Gary Ablett Jr holds the all time record for the most Brownlow votes. Dangerfield, Selwood and Pendlebury are top 10.

RichLeMonde

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Robert Harvey and Simon black weren't great on opposite feet yet you said Selwood's disposal was "deplorable" compared to those blokes.. can't have it both ways.
Selwood's disposal ain't elite but it's very good. He more than makes up for that MINOR flaw if you will, with other attributes
R Harvey was quite limited by foot. Knew he wasn’t a huge or elite kick so made elite decisions about how to dispose of the ball. But wasn’t damaging by foot. I’d say Selwood more damaging by foot than Harvey tbh
 
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Just in case anyone is wondering, here's the updated top 10 list:
  1. Gary Ablett Jr (Gee/GC) - 261 votes
  2. Gary Dempsey (WB/NM) - 246 votes
  3. Sam Mitchell (Haw/WC) - 227 votes
  4. Robert Harvey (StK) - 215 votes
  5. Chris Judd (WC/Car) - 210 votes
  6. Patrick Dangerfield (Ade/Gee) - 209 votes
  7. Leigh Matthews (Haw) - 202 votes
  8. Joel Selwood (Gee) - 198 votes
  9. Scott Pendlebury (Col) - 194 votes
  10. Brent Harvey (NM) - 191 votes
Active players in bold above. It's worth mentioning Dustin Martin (16th/176 votes), Nat Fyfe (18th/174 votes) and Lance Franklin (20th/170 votes) are also players which sit in the top 20 all-time Brownlow votes getters. It's probably fair to suggest 29-year-old Dangerfield is going to eventually break Gary Ablett Jr's Brownlow vote record given Gary will be retiring this year and Danger really only needs 2-3 more good seasons to catch him and he isn't even 30 yet.
I'm not sure Dangerfield is a lock to pass Ablett. We can't assume Ablett is going to get 0 more votes this year, he is bound to put the odd 1 vote game up and possibly even the odd 2 and the wind back the clock 3 once or twice this year. I'd be surprised if he doesn't poll 10 votes this year. He polled 13 last year.

Danger is already 52 behind, that's some pretty good seasons needed without injury, multiple seasons of 20+ to break Ablett's count. It looks simple on paper but things can change quickly and Danger might not be the same explosive player in his 30s, and he turns 30 in April, particularly if he spends more time forward or the Cats win less games, it might not be that easy to poll 20+ vote seasons in 2021/2022.
 
2007 not far off being just as outragous. Bartel was a champion and inspirational combatant on the footy field and seems A great bloke off it but god how the count unfolded to see him finish 8 or 9 votes (or whatever it was) clear of Gaz was mind boggling.
The only thing I can recall in 07 was GAJ frequently remonstrating with the umpires. Maybe they were offended or used a little retribution.
 
He retired in 84 and you have to be over 50 to see him in his prime
You’ve gone heavy on the mayo
but my point 2 years ago was he is still well known or at least i think it was

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Just in case anyone is wondering, here's the updated top 10 list:
  1. Gary Ablett Jr (Gee/GC) - 261 votes
  2. Gary Dempsey (WB/NM) - 246 votes
  3. Sam Mitchell (Haw/WC) - 227 votes
  4. Robert Harvey (StK) - 215 votes
  5. Chris Judd (WC/Car) - 210 votes
  6. Patrick Dangerfield (Ade/Gee) - 209 votes
  7. Leigh Matthews (Haw) - 202 votes
  8. Joel Selwood (Gee) - 198 votes
  9. Scott Pendlebury (Col) - 194 votes
  10. Brent Harvey (NM) - 191 votes
Active players in bold above. It's worth mentioning Dustin Martin (16th/176 votes), Nat Fyfe (18th/174 votes) and Lance Franklin (20th/170 votes) are also players which sit in the top 20 all-time Brownlow votes getters. It's probably fair to suggest 29-year-old Dangerfield is going to eventually break Gary Ablett Jr's Brownlow vote record given Gary will be retiring this year and Danger really only needs 2-3 more good seasons to catch him and he isn't even 30 yet.
Something is wrong with the Brownlow, or maybe more broadly football, when in two to three years the top 10 vote winners in Brownlow history will have eight players who all played large chunks of their careers in the 2010s.

