“I am trying to bring something to the public forum and by mentioning one person’s name the point gets missed,” Sheedy said. “Looking back I probably I shouldn’t have even mentioned a name – it probably would have been better for me to say there have been five or 10 lucky Brownlow Medallists in the past 45 years. That is a less provocative comment. I didn’t mean to get personal.”
“I wish I had not made the comment about Graham Teasdale – it was spur of the moment. Graham Teasdale is a very fine person. I would not want to offend Graham Teasdale – I’m offending the Brownlow Medal because I think it is done incorrectly.
“The point I was trying to make is that the system has got to get better if we want to reward our legendary players. Our legendary players aren’t being rewarded by the present system. You only have to look at the Team of the Century to see that – it only had eight Brownlow Medallists in it – surely that is telling us we haven’t got it right.
“You ask your own club – is Ted Whitten a better player than Brad Hardie? Is Gordon Collis a better player than Stephen Silvagni or Bruce Doull? If the press want to make it into a headline well and good but don’t miss the point – we don’t have a proper system in place that honors our best player.
“The Brownlow votes are rushed and I don’t think that is proper. The umpires normally vote within an hour after the game. After a match I know how stressed and how under-prepared I am to give my own best and fairest votes. I like to sit down and study the game by video. You ask a policeman on traffic duty who was the best driver that went past you today – umpires are out there to get their decisions right and control the game.
“That is what I am on about here. It took six years to get an extra player on the bench because the AFL didn’t want to and then they gave us to –we struggle with tradition.”
