Brownlow Thread (2021)

[liz]

It's true that non-midfielders won it more frequently in the past, and that it wasn't so rare for a player in a team outside the top four, but I'm pretty certain Plugger was the only permanent full-forward ever to win it. Bernie Quinlan played a lot at full-forward, but not exclusively.

I never saw him play (before my time) but a certain ex-CEO of the Swans is a one time Brownlow medalist and a two time Coleman medalist. Since I've heard it oft quoted that Lockett was the first (and only) full-forward to win the Brownlow, I presume he was a CHF. But his Coleman medal winning goal tallies would put most current full forwards to shame. (Yes, different era.)

[liz]

One thing for me which stuck out from the count was Touk Miller's 18 votes after a stellar season which I thought would lead to an embarrassing win to a suspended player. I believe the umpires may have ignored him after he became ineligible......which I thought they are not supposed to do. More HQ influence/directives on AFL umpiring perhaps??

I suspect it reflects that the Suns had a lousy second half of the season - again. He still polled by far the most votes for the Suns, more than twice Anderson in second place. And polled only one vote in the first six rounds, meaning the bulk of the votes he did get came after his round 8 suspension. You have to have had an outstanding game to poll more than the odd vote here and there when your team is regularly being beaten.

[liz]

Hi Liz,

I thought about this too, and came to a reasonable conclusion I hope.

The disparity between a midfielders dominant games and quiet games is a lot less than say a key forward or a defender or a small forward.

A midfielder who averages 30 possessions like Macrae or Wines could have a "quiet game" by their standards and only get 20-25. That could still be enough to net them a vote here and there. But a forward needs to regularly get a bag of goals to poll consistent votes, because 4.1 looks very different to 1.1.

I guess the midfielders - particularly the best few from each side - rarely have "quiet games" because their role is to get to lots of contests, and to flick the ball around a lot while they make up their mind what to do with it. But, despite what commentators would sometimes have you believe, a midfielder touching the ball 30 times, rather than 25, doesn't mean they've actually had more impact on the game. Not on its own. It depends what they do with it. And how they win it in the first place.

When Ablett (jnr) was in his prime, the commentators used to drool over him getting 30, sometimes 40 possessions a game. But what made him great was that, with about a dozen or so of those possessions, he split the game open, did things other players weren't capable of. Clearly, the more times a player gets the ball, the more chances he has to do something special with it, but it's that ability, not merely the accumulation of meaningless touches, that makes the best player great.

I don't have an issue with the winners list being dominated by midfielders. I just find it a bit sad that they are collecting such a high proportion of the votes. It used to be that you could win the Brownlow with barely 20 votes. Nowadays you don't stand a chance unless you score 30+. And some of those votes you'll have "won" without actually doing much special, but just because the umpires checked the stats at the end of the game and saw you touched it a lot.

When I think back to our game against Port, the first thing I remember is Charlie Dixon tearing us apart. And then Hewett keeping Boak very quiet in the first half, but Boak coming out after half-time and dominating the midfield, after our lads had done a very good job in the first half. The Brownlow votes were 3 Boak; 2 Franklin; 1 Wines. Franklin had a pretty good game (he kicked four goals) but Dixon was better. And a couple of our midfielders had better games than Wines. Arguably than Boak too, if you count both halves, though Boak's second half was worthy of recognition. I went and checked the AFLCA votes for the game and they bear out my recollection. Dixon scored 10 votes, Parker 8. Boak and Franklin featured in the minor votes, Wines did not.

Clearly that's just one game, and one where Wines just scored 1 point. So it's not comprehensive. But it does seem to suggest that maybe the umpires are swayed unduly by stats. (Eg Dixon only kicked two goals himself, to Franklin's four, but was the more dominant forward that game.)

[dejavoodoo44]

I guess the midfielders - particularly the best few from each side - rarely have "quiet games" because their role is to get to lots of contests, and to flick the ball around a lot while they make up their mind what to do with it. But, despite what commentators would sometimes have you believe, a midfielder touching the ball 30 times, rather than 25, doesn't mean they've actually had more impact on the game. Not on its own. It depends what they do with it. And how they win it in the first place.

When Ablett (jnr) was in his prime, the commentators used to drool over him getting 30, sometimes 40 possessions a game. But what made him great was that, with about a dozen or so of those possessions, he split the game open, did things other players weren't capable of. Clearly, the more times a player gets the ball, the more chances he has to do something special with it, but it's that ability, not merely the accumulation of meaningless touches, that makes the best player great.

I don't have an issue with the winners list being dominated by midfielders. I just find it a bit sad that they are collecting such a high proportion of the votes. It used to be that you could win the Brownlow with barely 20 votes. Nowadays you don't stand a chance unless you score 30+. And some of those votes you'll have "won" without actually doing much special, but just because the umpires checked the stats at the end of the game and saw you touched it a lot.

When I think back to our game against Port, the first thing I remember is Charlie Dixon tearing us apart. And then Hewett keeping Boak very quiet in the first half, but Boak coming out after half-time and dominating the midfield, after our lads had done a very good job in the first half. The Brownlow votes were 3 Boak; 2 Franklin; 1 Wines. Franklin had a pretty good game (he kicked four goals) but Dixon was better. And a couple of our midfielders had better games than Wines. Arguably than Boak too, if you count both halves, though Boak's second half was worthy of recognition. I went and checked the AFLCA votes for the game and they bear out my recollection. Dixon scored 10 votes, Parker 8. Boak and Franklin featured in the minor votes, Wines did not.

