The AFL is “extremely likely” to introduce mid-season trading next year, reports the Herald Sun’s Jon Ralph.
The league has asked clubs to lodge submissions on a number of major issues but it’s believed the change to trading, allowing players to switch clubs during a season, will be ticked off for 2025.
It won’t be introduced for 2024 because there are still elements of the system which need to be worked out, and some clubs have already traded away their 2024 draft picks, so waiting a year would allow for a balanced start to the system.
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A number of issues, including how these trades would impact the salary cap, whether future or only current picks can be used, whether free agents or only uncontracted players can be dealt, must be considered.
There is also the issue of balance. Teams may be willing to trade for a star player stuck at a bottom-four team if they’re fighting for a flag, but the AFL won’t want teams at the bottom to be able to completely dismantle their list.
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Trades in other sports leagues can get complex. For example the NBA has ‘trade exceptions’, where if a trade sees a team sending out more salary than it is receiving, they can use the ‘exception’ created by the deal as part of future trades, to bypass salary cap restrictions.
Teams can already bank salary cap space by going under the cap one year, and then paying over in the next, and vice versa.
The submissions from clubs will also deal with topics such as:
– Loosening the rules on matching bids for Academy players in the top 40 of the draft, after teams like West Coast complained;
– Changes to the draft bidding and points system, following Gold Coast’s ability to easily obtain the draft picks needed to match four first-round bids;
– Whether pick purchasing (buying draft picks by giving up unused salary cap space) should be introduced;
– Ideas on how to bring more Indigenous and multicultural players in to the league;
– AFLW and Under-18s league rules.
