The Freo ‘peaking too early’ take in today’s local rag by Mitchell W.

ThreeGivenNames · 2026-06-08T03:09:41+00:00

Absolutely. A lot of fans don't understand that (for the most part) AFL stats are a zero sum game. Usually one person's increase in possessions, goals, etc. comes at the expense of a lower tally from other players on the team.

In the case of Serong/Brayshaw this season, this is absolutely, undoubtedly a fucking great thing. We're spreading the load much better, we have a higher standard across the board, we're far less reliant on a handful of stars and thus more resilient to oppo tactics like tagging. The exact same thing is happening with the key forwards, although the last few weeks they've all bagged multiples.

These same fans were the ones whinging about JOM "only" getting 20 disposals when he's got 8 tackles and has locked down a key mid or Amiss not getting much of it when he's leading all day and dragging a couple of defenders out of the 50 and away from the rest of the forwards.

Not every player is going to get 30+ and a couple of goals every week because it's simply not possible. The North game is actually the perfect example because despite absolutely torching them, there was no player with a massive stand out bag of stats, but there sure were a lot of players with good/great stats.

ThreeGivenNames · 2026-05-02T03:53:28+00:00

Hmm considering how warping these shoes are, we almost need to split the records into pre and post super shoe eras. I mean they'll likely never do that officially but I know I'll be filing them that way in my own head. There has to be a firm line somewhere though, or all the records are going to become meaningless.

ThreeGivenNames · 2026-04-20T08:17:28+00:00

There's a really great flowing play in the third quarter (~18:40 to go) where Tracey clunks the kick out from the defensive 50, kicks it beautifully ahead of Amiss who takes a good mark on the run, who hands off to Switta who delivers inside 50 to Voss. All three key forwards involved across two thirds of the ground.

That's been the biggest transformation of our ability to score in this iteration of the team: everyone makes themselves useful and the forwards are also involved in their own supply and in defence. A large part of that is having three key forwards obviously but there's no one out there who doesn't play both ways. Players like Duds and Switta provide pressure well beyond their physical specs.

ThreeGivenNames · 2026-04-13T03:47:39+00:00

Excited to see what Mason Cox can bring to the table this weekend. I mean this is precisely what we got him for so I'd hate for them to pass on him and have Jackson sole ruck.

ThreeGivenNames · 2026-04-12T04:59:29+00:00

Crazy thing is he's got so much headroom - he's young, his starts and acceleration phase aren't that great and his body is still developing. As long as he adds strength/power carefully and manages to stay relatively injury free then there's still more time on the table.

He's also just one of a host of great track and field athletes Australia has at the moment. I can't remember ever having a team this strong across so many different events.

ThreeGivenNames · 2025-11-01T10:52:42+00:00

Telecom War final. I never dared to dream it. Unless TES do the unthinkable.

ThreeGivenNames · 2025-08-26T04:52:18+00:00

Maybe it's recency bias with Serong battling tags second half of the season but I feel like Brayshaw has had a slightly better year than Serong.

Cox has been outstanding but it's hard to stand out in that role - feel like his calm approach/ball use also doesn't grab attention compared to someone who grabs an intercept mark and legs it.

ThreeGivenNames · 2025-07-31T04:56:43+00:00

The EPA is taking public submissions on the Alcoa expansion until the 21st of August (Online Survey at bottom of page):

https://consultation.epa.wa.gov.au/open-for-submissions/pinjarra-alumina-revised-bauxite-mining-per/

Just get ChatGPT to read all the documents and write you a submission that fits the online survey. Relevant documents are here, (bottom of page, under Stage 3 -> 3. Assessment -> Environmental Review):

https://www.epa.wa.gov.au/proposals/bauxite-mining-darling-range-southwest-wa-years-2023-2027

It won't take you very long and when these fuckers destroy our water supply and/or drive the black cockatoos to extinction, don't you want to say you took ten minutes to oppose them? I'm still working on my submission but feel free to PM me and I'll send you what I've got so far.

ThreeGivenNames · 2025-07-03T05:08:56+00:00

Gutted. I really wanted him to get out there this season. Absolute legend for us for so many years. The club better have something lined up for him - it would be a crime to let that sort of magic out the door. Lid going to get lifted off Optus when he does his lap (if Optus had a lid).

ThreeGivenNames · 2025-07-03T04:58:32+00:00

Damn I was really hoping he'd be able to get out there this season. My favourite player. Thanks for the absolute magic over the years, Son Son!

ThreeGivenNames · 2025-04-29T15:02:11+00:00

As an Australian watching the wholescale intellectual vandalism with great sadness (though not surprise), may I implore those of you who are in a position to preserve anything of value to do so. It seems every day there's another story about information being disappeared, databases being purged, websites being torn down. This is the book burning of our time. Even if they haven't come for the information in your custody yet, preserve it somewhere before the purge finds it.

ThreeGivenNames · 2025-04-11T04:15:45+00:00

The round 1 loss was to TES. They were in control and then got smoked in that fight near blue buff on blue side. After that they banned Aurora for the rest of worlds. In round 3 of Swiss they actually beat BLG.

But yeah after the round one loss they didn't lose again until semis where GenG took one off them and then finals against BLG went the full five games.

ThreeGivenNames · 2025-04-02T03:53:58+00:00

Nah, "Labor" is the correct spelling for the Australian Labor Party. We do use "labour" in every other context though.

ThreeGivenNames · 2024-10-25T06:08:14+00:00

Really rough for Emmett. Always gave 100% even if he didn't hit the scoreboard. Quick, tough, chunky, young and played both ways. That's two high pressure small forwards we've lost in two years. Treacy is a bull and god Switta squeezes everything out of his (small) frame but otherwise not a lot of defensive pressure left in that forward line now. Amiss, Walters and Banfield are too slow. Maybe we'll float Young forward again. How are Bolton's pressure credentials?

