Melbourne’s Clayton Oliver is already a two-time best-and-fairest winner and an All-Australian. Photo: AFL MEDIA
The 2020 AFL national draft is only nine days away, which means it’s time for the latest instalment of Footyology’s annual “Redraft” series.
In this year’s first offering, we go back only five seasons to take a look at the 2015 national draft.
Interestingly, despite taking place so recently, only four members of the original top 10 retained their places in that bracket after the redraft was completed.
And the one who topped them all to take out No.1 spot in the revised top 10 is Melbourne ball magnet Clayton Oliver.
While critics will point to his at-times wayward disposal as his achilles heel, that flaw in his game is well and truly outweighed by his toughness, his attack on the ball and his prolific ball-winning ability.
After five seasons with the Demons, Oliver, originally taken at pick No.4, averages 28 disposals, 14 contested possessions, six clearances and six tackles in 99 games.
The 23-year-old is already a two-time best-and-fairest winner, earned an All-Australian guernsey in just his third year, and claimed the AFL Coaches Association best young player award in 2017.
He has also polled at least 12 Brownlow Medal votes in the last four years, achieving a career-high of 14 this season, despite it being shortened by the pandemic.
Oliver was one of Melbourne’s best players in its charmed run during the 2018 finals series, averaging 26 touches, 15 contested possessions, five clearances and six tackles before West Coast brutally ended the Demons’ September dream that year.
Coming in at No.2 in the revised 2015 top 10 is arguably that year’s biggest bargain, Tom Papley.
Papley was originally taken at pick No.14 of the rookie draft, which, taking in the national draft, was essentially pick 84, but the Sydney livewire has taken his game to such heights in the ensuing five years that he is now arguably the premier small forward in the competition.
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Desperately unlucky not to be named in this year’s All-Australian team after selectors decided to stack the forward line with superstar part-timers, Papley played a lone hand in attack for Sydney, winning its goalkicking award for the second year in a row with 26 majors.
In all, Papley has played 99 career games, like Oliver, and has 146 goals to his name, including a career-high of five against West Coast last year, and five bags of four.
Rounding out the top five are Brisbane forward Eric Hipwood, Carlton defender Jacob Weitering and Papley’s teammate Callum Mills.
The remainder of the top 10 is made up of St Kilda goalsneak Jade Gresham, Bulldogs premiership midfielder Josh Dunkley, GWS tough nut Jacob Hopper, triple premiership Tiger Daniel Rioli and another bargain pick-up in Essendon’s Anthony McDonald-Tipungwuti, who was taken by the Bombers at pick 22 of the rookie draft.
Ultimately, Papley, Hipwood, Gresham, Dunkley, Rioli and McDonald-Tipungwuti replaced Bulldogs forward Josh Schache (originally taken by Brisbane), Essendon duo Darcy Parish and Aaron Francis, Brisbane defender Callum Ah Chee (Gold Coast), promising Melbourne forward Sam Weideman and exciting Carlton youngster Harry McKay in the original top 10.
McKay’s partner-in-crime in the Blues’ forward line, Charlie Curnow, can also consider himself unlucky to miss out on making the revised top 10. But after missing so much footy, and with his immediate future under a big cloud after multiple knee injuries, it was too hard to put him ahead of so many impressive players with a lot more exposed form.
Papley and McDonald-Tipungwuti weren’t the only steals of the 2015 draft.
New Hawthorn wingman Tom Phillips was snaffled by Collingwood at pick 58, another three-time flag-winning Tiger in Nathan Broad was drafted at 67, Phillips’ new teammate Blake Hardwick went at 44, Port Adelaide defender Dan Houston had to wait until pick 45 of the rookie draft to have his name read out, and Adelaide was able to use pick 48 in the rookie draft on category B selection Hugh Greenwood, who now finds himself at Gold Coast.
Other noteworthy players who were stiff to miss the final cut were the Giants’ Harry Himmelberg, Port Adelaide’s Ryan Burton (originally taken by Hawthorn), Gold Coast defender Sam Collins (originally taken by Fremantle) and talented Crow Wayne Milera.
*Redrafts only consider the first time a player was drafted.
