What Can Richmond Really Know About Yeo and Wilson?
Richmond does not need to draft Finlay Yeo or Brodie Wilson to honour its history. But if it passes, what will distinguish a football reason from a familiar label? Yeo is 172 centimetres; Wilson’s route from senior local football to Eastern Ranges is less conventional. Those facts create different uncertainties, not conclusions. A small frame may complicate a forward’s projection, while a shorter representative record may leave more to learn. Neither tells us whether the useful actions will hold at AFL level. Richmond can neither recruit backwards from a premiership photograph nor know the future on draft night. The harder question is what its evidence really permits it to say. In the full feature, we examine how Richmond’s overlooked successes and Marcon’s brief career complicate the stories told about Yeo and Wilson.
Stories about overlooked Tigers make that uncertainty feel urgent, but they can distort it. Jack Titus, Kane Lambert and Liam Baker became examples of footballers who exceeded expectations; Adam Marcon’s brief senior career warns against treating perseverance as a guarantee. Their careers do not compel Richmond to select either young forward, and they cannot be reduced to one shared path. Players develop, roles differ and opportunities change. The same history can support belief in unusual strengths or caution about incomplete evidence. Which reading should carry more weight for Yeo and Wilson is not settled by remembering the names. It depends on what their own football shows, and what remains unknown. In our Members investigation, we trace what Yeo’s combine times and championship performances establish, and what they cannot settle about AFL translation.
What do Yeo’s and Wilson’s records actually establish?
Yeo’s latest testing changes one part of that discussion. WA Football reported a 7.533-second agility result at the 11 October state combine, faster than the previous benchmark attributed to Darcy Jones, alongside a 2.95-second 20-metre sprint. Those measurements support taking his movement seriously; they do not show how he performs through contact or makes decisions under match pressure. His championship returns add different evidence: 15 disposals, eight contested possessions, three clearances and six tackles against Vic Metro, then two goals from 11 disposals against Vic Country. The numbers broaden the picture beyond a single scoring role, but leave open how repeatable those actions are against AFL demands. In the full feature, we follow Wilson’s 36-goal local season into Eastern Ranges and examine the limits of comparing those levels.
Wilson’s evidence begins elsewhere. Upper Ferntree Gully’s 2025 season review listed him as its leading senior goalkicker, with 36 goals, before his involvement with Eastern Ranges and a place on the state-combine list. The progression matters, but those competitions are not interchangeable measures. The question is what held up as opponents and settings changed: his ability to find space, pressure, decisions or scoring chances. The record does not turn local goals into an AFL forecast, nor does the move itself prove that a weakness has been exposed. Wilson’s development may be harder to assess because the pathway is less familiar; that is not, by itself, evidence for or against him. In our Members investigation, we consider what Titus’s record says about physical assumptions, while examining where a modern comparison breaks down.
Where do Richmond’s historical comparisons help—and stop?
Jack Titus offers a historical parallel only if the comparison stays narrow. Richmond’s accounts describe a lightly framed forward whose timing, elusiveness, marking judgment and finishing helped him overcome a physical disadvantage; he kicked 970 goals in 294 League matches. That career shows how a player’s methods can matter more than a first impression of build. It cannot establish that a contemporary teenager will find the same answers. Titus played in a different era, role and tactical environment, and his success does not remove the contact or contest demands Yeo may face. The useful question is not whether Yeo is another Titus, but whether his own movement creates football value. In the full feature, we compare Lambert’s VFL advocacy and Baker’s WAFL step-up to ask how development changes a draft projection.
Lambert gives Richmond a closer, but still imperfect, comparison: selected at rookie pick 46 after substantial VFL production, he finished third in the club’s 2017 best and fairest. Damien Hardwick later acknowledged uncertainty about his size and fit, while former coach Denis Pagan had advocated for an opportunity. Baker’s route was different: after missing the 2016 national draft, he played senior WAFL football with Subiaco before Richmond selected him. Marcon complicates the celebratory version: Richmond recognised his VFL quality and named him its VFL best and fairest, yet his 2016 AFL season amounted to two senior games and no subsequent contract. Together, these careers invite competing readings, not a guarantee. In our Members investigation, we examine Marcon’s VFL recognition and brief AFL career, including what the available record cannot establish about opportunity.
What makes passing or selecting the more defensible risk?
Passing carries a cost beside selection. If either prospect flourishes elsewhere, the miss will be visible; if Richmond uses a pick on a player whose strengths do not translate, the list place, coaching attention and opportunity have also been spent. The balance depends on the alternatives available at the selection, the role Richmond expects and how much uncertainty it accepts. Those details cannot be settled by hindsight or by an appealing historical comparison. The central question remains uncomfortable: when Yeo’s testing challenges a concern, or Wilson’s pathway leaves gaps, what would make Richmond’s eventual choice convincing rather than convenient? The evidence does not yet close that debate. In the full feature, we weigh the visible cost of a missed prospect against the list place, role and development investment a selection consumes.
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