Top 13 could look like:

1 Ablett (10-19)
2 Dempsey
3 Dangerfield (10-19)
4 Mitchell (10-17)
5 Harvey
6 Judd (10-15)
7 Pendlebury (10-19)
8 Selwood (10-19)
9 Matthews
10 Martin (10-19)
11 Fyfe (10-19)
12 Harvey (10-16)
13 Swan (10-16)
 

Matchu

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Ablett has added an extra vote to his all-time record tonight (so far). He's up to 262 total Brownlow votes.

Dangerfield has overtaken Chris Judd and Robert Harvey to move into 4th position on the all-time leaderboard.

Pendlebury has overtaken Leigh Matthews to move into 8th all-time.

Selwood may also overtake Leigh Matthews later tonight to move into 9th all-time.

Dusty is only a few votes shy of a position in the top 10 all-time now and Fyfe is only a few votes behind him.
 

Matchu

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Updated Top 10:

1. Gary Ablett Jr (Gee/GC) - 261 votes
2. Gary Dempsey (WB/NM) - 246 votes
3. Patrick Dangerfield (Ade/Gee) - 230 votes
4. Sam Mitchell (Haw/WC) - 227 votes
5. Robert Harvey (StK) - 215 votes
6. Scott Pendlebury (Col) - 213 votes
=7. Chris Judd (WC/Car) - 210 votes
=7. Joel Selwood (Gee) - 210 votes
=9. Leigh Matthews (Haw) - 202 votes
=9. Dustin Martin (Ric) - 202 votes

Nat Fyfe (187/12th)
and Lance Franklin (178/=16th) are also in the top 20. Interesting to see 4 of the current top 10 are playing currently and I don't think it's unreasonable to suggest Dangerfield will break the all time record before his career is over. He's only 31 so you'd have to think he's still got a few good years left in him.
 

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Sam Walsh is going to give this a real shake. Absolute star.
 

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Updated Top 10:

1. Gary Ablett Jr (Gee/GC) - 261 votes
2. Gary Dempsey (WB/NM) - 246 votes
3. Patrick Dangerfield (Ade/Gee) - 230 votes
4. Sam Mitchell (Haw/WC) - 227 votes
5. Robert Harvey (StK) - 215 votes
6. Scott Pendlebury (Col) - 213 votes
=7. Chris Judd (WC/Car) - 210 votes
=7. Joel Selwood (Gee) - 210 votes
=9. Leigh Matthews (Haw) - 202 votes
=9. Dustin Martin (Ric) - 202 votes

Nat Fyfe (187/12th)
and Lance Franklin (178/=16th) are also in the top 20. Interesting to see 4 of the current top 10 are playing currently and I don't think it's unreasonable to suggest Dangerfield will break the all time record before his career is over. He's only 31 so you'd have to think he's still got a few good years left in him.

If he doesn't get injured I'd be surprised if he didn't surpass the record tbh. Could see him polling very well in 2022.
 
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Updated Top 10:

1. Gary Ablett Jr (Gee/GC) - 261 votes
2. Gary Dempsey (WB/NM) - 246 votes
3. Patrick Dangerfield (Ade/Gee) - 230 votes
4. Sam Mitchell (Haw/WC) - 227 votes
5. Robert Harvey (StK) - 215 votes
6. Scott Pendlebury (Col) - 213 votes
=7. Chris Judd (WC/Car) - 210 votes
=7. Joel Selwood (Gee) - 210 votes
=9. Leigh Matthews (Haw) - 202 votes
=9. Dustin Martin (Ric) - 202 votes

Nat Fyfe (187/12th)
and Lance Franklin (178/=16th) are also in the top 20. Interesting to see 4 of the current top 10 are playing currently and I don't think it's unreasonable to suggest Dangerfield will break the all time record before his career is over. He's only 31 so you'd have to think he's still got a few good years left in him.

How much of that list are there only because they now play more games now ?
What are you selling?
 
