Modern statistical milestones

[Pies4shaw]

We all know about Grundy's hitouts, JDG's goals, the Future Captain's intercept marks and Treloar's handballs.

However, there are some less-celebrated milestones coming up or already pencilled into the history books.

Jack Crisp has a brilliant record of consecutive games for us and has been a tremendous acquisition. But I don't think enough attention has been focussed on his upcoming milestone: he is sitting on 299 career-clangers. With a 2019 game average of more than 3, you'd think he'd reach his triple ton during the first half of Saturday's game. None of our modern players really looks like threatening Heater's team-best 13 clangers in a game but our modern masters, Adams and Grundy, have each managed 11. Indeed, Taylor is the only Collingwood player ever to top the ton over the season in this category. Even so, he trails Steele badly in career clangers - earlier this season, Sidey brought up his 500th (in our big round 2 win over Richmond). Obviously, he was in the nervous 490s because he could only mange the 2 that day, probably with his mind too focussed on the importance of the milestone.

No modern player looks to have what it takes to match Mark Williams' fantastic effort of 13 free kicks against in a big victory over Carlton in 1983. But Big Brodie has just brought up his 200th career free against. He once managed 8 against (in our 2014 Anzac Day victory) but he really doesn't have what it takes to match it with our all-time greats in this category. Mark Williams and Big Len both topped the ton over the season (Thommo twice). Despite his best efforts, Brodie's never even reached the half-century.

I remember one appalling cross-wind at Victoria Park in 1969 that helped our most accurate kick for goal of all-time, the wonderful Peter McKenna, to a game record of 10 behinds for the Pies (it really was a bad day, Pete kicked 1.10). Those behinds helped us to a big win over Hawthorn, back in the days when that almost always happened. Pete has 4 of our top 5 season records for most behinds. His best was 80 in a season. Because he also kicked 143 goals that year, his accuracy was still phenomenal. To put Pete's 1970 achievement in perspective, JDG, for all his recent woes, has only managed 62 behinds in his entire career, so far. Nevertheless, he's making big moves this season, having upped his average to 1.75 behinds per game, so there is just a prospect that we may get to celebrate JDG's 100th behind before we celebrate his 100th game. By contrast, Jamie Elliott is never going to be a standout performer in this category, for all the fanfare - he's only ever managed a disappointing 16 behinds in a season. In better news, Pendles did bring up his personal ton in round 19, 2018 against Richmond. Not only did he have 37 disposals and take the 3 Brownlow votes, but he brought up his ton with 1 of his 5 magnificent 2018 behinds.