Best Defender

Best defender

  • Andrews

    Votes: 57 39.6%
  • Grimes

    Votes: 35 24.3%
  • Mcgovern

    Votes: 21 14.6%
  • Rampe

    Votes: 10 6.9%
  • Jonas

    Votes: 2 1.4%
  • Stewart

    Votes: 7 4.9%
  • Haynes

    Votes: 2 1.4%
  • Moore

    Votes: 2 1.4%
  • Vlaustin

    Votes: 2 1.4%
  • May

    Votes: 6 4.2%

  • Total voters
    144

bungalow_bill

Norm Smith Medallist
Dec 11, 2010
9,975
11,243
AFL Club
Brisbane Lions
Daniel Rich deserves a mention as an elite general defender who is also damaging on the score board
 
Aug 11, 2006
33,042
27,534
Perth
AFL Club
Hawthorn
Other Teams
Timberwolves, Crystal Palace
Overall. McGovern and its not close in terms of how much work every AFL club do lining up against the Eagles to Tweek game plans to keep him away from any potential forward 50 movement. He's been ahead of everyone for 3/4 years now

Haynes/Andrews/Ryan/Grimes get mentions

Luke Ryan is particularly disrespected here. Absolute fantastic player the last two years. Considering he's not even on the list is embarrassing for the OP
 

Grrr

Brownlow Medallist
Aug 16, 2009
11,554
26,235
mildura
AFL Club
Richmond
The day a Richmond fan nominates a non Richmond player for a ''Best at'' award is the day I fall off of my chair in utter disbelief.
Well Grimes rates pretty highly, and not just by Richmond posters. Other than he, no other Richmond player is in the conversation, nor has been mentioned other than as a joke.
 

PetterdHoisted

Norm Smith Medallist
Apr 27, 2014
6,314
9,538
AFL Club
Richmond
The day a Richmond fan nominates a non Richmond player for a ''Best at'' award is the day I fall off of my chair in utter disbelief.
lol, true maybe, TBF we have a decent run of top defenders for a while. Still quite staggered at the break-outs of Short and particularly Balta this year, just as Houli and Grimes begin to fade a bit.

Not out fault either that when describing how good Andrews is, people say he is 'Rance-like'.
 

This Is Anfield

Cancelled
30k Posts 10k Posts Podcaster
Feb 25, 2014
32,084
70,155
AFL Club
Richmond
Other Teams
Liverpool, England, Furies
lol, true maybe, TBF we have a decent run of top defenders for a while. Still quite staggered at the break-outs of Short and particularly Balta this year, just as Houli and Grimes begin to fade a bit.

Not out fault either that when describing how good Andrews is, people say he is 'Rance-like'.
Liam Baker is grossly underrated...
 

garlic munchers

Premiership Player
Oct 3, 2006
3,763
5,180
Downbeat Optimist
AFL Club
West Coast
Other Teams
Cardinals
If you are fwd, no doubt would hate lining up next to Grimes.

Andrews, absolute star.

But is you are the opposition coach, pretty sure you don't anywhere near as much time working out how to stop Grimes and Andrews from influencing a game as you would McGovern.

Not saying this makes the Gov the best defender, but just saying.....
 
It was tongue in cheek, but it was nice that he started to get some recognition this year.

Deserved to be in there over your other AA Backman for sure


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro
 
Nov 30, 2018
6,931
17,171
AFL Club
Fremantle
Luke Ryan deserves to be on this list. I know Freo don’t get a lot of attention nationwide but I have always considered him criminally underrated. This year he got AA and won Freo’s B&F. Forced to play as an undersized KPD but still had the second most disposals in the team and his intercepting was elite.
 
May 5, 2016
43,465
48,500
AFL Club
Geelong
Richmond’s team defence is unquestionably fantastic. When you have a good key forward you tend to rate them on how they shut him down and while, like everyone else, Richmond doesn’t have an individual that can completely blanket Hawkins but they are very smart with him, force him wide, make him kick from awkward spots etc. They are very functional
 

S_Saed17

Debutant
Jul 10, 2020
79
142
AFL Club
Richmond
Overall. McGovern and its not close in terms of how much work every AFL club do lining up against the Eagles to Tweek game plans to keep him away from any potential forward 50 movement. He's been ahead of everyone for 3/4 years now

Haynes/Andrews/Ryan/Grimes get mentions

Luke Ryan is particularly disrespected here. Absolute fantastic player the last two years. Considering he's not even on the list is embarrassing for the OP
Ryan is great though don't think he's a traditional fullback in the simple sense, no doubt he's a star
 
Feb 23, 2009
32,141
45,744
Melbourne
AFL Club
Richmond
Other Teams
New York Jets
Best defender is tough, does an attacking rebounding defender count? Such a different player to a tall KPD.
For mine Grimes is the best all rounder, well rounded. Have seen him towell Charlie Cameron multiple times and Eddie Betts, but has also done stopping roles on 190cm+ big key forwards earlier in his career, or played the loose 3rd man interceptor. A pretty good kick out of defence too.

If I was picking a pure big man stopper to play on the 195-200cm 100 kg gorilla forwards Id pick Harris Andrews.

Best small rebounding attacking defender? Still classed as a defender I guess, I'm not sure.
 

PetterdHoisted

Norm Smith Medallist
Apr 27, 2014
6,314
9,538
AFL Club
Richmond
For a scragging hack who was dominated by Charlie in the QF, Grimes gets some love.
It's a bit like 'that day Hogan/Cox kicked 3 on Rance' perhaps? You know a defender is elite when people talk forever-after about a forward kicking 3 on them.

I guess with Grimes, the ultimate acknowledgement is that whichever forward he mans up on these days has to run away from the play and sit up on the wing, lol.
 
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