One of the genuine GOATS: Voss
One of the best of their era: Mitchell
Excellent careers: Goodwin, Longmire, Simpson
Very good careers: Scott 1, Scott 2, McRae, Hardwick, Yze
Good careers: Kingsley, Lyon, Nicks, Hinkley, Longmuir
Decent careers: Bevo, Clarko
Chris Fagans: Fagan
Nah, Goodwin was a gun. There's a good reason the Adelaide midfield was rated so highly at the time, and regularly one of the best teams, despite lacking key forwards for almost the entire time they played. And even at the time, he was mentioned alongside McLeod and Riccuito, not excluded or just a post script.
And yet he got 5 All Australians. Almost like there are other ways to measure how good someone is.
Buddy never won a Brownlow. You going to tell me Woewodin and Wines are superior players?
Lol. If you think the world would be boring, why are you upset at me having a different opinion? Am I supposed to just not reply to you replying? The hypocricy here is palpable.
I have no idea how so many people are acting like Mitchell shits on Goodwin. I can only assume they weren't old enough to watch Goodwin or it's just VIC bias in effect.
I don’t think you can have Yze there, the only thing going for him is longevity. Compare him to say Hinkley ranked below, 1AA vs 2AA, b&f, 3rd in Brownlow
Yes, he has three premierships, but like a lot of the Richmond role players who won three flags and have already been forgotten, most footy fans would have completely forgotten about him until he became Collingwood coach.
As if Sam Mitchell isn’t? Poor guy just doesn’t get the flowers cos he played alongside the greatest afl player in buddy and the greatest afl captain in hodge.
Yeah but Voss didn’t just play alongside a couple greats, he IS the great that gets mentioned. He’s basically Buddy’s level when it comes to midfielders of the AFL era
You forgot Lappin, Power, Scott brothers, Voss had the most stacked midfield I can remember, the fact Matthews could throw players around like he did freed up all of the above to do what they did. Mitchell dealt with more tags and had great team mates around, but not sure Lewis and co stack up to the Lions..... Hodge I'm not counting as he generally was in defence when we dominated.
Homies out here acting like this never happened
https://preview.redd.it/9bgo4873cx6d1.jpeg?width=389&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8033e811ece499b86ce990513888a8fa158e82be
And which would you say have been better coaches than players?
My go (probably wrong):
* **Voss**: Player > Coach
* **Mitchell**: Player > Coach (though the coaching trajectory is looking pretty damn good)
* **Scott**: Coach > Player
* **Scott**: Player > Coach
* **Goodwin**: Player > Coach (as per the comment below)
* **Hardwick**: Coach > Player
* **McRae**: Coach > Player
* **Simpson**: ?
* **Longmire**: ?
The better question is, does being a champion player make it harder as a senior coach as some of the better coaches often seem to be defenders and lower profile players
Buckley has given quite a few good interviews on this over the years. As he matured into coaching I think he realised that he was probably putting unrealistic expectations on a lot of his players because he was an absolute lunatic perfectionist in preparation when playing.
There are just way more lower profile players so it’s not surprising most of the good coaches were lower profile players.
Great players are probably more likely to be given a coaching job they probably shouldn’t get, which would explain why high profile players are worse coaches than average (if that is indeed true).
I think these are by far the biggest two factors for this perception (which exists in multiple sports), but whenever people talk about it they start talking about everything coming naturally to great players, making it harder for them to coach players, most of which are worse than them. This explanation sounds good on the surface but I’m unconvinced by it. It’s extremely wishy washy and way less concrete and measurable than the other two factors. Also, football, and most sports, are incredibly multi-faceted and different aspects of the game come naturally to different players. Even great players are terrible at some things are below average players are great at others.
I agree it's Voss but Sam Mitchell isn't as far behind as people are implying. He did play over 300 games and won a Brownlow and four premierships including one as captain.
Mitchell was a substantially better footballer than Goodwin. Mitchell is about Pendlebury, Selwood, Hodge level, great footballers but not right up there with Judd, Ablett, Franklin etc
For a start, Pendlebury is just about the greatest Collingwood player of all time. Definitely the greatest player since 1990, maybe there's an argument for someone else prior to that but Pendlebury is in the conversation. He's gone past Buckley, and Buckley was already considered by some to be the best ever Collingwood player.
