Opinion Bomber Thompson vs Chris Scott

[catscratchfever]

Scott reigns supreme. Bomber was good but not Scott-good.

 

[Hamingja]

Bomber started in 2000. We have had two coaches since the likes of SDK and Holmes were born. Would be interesting how many coaches all the other teams have had in that space of time...

 

[catscratchfever]

Who has the stronger legacy at Geelong now?

Both are 2x premiership coaches but some argue Scott rode the coattails of Bomber to get his first.

Did Bomber forever tarnish his legacy at Geelong with what happened after he left? Despite the one to break the drought?

Who would you build the statue of?

Bomber did his best to tarnish his reputation before he left, well before.

Doesn't change the fact that he's a 2-time premiership coach and good on him for that - but he wasn't an angel while he was at Geelong. Far from it.

 

[Turbocat]

Who has the stronger legacy at Geelong now?

Both are 2x premiership coaches but some argue Scott rode the coattails of Bomber to get his first.

Did Bomber forever tarnish his legacy at Geelong with what happened after he left? Despite the one to break the drought?

Who would you build the statue of?

To elevate from the bottom to the top is arguably the hardest task in football. Thompson , with the support of Costa and Cook did that. To do that you must coach up a lot of younger players.

To come in when Scott did and basically steer and maintain the elevation.. Yes had squeezed the orange a bit got a bit more juice, he add players as much as internally developed them and mostly made it work..To me its a different skill. Scotts ability to manage the players on our list is arguably better that Thompson. Under Thompson we lost Ablett , and went close to losing SJ to another club


For a long time our game style was a weakness. The 2022 game style was the most enjoyable footy I have witnessed in a decade. The list we have now , Scott has a chance to put the comparrison beyond the pale. In fact he has a chance to move into a very small number of coaches. How many have won more than two flags. How many have won two in a row. Its been 70 something years for geelong.

 

[CatToTheFuture]

Like asking me which one my favourite child is.

I love them equally

 

[DanA]

Both are great coaches with a huge legacy. Both have done an extraordinary job developing players.

With bomber, I feel he did well strategically with a great game plan and well balanced teams, we occasionally however lost games tactically in the coaches box that we shouldn’t.

With Scott I feel like he’s always good tactically on game day and we actually win games we occasionally shouldn’t. But there’s been years where strategically we’ve been off and the overall game plan hasn’t set us up for success in finals.

 

[Mad_Hatter]

Same same but different. Both had different issues and situations to work through.
The reason Scott could end up a clear better coach is because he's still going, if we go back to back or snare another in a few years there really isn't a question on which was better.
In saying that though, love Bomber. He gave us so much and walked into a shitful club full of mediocre loving losers.
Scott might end up more successful but that wouldn't diminish Bombers mark on the club.

 

[Drunkcat]

Bomber is the one who turned this club around, and stopped other clubs laughing at us, and gave every cat fan something we only dreamed about..so will always be number 1 to me..Scott close second

 

[dazbroncos]

Not sure it needs to be a competition..

Both have 2 Flags for us.

Both did it in their own way from different launching places and with different expectations....

And both had plenty of adversity.

Luv and respect them both and the club...

4 Flags in 16 years....

ill take it

Now if CS can do it again, that does change things but THAT lid is firmly back on.

GO Catters

 

[Footy_Fan2007]

Both equal at the moment. Back to back would put it beyond doubt.
Extremely hard to do though.

 

[Pollywaffle]

Scott still has to eat a big sandwich mid game in the coaching box to move ahead.

 

[Farmer2Goggin]

Both have been incredible for the Club, hopefully Chris will add to his legacy from here.

However I’ve no doubt Chris would have him covered for articulate conversation.
Let me explain.
A mate and I were close to Buddha in his playing days so we were able to be in the rooms up close with the players and officials over here - no nets or exclusion zones in those days.
As such we got to see Bomber up close pre and post game plus at the players hotel on occasions.
He was very socially awkward , friendly but a bit strangely reserved and not impressive at all.
We asked Buddha about it and he just shrugged and said that’s Bomber .
He must have had something though as he really had that side humming

 

[Boxhead_31]

Bomber did his best to tarnish his reputation before he left, well before. And no, I'm not referring just to drugs although that was part of it.

Doesn't change the fact that he's a 2-time premiership coach and good on him for that - but he wasn't an angel while he was at Geelong. Far from it.

Just ask Kent Kingsley

 

[CatFan73]

Bomber started in 2000. We have had two coaches since the likes of SDK and Holmes were born. Would be interesting how many coaches all the other teams have had in that space of time...

I think I’m right in saying the last time we sacked a coach was in 1988 when John Devine got the flick. 35 years ago. How many AFL clubs can say they haven’t sacked a coach in 35 years!

 

[PzBlinky]

I think I’m right in saying the last time we sacked a coach was in 1988 when John Devine got the flick. 35 years ago. How many AFL clubs can say they haven’t sacked a coach in 35 years!

