see more of in 2015.

The fact that Brandon Ellis was left one out guarding Daniel Giansircusa in the last minute of a game

Still so very much to learn.

The Port final

I’d still rather not talk about it but it was pretty grim.

Special mentions

• Mishandling Shaun Hampson
• The second half against North
• Lack of run against the best teams
• Watching time catch up with Nathan Foley

Who won stuff on the blog?

The Benny

• Brandon Ellis
• 2013: Cotchin

Blair Hartley Appreciation Award

• Anthony Miles
• 2013: Maric

Anthony Banik Best First Year Player

• Sam Lloyd
• 2013: Vlastuin

Joel Bowden’s Golden Left Boot

• Bachar Houli
• 2013: NA

Greg Tivendale Rookie Medal

• Anthony Miles
• 2013: NA

What happens next year?

God knows.

But the list has natural improvement in it, the draw is OK, they’ve chipped up in coaching by adding Truck Rutten and surely it can’t go that completely tits up again.

Corey Ellis aside, nobody really knows if any one of those new draft picks will come good but at the very least they’ve addressed positions and skills needed rather than drafting best available (also OK) as had been the case.

It’s not even close to a premiership list in 2015 but I suspect they’ll play finals again. Though this should be the year where just playing them isn’t enough.

Structural issues up forward aside, the list is sound and they’ve got through five years of rebuilding while remaining competitive. Given what Hardwick walked into at ground zero, it's already an almighty achievement.

The hard work is done and the next 36 months will shape his legacy.

Gone With Kicking Into The Wind

It is fitting that the same week a few celebrities had naked photos leaked all over the Internet that Richmond was stripped to its core and exposed in the middle of Adelaide Oval on a sunny Sunday afternoon, while 40,000 Port fans who probably still live with their parents and steal their next door neighbour’s Internet cheered on.

During the Hardwick era, Richmond has transformed from a club who doesn’t make finals, to a club who doesn’t win them. That doesn’t make the first Sunday in September of 2013 or 2014 any less shit, but it beats pulling up stumps in August.

Picking the worst part of Sunday is as painful a process as choosing your least favourite Channel 9 cricket commentator (Healy), but after much deliberation it’s the fact that 10,000 people who travelled across the border into that cesspit of a city and left without ever believing we were a chance. There was an Anthony Miles (what a guy) free kick and then we took screwing the pooch to lusty heights that only only English sporting teams usually accommodate.

Sunday doesn’t make the Great Nine Game Streak (#gngs) any less impressive, but it does give it context. Hardwick and Co have built a really good football team, but one that on current trajectory will always fall short of being great. Players like Grimes, Batchelor, Foley, Griffiths, Morris, Conca, Petterd and Edwards may well get you to the finals but they are never positioning you to give the whole shebang a nudge. I’m not saying they should have been on yesterday’s cull list, but over the next 24 months we need to make some decisions that either ship those guys off or transition them from 15-20 in the pecking order to 25-30.

Nobody needs another piece about Cotchin kicking into the wind, so I’m picking my obscure gripe to ask why was it Chaplin that delivered the pre-game pep talk on the field? Last I checked he wasn’t the skipper and the thought process behind those emails to his former teammates suggest that he’s bloody lucky to be in the leadership group. I like Chaplin, but what pearls of wisdom could he have to offer that were beyond Cotchin other than “Lads, I used to play for this mob when they were spectacularly shite so let’s do it for me”?

Watching the replay or even looking at the stats is about as appealing to me as a movie involving Nicole Kidman so anything I’m writing about the game is done so relatively blind. Imagine a grown man, sitting over a pint, with his head in his hands muttering ‘I can’t fucking believe this is happening again’ and that and that’s pretty much the drift.

The claims we played our final the week before are a) rubbish, b) incredibly unfair on Port and c) a cop out for Richmond players because it’s now bleedingly obvious that if that were a final against Sydney then they would have lost.

Two blokes rose above the crud: Miles and Houli (#Moneyball4Lyf). Miles, the guy delisted by a club that won five games this year. Houli, the horrifically under appreciated by his own supporters half back flanker who had the amazing sense to tell Hird he’d rather play for someone else and save himself from a doping program that would make a Russian weightlifter wince. Miles cracked in from the very first bounce which puts him in a select group of one. Houli made mistakes, but at least he tried to create things, refusing to look sidewards and breaking the lines while a lot of his mates were part of some niche gameday protest that involved refusing to offer themselves as an option.

So 18 hours later when I finally opened a footy news site to have a Cotchin: We are hurting (or whatever it was) headline thrust at me, I was flat. That did the job last year but doesn’t even go close to it doing so this time, I don’t want to hear it pal.