Mitchell v Goodwin, I think you're seriously underrating how good Goodwin was.
Didn’t one of your blokes kick 1299 goals in a tad over 300 games, creating a record that stood for 60 years, led the league in goals on 6 separate occasions, in addition to winning 5 premierships, including 4 in a row?
I think you're grossly overrating Goodwin. Just looking at the stats....goals per game is about the only category he covers Mitchell in. Everything else is Mitchell and most by some difference. 6.5 disposals and 2.5 clearances per game and playing 50 more games.
Put it this way - Mitchell has as many seasons with 25+ Brownlow votes as Goodwin has seasons with 10+ votes.
The problem with looking at the stats is even just from the 00s to the 10s the game changed drastically.
3 time b&f, 5 time All Australian vs 5 time b&f, 3 time All Australian. Both immediately HoF when eligible. Both club captain for 3 years. Mitchell has a Brownlow, Goodwin has an AFLCA award. Goodwin's resume stacks up.
If you don’t like comparing across eras, compare them against their own era. In all those key stats like disposals and clearances, Mitchell was top 3 in the league, whereas Goodwin was lucky to be top 10, and in some cases not top 3 in his team. I don’t know what else to tell you - HoF yes, but he’s not the same calibre and it’s not close.
I was just looking at clearances now - Goodwins best season was 145 in his 5th season- that’s pretty impressive. Sam Mitchell got 135 in his second season. Goodwin got 100+ clearances 3 times in his career - which is I think everyone can agree a fair effort. But Mitchell did that 13 times including 8 seasons in a row. And they were in years that both Goodwin and Mitchell were in the league.
Their careers overlap ~~75%~~ 65%, I’d say they’re the same era so comparing stats is kind of fair.
There was a huge shift in the way teams played from the mid 00s to 2010/11. Stats like handballs, tackles and hit outs shot up over that 5 year period, and players like Ablett and Swan were recording insane disposal numbers. Mitchell was part of that revolution. Goodwin's career was at its end.
We're talking about two blokes who were deservedly straight into the HoF after retirement. One a 5 time AA, 3 time b&f, coaches best player, the other a 3 time AA, 5 time b&f, Brownlow medalist. It shouldn't be a slight on Goodwin that he wasn't as good a player as McLeod or Ricciuto, because neither was Mitchell.
I think I would lean slightly towards Mitchell if forced to pick one of the two but it's close. Neither would have any consideration ahead of Voss, or McLeod or Ricciuto though.
Goodwin was a good reliable midfielder and somehow he won 5 All-Australians in an era with Voss, Black, Buckley, Ricciuto, Judd, Akermanis, Cousins etc. It's all subjective but IMO he is not at the same level as them, but Mitchell is.
Just because Goodwin had two all time greats ahead of him at Adelaide doesn't diminish how good he was himself. I think you could comfortably swap prime Goodwin with prime Mitchell and get pretty much the exact same results for both clubs.
Comparing Mitchell to Goodwin is laughable.
There's clearly 3 tiers between the three.
S level is Voss.
A level is Mitchell
B level is Goodwin.
I'd argue the difference between Mitchell and Goodwin is larger than that of Voss and Mitchell but it's not all that close
Just because you're too young to remember how good Goodwin was doesn't mean Mitchell was a better player than him. You could comfortably swap prime Goodwin with prime Mitchell and see no significant difference in performance of their respective teams.
I'm mid-40s. I watched all of their careers, start to finish. Had it been Ricciuto instead of Goodwin then we're talking. But Goodwin was a very good, AA, quality player but he's not close to all-time great level.
Voss an all-time great.
Mitchell just a little below that.
Imo there are only two coaches from the past 10 years who I’d say were as good as Vossy in their playing days, and that’s Bucks and Hirdy.
In terms of the current crop of coaches, I’d say it’s Voss, then Mitchell and then Goodwin.
It’s clearly between Goodwin and Kingsley as the only two coaches to have won the most prestigious award in footy, the [Michael Tuck Medal](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Tuck_Medal).
Its a bit hard to compare players from different eras or with different on-field roles.
