AFL Rising Star award needs a makeover

For all its excitement, the Rising Star award frustrates football supporters like nothing else. It’s an accolade that fans of every team can follow with anticipation. At the same time, though, it’s an accolade that transforms civil football dialogue into chaotic shouting contests.

This week, The Age’s Martin Blake opened up the can of worms, claiming that Jack Steven’s four years in the system had given him an unfair advantage over, say, a raw 18 year-old rookie.

In the consequent days, AFL guru Kevin Sheehan and journalist Greg Baum chucked their hat into the ring, each tossing up a plethora of opinions for the footy punters to muse over.

Blake had every right to question the system. And Sheehan had every right to defend his baby. Baum, meanwhile, had every right to argue for its immediate demise.

It’s a good, healthy debate, vital for sustaining the football democracy. But something’s missing. An alternative.

As it stands, the Rising Star can be criticised from a number of angles.

First of all, there are inconsistencies apparent in the round-by-round nominations. Some weeks, the honour goes to that week’s most prominent performer. Other weeks, it goes to a player on the basis of their consistency.

Their effort that weekend may not have been anything spectacular; rather, their nomination is a reflection of their week-to-week contributions. Both methods have their merits. But the AFL needs to make its criteria understood.

Secondly, the end-of-season voting format screams of subjectivity. While the list of previous Rising Star winners reads like a who’s who in football, the final voting scorecard often favours blonde-haired midfielders over blue-collar workhorses.

Ben Stratton is the perfect example. The young Hawthorn defender won rave reviews last year in his 23 games. When the votes were tallied up in September, however, the Hawk received a solitary mention.

The third problem was highlighted by Blake, in his criticism of Steven’s nod. There thus needs to be a solution which prevents mature players from stealing the thunder from their teenage contemporaries.

With the exception of Nick Holland – all the way back in 1996 – all Rising Star winners have received the honour within two years of joining an AFL list. With that in mind, why not place the cut-off there?

In addition to setting the age limit at 21, and restricting the award to players with less than ten games experience, the award should only be open to players in their first two seasons.

Sure, to specify that a player must fulfil three separate criteria is a tad wordy. Yet if it rids the system of freak anomalies, I’m sure the footy community won’t mind.

As for the voting and nomination process, a revolution needs to take place.

Each week, a panel of five judges – including Sheehan – gives ten eligible youngsters a vote out of ten. This leaderboard remains secret, until the end of the season, when the player with the most votes takes home the Ron Evans Medal.

Simple enough.

The weekly nomination goes to the highest ranked player for that round, so long as they haven’t yet been nominated during the season.

In the last four weeks of the year, the system changes. The weekly votes continue, but the Round 21-24 nominations instead go to the highest-ranked youngster yet to receive a gong.

If such measures were around last year, presently underrated players such as Jordie McKenzie, Mitch Robinson, and Ben Nason would have finished the year with some much-deserved recognition. It would have also prevented some not-to-be-named players from sneaking into the final voting tally, thanks primarily to the muscle of their media profile.

The most important thing to remember in this whole dispute, however, is that the Rising Star Award is not about the players. Just listen to the recipients during the weekly Rising Star interview. “Nah, I don’t think about it much. It’s all about the team,” is their oft-repeated tagline. The players themselves are never the ecstatic ones. Those emotions belong to the fans.

For the one-eyed supporter, the Rising Star offers that glimmer of hope when times are rough. In seasons where the premiership window has been smashed to pieces, the weekly nominations give us something to celebrate. It gives us something to scream about. It gives us something to argue about.