Put the red marker pen through Brownlow ineligible players

 
Bruce Walkley Roar Pro

By , 24 Sep 2008 Bruce Walkley is a Roar Pro

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Lance Franklin and Adam Goodes embrace after their Round 15 match. Image courtesy of GSP Images.
It’s time to stop awarding Brownlow Medal votes to players after they become ineligible to win it.
Umpires should be given a red marker pen before each game and use it to put a line in the Football Record through all players who have been ruled out in earlier matches, like Buddy Franklin and Adam Goodes were this year.

Why? Because the three votes Franklin got from umpires Simon Meredith, Scott McLaren and Ray Chamberlain in Hawthorn’s game against the Brisbane Lions at York Park in round 19 could well have cost Lions champion Simon Black a second medal to add to the one he won in 2002.

Black, who finished one behind the Western Bulldogs’ Adam Cooney on Monday night, polled his 23 votes in eight of the first 16 games (he missed round seven) and didn’t score in the remaining six.
But consider this: when the Hawks played the Lions in round 19, the votes went to Franklin (3), Cyril Rioli (2) and Stuart Dew (1) in a one-sided game that Hawthorn won by 69 points, 16.14 (110) to 5.11 (41).

One reputable list of best players in that game disagreed with the umps by naming Dew as only the Hawks’ sixth-best player, in a cast of thousands, behind Franklin, Rioli, Luke Hodge, Cameron Stokes and Sam Mitchell.

The same list, not surprisingly in view of the score, deemed only four Lions players worthy of mention – Black, Jared Brennan, Travis Johnstone and Luke Power, in that order.

And it’s not all that unusual for the best player in a team that gets thrashed to be rated the third-best overall.

So if ineligible players had been barred from receiving votes, the top three players probably would have been Rioli, Dew and either Hodge, Stokes or Black (Mitchell was also ineligible).

If Black had got the nod for that one vote it would have been enough to give him another medal, as he would have finished tied on 24 votes with Cooney.

Franklin, who became ineligible after round 12, also got one vote in round 15 against the Sydney Swans and three in round 18 against Collingwood, so he should have finished with 13 votes instead of being sixth on 20.

Goodes, unable to win after round 11, picked up two votes against Fremantle in round 19, so should have finished with 19 votes, tied with Geelong’s Joel Selwood, instead of 21.

Apart from Black, plenty of other players would have picked up votes along the way if errant players had been ruled out from the time they became ineligible.

That said, it wasn’t much of a surprise to me that Cooney won.

I had a gut feeling that the winner would come from the Bulldogs, as there were too many Geelong and Hawthorn players taking votes from each other, and Gary Ablett missed three games at a vital time.

When my wife asked me just before the count started who would win, I nominated Ryan Griffen, whom I also picked in a nationwide tipping contest, but said I thought Cooney might cost him the medal by taking a few top votes for some outstanding performances.

Griffen started like a house on fire, with six votes after four rounds, but faded to total 10 up to round 14. He missed the following week’s game and didn’t score again.

The Brownlow night tribute to retired dual medallist Robert Harvey was a nice touch, and brought the staggering observation that there are 173 AFL-listed players who weren’t born when he played his first game in 1988 at the age of 16.

It was no surprise to hear that the St Kilda coach who threw him in at the deep end that day was Darrel Baldock.

The Doc was given his baptism of fire in official senior football for Tasmanian club East Devonport at the same age, after playing in a practice game when he was 12.

East’s coach was Lindsay Webb, one of the best Tasmanian footballers never to play in the VFL/AFL.
Baldock, who reportedly isn’t in the best of health these days, turns 70 next Monday. Happy birthday, Doc.

And a pat on the back to the AFL and Channel Ten for allowing Fox’s Main Event channel to air the Brownlow count live in NSW and Queensland. Pity about those finals games, though. Maybe next year.

Premiership pick: Cats by 11, coming from nine down at three-quarter-time. Last week 1 from 2 (never again, Saints), total so far 118/183.

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