James Hird sets record straight on 'team Hird' claims & Bombers priority pick bid - Footy Classified

Hello James Heard.Hello Ed, how are you?

I'm very well, how have you?Can I ask you, how's the last seven days been for you?

Well, it's been a lot of, I suppose, you turn on the TV, you pick up your phone, you avoid social media, but it's been interesting.I thought the days of me being chased down the street by cameras and on motorbikes, they were well and truly gone, but we went back to that early last week and there was a lot of stories, some true, some not true, some speculating, a lot of opinions on what I should do, what I shouldn't do, but for me it was, I stand by what I said last night, I'd love to be part of the process and see what happens.

Okay, so last week, There's been so much analysis of something that was actually pretty candid and I thought it was interesting that you told the truth and that wasn't good enough for people.When did you realise that this has now taken off?The words you said last week, I want to coach Essendon and I want to go through the process.When did that really hit you?Was it the next day or even driving home and listening to the radio?What happened?

I'm not sure exactly when it hit me.Probably when I drove home after this show and you went, wow, you actually said you'd thrown a cat amongst the pigeons there.Look, it just got bigger and bigger and bigger all week to the point that on the weekend it felt like it was all consuming for the football world and that certainly wasn't my intention.

There's a lot of analysis and that's what people do for a living.living these days, they have their opinions, but we can hand on heart, Kel, you were here, hand on heart say, that was as natural as a question being asked and we knew that, you know, we'd spoken before the show, obviously, and you said, you know, I'll answer all your questions truthfully, but then you came out and went bang.So it's not as if there's a lot of people thinking that suddenly everyone sat down and had 15 PR merchants in there and you'd been meeting secretly and the likes.I'll get to that question in a moment about Team Herd because that's another one of the headlines.Let me ask you right now, what has happened as far as you and Essendon since last week?

Well nothing really.I mean I've been very conscious that Andrew Welsh is a good friend.of mine.We've been friends for 20 odd years.You know, I think I coached Andrew's last game was back in 2011.And so I've known Andrew since a young kid, but I've been very conscious not to reach out to him because I think that is spoiling the process and actually inserting myself in a way that I don't want to.

I want Essendon to go about, as I said the other night, to go about and go through an exhaustive process.And if I'm the candidate that they choose, fantastic.If I'm not, I'm not.But in terms of contact, yes, I've been contacted by them.

That hasn't happened.Would you hope to get a call soon and find out if you are going to be part of this shortlist that they're putting together?They expect to come through with something over the next 10 to 15 days.

I don't hope to do anything, Cal. I don't hope for anything.What I want is it done.the process to be an exhaustive process and I would like to be part of that process.That happens in two weeks, three weeks.It's their timeline and they should set the process about the best process possible and let's give them the air and the space to do that.

Has the reaction from the last week made you want this job more or has it changed your view on how much you want this role and to return to senior coaching?

It hasn't changed my point of view.What I said the other night stands exactly for what I think now.And if they don't contact you, just life is normal after that?

Life doesn't seem to be normal at all, Brownie.It seems to change.Are you expecting them to contact you?Look, I don't know.

I would like them to.And I'd like to go about going through the process, as I said.But if they don't, well...It's a hypothetical and we'll deal with that when it happens.Are you building a camp around yourself?

Is there a team heard?We've heard about Dyson, we've heard about Brendan McCartney, Mark McVay.Is there interest in Michael Voss?Is this part of your thinking and have you contacted those people to be a part of your ticket?I haven't gone to that level yet.

Obviously you think about who you'd like.You've got people in the football world who you respect and who you'd like to work with.with, but putting a team together hasn't happened together.I mean, it could be academic, but there's no doubt, you know, you don't get to this point now and not have been thinking about it day and day and night about how you would put it together.

OK, one final question to you, and that is, when do you start preparing yourself for the inevitable?Now, we know that Carlton announced that they've got their process ready to go.process being the word of the week.Bombers are two weeks behind that, so we'll leave the President to get himself sorted and he'll do that in an orderly fashion.He's got a board there and that's what they'll do.When do you start to really, or are you thinking deeply at the moment before you actually put together what the dossier is you'll present to the bombers?

I would think that I'm preparing for this interview for the last sort of 35, 40 years.