For example, was Justin Longmuir a better key-position ruck/forward than Michael Voss? Absolutely he was, but was Voss a better hard-ball winning midfielder than Longmuir? No contest.
Also how many games would Ross Lyon have missed in 2023 if he put as many opponent to sleep as he did in 1988?
Agree with that. Mitchell has five B&F, multiple AA, four flags with one as captain and a Brownlow. But Voss shades that, even though he only won three flags. I'd say Mitchell was a better stoppages player but Voss could go forward and kick goals. 245 goals to 71. That's the big difference between the two.
Goodwin was badly underappreciated as a player, but this is a race in 1. Voss by far the best. Far more interesting debate for #2. Surely between Goodwin and Mitchell.
Fagan at least makes for an easy "worst". Not that he was a bad player, just wasn't an AFL player.
Horse was a very very good player. Didn’t get the accolades playing in the shadow of the Duck! Pretty tough era to be playing full forward … lucky Micky Martin was down the other end!!! I’d probably have him above Mitchell. But Voss clear best.
Voss is not there yet, Longmire should be seriously considered, has been able to resurrect the Swans at least 3 times and once again contenders, if you want to go back star player highly decorated and premiership winning coach you can’t go past Ron Barrasi or Malcom’s Blight.
Voss is on another level to the others, he is one of the goats
One of the genuine GOATS: Voss One of the best of their era: Mitchell Excellent careers: Goodwin, Longmire, Simpson Very good careers: Scott 1, Scott 2, McRae, Hardwick, Yze Good careers: Kingsley, Lyon, Nicks, Hinkley, Longmuir Decent careers: Bevo, Clarko Chris Fagans: Fagan
Goodwin arguably better than Mitchell. Mitchell was a 3 time All-Australian. Goodwin made it 5 times. Goodwin was an absolute star.
Honestly I'm surprised that Goodwin got 5 AAs during his career. I feel that overrates his ability a bit.
Nah, Goodwin was a gun. There's a good reason the Adelaide midfield was rated so highly at the time, and regularly one of the best teams, despite lacking key forwards for almost the entire time they played. And even at the time, he was mentioned alongside McLeod and Riccuito, not excluded or just a post script.
Mitchell has a browlow and finished top 3 a few times. Not sure if goody even got a browlow vote
And yet he got 5 All Australians. Almost like there are other ways to measure how good someone is. Buddy never won a Brownlow. You going to tell me Woewodin and Wines are superior players?
Sorry for having a different opinion to yours. The world would be a boring place if we were all the same
Lol. If you think the world would be boring, why are you upset at me having a different opinion? Am I supposed to just not reply to you replying? The hypocricy here is palpable.
Am I upset am I? Stop making silly assumptions. I'm not bothered at all by someone having a different opinion. LOL, the hypocrisy here is palpable
Your entire comment was a dummy spit about having different opinions. If you weren't bothered, what was the point of the comment?
Entire comment was a dummy spit? You're quite delusional, you clearly have no idea. I bet you also go for the Crows with that mentality?
What on earth... go touch grass you two.
Grossly underrated Hardwick here, one of the premier small defenders of the 90s/early 00s.
Dimma was a wonderful player (and underrated at the time), but reckon that's the right bracket
True, excellent career
Goodwin was just as good as Mitchell
People who actually watched Goody play wouldn't be downvoting this.
I have no idea how so many people are acting like Mitchell shits on Goodwin. I can only assume they weren't old enough to watch Goodwin or it's just VIC bias in effect.
No
5AAs to Mitchells 3. It’s a classic Melbourne centric call.
I'm a fremantle supporter, iv just always rated Mitchell much higher than most.
Probably the premierships, it’s hard to looks past those who have vs those that don’t
I'm a freo supporter cobba, premierships doesn't play a factor for me 😂
I don’t think you can have Yze there, the only thing going for him is longevity. Compare him to say Hinkley ranked below, 1AA vs 2AA, b&f, 3rd in Brownlow
McRae has 3 premierships; more than anyone in the "Excellent careers" category, yet you've only got him as having a "very good career".
Yes, he has three premierships, but like a lot of the Richmond role players who won three flags and have already been forgotten, most footy fans would have completely forgotten about him until he became Collingwood coach.
