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onlooker wrote:At the time Matthews said words to the effect that they delisted (sorry traded) Gram because his defensive game wasn't up to the level of other players (he was talking about the Scott brothers) they had available.
Gram asked Brisbane for a trade because he was homesick and wasn't getting a look in at Brisbane's 22. Matthews has said since that Gram and Bolton were two players he regretted letting go the most. Whatever Matthews judgement of Gram was as an 18-to-20-year old is irrelevant. He's a very different player now to what he was then.
I wouldn't make too much of the efficiency stat either. Guys with a lot of inside 50s regularly have low efficiency. You're kicking into a funnel. Rebounders are kicking out of a funnel. I think he gets too excited by the 50m arc, but I don't think his kicking skills are any worse than Joey's or Ray's.
but you can see his kicking skill are not comparable to others when he goes for goal. This is where he is worse than ray and joey, particularly on the run he sprays them wide and it often results in turnovers. I think he rushes his drop to much, and possibly panics a little when at top speed, i think that if he were to slow down the drop of the ball a touch and make it more smooth and clean, hed be hitting a lot more targets.
People have short memories -under thomas he was about the only non forward goal scorer on a regular basis.
His big bombs from outside 50 came regularly enough to back himself when needed to. He can break games when they lock down defensively with kicking over the pack.
He is fast and kicks long and these are lower percentage shots than setting up a forward target.
Against sydney roo gave him a spray about not passing to him after a missed goal, even though he was surrounded by swans players and not marking anything -next time he got it in there he passed to a pack and turned the ball over.
It's like when people crack the s***s when Milney backs himself and turns the ball over- you loose something by not allowing creative players to use their tricks.
Gram will straighten up soon and everyone will pretend they always backed him.
He grew up a Saints supporter and that makes him even more awesome- I never saw any thing Peckett did wrong because he grew up barracking for the Saints.
Gram's always been a pretty iffy kick but some of his shanks in the first two rounds have been atrocious by any standard.
I reckon they're the types of kicks that blokes do when they've had an injection in their foot and have no feeling. I asumed that was what was happening with him.
I reckon his kicking's pretty good, generally, certainly no worse than guys like R Clarke or Gwilt who are thought of as good kicks.
In terms of goalkicking specifically, he played every game last year and kicked 20 goals, fifth behind the forwards and much better than any of our other midfielders. 13 behinds makes 61% accuracy which compares to other midfielders in 08 thus:
So he's basically in the middle of the pack for accuracy, but note that he had 33 scoring shots while the next best was Joey's 23, for much worse accuracy. Here are the forwards, for comparison.
I'm with plugger. I think he's a really useful player, he's definitely in our best 22 and probably in our top 10, and with his run and goalkicking he has dimensions that many of the rest of our midfielders don't.
Saints43 wrote:Gram's always been a pretty iffy kick but some of his shanks in the first two rounds have been atrocious by any standard.
I reckon they're the types of kicks that blokes do when they've had an injection in their foot and have no feeling. I asumed that was what was happening with him.
Does anyone know if he's carrying an injury?
Dunno, but people have been highlighting the fact that he has not been around for many training sessions so far this year. Could be on a specialised program, could even be that he needs to work harder. Either way, I am still of the opinion that he is very much needed.
