Will Crippa win the rising star?

[crashlander]

I hope everyone can temper their expectations of Cripps for next year. While I expect him to become a great 200+ game player for us, I also kind of expect him to have some 2nd year blues next year.

He hasn't really been tagged yet, next year clubs will put a lot more time into trying to stop him. Until he learns to play with high expectations and a lot closer attention from opposition teams his output may be lower than we are expecting of him.

Let him get to 50 games and then really watch him take off !!

Not quite true, although it has only happened a few times as yet. Melbourne tried it and Cripps prospered.
However, you are correct. having mad an impression this year, opposition clubs will be on the lookout for him next year. How effective their countermeasures will be will depend on how guys like Gibbs come up from injury and if we get another good young mid to make an impression. Most teams don't like too many tags, so if our mids step up, it will be a lot harder to hold any particular one down.

The other thing in his favour is that he is tall enough to be a useful marking target when 'resting' forward. One way to break the tag would be to start him forward and see if the tagger can handle a strong guy who is taller than John Nicholls.