Eagles still the flavour

April 5, 2023

The 2016 Footy Sausage AFL Dreamteam Fantasy Draft started off as expected with Tom "Oink once for the new Pig" Rockliff going to the Wet Dogs at pick one, but the night took a number of twists and turns as it went on. The top ten picks didn’t fall too far from what was expected – Melbourne took Clayton Oliver and Sam Weideman, Essendon secured Darcy Parish and Aaron Francis, while Gold Coast took Callum Ah Chee.

Carlton were able to secure two more talls in Harry McKay and Charlie Curnow – brother of Ed – while Adelaide took a local boy with their first pick in Wayne Milera.

Bids came for Callum Mills and Jacob Hopper early in the draft but it wasn’t until Richmond’s first pick that Matthew Kennedy was bidded on, proving a bargain for the Giants. The Tigers also bid (unsuccessfully) on Eric Hipwood. Eventually the Tigers settled on Daniel Rioli with their first-round pick.

However the first real shock of the draft was when Adelaide took Tom Doedee as their second and last pick at no. 17, a medium defender who was probably expected to last until the second or third round.

St Kilda picked up small mid Jade Gresham before Hawthorn made a great value selection with Ryan Burton at their first pick, and then took Tasmanian Kieran Lovell just a few picks later.

In the meantime Gold Coast selected Brayden Fiorini and North Melbourne picked up Ben McKay – identical twin brother of Harry, who had already been drafted by the Blues.

Carlton’s selection of David Cunningham rounded out the first round.

By this point a number of ‘sliders’ had emerged in the draft, players who were expected to go in the first round or close to, but instead were slipping down the draft order as clubs made some unexpected decisions.

One of the real shocks of the draft came when the Western Bulldogs made a bid for Sydney’s father-son prospect Josh Dunkley, and Sydney chose not to match the bid – the first time in the history of the draft that a father-son or academy bid has gone unmatched.

The Bulldogs also nabbed a real slider with their pick immediately after in Kieran Collins, who was expected to go in the first round, and Fremantle picked up another slider with the next pick in Darcy Tucker.

Mitchell Hibberd at North Melbourne’s pick 33, Riley Bonner at Port Adelaide’s 37, Harley Balic at Fremantle’s pick 38, and Rhys Mathieson at Brisbane’s pick 39 all seemed to slide much further than projected, and might one day be looked back on as draft bargains.

A number of mature players got their chance. The Bulldogs picked up a mature key defender from WA in Marcus Adams, former Geelong player Mitch Brown got a second chance with Essendon, a WAFL star in Shane Yarran got picked up by Fremantle, and Sam Menegola joined his third AFL club, drafted late by Geelong. Michael Hartely, a former Collingwood rookie, was picked up by Essendon.

Harrison Himmelberg and Matthew Flynn successfully made their way to the Giants after being bid on by Adelaide and Melbourne respectively, Bailey Rice joined St Kilda and Jack Sivlagni Carlton after their clubs chose to match bids, but not so for Brisbane academy player Corey Wagner who joined North Melbourne after the Lions decided not to match the Kangaroos’ bid.

Geelong took the final two picks of the night, closing out the draft with two fantastically-named players in Wylie Buzza and Matthew Hayball. The 2015 AFL Draft