{"id":42598,"date":"2018-11-21T11:26:10","date_gmt":"2018-11-21T00:26:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.afldraftcentral.com.au\/?p=42598"},"modified":"2018-11-21T11:26:10","modified_gmt":"2018-11-21T00:26:10","slug":"afl-draft-preview-west-coast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/2018\/11\/21\/afl-draft-preview-west-coast\/","title":{"rendered":"AFL Draft preview: West Coast"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>THE 2018 premiers do not have too many pressing needs for their list, especially considering their premiership window is wide open.<\/p>\n<p><strong>LIST NEEDS<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Best available but:\n<ul>\n<li>Ruck depth<\/li>\n<li>Small-medium forward<\/li>\n<li>Key defender<\/li>\n<li>Small-medium defender<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>DRAFT PICKS:<\/strong> 20, 22, 61, 72, 76, 94<\/p>\n<p>Coming off the premiership, the Eagles do not have any significant holes in their list management \u2013 they have a well-stocked midfield, an array of gun forwards, some excellent defenders and serviceable ruckmen.<\/p>\n<p>They enter the draft at pick 20 and depending if he slides, the Eagles could look to Perth product <a href=\"https:\/\/www.afldraftcentral.com.au\/player\/ian-hill\/\"><strong>Ian Hill<\/strong><\/a> to fill the shoes left by the retired Mark LeCras. Hill is a similar damaging small forward to Fremantle star Michael Walters, and would add an extra spark to an already impressive forward line. They might opt for a taller forward option in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.afldraftcentral.com.au\/player\/sam-sturt\/\"><strong>Sam Sturt<\/strong><\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/www.afldraftcentral.com.au\/player\/curtis-taylor\/\"><strong>Curtis Taylor<\/strong><\/a> if either are on the board. West Coast could be the side that pounces first on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.afldraftcentral.com.au\/player\/bailey-williams\/\"><strong>Bailey Williams<\/strong><\/a> if they think he can fit amongst their talls and secure a long-term ruck\/forward rather than a short-term mature-ager.<\/p>\n<p>With pick 22, West Coast could look at Victorian pair <a href=\"https:\/\/www.afldraftcentral.com.au\/player\/xavier-ohalloran\/\"><strong>Xavier O\u2019Halloran<\/strong><\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.afldraftcentral.com.au\/player\/ely-smith\/\"><strong>Ely Smith<\/strong><\/a>. O\u2019Halloran, a product of the Western Jets, is seen as the best leader in this year\u2019s draft pool and is a midfielder capable of inflicting damage on the scoreboard &#8211; traits similar to Richmond\u2019s premiership captain Trent Cotchin. Smith on the other hand is a speedy and competitive midfielder who attacks each contest with vigour, similar to St Kilda\u2019s David Armitage.<\/p>\n<p>It is expected the Eagles will receive a bid for Next-Generation Academy member <a href=\"https:\/\/www.afldraftcentral.com.au\/player\/jarrod-cameron\/\"><strong>Jarrod Cameron<\/strong><\/a> around pick 40 and will certainly match the offer, giving up their remaining picks for the Swan Districts product. Cameron is a small forward who is raw but has plenty of upside. If they look to add a tall late in the draft, perhaps they turn to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.afldraftcentral.com.au\/player\/james-blanck\/\"><strong>James Blanck<\/strong><\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.afldraftcentral.com.au\/player\/riley-grundy\/\"><strong>Riley Grundy<\/strong><\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/www.afldraftcentral.com.au\/player\/kyle-reid\/\"><strong>Kyle Reid<\/strong><\/a> who could be there in the final stages of the draft.<\/p>\n<p>There is talk that the Eagles will look to add ex-Sydney player <strong>Harry Marsh<\/strong>\u00a0or ex-Brisbane player <strong>Marco Paparone<\/strong>\u00a0in the Rookie Draft. Marsh will add to the small-medium defensive options, especially considering Shannon Hurn is 32. Paparone will be the fourth recognised key defender at West Coast behind Jeremy McGovern, Tom Barrass, and Will Schofield.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>THE 2018 premiers do not have too many pressing needs for their list, especially considering their premiership window is wide open. LIST NEEDS Best available but: Ruck depth Small-medium forward Key defender Small-medium defender &nbsp; DRAFT PICKS: 20, 22, 61, 72, 76, 94 Coming off the premiership, the Eagles do not have any significant holes [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":39932,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[2085,144,3630,894,3835,2380,2444,3986,6442,7436,2318],"class_list":["post-42598","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-bailey-williams","tag-curtis-taylor","tag-ely-smith","tag-ian-hill","tag-james-blanck","tag-jarrod-cameron","tag-kyle-reid","tag-riley-grundy","tag-sam-sturt","tag-west-coast-eagles-draft-preview","tag-xavier-ohalloran"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42598","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42598"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42598\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39932"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42598"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42598"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42598"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}