Will Brodie, Peter Wright, Jack Martin and the curious case of the Gold Coast Suns

The big ticket item was pick one of the 2019 draft, which was in effect more like giving the Suns pick No. 2, because they already first dibs as wooden-spooners.

The stars aligned to make it a perfect time for the gift to be given, allowing Gold Coast to draft underage guns Matt Rowell and Noah Anderson as a package.

By taking the best mates together, the idea was that they would be considerably less of a flight risk; a perennial concern for the expansion club.

The freebies didn’t stop there though for the Suns. While Rowell and Anderson will forever be concessions poster boys, Gold Coast also received 5an end of first-round pick in 2019, a mid-first round pick in 2020, a start of second round selection in 2021, priority access to the Darwin recruiting zone, and an expanded rookie list of 10 players.

Even when AFL lists shrunk as a result of Covid-19 austerity measures in 2020, the Suns kept their advantage on a pro rata basis.

In the AFL’s press release that accompanied details of the concessions, the league’s general counsel Andrew Dillon said that it was in the broader interests of football that Gold Coast was given every chance to succeed.

“There is no doubt the Gold Coast Suns have had enormous challenges throughout their short history and it is to the benefit of the entire competition that the Suns are competitive,” Dillon said.

“The AFL and football fans want a strong and even competition and while the endeavour and intent can’t be faulted by the Gold Coast Football Club, there have been executional challenges along the journey that have impacted the on-field competitiveness of the team.”

Such words were cold comfort at the time for Adelaide, who felt the goalposts had shifted from beneath them.

The Crows had been part of a blockbuster draft night trade the previous year with Carlton, but because of the Suns’ extra pick at the top of the 2019 order, Adelaide’s first selection – tied to the Blues’ ladder position – fell from No. 3 to No. 4. The pick was eventually used on tall Victorian utility Fischer McAsey, who has thus far been unable to secure a regular spot in the Crows’ line-up.

In reality this was merely the first in a long list of trickle-down effects from Gold Coast’s concessions.

One rival list manager said the AFL had been overly generous with concessions to the Suns and Giants, creating an inflationary mechanism across the league’s wages and stifling the prospects of player continuity at either club.

And the weekend just gone provided a fascinating cross-section of the unintended consequences.

We will start, counterintuitively, at the end of the story. Well, the end at least chronologically; the ninth of the round four matches.

On late Sunday afternoon at Metricon Stadium, the Suns jumped Carlton early, ending the Blues’ unbeaten start to the season with a heartening five-goal victory, one which for the time being eased the pressure on out-of-contract Suns coach Stuart Dew.

This game was the one where the concessions shouted at you in the face. Anderson upstaged Carlton’s much-vaunted midfield, finishing with an equal-career high 35 disposals and claiming nine AFL coaches’ association votes for his performance.

Needless to say, the Suns would not have Anderson without that bonus pick.

It is entirely hypothetical, though nonetheless intriguing, to ponder whether Melbourne, who had the first non-Gold Coast pick in the 2019 draft, would have taken Anderson had he been available, or opted for the player they ultimately chose: the freakish Luke Jackson, who has already become one of the AFL’s best talls and hottest properties.

Equal-leading goalkicker on the ground on Sunday was a much lesser known and cheaper player; small forward Malcolm Rosas jnr, who kicked three goals in an eye-catching display.

Like Anderson, Rosas arrived at the Suns at the end of 2019 via the Darwin concessions.

A very handy bonus and a player Gold Coast would probably not have been able to take without the handout package. Essendon were keen to lure him at the end of 2021.

At the other end of the ground was Jack Martin. Once considered among the Suns’ brightest prospects, his talent has come to the fore all too fleetingly.

In his defence, Martin may still be recovering from his recent bout of Covid-19, but his fumbles belied his class.

Finishing with 0.2 from just 11 disposals, he is at the moment a genuine fringe player at Carlton.

It is extraordinary, because by dint of a heavily front-ended deal, Martin was among the handful of highest paid players in the competition across 2020 and 2021. When he fell out of contract at the end of 2019, the Suns wanted Carlton’s pick No. 9 as part of any deal.

The Blues were unwilling to hand over that selection, having siloed that pick for any dealings to land Tom Papley from Sydney, a move which did not eventuate.

The Suns ultimately got nothing for Martin, allowing him to walk to the pre-season draft and opting against picking him back up. There were a couple of key reasons for this.

