To be brutally honest, any player can improve regardless of their age. Doesn't matter whether you're 18, 28 or 38, you can always improve, be it your fitness, your attitude, your skill's, in other words you should never stop learning. If you're an AFL footballer drafted at 17, you've got one hell of a long way to go before you reach the top eg: Brownlow Medal or Grand Finalist.
Of course some players have more talent than other players, conversely those players with talent may just kick back and relax, whilst the players with the lesser talent have to do the hard yards. Look at Gary Ablett Jr, he's got all the talent in the world, he cruises through games, you've think you've got him on toast and within 2 minutes he has effectively taken the game away from you. With other players you can shut them out of the game, with Ablett or Chris Judd that is simply not possible.
Ben Cousins, Brownlow Medalist, Grand Final Winner, look at his work and training ethic on and off the field, a perfect example of working hard and if anything he probably works hardier today as he's gotten older to maintain as much competitive edge as possible. Ditto Matty Richardson.
Others have to work really really hard after they've been drafted to make it into the seconds and hopefully within a couple of years the AFL. Some don't of course play a AFL game at all in say the 4 years they've been given the opportunity to develop as a footballer.
I guess it all comes down to ones own personal motivation. You have to be motivated to go all the way, or you may just be motivated to go only part of the way, its an individuals choice. At the end of the day, regardless of how much coaching, how much work is done by a club on a particular player with diet, training tapes, weights and gym, running laps, skill's sessions, it still comes down to the player themselves as to just how much they will improve by. Of course its totally unrealistic to expect every AFL draftee to become all Chris Judd's, Richo's or Ben Cousin's, but there is nothing to stop them from playing at least 200 AFL games if they do the right thing and knuckle down, listen to what they are told, watch their senior players and how they go about, ask questions, do extra sessions etc etc.
Of course you may arrive at a club full of zeal and zest ready to rock and roll, only to find said club's older players with attitude issues, they don't train hard enough, the coaching staff are too soft, they'll only do what is absolutely bare minimum necessary to keep the coaches happy, they are sloppy on the field but they don't seem to care because they know that next week they'll get a game because there is nobody else to replace them on a regular basis. Sloppy clubs do not win Grand Finals, they might if they are lucky make the odd finals series but overall if they have a sloppy nature about themselves, then they are pushing the barrow up Mount Everest and not getting anywhere.
So if you were a smart young draft pick, you'd train the house down, make the most of your limited opportunities and when your initial contract is up take a gamble and go for the pre season draft in an attempt to get to a club that has a better attitude within, which is of course rather a pity because the initial club you were selected by is in the end the loser.
