I never mentioned anything about what position Apeness played before being drafted Jezza (it was majority forward with stints in the ruck in case you were unaware and missed his games). What I referred to was the way he was talked up and positioned once drafted by Freo which you completely threw out the window and ignored in order to take cheap shots at me and defend RL. RL by his own admission has nothing to do with drafting so what position he played before then would be irrelevant in that discussion anyway.
The point is he was drafted as a forward with repeated interviews declaring him a forward and showering praise on his ability to mark the ball and play as a KPF. I agreed with this sentiment and still do, he's a fantastic mark and exactly the type of key tall we need up forward to make a contest and bring the ball to ground against the biggest defenders.
All of a sudden we now have RL spinning things differently to the first few years Apeness was at the club and declaring him a ruckman (which at 200cm he is undersized and not able to compete against the best). A complete 180 like this makes me ask a lot of questions, especially when he spent so long trying to convince us he was something else. I'm not a fan of the lying and deception, especially when it seems aimed at the fans and keeping them on side with his agenda. I'm not that easily bought.
Now Apeness has been declared a ruckman in waiting and he goes out this weekend to lead the ruck on his own (and I think a smaller, more mobile ruckman like Grundy is a better initial match up for Apeness if he is fit after all his leg injuries) and struggles, he cops more criticism than he should as a forward who can compete in the ruck similar to a Jenkins at Adelaide or Patton at GWS.
RL gets away with selecting an injury prone player in an unnatural position just to get by till his proper ruckman are back from injury instead of playing one of the actual ruckman we selected last draft or should have been selecting the past few years. Cox/Fyfe are not a good combo in reserve either with both at risk of injury and needed more urgently elsewhere but that is the role Apeness should be playing.
Just in case you're still wondering where I got the impression Apeness was Pav's replacement or 'the Messiah', I spent 2 min googling to find these:
"The two flavours at the moment are ruck-forwards, because you can only play one ruck, and big mids. So Michael's a rare commodity in the draft.''
At 200cm and 105kg, Apeness was viewed as the long-term replacement for retired forward Matthew Pavlich.
Luckless Fremantle Dockers forward Michael Apeness looks likely to return for Peel Thunder... but has played just two games for the Dockers after injuries derailed the initial stages of his career. In those two games Apeness showed an aggressive presence in the forward line, making an impact...
Young Fremantle forward Michael Apeness has signed a new deal which will see him remain at the club until the end of the 2018 season.
He even debuted as a late replacement for Pav!
