Tag - You've got J MAc

[Capper]

during the first game last night James McDonald was used to tag Griffen.

Will he be used as a tagger through out the season or will he be set free??

I guess also if he is set free will he be tagged?? Yes

[jasonweare]

You would think Gws might not be very competitive might not get tagged

[Talisman]

Yeah, didn't love seeing that tbh. Having siad that, Cam Ling was pretty much always a tagger & even in s v.strong team like the Cats with lots of players takign points off him, he was able to average high 70's-low 90's every year (even in the 100's one year - 2005).

So I guess my points are these: JMac knows what he's doing/he' very experienced. There is no place for true "taggers" anymore - they are all "run-with" players, who need to get plenty of touches to hold their spot in their team. He is playing in a team where very few players will be racking up huge numbers - i.e. lots of rookies getting low numbers. Therefore, he has the opportunity to score very respectable scores and, as he'll be Sheedy's coach on the field, will need to play basically every game to teach the youngsters (a bit like GAJ last year).

[Bruce McAvaney]

JM spent most of his career at melb as a tagger. he still accumulates possessions and tackles. wont hurt him.

[Swallow12]

He will still average 80 quite easily

[Ziplock]

he looked pretty good out there, and it didn't really seem to hurt his scoring.

[TheMailman]

Hopefully Sheedy merely implements the GC tactic of not really tagging players but trying to get brownie points against them by fighting skill with skill

[Colliwobblers]

yep with him it is not the role that concern me but the JS as in number of and time in each consecutive games.

[TheMailman]

Surely GWS needs as many experienced bodies with the young kids as possible?

I would of thought McDonald would get as many games as he can play

[MC]

Surely GWS needs as many experienced bodies with the young kids as possible?

I would of thought McDonald would get as many games as he can play

Exactly, which may not be that many given that he's effectively a dinosaur now. A year away from AFL can't have done much good for his game, he'll struggle to play 10 games imo, and those games will not be 20+ possie games, they'll be 'meat shield' games.

[Ziplock]

a year from afl level, he wasn't just sitting on his ass though, he was playing for his local club... fitness shouldnt have changed.

[MC]

Not his fitness that i'm worried about - AFL level is a massive step up from local footy... The speed, endurance, skill and awareness needed for AFL is light years from local footy!

[Ziplock]

did a pretty good effort keeping up with griffen last night.