Hang on a minute...hang on!!?? -..."Guess you are on the young side " ??!!!! ...HA!!!
If you are ranking "good marking players" by the fact that they once or twice took a speccy grab ...well...you are dreamers!!
Presumably, being AFL players, one would expect them to take a grab now and then, and yep, since inception we have had a fair few blokes who have proven 'they have taken a grab.'
But a "good mark" - obviously in my view - is a fella who in any condition, under any pressure, under any match situation, can be relied upon to complete the task at a high percentage rate of success.
And, yep, Fyfe, Hasleby, Pav and Mcpharlin -in my view - are the only blokes, since inception, that meet that criteria. They all "played tall'...and you all know what that means.
Yep, maybe Ive been a bit harsh on Polak -(a courageous, going back in the pack mark ) Fletch (a player I really respected and yep, played tall), and I'd say the other would be Modra. Yep, I'll accept Mundy can take a grab.
But, the rest Clive, Koops, Mann, Chisolm Crozier(????)and anyone else mentioned Wills(???) were all just as likely to drop them as they were to clunk them! Abilty to take a speccy? - Yes. Good reliable clunkers? - No.
And my point was, throughout our history, we have struggled to find blokes who can "clunk 'em", which is why -in my view- Ive paid a lot of interest in Tabs' development ...ie been so frustrated, but also so pleased to see him start "clunking 'em".
As a club, we've struggled to have blokes that have had strong hands, and, quite obviously, that can be measured and quantified by our complete lack of dominant KPP's who - are generally - pretty sound marks.
Yep, Pav, and Mcpharlin fit that bill, Fyfe could and probably will eventually, but we have a need for him to be everywhere else at the moment and, in the near future. Yep, Hasleby was no KPP, but geez he had strong hands. He was a great, solid and reliable mark for a midfielder & man his size.
I'd also put this hypothesis to the masses to consider:
"Blokes with 'strong hands' are like gold - They dont get traded. "
The 4 I mentioned , obviously played out their carreer at Freo, the others mentioned clearly did not.
Yep, undoubtedly, we have had blokes capable of taking great marks ( The Wiz, Winny, Dhurkay and Walters, and maybe Ballas are amongst that lot ) , but we've had very few are "genuine clunkers"...
