I’m not so worried about the AFL list size at the margins. There was a stat thrown around a while ago that the top 31 players on each list play 98 per cent of the season combined across the league. I think I’d be ok with slightly smaller AFL list sizes if there was a genuine mid-season draft.
But in my mind the more pressing challenge is that there is no real second-tier professional league (the WAFL salary cap is around the same as one average AFL player’s salary).
On the AFLPA, I feel like the upper-echelon of salaries is now high enough - most people would say if you earn over a $1 million a year you are doing very well - the focus for the AFLPA should really be on the lower-mid tier players. I’d probably start with maximum player salary tied either to the salary cap or minimum salary.
But other than minimum salaries, the AFL and AFLPA have left the clubs to their own devices, and so there’s the thorny question of where clubs should spend their player salary. I think players and clubs fall into the trap of overestimating how much the superstar players contribute to wins. The AFLPA and clubs seem to be operating on the 80/20 rule, that 20% of the players are responsible for 80% of how good a team is. As I’ve argued before, I think that might be true of sports like basketball, but with Aussie Rules where you’ve got 18 blokes running around a huge field and each of them need to contribute to scoring a goal, I don’t think it’s a good way to build a list or remunerate players.
As for the players on your list NPK, I think they are mostly on the margins and I wouldn’t be too fussed either way if they were retained or let go. The two exceptions are probably Bewley who is nominally our starting wingman (which perhaps speaks to our dearth of outside runners more than anything) and Blakely. Blakely is being squeezed at both ends – Mundy is timeless and Serong has taken his chance at such a young age – so I can’t see Blakely being a regular for us, and he’s too good to sit on a list not being played. I don’t think he’d have a heap of trade value, so I wouldn't be suprised if we release him from his contract, he’ll sign with another club and play well for them.
