Pick 29: Shai Bolton

[caesar]

I love him taking on multiple opponents, but the point is that isn't the only option and isn't always the best option (sometimes it is, and we all love his ability to skip past and wriggle away from opponents). There were at least a couple of times last night that resulted in turnovers (mainly free kicks for HTB) because he didn't give the handball when he should have. Its not his ability but his assessment of his best option last night was off. Its not something we generally see from Shai which is why people are commenting on it, generally Shai's decision making is very good, but last night his decision making radar was certainly off.

The 3 obvious ones were, 3rd quarter, he played some handball tennis with Dan Rioli on the Shane Warne stand wing, went inside 50 and instead of centreing the ball decided to snap for goal from 50m out and kicked out on the full - 9 times out of 10 Shai centres that.
Not sure of the quarter, might have been the 4th (we were kicking to the PRE), tried to take on about 3 tacklers in the forward line, I think spook mentioned that he looked for the handball instead of kicking, he did do that and had 2 players over the top who would have run in to an open goal, but he dodged back inside to get the ball on his left foot and was called HTB - normally Shai would handball that
In the last I think, won the ball out of the centre, instead of either handballing or kicking the ball wide, dodged back into the pack and was gang tackled , again HTB and again 'd say 9 times out of 10 he would have given that off to the runners and we'd have been kicking the ball inside 50.

I love Shai but some of these acts were very un-Shai like from what we have come to expect over the last few years as he has matured and gone back to that 19 year old kid that burst onto the scene.

In the last qtr he took on 3 players and handballed to Jack, great play.
Again in last qtr took on and beat 3 players in fwd pocket and was only dispossessed at the last minute as he chose to try to handball to Dusty who was calling for it rather than snapping on left.
But by all means pick on the 1 handball he maybe should of got through to Shedda also in the last qtr after AGAIN weaving and beating two or three opponents.
**FFS He has taken on & beaten two or three opponents 3 times in the last qtr not to mention his handball over the top to Bakes in the last streaming in to goal.
There is no player I'd rather watch in the comp when he's on and just treat the occasional selfish act as being fallible.

 

[Mr Brightside]

Just on Shai’s agility/elusiveness don’t think I’ve seen better , geez he must be hard to tackle , I’d put him on a par with Dusty in that area , totally different reasons why, but bloody amazing

 

[Willo]

Sometimes he plays like a proliferate millionaire when a blue collar effort is required.
But that’s his character I guess.
Is it a flaw to be harnessed or would that dim his self belief somewhat.
Sometimes you give the stars free rein to showcase their wares. When it all clicks, it’s sublime. When it doesn’t it looks selfish.
Shai just needs to deliver more of the sublime consistently

 

[MD Jazz]

Not counting George's out on the fulls and complete misses. Richo would be the only bloke who's accuracy stats benefit from that exclusion close to as much as George.

Btw, Selfish Shai has 12 goal assists from 12 games this year, and had 20 from 20 games last year. He was one of six Tigers to have one last night (Dusty had two). Career average of 0.8 goal assists per game. Dusty had 16 from 16 last year, 3 from 6 this year (0.7 per game career average). Jack has 4 from 10 this year, 17 from 22 last year (0.7 per game career average). Dion has 10 from 9 this year, 1 from 9 last year (0.5 per game career average, same as Cotch). Sheds, who had a career-best 31 goal assists from 24 games in 2018, has 10 from 12 this year after 7 from 16 last year (0.6 per game career).

Selfish Shai averages more goal assists per game than anyone on the list, while averaging a goal a game himself. And next week he reaches game 80, the rough approximation of when a player starts to "get it". If we can get there and hold our own in the middle he is going to rip a September game to shreds. 19 disposals, 0.5 in June will be 23 and 5.1 in September.

How much better would we be if he kept finding his teammates when in better positions!

He's potentially the best (most effective) player in the AFL.

