Crawford’s win remains the sole instance of a Hawthorn player winning the medal outright, as the Club’s other three Brownlow medallists: Col Austen (1949), Robert Dipierdomenico (1986) and John Platten (1987) were all involved in ties.
Crawford polled 28 votes in the 1999 season, a comfortable six vote margin ahead of runner-up, Mark Mercuri from Essendon. Crawford set up his win by polling four consecutive BOGs from Rounds 18 to 21, as the Hawks put together a late run of wins.
This school holidays readers should make an effort to check out the Brownlow Medallists’ cabinet at the Hawks Museum at Waverley Park, one of many great displays telling the history of the Club.
Sam Mitchell and Brad Sewell’s tie with 13 votes for leading Hawthorn vote-getter in the Brownlow for 2009 is just the fourth in the past sixty years. Neil Pearson and Ted Fletcher tied with eight votes in 1953, Leigh Matthews and Terry Wallace with 17 in 1982 while, in 2004, Peter Everitt and Richie Vandenberg both recorded six votes.
Sam Mitchell’s 13 votes in the 2009 Brownlow has taken his career tally to 83, comfortably in the Hawthorn all time top ten. Sewell’s 13 took him to 38, third of the current playing list, behind Mitchell and Luke Hodge (53).
A number of other Hawthorn players have gone close to winning the Brownlow. Second-place getters have been Stan Spinks (1938), Brendan Edwards (1958), Phil Hay (1964), Peter Hudson (1971), Peter Knights (1976 and 1978), Jason Dunstall (1988 and 1992), John Platten (1989), and Darren Jarman (1995, although ineligible).
In finishing runner-up in 1964, Phil Hay recorded 19 votes, in the 18-game season. What is remarkable about this is that he only recorded five votes for the rest of his 107-game career.
Hawthorn’s best two seasons for total Club votes are not surprisingly the back-to-back Premiership years of 1988 and 1989, when the Club polled 100 and 101 respectively. In both those seasons, the Club had 19-3 records in the home and away season.
One might expect the Club’s third best season to be 1971, the only other 19-3 season in the Club’s history, but the tally that year was a comparatively modest, 87 votes. The third best is actually 1982, when the Club recorded 99 votes in a 17-5 season.
Peter Hudson’s injury in Round 1, 1972 and return for just one match in the 1973 season provides a rare pre-1984 opportunity to assess how umpires rated a particular game. He received one vote for kicking eight goals prior to his injury late in the 2nd quarter against Melbourne in the opening round of 1972, and two votes for booting eight in the whole match when he flew in by helicopter for the game against Collingwood at Waverley in Round 21, 1973.
One of the players tried at full-forward as a replacement for Hudson failed to impress the umpires. Michael Moncrieff kicked 10 goals against Essendon in Round 20, 1972, but did not gain a single Brownlow vote that season.
Hawthorn did very well from the umpires in their debut League season of 1925, recording seven BOGs, despite winning only three games. Clem Splatt recorded three of them. In those days the umpires only awarded a single vote, so one might have thought that Hawthorn would not record any votes in its winless 1928 season. In fact, the Mayblooms managed two BOGs – Miles Sellers and Jack Sharpley.
In the 25 seasons since 1984 when the actual voting for each match has been made public, 65 different individuals have secured the three votes. 49 of the 65 were BOG multiple times, leaving only 16 singles - one has to go back to 2002 to find the most recent, Simon Cox.
An impressive list of Hawthorn players have polled three votes four or more times in the one season. The list is Byrne, Ayres, Dipierdomenico, Platten (three times), Dunstall, Paul Hudson, Jarman, Crawford (twice), Salmon, Holland, Mitchell (twice) and Hodge.
Luke McCabe is the Hawthorn player to have played the most games (138) without recording a vote. Robbie Campbell and Rick Ladson have now gone past 100 games without recording a vote.
One player with an unusual Brownlow Medal record was Ray Jencke. He polled votes in two seasons, seven years apart. He recorded eight votes in 1987 and did not catch the umpires' eye again until he polled a three vote in 1994.
It is always interesting to compare the Brownlow votes with that of the Club Best & Fairest.
Three of the Club’s four Brownlow Medalists also won the Best & Fairest in the same season, the one exception being Dipierdomenico who did not run a place behind 1986 B&F winner, Gary Ayres, who in turn did not receive a single Brownlow vote. A similar discrepancy occurred in another Premiership season, 1991. Paul Hudson received 17 Brownlow votes, but was beaten in the B&F by Ben Allan, who had received just a single Brownlow vote.
In recent seasons, the two awards have tended to coincide with exceptions being 2007 when Sam Mitchell secured the most Brownlow votes and Brad Sewell (eight Brownlow votes) won the B&F, and 2001 when Crawford topped the Brownlow tally, while Joel Smith (seven Brownlow votes) won the B&F.
Several Hawthorn players have had success in State League medals. Three Hawks have won the Liston Trophy in the VFA/VFL – Bryan Waters (1959), Stephen Allender (1980) and Sam Mitchell (2002); two have won the Magarey Medal in the SANFL – John Platten (1984) and Greg Whittlesea (1988); and two the Sandover Medal in the WAFL – Steve Malaxos (1984) and Craig Treleven (1995).
If you are not a Friend of the Hawks Museum make sure you join soon so that you get an invite to the annual Friends function on Sunday 15 November, when we will be putting together “The Perfect Hawthorn Grand Final”, made up of quarters from four different Premiership wins.
Join at the Hawks Museum or ring 9535 3075 or email hawksmuseum@hawthornfc.com.au
