Those readers familiar with my weekly wonderings and wanderings are probably also familiar with my tracking of the ‘meta-Brownlow’.
It’s tallied by compiling the votes from a plethora of different sources following each round, including game-day best and fairest, team-of-the-round declarations, and as many of the 3-2-1 style post-game player evaluations as I can find.
The goal is to simulate the consensus of the various player of the year awards: not just the Charlie but like the articles in vogue here at mid-season, the mid-season All Australian projected team.
(As if that matters as much as a single sock with an extra hole in it. But it’s amusing, and I play along.)
Except that, being American, I prefer to present them not as top 22s or 25s, but as we do our All American teams: a first team of 18 starters, and a second team of 18 on the imaginary depth chart.
So, using only the point totals from the first half of the season as the defining criteria, here are my first and second teams of the just-over-half-a-season:
First team
Defence: Rory Laird (180 points), Alex Rance (165), Jason Johanissen (123), Sam Docherty (111), Dylan Roberton (110), and Shaun Burgoyne (103).
Midfield: Dustin Martin (323 points), Rory Sloane (311), Patrick Dangerfield (304), Joel Selwood (273), Scott Pendlebury (246), and Elliot Yeo (221).
Ruck: Brodie Grundy (119).
Forwards: Lance Franklin (184), Toby Greene (148), Joe Daniher (140), Charlie Dixon (139), and Jeremy Cameron (137).
Second team
Defence: Zac Williams (102), Jeremy Howe (100), Zach Tuohy (97), Michael Hurley (97), Michael Hibbard (96), and Robbie Tarrant (94).
Midfield: Josh Kelly (203), Zach Merrett (171), Ollie Wines (181), Marcus Bontempelli (174), Gary Ablett Jr (171).
Ruck: Sam Jacobs (112).
Forwards: Josh Kennedy (135), Eddie Betts (126), Jack Riewoldt (125), Tom Lynch (119), Shaun Higgins (117), Taylor Walker (105).
(Since rucks can either be midfield or forward, but rarely defence, I chose to take the ruck spots one from each category – 11 mids, 11 forwards, two rucks.)
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Blondes have more fun, and midfielders get all the votes. As much as I try to balance my scoring system to counteract this tendency, it’s hard to imagine a forward winning an MVP award without kicking a century or more. And it’s hard to imagine a defenceman doing so without bribing everyone doing the voting.
I’m so glad I wasn’t doing this from a place of personal preference. It was so tempting to fudge numbers to move players I like into place, but that’s not the point (the best example: I would take Kelly and Betts on my team in a heartbeat, and figure out who to cut later. But that’s not what the numbers say).
I did pro-rate point totals to even out the teams that have and have not had their bye yet, however (Jeremy McGovern of the Eagles was the only player who lost his spot because he was passed by someone with more points-per-game).
There are only two teams not represented here: Brisbane (sure), and Fremantle (hmmm, well…). I found it incredible to realise that not a single member of a 6-6 team is in our top 36 players. But the Dockers are about as soft a .500 team as you’ll see, carrying the fourth-worst percentage in the contest at 78 per cent; this is pretty indicative of that.
Greater Western Sydney has two first teamers and two ‘first off the bench’ in the second team, but Adelaide is the only team with five representatives in total. Given those two teams’ dominance in 2017, that seems apros pos.
After a blazing start, Sloane has now been passed by Dusty the Tiger for the lead in the meta-Brownlow race. It’s the first lead of the season for Martin, and the first time Rory hasn’t led since his fourth consecutive dominant performance, after Round 6.
Since I mentioned dominant performances, or games where a player is recognised as outstanding by at least 90 per cent of the sources I monitor, now’s a good time to mention that Sloane still leads that count, with five dominants plus one ‘prominent’ (80-plus per cent recognition). Dangerfield has four dominants and two prominents; Martin and Selwood both have four and one. Yeo and Pendlebury are the only other men with three dominant performances in the first half of the season.
