Jim Park Medal 2016

[crashlander]

You mean the folk who post here don't know everything there is to know about footy  :o

There are always anomalies with Jim Park voting but, at the end of the season, the tallies will be pretty close to other awards - except the Brownlow!

Indeed. With many people with considerably different views as to how things may go, a considerable variability in the voting is not just an effect, but quite a positive. We usually mention all of the players who deserve to be mentioned. Sometimes that isn't a lot of guys, sometimes it can be a significant portion of the team.
In the end, we usually have a pretty good guide to how players have performed. There is considerable correspondence between our votes and Carlton's B&F.

Compared to the Brownlow, we don't do that well, as Brownlow voting is extremely limited in the number of players who can get a mention each week (only 3). As a result, players from losing teams generally get poor representation, no matter how well they have played. The other thing is that Brownlow voting is done by the umpires. From their position in the game, they cannot but bias their views towards midfielders: these are the guys they see most and who often get the ball more.
I wouldn't change the Brownlow - it has its strengths and weaknesses, but it is a very individual award. But I do consider our sort of voting to be a very good way of determining the best players at our club.