To be fair, Ayres probably saw the writing on the wall - I don't know what the Crows saw in him.

That said, post-season 1999 was pretty dire. We had a truckload of debt, lost our coach, lost our captain, and had to find a new CEO... kind of incredible what the next 23 years delivered.

 

[Jemaine]

One made Ablett leave, one got him back.

I often wonder how many flags we would have won if Thompson announced he was leaving earlier and Gaz ended up staying (yes I know there was money involved as well but Ablett did not want to play for Thompson by the end).

Scott every day of the week for me because of this, even before Thompson's legacy was tarnished by the skipping town for Essendon and drugs stuff.

 

[patmatcat]

I think Scott gets the marginal nod, but it is close, they are both exceptional coaches. The following is my analysis.

Bomber:
pros-

• was a good development coach
• came up with a good initial strategy to overcome the defensive food tactics of west coast and Sydney.
• Put a lot of faith in the playing group and established a great culture
• his long-term planning and visions were sound and set us on the right path from the get-go. Examples of going down the path of wanting to recruit bigger bodied midfielders and flushing out the mature players we had at the time was the right calls others probably wouldn't have made.
• the players were very fond of him

Cons-

• not the best communicator
• was tactically not a top coach. Got consistently outcoached on the chess board by Clarkson malthouse and Ross Lyon in particular.
• was not great at adapting the game plan after 2007.
• had a lot of premium support that shouldered a lot of the work in development coaches and heavy hitters at the top of the administrative chain in Brian cook and co. He was heavily supported with the best.

Scott:
Pros

• excellent communicator
• extremely resilient
• highly regarded industry wide as one of the best if not the best coaching strategist in the business.
• worked with a playing scenario that is historically a period of mass decline and had them consistently competing for a flag year in year out.
• highly adaptive game plan that maximizes team strengths and covers deficiencies
• very humble

Cons:

• has also had incredible support around to help him during this phase
• very fortunate to have turned into a destination club with free agency and trading which has assisted his situation outside his control
• is a more introverted style intellectual deep thinking character which seems to have come across as less social or warm to aspects of the playing group over the years in particular reported isolation from the youth group.

I give Scott the nod simply because Scott had much more adversity and challenges to work with to obtain two flags, where as Thompson fell short due to being outsmarted by other coaches over those years, but enormous credit has to be given to getting there, although with heavy assistance from the likes of wells and coaching staff.

I call BS on Chris Scott’s coaching strategies, dropping a ruckman in a final against Grundy and then getting slaughtered in the ruck will go down in folklore as some of shittest decision-making in finals history for the cats ! In addition to more horrible selections during multiple finals campaigns.

 

[catters05]

CS after this season when he achieves B2B for us.

 

[00VicWard001]

Bomber better at developing young players, Scott the better game day coach.

Bomber had an amazing team of assistant coaches that were more focused on development - McCartney, Hinkley and Sanderson. All went on to coach their own teams and were very much mentor-style.

Scott had some very strong game day assistants, Caracella, Scarlett, Lappin, Enright. He's now shifted his team towards a combination of development and game day (Byrnes, Kelly and Grigg are definitely there to get the young players involved and up to speed).

Its a nice evolution.

 

[Partridge]

I think I’m right in saying the last time we sacked a coach was in 1988 when John Devine got the flick. 35 years ago. How many AFL clubs can say they haven’t sacked a coach in 35 years!

Correct. That was also the last time we had an ex-Geelong player as a Coach. Which makes it pretty funny how many still think we need to bring ex-players "home" to achieve success. The last 16 years would indicate we don't at all (neither did Hawthorn with Clarkson, neither did Richmond with Hardwick). Combined games played for those clubs by all four premiership coaches (including Thompson) - 0.

To be fair it isn't just Geelong. Most clubs just don't sack coaches anymore. They'll let them run to the end of their contract in most cases, unless they've really gone off the rails or are completely clueless (i.e. Noble at North).

 

[Seeds]

Thompson has two flags all his own plus significant influence on scotts first flag. And he did it in less seasons starting with a bottom 4 quality side whose list had been decimated by the previous coach. The club also had little money.

thompson got lucky with some father sons but scott also benefitted from many of those father sons and traded in superstars like cameron and dangerfield.

thompson first. Scott second. Everyone else well behind.

scott still has more time on his side though to change the outcome.

 

[D BRIDGE]

I’ll sit on the fence (which is rare)... but Scott has the opportunity to make it undoubtedly him with one more flag imo.

 

[AlcoaCat]

Scott still has to eat a big sandwich mid game in the coaching box to move ahead.

CS does have that googly-eye WTF meme with his arms outstretched that has become pretty famous. I'd say that level pegs with the sandwich.

 

[Reppie]

Bomber.

 

[Partridge]

Bomber.

It can't be forgotten that not just the team, but the club, was in a far, far worse state when he took over. Very different set of circumstances.