Lions List Manager Peter Schwab spoke to NAB’s AFL Trade Radio yesterday and provided an update on all things Lions trade news.
On the Tom Bell trade:
“You always try to do a deal that’s fair to everyone and we think it’s a good deal for us,”
“We’ve got the intricacy of making sure we have enough points to keep our Academy boys that we want to draft in the national draft.”
On where Bell will play:
“That’s up to Justin. We can show Justin where we thought he played his best footy during the year.
“I think a high forward role, he’s always gets up the ground, got great running capacity and he’s got the potential to kick about 20 goals and give a few away.”
On calculating draft points:
“Every draft pick now has a points value so you’ve got to equate that all the time when you lose a pick.
“The number one thing we think about is where Hipwood and Keays would go for us.
“We factor in the worst-case scenario for us and then we work off our 20% and get to a figure, then we look at our draft picks.
“(We want to) have that covered this year because we don’t want to go into next year.
“We think they’ll go first round so that’ll take points off our first round which we don’t want to do.
On the new formula:
“I bow to the mathematicians who have done all of that.
“In the end, the AFL made a call.
“We would’ve loved the old system, it was so much better for us but we work with what we’re given.
“It has made the trade period a lot different in a sense in that it’s not a true value of a pick, it’s sometimes the points.
On future picks being available:
“I think its only fair because the Academy’s (and father-son) were always going to push potential points into the following year.”
“Every Club needs to have that available to them.”
On picks #2 and #17:
“We’re going to the draft with those two picks.”
On Schache and Weitering:
“It’d be clear, I think the two best players we’ve identified as Schache and Weitering.”
“They’re both highly talented boys. I don’t know what Carlton are going to do, that’s the unknown.”
On this year’s draft group:
“We think there are about 40 players on board that we’d be happy with.
“But once you get past that, there are some good players there but they’d be harder to find.”
“There’s always going to be some players who get drafted late who will end up being great players.
On Aish:
“Time will tell.”
“It’s in Collingwood’s hands; they’re the Club he said he wants to go to. So Collingwood need to satisfy Brisbane Lions.”
There has been “no official offer, we’ve had a lot of discussion but nothing really put on the table.”
“I know North Melbourne have shown a lot of interest in James and we’ve got some interest in Ryan Bastinac. So we’d be happy to get Ryan to Brisbane so that’d satisfy part of the trade.”
“What we don’t want to come out with is James Aish for a second round pick – that won’t do it.
“If that’s the case, he will go through (to the draft).”
On Aish’s form this year:
“James had a really good first year with us.
“And last year wasn’t so good but there was good reason for that - he did have injuries which were unfortunate in some cases, he broke his jaw in one of them.”
“He’s a good player, he’s going to have a long career in the AFL and do very well with whichever Club he ends up with.”
On Astbury coming to the Lions:
“Tom Bell’s (deal) sort of takes away that now.
“David came up to see our facilities and we’ve had discussions with David and his management.”
“But at the moment that’s probably not going to happen,”
“It’s a combination of ourselves and Dave (who) hasn’t said that he would come anyway,”
On the trade period:
“I think the format works well. You kick it off on the Monday and everyone gets a chance to spar and then we open up our phones to about 100 calls a day.”
“You could bring it back even further because ultimately people will work to a deadline.”
“So if we started last Monday, we could almost finish at 5pm on the following Monday - whatever time frame you give a club, I think they’ll work towards it.”
On player retention:
“For us, at the moment, because were sitting at the bottom part of the ladder, it’s about showing them that regardless of that, we do have a good coaching structure.”
“We have (Craig) Lambert back to head up our welfare and off field, which I think is really cricitcal because we’re still getting nearly about 80% of our players from outside Queensland.”
“We’re very conscious that we settle them into a new environment as quickly as possible. Then hopefully in time we can show them that we’re going to be successful.”
