AFL Pre-season Draft

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The AFL Pre-season Draft is the drafting of uncontracted players to teams in the Australian Football League. The draft is conducted after the National AFL Draft and before the start if the next AFL season. It is conducted at the same time as the AFL rookie draft. The pre-season draft is a place for any uncontracted players to nominate that missed the AFL Draft or who were delisted after the main draft.

Contents

[edit] About

[edit] Picks

Clubs receive picks in the draft based on where the finished on the AFL ladder during the year, for example, Richmond finished last in the 2007 AFL season, therefore receiving the first pick at uncontracted players in the draft. Teams have the chioice of whether to participate in the draft, some may pass on their choice if there is not a player there they want to recruit. Picks in the pre-season drafts cannot be traded between clubs.

Despite the draft containing mostly "recycled" players, the pre-season draft can become a powering bargaining tool during trade week, as the team with the first pick can refuse a trade for a current uncontracted player at another club, and then recruit the player that wants to join their team for free with the first pick in the pre-season draft without giving anything to the other club. Terry Wallace, coach of the Richmond Football Club, at the end of the 2007 season, was actually relieved to finish last in the 2007 AFL season in order to receive the first pick in the pre-season draft for those reasons, bringing up the debate of "tanking". [1]

[edit] Players

Mostly the AFL pre-season draft contains Recycled players, as most teams are not prepared to pick them ahead of younger players in the national AFL draft. [2] Younger players are not generally selected in the pre-season draft, because of the large amounts of picks available to select young talent in the national AFL draft. Players who nominate for the Pre-season draft may set the terms for their contracts; in contrast, all players selected in the National Draft are fixed into common-price two year contracts.

Given that changes to each AFL club's playing list is strictly restricted to the three drafts and the trade week, the headline news following each pre-season draft is often who wasn't selected, as much as who was selected. In the 2005 draft this included that Shane Woewodin, the 2000 Brownlow Medal winner, was not selected, and hence would not play football at AFL level in 2006.

[edit] 2007

See also: 2007 AFL Draft

The 2007 Pre-season draft for the2008 AFL season, was be held on December 11, 2007 at 10am. [1]

It was mostly seen as a "no-name draft", with players who would normally go in the draft, instead being either traded during trade week, or re-signing with their current club. [3]

The Richmond Tigers had the first pick in the draft, taking youngster David Gourdis who was overlooked in the AFL draft, despite ranking no.1 in the 20m sprint at the AFL Draft Camp in Canberra. Carlton had the second pick, and picked up former crows player Darren Pfeiffer. The only big name recruit was Scott Welsh, who is also a former crow, that was picked by the Western Bulldogs with the 4th pick. In total, 8 players were taken, by 7 teams, with Essendon taking two players.

[edit] Number 1 Picks

Number 1 picks in the Pre-season drafts:

[edit] notable pre-season draft picks

[edit] Draft list

v • d • e
VFL/AFL Drafts
VFL Drafts
1986 • 1987 • 1988 • 1989
AFL Drafts
1990 • 1991 • 1992 • 1993 • 1994 • 1995 • 1996 • 1997 • 1998 • 1999 • 2000 • 2001 • 2002 • 2003 • 2004 • 2005 • 2006 • 2007 • 2008

[edit] References

  1. ^ "Loss a big win for Tigers", Fox Sports Australia, 2007-09-01. Retrieved on 2007-10-24. 
  2. ^ "Draft exposes cold realities", Sydney Morning Herald, 2006-11-27. Retrieved on 2007-10-24. 
  3. ^ "Brennan sticks with Lions", Fox Sports Australia, 2007-10-25. Retrieved on 2007-10-25. 

[edit] See also