Hey everyone!
This is the thread where we announce our Best & Fairests, Coaches Awards and discuss matters such as the Rising Star winner and Coach of the Year in preparation for the Awards Week! (which is essentially this week... via any spare moment I find where I have the mental energy to give it the reception it deserves).
I'd really like your Coaches Award nominee (so a player) by say
Friday night, so I can send the votes out and derive a winner over the weekend. It's tight deadlines, but I rate the responsiveness of our group.
Award Nominations1. Coach of the YearI'll nominate this years candidates, using last years criteria to help me out:
- If you've won more games during the regular season in 2021 than 2020, you get a nomination for coach of the year. If you had the same amount of wins, but scored more overall points you get a nomination.
- A wild card nomination if I feel that a coach has had to overcome particular adversity or done something special to deserve it.
The nominations will be announced... when I send the vote out haha.
2. Coaches awardEach team can nominate a player on their team they think deserves special mention. You can use any criteria you like, it doesn't have to be the best player. Previous winners are Daniel Talia, Mark Blicavs, Matt Jaensch, Clayton Oliver, Jordan Ridley and Brodie Grundy.
Tell us why they are the recipient of your Coaches Award! The more reasons you provide, the higher the chance the comp will vote your player as the WXV 2021 Coaches Award recipient.
3. Rising Star WinnerHere are your nominations! Talk your player up over the next couple of days, and decide who you'll vote for when I send out the PM!
The follow stats have been recorded over the WXV H&A season only.
| Nomination | Full Name | WXV Club | POS1 | POS2 | SENIOR GAMES | RESERVES GAMES | AVERAGE |
| R1 | Lachlan Sholl | Toronto Wolves | DEF | MID | 14 | 3 | 67.41 |
| R2 | Errol Gulden | Moscow Spetsnaz | MID | | 11 | 2 | 79.00 |
| R3 | Deven Robertson | Christchurch Saints | MID | FWD | 12 | 2 | 63.64 |
| R4 | Harry Schoenberg | Christchurch Saints | FWD | | 14 | 3 | 71.06 |
| R5 | Mitch Georgiades | Mexico City Suns | FWD | | 7 | 9 | 61.13 |
| R6 | Tom Powell | New York Revolution | MID | | 11 | 1 | 69.42 |
| R7 | Tom Green | Buenos Aires Armadillos | MID | | 12 | 3 | 82.60 |
| R8 | James Jordon | Rio de Janeiro Jaguars | MID | | 15 | 2 | 70.76 |
| R9 | Caleb Poulter | Pacific Islanders | MID | FWD | 6 | 4 | 59.80 |
| R9 | Jack Bytel | London Royals | MID | | 2 | 8 | 51.60 |
| R10 | Cody Weightman | Tokyo Samurai | FWD | | 5 | 4 | 66.44 |
| R11 | Trent Bianco | Pacific Islanders | DEF | MID | 3 | 4 | 61.43 |
| R12 | Connor Idun | Pacific Islanders | DEF | | 6 | 10 | 60.88 |
| R13 | Justin McInerney | Toronto Wolves | MID | | 12 | 3 | 74.13 |
| R14 | Matt Rowell | Seoul Magpies | MID | | 6 | 1 | 61.00 |
| R15 | Riley Garcia | Cairo Sands | MID | | 5 | 1 | 48.33 |
| R16 | Jeremy Sharp | Buenos Aires Armadillos | MID | | 3 | 2 | 84.60 |
| R17 | Atu Bosenavulagi | Toronto Wolves | FWD | | 2 | 3 | 55.60 |
4. Best & FairestWho polled the most votes in your best & fairest? It can be any system you choose, but be sure to announce your winner here so we can record their achievement for the ages :)
New York Revolution Coaches Award
This was a tough one as we had several candidates who really stood up and took their game to another level, but the winner of NY's Coaches Award for 2021 is Blake Hardwick
Hardwick was extremely reliable and solid down back, having a break-out year where he went on to avg 90
Special mentions also go to Sam Taylor and Luke Dunstan, who unfortunately both missed chunks of the season
New York Revolution Best & Fairest
Cam Guthrie wins NY's B&F for an outstanding year. He broke out last year with a 103avg and has gone up another level to average over 113 in 2021. A consistent and reliable leader for NY
Dillos
Parish and parish
Insane season, averaging 116 for the year! Who’d of thought!
London
Coaches Award - Nick Hind who has lifted his work rate and increased his average from 52 to 91 this year. Brought consistency to his game this year.