Firstly, after a spate of high-profile deportees (Tom Lynch, Steven May, Gary Ablett, Jaeger O’Meara, Dion Prestia etc.) Gold Coast list manager Craig Cameron was keen to send something of a message to any Suns thinking about leaving in the future: we will not make it easy.

But perhaps more to the point, there was also little to gain for Gold Coast in compromising on a lesser selection.

They already had more early picks than they really knew what to do with. What was an extra second-rounder?

This is where the concessions created something of a two-speed economy.

A particular draft selection does not necessarily hold the same worth to every club, particularly where the Suns have been involved.

This played out during the 2019 national draft, when the Suns traded their future mid-first rounder freebie to Geelong and pick 64 for selection No. 27, used to take Jeremy Sharp.

The Cats ultimately used that future first to trade for Jeremy Cameron at the end of 2020, the pick ending up at Greater Western Sydney, who used it on the hitherto untested Conor Stone.

Players and picks are two of the three key commodities in list management. The other considerably more opaque property is money.

Unlike in US sports, player salaries remain officially private, meaning reports of what certain players ultimately hinge on the honesty of journalistic sources.

But it is a key consideration, and one which cannot be forgotten in the evaluation of another couple of former Suns who have shone so far this season.

Tall forward Peter Wright has arguably been Essendon’s best performer across the first four rounds, while midfielder Will Brodie was best afield for Fremantle in their win over Greater Western Sydney.

At face value this could seem like poor list management from Gold Coast, who traded away both players while under contract for negligible returns.

In Wright’s case it was a future fourth-round pick, a selection the Suns didn’t end up using, while with Brodie it was even more stark, with Gold Coast actually handing pick 19 to Fremantle as part of the deal to get Brodie, with the Suns getting back a future second round pick.

Some fourth-rounders were also exchanged in the deal.

At one level this seems like just the latest cases of players leaving the Gold Coast and playing better.

Jarryd Lyons, delisted at the end of 2018, is the face of this phenomenon, although Jack Scrimshaw and Trent McKenzie are a couple of other examples.

This argument has some merit, and in the face of Hugh Greenwood’s embarrassing stealth defection to North Melbourne, the Jordan Murdoch flop and Rory Atkins’ highly-questionable long-term deal, there are legitimate queries around plenty of the Suns’ list decisions.

On the flip side though, Martin has if anything gone backwards since departing, while the Suns have made good from discarded Blues Levi Casboult and Nick Holman. Gold Coast have also turned ex-Docker Sam Collins into a reliable key defender.

There is a bit of swings and roundabouts to it all.

And with Brodie and Wright, the truth was neither lived up to their potential at Gold Coast, and were taking up valuable cap space which the Suns realistically needed to secure some of their top-end young talent.

More to the point, Gold Coast just don’t need any more early picks.

They have their nucleus (Rowell, Anderson, Ben King, Jack Lukosius, Wil Powell, Izak Rankine, Jack Bowes, Elijah Hollands, Mac Andrew, Sam Flanders etc) and their attention must now be centred on keeping them all.

Brodie has so far proven a ready-made replacement for Adam Cerra at the Dockers, who appear to be focusing more on what the onballer can do rather than limitations with his running which had worked against him under Dew.

Also easy to forget is once Rowell and Anderson came into the side, they were always likely to take two midfield spots for the long term.

With Touk Miller having emerged as a genuine A-grader since the start of last year, midfield spots were always going to be in short supply.

Brodie’s departure has helped smooth the way for Brayden Fiorini, who had stagnated, to again get regular senior matches.

Wright’s departure is being felt much more acutely given King’s knee injury. And top key forwards, as a rule, are much harder to find than solid midfielders.

But then again, who is to say the Suns would have been able to re-sign King had they kept Wright and Brodie? For what it’s worth, Wright is winning immense plaudits at Essendon for his attitude and dedication to improvement.

More Coverage

Back playing AFL too soon after Dad’s funeral

Will Schofield

Yes, Gold Coast have made some serious missteps along the way, but just as has been the case with Sydney, Greater Western Sydney and the Brisbane Lions, the traditional principles of list management at Victorian clubs cannot apply in the same way to the Northern clubs. The AFL’s view is that the only way for the Suns to break out of their retention and coach-sacking death cycle is to build a crop of top-end and super well-paid talent and then fill much of the rest of the list with role players.

This was also the model used by the Giants, and while they haven’t won a premiership it has taken them to a grand final and five finals series in six seasons.

The Suns must ultimately be judged on their own on-field performance, not those of players who used to play in their reserves.