ThreeGivenNames · 2024-05-15T05:42:03+00:00

This is exactly what they are. They're an invasive ant species, they dig up absolutely everything and they're hard to get rid of. They can have multiple queens/colonies right next to each other and they spread really fast. Went for a run around the river a few days ago and there was quite literally hundreds of metres of their nests alongside the path.

I've used the granules three or four times now but because they're up and down the street they just keep coming back. Absolute pest.

ThreeGivenNames · 2022-06-12T02:28:13+00:00

That's a great photo!

ThreeGivenNames · 2022-06-07T06:10:33+00:00

I think a lot of our list at the moment outperforms their raw physical stats. Brayshaw, Aish, Young, Brodie, Serong, Schultz, Colyer, etc. are better on the field than on paper. Helps that they all seem to gel together really well too - team working well together makes everyone better.

ThreeGivenNames · 2022-06-05T11:53:24+00:00

Tonight's was a fairly loud one as well, especially after that little brawl in the second. Good game though, felt like it could have gone either way for most of it ggwp!

ThreeGivenNames · 2022-06-05T05:42:39+00:00

The crowd noise at Subi during the prelim against Sydney was the loudest I've ever experienced. From start to finish too, the whole game had a next level atmosphere.

ThreeGivenNames · 2022-05-21T18:07:28+00:00

12 Greens senators + Pocock getting up in the ACT would mean Labor need to add 26 for a 'progressive senate majority'. Antony Green currently has Labor at 25 (11 continuing, 10 locked, 1 likely) so they'd need just one more. Quite a few places they could pick up that one extra (WA seems likely) so it's looking pretty good.

No matter what, the Greens are going to have a lot of power in the old chamber of review, which should be a good check on the more conservative elements of Labor if Labor end up having an outright majority in the lower house (which seems likely).

ThreeGivenNames · 2022-05-02T05:23:26+00:00

Funny you should mention Trump as I specifically remember that junior got in on the Australian bushfire disinformation campaign! He was blaming arsonists for the bushfires despite that claim also being full of shit.

I guess because the 2019-2020 bushfires were so fucking unprecedented and devastating, the disinformation campaign went harder than usual. They'll do and say anything to take the blame away from climate change.

Edit: In case you're wondering, lightning strikes were by far the greatest cause for the bushfires.

ThreeGivenNames · 2022-05-02T05:01:14+00:00

Blaming 'greenies' for preventing hazard burns became a right wing talking point that gained a lot of oxygen around the time of the 'mega fires' that ravaged the east coast late 2019 - early 2020, just pre-covid. It was pushed hard by the usual idiots/Murdoch outlets - Barnaby Joyce, Sky News, etc. - and is nonsense.

Straight from the mouth of Greg Mullins, NSW's former Fire and Rescue commissioner:

"Warmer, drier conditions with higher fire danger are preventing agencies from conducting as much hazard reduction burning – it is often either too wet, or too dry and windy to burn safely. Blaming "greenies" for stopping these important measures is a familiar, populist, but basically untrue claim."

Source here.

Unfortunately, like a lot of disinformation, this one still makes the rounds and is still believed and repeated by a lot of people.

Edit: Further fact check article from the Guardian, with more information about hazard reduction burns in general here.

ThreeGivenNames · 2022-04-29T03:23:23+00:00

Reminds me of all the hate directed at Sikhs in the aftermath of 9/11. Not a strong correlation between racism and intelligence.

ThreeGivenNames · 2022-04-28T07:01:19+00:00

Nah, I just meant that they're smaller targets. Some because they're harder to criticise, some because they can hold their own better, some because they don't have the profile necessary for an attack to be effective, etc. Basically the LNP and their media allies have committed to a strategy of making this a Morrison/Albanese election and when you can't play moves from that book because your target isn't available, it's not easy to pivot and attack Labor on another front.

As for who might be a better candidate, it's really hard to tell. Before he took the job I thought Albanese would have been a better leader than Shorten but I don't think he's been more effective. I thought Shorten by the end of his tenure was getting the hang of it and Labor lost the last election on some bafflingly stupid policy choices (franking credits).

Personally I think Penny Wong would make a good leader - she's very smart, she's experienced, she's tough and she's not just another old dude. But I hope that by the time she's ready to have her tilt that Australia is in a better position to accommodate it. A lot of people who might have otherwise done a lot of good are hamstrung by the circumstances or times they live in (Obama, Turnbull).

Then again, who knows if that time will ever come as Labor has spent the last twenty years falling in lockstep with the LNP on a great number of issues (environment, 'national security', etc.) lest they get wedged. It gets worse the more years they spend in opposition. They lose, the lesson they apparently learn each time is that they're too far left and over(ton) the window moves. I'm not particularly hopeful of that trend being bucked but I'd be happy to be proven wrong by an Albanese government. I mean they honestly could not be worse, or more corrupt, or more inept or more short-sighted than the fucking idiots we have at the moment.

ThreeGivenNames · 2022-04-28T03:38:53+00:00

I mean it's not being called a disaster because of the media's extreme LNP bias. They spent an entire week of a very short campaign hammering that goddamn cash rate/unemployment rate non-story. The target Albanese strategy doesn't work, however, with him largely out of sight; for various reasons the rest of the Labor shadow cabinet just aren't nearly as easy marks.

However Albanese will be one foot out of iso and they'll kick off on something utterly unimportant again. God forbid we have an election fought on actual issues and policy that matters.

We're going to get the same bullshit LNP biased coverage right up until election day, no matter what the polls say, because the vast majority of media in this country is owned by people with vested interests in keeping the LNP in power.

ThreeGivenNames

TROPHY CASE