London MVP is Touk Miller obviously with 9 best on ground performances.
Cameron Zurhaar.
Because he got good (85+ average injury unaffected) when he got a dog, and I think we can all identify with that.
#pupperpower
Heh, and Gawn wins our B&F.
B&F: Tom Stewart - The man showed some insane consistency and a very impressive floor, except for that one game he scored 58 and made me lose my god damn mind. Nevertheless, a worthy winner. I hope that his Lisfranc injury is fully healed by the time Round 1 2022 rolls around.
Coaches' Award: Bailey Dale - I like to think he's kinda what the award embodies, particularly when you look at some of the past winners of the award. Picked him up because I needed a solid forward I expected to average about 70ish as he did in 2019 and got close enough to in the season where he played the most games before this season. Switched to a new role down back, admittedly a very fantasy friendly one, where he was able to use his biggest strength - his amazing kick skills to play every game, score relatively consistently 95 avg in SC as of this week (Purps probably has the WXVs avg). I was bullish about his recruitment over the offseason, but he well exceeded expectations and couldn't be a better nominee for this award I think.
B & F: Goldy wins his 4th Straight Best and Fairest and 6th in the last 7th years, to cement his spot as the best Dubliner ever. Top scorer for the team again and was the captain at the pointy end of the season
Coaches Award: HepD was apparently "cooked" but ended the season the 2nd highest average and amazingly never dropped below a 80 for the season. On top of bouncing back to his best he has locked in DPP for next year.
We nominate Jack Ziebell for our Coaches Award. Took a big risk trading pick 21 (which became DGB, so a good albeit key position prospect) for a possibly cooked 30-year old who played 8 games for a 48 average last year, but we all know the rest - played every game this season, a surprise given how physically demanding and gruelling his role at North is, for a career-best 107.6 average, and what I believe a 111.67 average for Moscow (citation needed).
Our B&F is Luke Parker.
Dean Darcy for both. Man is quite literally Mr. Church
Beijing
Coaches Award: Wil Powell - Was happy to see this guy on Jing's list as I figured a breakout was coming with his move to defence. Improved his game by almost 20ppg to be averaging 84 currently, with a nice ceiling to boot. Should be a good player for a long time.
B/F: Brodie Grundy snags the newly created Panda Medal for 2021! A comfortable victory for our big man as he cruised to several monster scores, while his lower scores were usually enough for max votes on account of everyone else being bad. What a fall from grace for Jim Stynes medallist Lachie Neale though! Could only manage equal 8th place.
Pacific Islanders
Coaches Award was a hard decision with so many players performing above and beyond.
Stepped up another level and cemented the D2 spot. Let's all cheer Aliir Aliir
B&F goes to Marcus Bontempelli in what could be a Brownlow winning year.
Mitchell, Laird and Lyons logjammed for 2nd with one match remaining.
Coaches award: Jack Crisp, so reliable in defence. Can bank on him to turn up every week.
Best and Fairest: Clayton Oliver pipped Jack Steele by one vote with Crisp in 3rd.
Coaches Award: A-a-ron Hall for sure. Going from 73 to 103 in a year and pretty much holding up my forward line by playing down back.
MVP - Sam Walsh, no real need to explain. It's Sam Walsh.
Toronto
B&F: It's Jack Macrae in a landslide!
Coaches Award: After an injury-riddled couple of seasons, Ryan Burton played every game in 2021 and started to recapture some of his best form, particularly toward the back end of the season when it mattered most.
Rio de Janeiro Jaguars
Coaches Award: Karl Amon
Went from an 80avg to a career best 93avg :)
Best and Fairest: Daniel Rich
Played every game, one of the best defenders in the game this season!
In a year where the midfield was constantly without Duncan, Cunnington, or half my other mids, Kate's coaches award will go to Chris Mayne, taking his game from a sub-70s avg to almost 95, and being one of our more reliable players with a low score of 84 from rounds 6 to 20.
And i haven't done the count but I'm pretty confident that Callum Mills wins our B&F, taking another jump to become one of the elite scorers in the comp, and with insane consistency, not dropping under 100 from round 6 onwards.
Parisian Nice Lyon Reindeers
Coaches Award = Tom Hickey. PNL always stuggled for ruck and big Tom Hickey not only stepped in,
but boosted his average from a career best of 89 to 102 also was VC for most of the year too
BnF = the usualy suspect in Zach Merrett perma captain and 114 average to go with that
BnF = Libba
Coaches Award = Isaac Smith