The current top vote-getter from each team
Adelaide – Rory Sloane
Brisbane – Dayne Beams
Carlton – Marc Murphy
Collingwood – Scott Pendlebury
Essendon – Zach Merrett
Fremantle – Lachie Neale
Geelong – Paddy Dangerfield
Gold Coast – Gary Ablett Jr
GWS – Josh Kelly
Hawthorn – Tom Mitchell
Melbourne – Clayton Oliver
North Melbourne – Ben Cunnington
Port Adelaide – Ollie Wines
Richmond – Dustin Martin
St Kilda – Jack Steven
Sydney – Lance Franklin
West Coast – Elliot Yeo
Western Bulldogs – Marcus Bontempelli
Team-by-team breakdown of the first and second teams
Adelaide – Laird, Sloane; Betts, Jacobs, Walker
Carlton – Docherty
Collingwood – Grundy, Pendlebury; Howe
Essendon – Daniher; Hurley, Merrett
Geelong – Dangerfield, J.Selwood; Tuohy
Gold Coast – Ablett, Lynch
GWS – Cameron, Greene; Kelly, Williams
Hawthorn – Burgoyne
Melbourne – Hibbard
North – Higgins, Tarrant
Port – Dixon; Wines
Richmond – Martin, Rance; Riewoldt
St Kilda – Roberton
Sydney – Franklin
West Coast – Kennedy, Yeo
Western Bulldogs – Johannisen; Bontempelli
And an off-topic footnote: Using the current betting lines and assuming the favoured team will win every game from here on out (and after Round 12, that’s obviously a terrible assumption!), not only would Sydney make finals, they would be in the eight just three weeks from now!
The eight finalists under these assumptions would be Adelaide, GWS, Geelong, Western, Port, and Sydney, with Richmond and West Coast taking the last two slots over St Kilda on percentage only.
In order behind those nine would be: Essendon, Fremantle, Collingwood, Melbourne, North, Gold Coast, Hawthorn, Carlton, and Brisbane, who as of now would be the underdog all 22 times this season.
Gordon P Smith
Roar Guru
I've looked at this nomenclature issue for as long as I've watched the game, and it's one of those things that I think we've simply ingrained into our skulls. A major American university in the "Big Ten" conference (which of course has 14 teams, because America) is named "Northwestern". The Northwestern Wildcats are no longer north or west of anything particularly significant, except that back in the 1800s when it was founded on the outskirts of Chicago, it was on the northwest edge of the US. Nevertheless, it's still simply called "Northwestern" without irony. (And the U of Michigan sings that they're the "champions of the west". Ridiculous.) So when I see "Western" as a team "location" name, I think nothing of it, because I haven't followed footy long enough to have followed them as Footscray (I first discovered my sport of passion around the year 2001 or so). However, my two-letter abbreviation isn't WE or WS... it's always WB. Looking back, I also notice they were the only team I added the mascot to on the last two tables (the current best and fairest; top 36 players from each roster). I guess I'm saying, don't get too worked up over the name.
Gordon P Smith
Roar Guru
Yes. I mentioned that I used a forward position on one team for the ruck and a midfield position on the other. In order to keep it to 18 on a team. I thought squeezing out one of each was fairer than, say, naming 10 mids and 12 frontmen.
Kavvy
Guest
But Collingwood is a place as is Sydney and Hawthorn. Western means nothing. Even West Coast has some definity about it. That's why noone says Western, it hangs there waiting to be finished
Cat
Roar Guru
I'm not arguing that it is a stupid name, it most definitely is. If you are going to say western Bulldogs then you should say Hawthorn hawk, Collingwood magpies, Sydney swans etc. All full names or all shortened the same way.
Kavvy
Guest
If you're trying to be technical, i.e. ignoring common usage/norms, then 'Western' is meaningless, it would need to be "Western Suburbs" or "Western Melbourne". Which is why noone says it standalone, it's always "Western Bulldogs" for this reason (that "Western" doesn't mean anything standalone).
Cat
Roar Guru
But when you are calling the rest of the sides by their location, rather than nickname, Western it is. Either have to use nicknames, locations or both. However, its poor writing to use same name multiple times in succession.
CCT
Guest
Great article... thank you. Just by way of making you aware of colloquial quirks, I've never heard nor seen anyone before refer to the Bulldogs as Western. It makes sense, but it doesn't work...They were Footscray. Some bright spark changed their name to try to induce support from a broader base - the under-represented western suburbs of Melbourne. Out of politeness, the rest of us have stopped calling them Footscray, at least in print. But Western is a step too far. If you need to abbreviate, it has to be Bulldogs. And - unfortunately perhaps - such things are culturally important. I still have family members who refuse to clap foreign clubs (even the nice clubs from SA (Port) and WA (Freo) as much as the clubs made up by marketers or sold into slavery in other states) against the most hideous hateful and contemptible of Victorian clubs (yes, of course I mean Hawthorn), even when a foreign win would help their own club's cause. For these folk, the Bulldogs should be ... are... Footscray. That said, they'll accept the Bulldogs. But Western means nothing.
JamesH
Roar Guru
Interesting. You've got 6 mids and only 5 forwards in the first team tho - is that deliberate?