Good on Port. It wasn’t that long ago that we were both anchored to the bottom of the ladder along with the Dees and, while they carried on about a jumper they’ve worn for five minutes, I hope both they and North Melbourne get right up Fremantle and Geelong because I’m not sure I can hack the same top four battling it out for what feels like the 53rd year straight. I don’t like that song because I reckon if I had access 50,000 people I could easily get them to sing along to INXS and wouldn’t need the world’s best stadium (Anfield and Fenway Park say hi) to get it happening. But I completely understand that I am just about solo with this and it’s time to move on.

All in all, we made the finals twice in a row for the first time since Magellan set off for the East Indies so 2014 isn’t a complete loss. We managed to turn a 3-10 debacle into a tilt at the finals a final, found a corker in Anthony Miles while the Dees and Pies sold the farm for lesser players, continue to diversify our avenues to goal (even though sometimes I’d prefer it if we’d kick it to the two time Coleman medallist), introduced Ben Lennon ever so gently into the fray and Ty Vickery punched someone in Western Australia and nearly caused WWIII which is still top of my list.

Like anyone else not playing for the next three weeks there are a few issues, some of them that need to be addressed ASAP. The Hampson trade I can handle for insurance purposes but the three year deal remains a noodle scratcher, we have problems in defence and by my count are short a quality tall, medium and small sized defender as well as a rebounding player and, like everyone not playing this weekend, we are short three quality midfielders (not counting McDonough, Lennon and Pick 10 who will hopefully come on next year), a small and medium sized forward ( =not counting McBean), a young ruckman, leadership, a partridge in a pear tree and for the love of god if we don’t have a crack at a ready made small forward I will go spare.

The one thing we do have apparently is oodles of cap space. But given what’s left of the dwindling free agent list, we’ll likely need to trade to get players and, unless Dylan Shiel is involved, I like the idea of another top ten pick. Anyway, only Melbourne seem to be gearing up to be active traders and anyone they’re willing to let go of could have been traded for Aaron Edwards. So I suspect we’ll be relatively quiet again and continue front loading contracts until 2021 when everyone will be playing for free. Chances are we’ll have a lash at a few delisted types and the need for speed suggests we’ll be into Leroy Jetta and Sam Blease both of whom I would be reasonably content about parting with a late draft or rookie pick for.

In terms of trading chips at our disposal, it’s hard to see who would be on offer. Griffiths recently signed a two year deal which doesn’t rule out a trade, but makes it very unlikely. Everyone seems to hate him but I’d be right into Vickery if I was the Dogs and/or Lions. Conca is very tradeable from where I’m sitting but we’d be getting change on the dollar considering we spent a top ten pick not that long ago. Grimes and Batchelor would be on the table for anyone desperate for a defender, but we are hardly likely to snare Luke Parker in return. So unless something left field happens, or we can talk someone into heading out of contract into stiffing their club and heading into the pre-season draft and hoping like all get-up he’s still around when we have a pick, I reckon we’ll be pretty quiet.

Of the guys who seem willing to leave and who would add to our structures (ie. aren’t called Mitch Clark. Jared Waite or James Frawley), Higgins is by far the most appealing but he’ll likely have plenty of suitors who will offer more cash than Blair Hartley will be willing to part with and continue sleeping at night (not a criticism).

Votes (finals count for double)

10: Anthony Miles

8: Bachar Houli

6: Brett Deledio

4: Shaun Grigg

2: Nathan Gordon

Leaderboards

The Benny

36: Brandon Ellis

31: Trent Cotchin

28: Brett Deledio

27: Dustin Martin, Jack Riewoldt and Anthony Miles

23: Alex Rance

22: Bachar Houli

14: David Astbury and Bachar Houli

13: Shaun Hampson

12: Shaun Grigg

11: Shane Edwards, Troy Chaplin and Ricky Petterd

10: Daniel Jackson

6: Steven Morris, Matt Thomas and Ty Vickery

5: Nathan Foley and Ivan Maric

4: Sam Lloyd and Dylan Grimes

3: Ben Griffiths and Nathan Gordon

2: Nick Vlastuin, Nathan Foley and Chris Newman

1: Orren Stephenson, Matthew Dea and Ben Lennon

Blair Hartley Appreciation Award

27: Anthony Miles

22: Bachar Houli

13: Shaun Hampson

12: Shaun Grigg

11: Ricky Petterd and Troy Chaplin

6: Matt Thomas

5: Ivan Maric

3: Nathan Gordon

1: Orren Stephenson

Anthony Banik Best First Year Player

4: Sam Lloyd

1: Ben Lennon

Joel Bowden’s Golden Left Boot

22: Bachar Houli

12: Shaun Grigg

11: Troy Chaplin

Greg Tivendale Rookie Medal

27: Anthony Miles

6: Matt Thomas

1: Orren Stephenson

The wash up

Brandon Ellis wins The Benny, which given Jackson finished mid-field last year should not be seen as any sort of B&F form.