Clearly that's just one game, and one where Wines just scored 1 point. So it's not comprehensive. But it does seem to suggest that maybe the umpires are swayed unduly by stats. (Eg Dixon only kicked two goals himself, to Franklin's four, but was the more dominant forward that game.)

Yes, there has been a bit of chat recently, about the number of times that somebody scored a 9 or 10 in the coaches votes, but didn't get a Brownlow vote. Possibly the AFLCA will slowly become the more prestigious award, since most observers would rate coaches better judges than umpires? Though it would probably need a glitzy ceremony, in order to achieve that.

[giant]

I never saw him play (before my time) but a certain ex-CEO of the Swans is a one time Brownlow medalist and a two time Coleman medalist. Since I've heard it oft quoted that Lockett was the first (and only) full-forward to win the Brownlow, I presume he was a CHF. But his Coleman medal winning goal tallies would put most current full forwards to shame. (Yes, different era.)

I take it we're talking Templeton (didn't realise he won the Coleman twice!). My recollection of him was as a CHF, in the ilk of a MacLure/Knights - but yes, he did score a helluva lot of goals as well!

[bloodspirit]

Yes, there has been a bit of chat recently, about the number of times that somebody scored a 9 or 10 in the coaches votes, but didn't get a Brownlow vote. Possibly the AFLCA will slowly become the more prestigious award, since most observers would rate coaches better judges than umpires? Though it would probably need a glitzy ceremony, in order to achieve that.

I already think the AFLCA (and even the AFLPA) awards have more cred than the Brownlow. I have never understood why the Brownlow gets such prominence except that it's tradition.

[dejavoodoo44]

I already think the AFLCA (and even the AFLPA) awards have more cred than the Brownlow. I have never understood why the Brownlow gets such prominence except that it's tradition.

Yes, I'm sure a fair few players, would feel that those other two awards are a more realistic measure of achievement. But I think that the AFL would only really want to have one award as a celebratory public event, and due to its history, that's going to be the Brownlow.

[KSAS]

I was surprised by the number of votes Tom Mitchell polled (25 votes) which in most years is enough to win medal. Thought he had a fairly quiet year by his standards, but was aware he played some big games towards end of the season. Didn't expect him to come home with that much of a rush though!

Umpires seem to like give Buddy votes when he has a good game (than most forwards). If he produces a 70+ goal season next year he may give the medal & (flag) a shake, being a KPF with so much flair. Aaron Naughton is the another KPF in this mould, but not many in comp unfortunately.

Umpires may subconsciously wind back awarding top votes to mainly star midfielders next season, after seeing how high % of votes were funnelled to a select group.

[neilfws]

It's interesting how predictable the Brownlow is, in the mathematical modelling sense. A fun article from last week:

Can you pick the AFL's Brownlow Medal winner without knowing the first thing about Australian rules?

The headline is a bit clickbait-y. They work with a sports data analyst who isn't familiar with AFL, but teach him enough to build sensible models as he goes.

A lot of the model-based predictors have the same mix of people in the top 4, though the order varies. What I found most interesting was the comments from Stats Insider, who have a very good record of predicting the winner in recent years.

His final breakdown is based about 25 per cent on statistics and 75 per cent on media and coaches' votes.

"When you train a model like that, it does throw out the statistics that aren't relevant and it just happens to be that a lot of the match day's statistics aren't as relevant as the people voting," Butyn said.

So the game stats are important, but not everything. That explains why some players are always predicted higher than reality - this has been the case for Clayton Oliver in previous seasons. This year he has benefitted from being on a winning team, which always boosts the votes. Someone like Patrick Cripps, for example, tends to score lower than predicted through often being on the losing team.

An interesting observation is that models often underestimate the total votes: the highest predicted are usually mid-high twenties. Another recent article looks at vote inflation. In that article Hayden Kennedy says umpires don't get to see the stats, but it's not clear whether he's talking about "in his day".

[sidswan]

I am sorry to be so cynical, but I'm amazed anyone here seriously thinks umpires could give enough votes for any Swan to win the Gownlow......

[MattW]

I am sorry to be so cynical, but I'm amazed anyone here seriously thinks umpires could give enough votes for any Swan to win the Gownlow......

That cynicism is not warranted on this occasion: Swamp on Twitter: "Average Brownlow votes per win in 18 team era
5.22 - SYD
5.19 - FREM
5.18 - COLL
5.13 - GWS
5.12 - STK
5.11 - CARL
5.07 - MELB
5.07 - GCS
5.05 - WCE
5.05 - PORT
5.00 - WBD
4.96 - ADEL
4.89 - GEEL
4.88 - NTH
4.87 - BRIS
4.83 - RICH
4.79 - ESS
4.78 - HAW

@AFL… https://t.co/8GYnrMd32P".

[sidswan]

Many thanks for that, I had no idea, it seemed to me that the Swans were completely out of favour