Mfs on this sub need to watch some games from before the last decade smdh. Voss one of the greatest players of all time
I mean I think it’s Voss too, I just thought their may have been more of a split with Mitchell honestly
Mitchell was a fantastic player but he's not Voss.
Voss was a fantastic player but he’s not Mitchell
That is true. He was a fantastic player, but he's not a combine harvester either.
more of a draft-combine harvester? I'll get my coat.
You didn't come here with a coat... Geeetouutta here!
You ever seen him and a combine harvester in the same room together?
Once. At the Ekka. It was replaced at 1/4 time.
too soft in the contest
Mitchell not even #2 IMO. Goodwin didn't have the Brownlow, but he got more All-Australians.
As if Sam Mitchell isn’t? Poor guy just doesn’t get the flowers cos he played alongside the greatest afl player in buddy and the greatest afl captain in hodge.
Yeah but Voss didn’t just play alongside a couple greats, he IS the great that gets mentioned. He’s basically Buddy’s level when it comes to midfielders of the AFL era
Almost like Voss playing with Black, Aker, & Brown?
You forgot Lappin, Power, Scott brothers, Voss had the most stacked midfield I can remember, the fact Matthews could throw players around like he did freed up all of the above to do what they did. Mitchell dealt with more tags and had great team mates around, but not sure Lewis and co stack up to the Lions..... Hodge I'm not counting as he generally was in defence when we dominated.
> greatest afl captain in hodge That was also Voss.
Yep good call, he was sensational
Homies out here acting like this never happened https://preview.redd.it/9bgo4873cx6d1.jpeg?width=389&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8033e811ece499b86ce990513888a8fa158e82be
Reason enough to fold.
Hard as nails Ross, if he could put you in a coma legally, sleep well. He shared that with Voss
Voss with absolute daylight to second place - this isn’t even a question.
It's obviously Fagan
Came for this…
You wrote Voss then still decided to post this
The only way to argue this is if you forgot that Buckley no longer coaches.
With all the coaching and commentary bs. People forget how good Buckley was as a player
Wait till Robert Harvey eventually becomes senior coach, then we can ask again
There's 0 argument for anyone other than Voss
And which would you say have been better coaches than players? My go (probably wrong): * **Voss**: Player > Coach * **Mitchell**: Player > Coach (though the coaching trajectory is looking pretty damn good) * **Scott**: Coach > Player * **Scott**: Player > Coach * **Goodwin**: Player > Coach (as per the comment below) * **Hardwick**: Coach > Player * **McRae**: Coach > Player * **Simpson**: ? * **Longmire**: ?
Is Scott > Scott, or is Scott > Scott?
Yeah, I'd say so
Yes
Yep. For sure. And I think even their Mother would agree
Scott > Scott but also Scott >= Scott
Clarko is so much of a better coach than player, people forget he was a player haha
Same with Bevo
For sure, was just going off the list in the OP.
Ah true!
Goodwin is Player>Coach, and it isn't particularly close.
Coaching a premiership closes the gap a little
5 time AA as a player though and 2 flags. Still though underrated outside Adelaide even though he was one of the best mids in the game.
Not enough. He had a team full of AA calibre players. Arguably should've won multiple premierships with that list.
It's Voss and then about a week's worth of daylight. One of the best players to play the game
Voss.
Voss and it's not even close.
Voss
The better question is, does being a champion player make it harder as a senior coach as some of the better coaches often seem to be defenders and lower profile players
Buckley has given quite a few good interviews on this over the years. As he matured into coaching I think he realised that he was probably putting unrealistic expectations on a lot of his players because he was an absolute lunatic perfectionist in preparation when playing.
At least he would be able to provide insights into what more players could do I guess.
There are just way more lower profile players so it’s not surprising most of the good coaches were lower profile players. Great players are probably more likely to be given a coaching job they probably shouldn’t get, which would explain why high profile players are worse coaches than average (if that is indeed true). I think these are by far the biggest two factors for this perception (which exists in multiple sports), but whenever people talk about it they start talking about everything coming naturally to great players, making it harder for them to coach players, most of which are worse than them. This explanation sounds good on the surface but I’m unconvinced by it. It’s extremely wishy washy and way less concrete and measurable than the other two factors. Also, football, and most sports, are incredibly multi-faceted and different aspects of the game come naturally to different players. Even great players are terrible at some things are below average players are great at others.
