ferball
desperately terminally-contrarian
North Melbourne - 2024 Hugh Greenwood Player Sponsor
Veteran
North Melbourne - 2023 Ailish Considine and Bella Eddy Player Sponsor
North Melbourne - 2023 Aaron Hall and Flynn Perez Player Sponsor
10k Posts
30k Posts
North Melbourne - 2022 Aaron Hall and Flynn Perez Player Sponsor
North Melbourne - 2022 Kaitlyn Ashmore and Aileen Gilroy Player Sponsor
- Jul 24, 2015
- 42,981
- 86,518
- AFL Club
- North Melbourne
You said the number of goals kicked has declined significantly across the League but more goals were kicked in 2016 and 2017 than any year in the 90s.
Compare the average goals kicked in the 80s/90s early 2000s to this decade.
Also consider this:
From 1991-2000 a single player kicked 80+ goals in a season 30 times. In that time the likes of Cummings, Loewe, Rocca, Sumich and Longmire achieved this feat. Now they were great players, but they’re not on the level of Dunstall, Carey, Lockett etc. yet they still managed it. Comparatively, from 2012-2021 it happened 3 times. Buddy and Kennedy the only two that have managed it.
What stats have you got that are suggesting it’s easier for key forwards to kick bags now?
You claim Cummings, Loewe, Rocca, Sumich and Longmire were not that great but they were better than most KPFs of this century. Maybe not Buddy but that's about it. How old are you? Did you watch any of those guys play? They were shitloads better than the likes of Brown, Cameron, Roughhead, Riewoldts etc etc. Dunstall, Carey and Lockett were some of the greatest forwards of all time. The reason they kicked so many goals was because their sides structured their game around supplying them.
In 1996 Dunstall and Lockett both kicked over 100 goals. For both clubs the next highest goal scorer was kicking a third or a quarter that many goals. Whereas in 2013 Buddy and Roughhead kicked 130 odd goals between them but their side had other options as well. Without Roughhead Buddy could have kicked 100 goals that year but it obviously didn't happen.
You say he would be better one on one but I disagree.
In 2012 he kicked 13 goals against us and we then made sure he never did that again cos we played him like old school backs did. Hard one on one, sometimes two on one defense. (Compare with Carey who used to triple teamed and still took marks and kicked goals.) After that game in the next five years he had multiple goalless games against us and scored in only three games. One a prelim where we were cooked at the end of the season and lucky to get that far.
To me that indicates he would have struggled with the sort of personal attention 90s forwards got, as opposed to the structured defense that was becoming standard at the time. It wasn't just one on one defense back then either as I mentioned. Plenty of footage on youtube of Carey marking with multiple blokes hanging off him.