The world’s greatest man Anthony Miles only needed half a season to clean up the Blair Hartley Appreciation Award, Greg Tivendale Rookie Medal and a top six finish in The Benny. Which isn’t all that bad for bloke who started the year on $65,000.

Sam Lloyd only needed to poll once to pick up the Anthony Banik Best First Year Player and funnily enough, both he and Ben Lennon only polled in their first games. So hardly a grand start for this award.

My man Bachar Houli sealed Joel Bowden’s Golden Left Boot by being one of the two players not to completely disgrace themselves against Port.

Australian Eastern Standard Tiger Time

There are just so many quickly cobbled together stats that I don’t know where to start. That we are one of only six clubs who have played finals the last two years? That the last time we played consecutive finals series Gough Whitlam was Prime Minister? That this is the first time since 1977 we will play finals and Carlton won’t. I’m sure there is more that will come out progressively throughout the week but they are pretty good starting points.

My favourite though is that Nick Vlastuin knows one consistent thing in his playing time at Richmond, finals.

I was lucky enough to be in attendance on Saturday afternoon, and I really do consider that a privilege. When Dusty lost Ted Richards (of all people) on the turn and ran directly at the Richmond throng behind the goals I can’t remember being happier (don’t tell my other half). Don’t talk to me about five goal leads, that moment was when I started to believe. Sure enough, Sam Reid wrenched us all back in crippling doubt about a minute later but when have Richmond ever made things easy?

I love Richo, we all love Richo, but unwittingly he gave a reasonable insight into why we’ve been rancid for too long when commentating last weekend and having a laugh about Greg Stafford taking his GPS in the car up Punt Road instead of pre-season running. It was a good yarn but that’s not really all that long ago and Greg Stafford was on reasonable coin. Somewhere in the 2002-2006 timeframe (hardly our halcyon days), our number one ruckman couldn’t be arsed with a running session. This was a time when Brisbane were taking professionalism to another level, Port shook the choke tag for their first flag and West Coast and Sydney played two of the best grand finals that we’ll ever see. Richo makes up for it in this video though, which I’ll watch at least another ten times before the week is out.

So when Ivan Maric talks about the Richmond way ‘that we want to play each week, but it’s also the Richmond way how you conduct yourself down the street with fans, your family and friends, and even just a stranger that you walk by’, it’s spine tingling for me. Even if things go pear shaped on Sunday afternoon, terms like the Richmond way have meaning for the first time in my life. No other Richmond squad in my lifetime was winning that game of football, not 95, 01 or 13.

They left a few in the change rooms, but Sydney are proud. When Dan Hannebery (can play) kicked a goal and did the jumper chest thump that showed everyone they weren’t screwing around. Unless you are Brad Green, the jumper chest thump means something, it means that at that moment of that game, you will do anything to win. When Dan Hannebery is doing the jumper chest thump, best you bring your a-game.

Enough has been written and spoken about Alex Rance’s performance that I don’t need to add anything, but I’m going to anyway. How often have you sat back and admired players like Akermanis, Bartel, Pendlebury, Brown, Franklin and Judd as they’ve singled handedly carried their team over the line when they needed it most? When it needed to be done otherwise there was no next week. For the first time since 1995 and Matthew Knights, we have that story. What a performance. He had some mates who I will touch on very shortly, but without Alex Rance West Coast would be playing on Sunday, not Richmond. He took his opponent, Tippett, right out the match but made sure that no entry was getting past, Gandalf style. It was amazing to watch.

As mentioned, he had some mates and funnily quite a few of them had something in common. Maric was a colossus, Grigg much more influential down back in the second half that he is getting credit for, Miles a clearance machine, Houli calm in defence and constructive in building assault after assault off half back, Gordon crucial in defending the spread as pointed out by the RTT lads and Chaplin was reliable as ever (the first half of the season didn’t happen) as Rance’s sidekick. It reminds you of that baseball book where a team is rock bottom in a season before being dragged over the line by strategically chosen recruits undervalued by other teams. Why don’t the Herald Sun footy journos ever make that connection?