 

[Redford]

Just on Shai’s agility/elusiveness don’t think I’ve seen better , geez he must be hard to tackle , I’d put him on a par with Dusty in that area , totally different reasons why, but bloody amazing

His evasiveness and agility is off the charts. As is his ground ball cleanliness. He’s a one grabber every time.

 

[spook]

He's a freak. As Jazz says, potentially the best player in the comp. But to get there, he has to overstep his limits at times, to know where they are. A wiser Shai in complete command of his game while still at his bending, twisting, soaring peak is something to look forward to.

 

[Redford]

He's a freak. As Jazz says, potentially the best player in the comp. But to get there, he has to overstep his limits at times, to know where they are. A wiser Shai in complete command of his game while still at his bending, twisting, soaring peak is something to look forward to.

I was thinking last night that if his execution - even just by foot in front of goal improved - he’d be approaching the top 10 players in the league sort of category.

 

[mrposhman]

In the last qtr he took on 3 players and handballed to Jack, great play.
Again in last qtr took on and beat 3 players in fwd pocket and was only dispossessed at the last minute as he chose to try to handball to Dusty who was calling for it rather than snapping on left.
But by all means pick on the 1 handball he maybe should of got through to Shedda also in the last qtr after AGAIN weaving and beating two or three opponents.
**FFS He has taken on & beaten two or three opponents 3 times in the last qtr not to mention his handball over the top to Bakes in the last streaming in to goal.
There is no player I'd rather watch in the comp when he's on and just treat the occasional selfish act as being fallible.

I think you are taking this personally. I love Shai, he's electric and you can hear it in the ground, everyone gets so excited when he gets the ball, we used to only hear that excitement at that level every time Dusty gets it, now we have the 2 of them, but last night seemed unlike Shai in several instances. It doesn't mean I hate him, or don't like watching him play, as I said I LOVE WATCHING SHAI, he's one of the reasons I love going to the footy as I reckon I love watching him live more than on the TV, much like Dusty and Rancey) but that doesn't mean we shouldn't call out when he's played a game thats a bit unshai like.

Not saying he had a bad game btw, I didn't. He was very involved, it was just one of those nearly games for him. He could have easily finished the game with 4 or 5 goals and 4 or 5 goal assists and easily been BOG but a combination of some poor execution (I'm less concerned with that) and a bit of poor decision making he didn't get to that crazy level that he could have.

 

[Tigers of Old]

I didn't think he was that bad. Just needs to tidy up his work. Small difference between a very good & bad game.

 

[Coburgtiger]

Ridiculous pile on on Shai, still had an almost anything game, still provided some creative play but yes off on some of his finishing.
People wanting to take taking on multiple opponents, that mere mortals could only contemplate and only dream of, out of his repertoire, how boring to want to harness a player that electrifies the game.
Did I get frustrated last night? yes but only because it didn't come off not that he tried.
**Still the number 1 score assist player on our list this year up till bye.

To be clear, I absolutely don’t want him to take that out of his game.

There’s a fraction of a percentage of players who can do what he can do in congestion.

But there’s a time and a place for taking on three players. Outnumbered in the forward line? Gold. In a pack in the centre? Invaluable. When you have get out options in front of the opposition goal? Silly.

Taking on the impossible, creates the impossible. Being able to do what Shai can do is the literal difference between a good team and a great one.

But, If you have three players on your hammer and a teammate on the outside, then it is stupid not to use them. If you take on the mob, even if you are successful, all you’ve done is put yourself in the position your teammate was already in. If you trust your teammate, use them. We’ve always done that. It’s part of the fabric of our success.

It’s not a rewriting of Shai’s genetic code. It’s a calibration to the mindset he had last night. You don’t need to be the match winner on every play. Your teammates can help.

 

[Tigers of Old]

Saw this on Twitter. Credit to the original poster.
Had to laugh.

 

[waiting]

Insanely talented but last night equally frustrating.