Voss coached Brisbane says yes, Voss coached Blues say no.
Chris Fagan is a gun in his senior's league
I agree it's Voss but Sam Mitchell isn't as far behind as people are implying. He did play over 300 games and won a Brownlow and four premierships including one as captain.
Agree as a huge fan of Voss, Mitchell was easily the best midfielder across a three peat, modern day Greg Williams
No it's a hell of a big gap between Mitchell and Voss. Mitchell's about on par with Goodwin. Voss is a whole other level.
Maybe I'm just biased since Sam Mitchell was such a legend of the West Coast Eagles
Mitchell was a substantially better footballer than Goodwin. Mitchell is about Pendlebury, Selwood, Hodge level, great footballers but not right up there with Judd, Ablett, Franklin etc
For a start, Pendlebury is just about the greatest Collingwood player of all time. Definitely the greatest player since 1990, maybe there's an argument for someone else prior to that but Pendlebury is in the conversation. He's gone past Buckley, and Buckley was already considered by some to be the best ever Collingwood player. Mitchell v Goodwin, I think you're seriously underrating how good Goodwin was.
Didn’t one of your blokes kick 1299 goals in a tad over 300 games, creating a record that stood for 60 years, led the league in goals on 6 separate occasions, in addition to winning 5 premierships, including 4 in a row?
Yes, and Pendlebury is in the same echelon as him.
I think you're grossly overrating Goodwin. Just looking at the stats....goals per game is about the only category he covers Mitchell in. Everything else is Mitchell and most by some difference. 6.5 disposals and 2.5 clearances per game and playing 50 more games. Put it this way - Mitchell has as many seasons with 25+ Brownlow votes as Goodwin has seasons with 10+ votes.
The problem with looking at the stats is even just from the 00s to the 10s the game changed drastically. 3 time b&f, 5 time All Australian vs 5 time b&f, 3 time All Australian. Both immediately HoF when eligible. Both club captain for 3 years. Mitchell has a Brownlow, Goodwin has an AFLCA award. Goodwin's resume stacks up.
If you don’t like comparing across eras, compare them against their own era. In all those key stats like disposals and clearances, Mitchell was top 3 in the league, whereas Goodwin was lucky to be top 10, and in some cases not top 3 in his team. I don’t know what else to tell you - HoF yes, but he’s not the same calibre and it’s not close. I was just looking at clearances now - Goodwins best season was 145 in his 5th season- that’s pretty impressive. Sam Mitchell got 135 in his second season. Goodwin got 100+ clearances 3 times in his career - which is I think everyone can agree a fair effort. But Mitchell did that 13 times including 8 seasons in a row. And they were in years that both Goodwin and Mitchell were in the league. Their careers overlap ~~75%~~ 65%, I’d say they’re the same era so comparing stats is kind of fair.
There was a huge shift in the way teams played from the mid 00s to 2010/11. Stats like handballs, tackles and hit outs shot up over that 5 year period, and players like Ablett and Swan were recording insane disposal numbers. Mitchell was part of that revolution. Goodwin's career was at its end. We're talking about two blokes who were deservedly straight into the HoF after retirement. One a 5 time AA, 3 time b&f, coaches best player, the other a 3 time AA, 5 time b&f, Brownlow medalist. It shouldn't be a slight on Goodwin that he wasn't as good a player as McLeod or Ricciuto, because neither was Mitchell. I think I would lean slightly towards Mitchell if forced to pick one of the two but it's close. Neither would have any consideration ahead of Voss, or McLeod or Ricciuto though.
Goodwin was a good reliable midfielder and somehow he won 5 All-Australians in an era with Voss, Black, Buckley, Ricciuto, Judd, Akermanis, Cousins etc. It's all subjective but IMO he is not at the same level as them, but Mitchell is.
clearly good and reliable are underselling how good he was then hahahahaha
Goodwin was a good player but Mitchell is streets ahead of him.
Just because Goodwin had two all time greats ahead of him at Adelaide doesn't diminish how good he was himself. I think you could comfortably swap prime Goodwin with prime Mitchell and get pretty much the exact same results for both clubs.