Ed, while we're on the bombers, I want to take you to...

Can I just say one last thing before we go?We're going to leave you alone now.So come back in as a panelist on this show.You've been really honest with us and we trust you that in due course in the next few weeks when things open up.you'll be able to tell us what's going on here on Footy Classified.

Thanks, Ed, appreciate it.

Good on you, mate.

Let's go inside the Bombers and the fallout to last week because there was some fallout beyond just the senior coach being sacked in Brad Scott.Let's start with the players because my understanding is that several members of Essendon's leadership group, guys, including the captain Andy McGrath, Sam Durham and Nick Martin, two of their best players, were particularly disappointed about the way this played out last week and the decision to sack Brad Scott.Now, Durham in particular only signed a long -term extension only a couple of months ago, waiting his future in some ways too.the Brad Scott stability that he was bringing.So players weren't consulted along the way.That's part one.

It's hard to consult.We understand that.

So you don't think any of them knew until Tuesday morning, any inkling this was going to happen until Tuesday morning?No.

They found out when they were at the footy club reading Twitter.

So that's how they found out.One win in a year wasn't a giveaway?

Well, going into this season, as a player, when you start this season, you would knowthat Brad Scott is under the pump.If we start this season poorly, there's a chance that the coach is not going to be there.Zach Merritt, our best player, won it out at the end of last year.He didn't get out.There had to be an idea from these players.

It just wasn't out of the blue.

It wasn't out of the blue, but I still think the timing shocks them when it actually happens, and that is always the case.The other part to this is the assistant coaches.So Ben Jacobs, as we know, quit the football club.He was the midfield assistant last week.That was partly and largely in solidarity with Brad Scott who got him to that football club.But also it's my understanding that Interim Coach Dean Solomon spoke to the assistants last week.

His view was that he'll look after the culture element to this and that the assistants would go and forward with the strategy part.Now the assistants, my understanding, went away, came back and said, no, no, no, let's share this strategy part of this and then two days later Ben Jacobs quit there.So there was some misalignment there on that part.There's uncertainty within this football club on the whole.Herdy?Again, can I ask you one question?

You can.It seems strange that the senior coach would say I don't want to have anything to do with strategy of the way the team plays.

I don't think he said I don't want anything to do with it, but his focus was the energy, the spirit, the camaraderie, the culture.and leaving the strategy mainly to the assistants.That's my understanding of how that played out.

Brownie, would that seem strange to you?Very strange.

I think the coach is pretty much everything.He wears many hats and he has to wear every hat at the football club right down to trying to promote the membership of the football club.So he can't set yourself aside from that.

Implementing strategy, yes, with assistant coaches, but actually coming up with what the main strategy is, I would have thought he would have had a big part.

Righto, let's move forward though, because you've got an exclusive tonight, Kel Toomey, from AFL .com, I'll give you a full title.It's in the blueprint.So, the blueprint is, and this is what I was teasing earlier on, this is big news for the Bombers.

Well we can reveal tonight that Essendon has started discussions with the AFL about trying to get an assistance packagefor this year.So this would be historic for that football club.They haven't gone to the AFL previously to do that but the Bombers have open talks with the AFL and are expected to make an official submission later this year trying to get AFL help.So I expect their request to look similar to what West Coast was given last year.Here's four of the last assistance packages there.

West Coast last season, we'll see some of the numbers there.North Melbourne, two years in a row, 23 and 22.And then Gold Coast had the big, big assistance package back in 2019.But if Essendon doesn't win another game this year, guys, they would have won 18 if they'd passed 69 games.They're also expecting to lean on the fact that, of course, they've gone 22 years without a finals win.Are they rightfully putting their hand up for AFL assistance now, Brownie?

I don't think so.

I know a lot of people at Essendon will probably want that assistance package, but this is one of the original big four clubs.Back in 2016, that's a decade ago they finished on the bottom.Since then, their lowest finishing position has been 15th.Now, those numbers that you showed on the screen there and what you just said about Essendon's win -loss, it's nothing like North Melbourne or West Coast.I don't see how they'd get an assistance package out of the AFL.I don't like it.

Ed?

I think they need an assistance package.Why?They're too important to the competition.They're too important for the television rights coming up.And to be honest, just out of fairness to their supporters, it's been a generational thing now.They copped their whack for salary cap indiscretions in the 2000s.