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Ron The Bear

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Something is wrong with the Brownlow, or maybe more broadly football, when in two to three years the top 10 vote winners in Brownlow history will have eight players who all played large chunks of their careers in the 2010s.

The way the umpires vote has changed markedly from the early days of the Brownlow.

Having located the round-by-round votes for 1931-34, the thing that jumps out is how rarely the votes all went to one team compared with today.

1931-34 it happened 10 times (2.4%) from 417 voting games that weren't draws. In two of those, all six votes went to the losing team.

2021 it happened 100 times (51%) from 195 games that weren't draws. None of these involved losing teams.

Average margin 1931-34 was 30 points; in 2021 it was 29 points.

This helped Fitzroy to provide 5 of the 6 Brownlow winners 1931-36 despite winning only 33 games in that period. In winning his second Brownlow at 21yo, Bunton was able to poll in 11 of his 14 games - 9 of them defeats.

There is a far greater focus on winners today.
 
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The way the umpires vote has changed markedly from the early days of the Brownlow.

Having located the round-by-round votes for 1931-34, the thing that jumps out is how rarely the votes all went to one team compared with today.

1931-34 it happened 10 times (2.4%) from 417 voting games that weren't draws. In two of those, all six votes went to the losing team.

2021 it happened 100 times (51%) from 195 games that weren't draws. None of these involved losing teams.

Average margin 1931-34 was 30 points; in 2021 it was 29 points.

This helped Fitzroy to provide 5 of the 6 Brownlow winners 1931-36 despite winning only 33 games. In winning his second Brownlow at 21yo, Bunton was able to poll in 11 of his 14 games - 9 of them defeats.

There is a far greater focus on winners today.

:thumbsu: & votes per game havent always been 3-2-1. See 76/77, Graeme Moss polled 78 votes in 1976 & Graeme Teasdale won with 59 votes in 77.
 

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I don't think it's unreasonable to suggest Dangerfield will break the all time record before his career is over. He's only 31 so you'd have to think he's still got a few good years left in him.
I don't know about that. I think Danger is on the decline, probably a 10 votes a year (max) kind of player now. So he'd still need to do that for another 3-4 years. Not sure I see him playing to 35. He might get there, but it'll be touch and go.
 

Ron The Bear

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:thumbsu: & votes per game havent always been 3-2-1. See 76/77, Graeme Moss polled 78 votes in 1976 & Graeme Teasdale won with 59 votes in 77.

Yeah, typically the votes from those years are halved when comparing tallies.

Bontempelli is already top 50 and second on the all-time list by age behind Leigh Matthews (136 to 130) - after Matthews had polled 57 votes in the dual-voting years of 1976-77. Longevity permitting, he's a big chance to be near the top of the list by the time he's finished.
 
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Yeah, typically the votes from those years are halved when comparing tallies.

Bontempelli is already top 50 and second on the all-time list by age behind Leigh Matthews (136 to 130) - after Matthews had polled 57 votes in the dual-voting years of 1976-77. Longevity permitting, he's a big chance to be near the top of the list by the time he's finished.

Do you have to hand, the Bonts total votes to date from his 164 games.
 

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I’ll be interested to see if Dusty can chase down Danger in the next few years. Both look like polling votes for 2 or 3 years yet. Dusty a year younger so maybe gets an extra year to catch up in games tally. Both could go top 3 by end of career.
 

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I don't know about that. I think Danger is on the decline, probably a 10 votes a year (max) kind of player now. So he'd still need to do that for another 3-4 years. Not sure I see him playing to 35. He might get there, but it'll be touch and go.

Not so sure about that. Dusty, Fyfe and Danger all missed extended periods of time in 2021, wouldn't be surprised to see one of those three win another despite their age profiles being slightly past it if they have a big preseason and play 22 games. It does look like changing of the guard though to Bont, Oliver, Petracca, Walsh etc, but wouldn't count those guys out just yet - they are champions.

Danger is contracted for 3 more seasons (2024), would be surprised if he didn't poll at least 15 votes in 2022, with the potential for much more.
 
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How much of that list are there only because they now play more games now ?
What are you selling?

winning totals seem higher which suggests that umpires are voting more for "favorites/ stars"
 
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