Instead of being a nerve racking game last night , we win by 40+ and everyone would be raving about his performance last night instead of……..

 

[RoarEmotion]

I reckon in the bye he got told he cost us games with the stupid 50m penalties and that affected him. It was pretty relaxed on talking tigers but balmey basically said that the group reviewed that silly 50m and dumb frees cost us games and we’re looking to fix it in the second half of the season.

The good was he didn’t give away any 50m and still created heaps of opportunities. The bad was all the burning of teammates (lack of composure I think) and wasting of opportunities as expounded on here already.

Reckon he is still just a kid in some respects and hopefully that mental aspect clicks in to place for him soon. My mate said sometimes the best play is just taking the easy option and hand passing it to the bloke in the clear - that was what didn’t happen enough Thursday night.

 

[caesar]

When you have get out options in front of the opposition goal? Silly.

I have never seen Shai venture into defence before, what the %*@& was he doing there? , lost his roadmap.

 

[tigerlandishome]

He reminds me of 'the greased up deaf guy' from Family Guy. "You're never gonna catch me."

 

[No 4]

He certainly had a bad day. But I'll back for the rest of this year. Go Bolts

 

[TigerMasochist]

Ridiculous pile on on Shai, still had an almost anything game, still provided some creative play but yes off on some of his finishing.
People wanting to take taking on multiple opponents, that mere mortals could only contemplate and only dream of, out of his repertoire, how boring to want to harness a player that electrifies the game.
Did I get frustrated last night? yes but only because it didn't come off not that he tried.
**Still the number 1 score assist player on our list this year up till bye.

Shai had a massive Georgie almost game on Thurs n he's way to talented for that. Doesn't matter how good you are, sometimes it's way better to take the safe n simple option of sharing with your mates. Dusty does it n it makes him, n the entire team a whole lot better.

 

[tigermike]

To be clear, I absolutely don’t want him to take that out of his game.

There’s a fraction of a percentage of players who can do what he can do in congestion.

But there’s a time and a place for taking on three players. Outnumbered in the forward line? Gold. In a pack in the centre? Invaluable. When you have get out options in front of the opposition goal? Silly.

Taking on the impossible, creates the impossible. Being able to do what Shai can do is the literal difference between a good team and a great one.

But, If you have three players on your hammer and a teammate on the outside, then it is stupid not to use them. If you take on the mob, even if you are successful, all you’ve done is put yourself in the position your teammate was already in. If you trust your teammate, use them. We’ve always done that. It’s part of the fabric of our success.

It’s not a rewriting of Shai’s genetic code. It’s a calibration to the mindset he had last night. You don’t need to be the match winner on every play. Your teammates can help.

Exactly, stop taking on 2 or 3 opponents just to show you can when a teammate is close by, that's lairising and costly when he gets caught. The resulting free kick may send the ball downfield for a possible goal. I like Shai's talent but he is over-doing it and not putting enough value on maintaining team possession.
That last Qtr failed attempt at a dribble kick from the top of the square when he had plenty of time to settle and concentrate on a proper kick was a (smiling) disgrace. He cannot be so wasteful when teammates have worked hard to get the ball down there. His mindset needs to change from me-first to team-first.

 

[AngryAnt]

It’s rare air , Georgie did it in a GF

Shai's got a lot of work to do to get to that level

 

[FitenFitenWin]

I like what you posted Oldie. It's been on my mind for a while now that George and Shai are similar players with regards to their strengths and weaknesses. Shai, of course, is several stratospheres more talented than George - but they provide a similar structural forward line role (not talking about Shai's midfield role here).

Both bring strong ground and air games, play instinctively rather than by utilising high footy IQ and can be wildly inconsistent. Shai has a bit of time left to work on his weaknesses. I think it's too late for George. And I don't think a forward line with both of them in it is optimal. We're better looking at other options - players that have different strengths and weakness.

Bringing in the juniors the way we're doing is exactly the right thing.