What did Jack Riewoldt do wrong to miss out in Mike's Top 50 AFL players Jon Anderson
From: Herald Sun
March 12, 2013 Like many in our football-obsessed city I have long been an avid reader of your Top 50 AFL players, in fact dating back to 1990 when Stephen Kernahan pipped Jason Dunstall and Greg Williams for your inaugural No.1.
Sitting alongside you during your arduous compilation of the list has allowed me to realise just how diligent you are when rating the young men who make our weekends more enjoyable.
Naturally, given it is such a subjective exercise, there can never be a definitive list and the general consensus would suggest you do better than most could hope (otherwise, it wouldn't still be running).
But as is always the case with a complimentary build-up there must come the obligatory whack, and mine is what in the heck did Jack Riewoldt do for you exclude him from your Top 50?
We are talking about the 2012 Coleman medallist, someone who was proficient enough at his craft to boot more goals than Travis Cloke, Buddy Franklin, Tom Hawkins, Matthew Pavlich and Taylor Walker.
Yet that crew all rated not in your top 50 but in your top 20 players in the following order: Franklin (4th) Walker (9th) Cloke (12th) Hawkins (17th) and Pavlich (19th).
Maybe you based it on the fact the Riewoldt could only finish ninth in his club's best-and-fairest, yet that argument becomes void given Cloke had the same finish at Collingwood.
Or maybe you just don't rate the cousin of Nick that highly. And given your Top 50 is based on who you think will be the best 50 players in 2013, as distinct who were the best in 2012, then you clearly don't think Riewoldt is in for much of a season.
I beg to differ given his 2012 season, while far from his maximum output, was achieved on the back of a severely restricted pre-season because of injury.
This pre-season has seen him moving freely, even if he has developed a strange penchant for wanting to give the ball off when he is in position to score.
Or maybe, and I think this must be the real reason, you haven't been too impressed with "Jumping Jack's'' desire to become involved in ridiculous arguments with umpires in games that mean nothing.
No doubt the Richmond hierarchy has been in his ear to stop wasting his breath on no-win situations and to save it for repeat efforts.
But isn't everyone allowed a weakness? And wasn't it Matthew Richardson who was once criticised for the same before becoming the competition's most loved player?
Best wishes, Ando
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/afl/more-news/what-did-jack-riewoldt-do-wrong-to-miss-out-in-mikes-top-50-afl-players/story-e6frf9jf-1226594987042