The home grown lads were reasonable as well I suppose. Hannebery probably shaded him in the end, but our first half lead was pretty closely correlated with the skipper’s output, Deledio’s extraordinary second half of the season continued and he’s Sunday away from silencing those lingering ‘big game’ doubts, Ellis again performed at a level far beyond anyone else taken in the bumper 2011 draft, Griff took the game on in the first quarter and helped set up the five goal insurance cover before taking a clutch grab at the end, Dusty had a stinker but he still managed to leave Richards sprawled on the turf while he ran in for the sealer, Grimes and Batchelor continue to help hold things together, Titch’s possession tally continued at a level where his creativity can be shown for all to see, Newy was very often the last guy in a desperate handball chain out, Foley threated to terrorise them when he snuck forward, Vlastuin and Conca were busy, Petterd had a game to forget but hurt a couple of blokes along the way which I don’t mind and a certain bloke called Riewoldt managed four clutch goals (more than a fifth of all goals kicked on the day) against arguably the best defence of the last decade. I could go all Tolstoy on Rance but people tell me that the Internet is filling up and I like the Internet so I won’t.

This is all made even better by the fact that as I type, right this very second, world war three is breaking out at a gym named after whoever sponsors Collingwood this week and Eddie is pleading for peace. Somewhere along this magnificent nine weeks we even managed to get The Age’s chief grump RoCo on board, probably around the exact time his web people told him that a semi competent Richmond could well save journalism and based on flight prices right now, maybe QANTAS should have held off on their financial announcement for a week.

This time last year, Ross Lyon simply shrugged off the fact that Fremantle had to travel down to Geelong. Today, Port Adelaide threw every single toy out of the cot over not being allowed to wear their ‘traditional’ home jumper that they’ve had since 2010 and was designed by a seven year old. That doubled with Boak’s comments about Chaplin (which must have seemed like a free hit at the time but are now another example of why players generally stick to clichés) and all of a sudden this seems to be the final of public interest. Which is fair enough because Hawthorn will brain Geelong, Fremantle and Sydney are very good but exceptionally boring football teams and other than the few remaining #standbyhird crew, people got sick of Essendon long ago and last time I checked North are still coached by Brad Scott.

There is just so much cool content bouncing around following Saturday and, if you are reading this, you’ve probably already read or watched them multiple times, but just in case:

The last two minutes (two days later it’s still squeaky bum time)

Robbo’s Rance love in

The ABC’s montage of the streak

A really cool piece on Sam Lane on how we are leading the pack on gender equality

And a piece by Chris over at TTBB (nice guy, have met) on his experience of what was a truly amazing day at the footy, don’t just read it – buy a tshirt as well.

Let that not be the last of 2014, let #tigertime continue.

Very late addition, this is how good this streak is. Read Demonblog as well by the way, incredible story teller.

Votes

5: Alex Rance
4: Shaun Grigg
3: Brett Deledio
2: Jack Riewoldt
1: Ivan Maric

Leaderboards

The Benny

36: Brandon Ellis

31: Trent Cotcin

27: Dustin Martin and Jack Riewoldt

23: Alex Rance

22: Brett Deledio

17: Anthony Miles

14: David Astbury and Bachar Houli

13: Shaun Hampson

11: Shane Edwards, Troy Chaplin and Ricky Petterd

10: Daniel Jackson

8: Shaun Grigg

6: Steven Morris, Matt Thomas and Ty Vickery

5: Nathan Foley and Ivan Maric

4: Sam Lloyd and Dylan Grimes

3: Ben Griffiths

2: Nick Vlastuin, Nathan Foley and Chris Newman

1: Orren Stephenson, Matthew Dea, Nathan Gordon and Ben Lennon

Blair Hartley Appreciation Award

17: Anthony Miles

14: Bachar Houli

13: Shaun Hampson

11: Ricky Petterd and Troy Chaplin

8: Shaun Grigg

6: Matt Thomas

5: Ivan Maric

1: Orren Stephenson and Nathan Gordon

Anthony Banik Best First Year Player

4: Sam Lloyd

1: Ben Lennon

Joel Bowden’s Golden Left Boot

14: Bachar Houli

11: Troy Chaplin

8: Shaun Grigg

Greg Tivendale Rookie Medal

17: Anthony Miles

6: Matt Thomas

1: Orren Stephenson

Championship belt:

Incumbent	Winner	Streak	Wins
NA	Cotchin	1	1
Cotchin	Astbury	1	1
Astbury	Riewoldt	1	1
Riewoldt	Astbury	1	2
Astbury	Petterd	1	1
Petterd	Ellis	1	1
Ellis	Conca	1	1
Conca	Martin	1	1
Martin	Riewoldt	1	2
Riewoldt	Martin	1	2
Martin	Martin	2	3
Martin	Miles	1	1
Miles	Martin	1	4
Martin	Cotchin	1	2
Cotchin	Rance	1	1
Rance	Houli	1	1
Houli	Deledio	1	1
Deledio	Deledio	2	2
Deledio	Miles	1	2
Miles	Cotchin	1	3
Cotchin	Riewoldt	1	3
Riewoldt	Rance	1	2

Friendly reminder (that I didn’t think I’d have to give this year) that finals votes count for double so everything bar the Tivendale is still in play.