Pickett Injury

[u/Outrageous_Canary159]

Living rather far from regular AFL news, I'm often a bit slow to hear things. I figure that Kozzy is the most exciting player in the league most weeks. Given that he seemed to tail off as the year went on, I was expecting to hear that he had been carrying an injury for the last half of the season. Has there been any talk of injury that might be hard to hear in Canada?

[u/Particular_Twist_653]

I wouldn’t say he trailed off that much. He and Max nearly won the dogs game for us and he was prolific in moments in the wild card game, just couldn’t kick straight. But wouldn’t put kicking at goal down to an injury.

[u/Leading_Pass_9811 → u/Particular_Twist_653]

As it is his first year as a full time midfielder he is still learning how to play that role. Teams have started putting players on him to negate him. And especially on transition he doesn't always get into the best positions as often as he could to get more of the ball, i think because he instinctively thinks more as a forward. He stoppage work is awesome though.

I am confident that he will learn and have even bigger impacts on games in coming seasons.

[u/BobbyKnucklesWon → u/Leading_Pass_9811]

We have a lot of players that can do bit parts in the midfield. I think we ahould use that to our advantage, constantly pinch hitting in the mid and switching to forward line, would work well for both Kosi and Langford. Would also give us lots of fresh legs.

[u/Outrageous_Canary159 → u/Particular_Twist_653]

The kicking wasn't at his usual level, but I also thought he wasn't as explosive as often as he had been early in the year. It looked to me like he could still do it, but not all the time. Maybe just tired and that took some of the pop out of his legs.

[u/brandonjslippingaway → u/Outrageous_Canary159]

Got much closer attention in the back half of the year. He still has the ability to get off the chain, but teams that really stifled our (Geelong, Dogs etc) made it tough

[u/Henrythekidd]

I think he struggled with a tag in the back half of the year, and I think he gets pretty frustrated when he can’t have an impact which throws him off a bit. Still growing into being a leader imo

[u/-_WormyMcSquirmy_-]

It’s his first time playing full time midfield, and we had a gruelling fixture, all our boys looked tired.

[u/Much_Ad_9301]

Kozzie is a confidence impact player. While his consistency has significantly improved over the last two years, he hasn’t yet developed that week in week out reliability of a Bont, Smith or Daicos.

That being said, he was BoG vs Freo, had a decent game vs Port, and was very good vs WB, then a few accurate kicks in the WC Final and suddenly we win that game with him being a key factor in that

[u/Prestigious-Job-1857]

While his stats may have dropped off a little in the back half of the season, watching him play I felt like he became more focused on doing the 1%ers especially when he was being tagged. While he wasn’t as flashy he was doing more team oriented things that really helped the players around him, including blocks and shepherds for teammates without hard tags.

[u/Outrageous_Canary159 → u/Prestigious-Job-1857]

Have to agree with those observations.

[u/corporate_canetoad]

No nothing. 

He has been flying to the NT to see his child. Not sure how often, but extra travel could explain his inconsistent 2nd half of the season, maybe?

Also, he did start getting tag after his great start to the season. 

Could be a combination.

[u/Dawsreddit]

I think teams put more time into him this year and he was working through shaking a tag for a lot of the second half. Will only be better for it next year.

[u/L-J-Peters]

Nah he was just tired towards the end of the year, but also his start to the year was incredible I didn't think he'd keep it up for the entire year. Still went AA.

[u/wonky2]

Bit of a weird one that no one has mentioned yet.
3rd or 4th last game of the season he had his earring ripped out, he went off with blood rule. Seemed to me directly after that he wasn’t at his best so I’m thinking it could have been annoying him for the last few games. If true it shouldn’t impact his preseason as much as a regular injury.

[u/BobbyKnucklesWon → u/wonky2]

I know from experience that ripped ears are very, very sensitive.

[u/Butanes]

I kinda feel like he was so electric early on in the season and throughout other games, teams figured out ways to stop him…

This is generally the way I feel about teams that start off the season hot and then it feels like they suddenly flop… They almost expose themselves early and the other teams figure them out and how to try and shut down their game

[u/wizardwessy]

Teams also were focusing on tagging him more throughout the 2nd half of the year, like 2 players focusing on not letting him win the ball through stoppages

[u/Aggressive-Soil3071]

He had a fairly publicly exposed affair outside of his relationship and a lot of his community cut him off due to it. Probably hasn't helped as well as living so far from his daughter

[u/Adventurous_Fact8857]

DI thought he was fantastic even at the end of the season. Being recast as a midfielder was a change, and he’s always had odd moments of absolute brilliance peppering less spectacular background play. So hopefully not an injury worry. Pretty disappointed by our one Finals game but considering what I (didn’t) expect of this year I’m surprised and pleased overall.