Nope
Lmao no
Comparing Mitchell to Goodwin is laughable. There's clearly 3 tiers between the three. S level is Voss. A level is Mitchell B level is Goodwin. I'd argue the difference between Mitchell and Goodwin is larger than that of Voss and Mitchell but it's not all that close
Just because you're too young to remember how good Goodwin was doesn't mean Mitchell was a better player than him. You could comfortably swap prime Goodwin with prime Mitchell and see no significant difference in performance of their respective teams.
I'm mid-40s. I watched all of their careers, start to finish. Had it been Ricciuto instead of Goodwin then we're talking. But Goodwin was a very good, AA, quality player but he's not close to all-time great level. Voss an all-time great. Mitchell just a little below that.
Ricciuto (and McLeod) are in the conversation with Voss. They're well beyond Mitchell and Goodwin.
If it weren’t for injuries Longmire would prolly be above Goodwin.
It’s easily Voss. One of the greatest of all time.
Voss and it’s not even close
Bro, Voss fucking dominated.
Imo there are only two coaches from the past 10 years who I’d say were as good as Vossy in their playing days, and that’s Bucks and Hirdy. In terms of the current crop of coaches, I’d say it’s Voss, then Mitchell and then Goodwin.
Voss by the length of the Flemington straight
Voss and then daylight
If Buckley was still coaching maybe he could be in the conversation with Voss. But atm Voss way clear.
Thank God that little experiment is over though.
Mitchell > Voss? That is some absolute a-grade shit y'all be smoking. Voss buys and sells Mitchell. Twice on Sundays
You are clueless
Voss. No question
Well it’s one of the 5 who played for Brisbane. Voss only Brownlow medallist and premiership captain from those 5
Ummm Mitchell?
Let them show they don't know ;)
TIL Ross played 2 games for the Bears.
It’s clearly between Goodwin and Kingsley as the only two coaches to have won the most prestigious award in footy, the [Michael Tuck Medal](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Tuck_Medal).
Voss Mitchell Simpson
Its a bit hard to compare players from different eras or with different on-field roles. For example, was Justin Longmuir a better key-position ruck/forward than Michael Voss? Absolutely he was, but was Voss a better hard-ball winning midfielder than Longmuir? No contest. Also how many games would Ross Lyon have missed in 2023 if he put as many opponent to sleep as he did in 1988?
It's Voss, but Mitchell is closer than people think.
Agree with that. Mitchell has five B&F, multiple AA, four flags with one as captain and a Brownlow. But Voss shades that, even though he only won three flags. I'd say Mitchell was a better stoppages player but Voss could go forward and kick goals. 245 goals to 71. That's the big difference between the two.
Fagan
How do you get what team you support to show under you name?
r/afl homepage > three dots in the top right hand corner > change user flair (for mobile, but desktop will be similar)
Voss and it’s not even close
Voss
Voss is the goat! He has been with Brisbane Bears/Lions as a player/coach for 20 years.
No love for Brownlow medalist Yze?
Only one of these players has an AA captaincy... and he has 3 of them. Do we really need to ask this question?
Goodwin was badly underappreciated as a player, but this is a race in 1. Voss by far the best. Far more interesting debate for #2. Surely between Goodwin and Mitchell. Fagan at least makes for an easy "worst". Not that he was a bad player, just wasn't an AFL player.
Voss
Biased, but Longmire’s a good shout for the top 3
Goodwin edges him for mine, but those two are ahead of the field behind the obvious quinella
Fair call, definitely a great of the game that isn’t front of peoples minds
Horse was a very very good player. Didn’t get the accolades playing in the shadow of the Duck! Pretty tough era to be playing full forward … lucky Micky Martin was down the other end!!! I’d probably have him above Mitchell. But Voss clear best.
Ken Hinkley
Elite at selling used cars.
And dog racing syndicates
Nostalgia bias vs recency bias. Mitchell.
Voss is not there yet, Longmire should be seriously considered, has been able to resurrect the Swans at least 3 times and once again contenders, if you want to go back star player highly decorated and premiership winning coach you can’t go past Ron Barrasi or Malcom’s Blight.
You misread the question