They copped their whack over the supplement situation.We're 16 years down the track.And I think now it's time to draw a line under these things.There's a lot of people in the media at the moment who Back in the supplement situation, I watched from afar and also in close as a president of a football club in those meetings.One of the things that I really noticed was it became as much a battle between the Herald Sun and The Age.they took their positions and they won't put the guns down.

So it's fair enough, write the stories, there's no problem with that, history is as it is, but let's move forward.Let's go on with this now and I think for the fairness and for 130 years of pretty good service the Essendon Football Club have been to football, it's time to take the foot off their throat.So I would, if I was President of Collingwood and it came to a situation there, I'd vote in favour of Essendon receiving an assistance package.What's the package, though?

So is the foot on their throat, though?Who's got the foot on their throat?

Look, they'd probably put their own foot on their throat and put their own...Through recruiting?Mistakes?On everything.Paying out coaches?Yeah, but at some stage, you cop their whack.

The whole competition, the whole thing is about equalisation.Big clubs have been forking out for years for small clubs to survive and Essendon have been signing those cheques.It's their turn.It's their turn for the competition to go, righto, enough, we'll give you the hand out of the gutter.That's what I firmly believe.Our game is built on everybody working together.

We belt each other for two hours.That's the whole ethos of equalisation.And if the big clubs didn't vote for it, Melbourne and the Western Bulldogs don't win a premiership in the last few years.They don't get it if they stay where they were in their death cycle.We've got to get the Bombers out of the death cycle.Simple as that.

It's good business.and it's fair.

build last week.You get two more picks in somewhere inside the first half.or top 25.That leads to this.This is the bounty that they could walk into the end of the season with.Pick two, which is their own after making that bid.

Let's say it's Hawthorne's pick 16 for Zach Merritt, a draft assistance package, their own pick there at 20, pick 21 as well, which comes in after that extra pick, and then the Jordan Ridley trade.So as we see there, that could lead to a bounty, Ed, of six picks inside the first 25 and that would help them restore things.

And that merit pick is predicated on Hawthorne being the destination.But if you're the Bombers and you go to Merritt and say, hey listen, you do the right thing by us, we'll let you go.But there's a few other clubs Now Brandy, you've had a look over that.Who are some of the clubs who could finish down towards the bottom area that might want to do a deal with Essendon?In that bracket under Hawthorne?Yeah, so they get a better pick for Essendon.

And Merritt get a good place.

Adelaide definitely need another midfielder.But his age is starting to... 31, going on to 32 next season.But I would have thought that Adelaide need that running midfielder.They need a little bit more dynamic out of midfield.We'll get into that a little bit later.But Adelaide is definitely a club.

But clubs need to just survive this Tasmanian period.You've got to survive and then you can go get them.What about Collingwood?their cap.We said two and a half here and Xander Maguire actually did that story and got pilloried by the SNN officials.at that at one stage and then the coach last week the former coach came out on Agenda said they've got three million dollars so there you go they've got a poultice of cash and I think you know the old Essendon war chest the joke was they still had the war bonds at Essendon.

I've seen them.

Well they've got plenty if they want to go over the soft cap as well and get the team that they need to get in place.I think it's all in there for the Bombers they've just Forget about it.Just go.

How far down the track is it?Is it likely or not likely?The assistance package?Yeah.Well, the discussion's already started, which to me suggests that the AFL's open to the conversation.And, yeah, you put your hand up, it's open to do that.

That's the AFL rules.You're allowed to ask for them, and they're in their rights to ask.

Compared to North Melbourne, West Coast, you look at Essence history, in your opinion, will it happen?

I think they'll get something, yeah.

Really?

Yeah.

Mate, your other job, I'd be taking the odds on that.

I don't like it, but if they get it, good luck.

I was the same with West Coast last year.I was against it only because of the club they are and the resources they've got behind them and what they could do to rebuild the club.

They won a premiership seven years ago before they got theirs.Essendon hasn't won a final since 2004.

Everyone pays their way in this family of football and the Bombers have been holding up the competition financially for the best part of 130 years.So do West Coast.They're cast.We need to get them up.

I'm certainly not against it.