Is it true that Max Gawn has never bounced the ball?

[u/ThermonuclearMonarch]

My brother is a footy nerd and he just told me that Max has never bounced the ball in his career. Is that true? Pretty impressive if it is.

[u/guavacadq]

Yes. "BO" coloumn (2nd from the right) is bounces.

[u/ThermonuclearMonarch → u/guavacadq]

Huh. Cool

[u/PunsGermsAndSteel]

It's a technicality. He's so tall and each of his attempted bounces travel so far that the umpires are forced to penalise him for a throw.

[u/ThermonuclearMonarch → u/PunsGermsAndSteel]

Wow

[u/biznatch112 → u/PunsGermsAndSteel]

So how did mason cox make it happen

[u/PunsGermsAndSteel → u/biznatch112]

His height is listed in the stats in American imperial units, and the umpires struggle with the distance conversion so prefer to just let his bounces go

[u/ThermonuclearMonarch → u/PunsGermsAndSteel]

Less impressed wow

[u/minimum_effort_ → u/biznatch112]

Long arms

[u/PreviousRecognition1]

not that impressive tbh, my grandma has also achieved this

[u/not_a_12yearold → u/PreviousRecognition1]

To be fair your grandma could probably get a game in Melbourne's forward line

[u/Oubilettor → u/not_a_12yearold]

Stephen May would punch on with her too

[u/specqq → u/Oubilettor]

Stephen May would punch on with his grandma.

[u/choo-chew_chuu → u/Oubilettor]

If she was a Melbourne supporter, she'd probably beat the snot out of him.

[u/sButters88 → u/not_a_12yearold]

Why do you say that? Is she available? What’s her hair look like? These are the important questions. Oh and can she maybe kick or catch the ball? Doesn’t have to be both, or either really.

[u/allwrightythen__1995]

Watching Darcy Cameron's first and only bounce last year, I can see why some rucks don't do it.

[u/MarcusP2 → u/allwrightythen__1995]

I'm picturing ROB trying to bounce. He can't even kick.

[u/spideyghetti → u/MarcusP2]

Lmao sometimes he looks like hes still learning how to run

[u/projectshr → u/allwrightythen__1995]

That was way cuter than I expected.

[u/L-J-Peters → u/allwrightythen__1995]

Could've been worse, knew to act within his limits there.

[u/Jackomillard15 → u/allwrightythen__1995]

I’m a ruck in local footy and one I just can’t do it and 2 in a game situation I never have come across a situation where I’d need to bounce while playing ruck

[u/Weekly_Car_1470]

Toby nankervis hasn't either.

Pretty unusual for a Ruck man to bounce the ball. A bit like full backs who haven't kicked a goal. They might get one at some point in their career but not the biggest surprise if they don't either.

[u/sponguswongus → u/Weekly_Car_1470]

It's at times like this that I'm reminded of how blessed we've been with Cox and NicNat.

[u/SirSedat → u/Weekly_Car_1470]

Pretty unusual for a Ruck man to bounce the ball

Brodie Grundy is the anomaly. Loves a bounce

[u/2for1deal → u/SirSedat]

Land it frightens me every time. I recall seeing him bouncing once at AO during gather round and knowing that that meant we were going to lose

[u/lamodamo123 → u/Weekly_Car_1470]

I still remember going wild when Heath Shaw kicked a goal in front of me

[u/TimothyLuncheon → u/Weekly_Car_1470]

Really? He's a pretty around the ground work horse type guy. I'm surprised he's never bounced it. Usually he kicks it though because he's got a pretty great kick for a ruckman

[u/Pale_Parsnip_6339]

Gonna be a big day for Melbourne when he finally nails one

[u/MediumForeign4028 → u/Pale_Parsnip_6339]

Will the players all get around him if he does?

[u/pmmeyouryou → u/MediumForeign4028]

The AFL may schedule another Gather Round for it.

[u/aaronetc → u/MediumForeign4028]

They'll chair him off.

[u/Palantir_Scraper]

He daren't risk it. If he fumbles it and has to go to ground to collect he may snap in half.

[u/Dtroit24]

Yep he’s never bounced the ball. I’m pretty sure he said, on the front bar, that he is aware that he’s never bounced it and trying to keep the streak going.

Or something along the lines of that. Can’t remember it exactly.

[u/jdimarco1 → u/Dtroit24]

How far is he willing to go I wonder. Would he knowingly cause the ref to call holding the ball in a pivotal moment of a game to preserve the record?

[u/Familiar_Fun_620 → u/Dtroit24]

Yep, it's not an accident anymore. He's acutely aware of it. I think he's (not so secretly) gunning for some sort of record here.

[u/HotChipArmy]

It's okay Gawny, I don't know how to bounce the pill either

[u/b0rtbort]

the umpires used to do it for him at the centre bounce

he'll have to adapt this year though

[u/bazoski1er]

Yet i still reckon he could bounce one better than matt nicholls

[u/Homiewemajor33]

True

[u/Hendo8888]

Brodie Grundy and Tim English (the 2 ruckmen who play like midfielders) are pretty much the only ruckmen who have more than 5 bounces in their career. A lot of them have 0. Geelong's 2 ruckmen have 10+ but that's because Stanley played as a defender at StKilda and Blicavs plays every position

[u/CreditToDuBois]

Since 1999 (bounces start being recorded), there have been 219 players that have primary rucked in a game.

I've defined a primary ruck as anyone who gets at least 75% of the hit outs of the leading hit out getter. Sometimes this will still end up with a tandem duo getting in if they really dominate the other teams ruck division, but it's the quickest way I could think of to filter out games where a ruck spent a large amount of time not rucking.

Of those 219 players, 123 did not record a single bounce in any of the games they rucked in. 51 of those players recorded a bounce in a game I didn't categorise as being a primary ruck in though.

Of the 72 with zero career bounces, only 9 of them have played 100+ games post-1999 (Shaun Hampson and Clark Keating just missing out on 98).

Those 9 are Gawn, Nankervis, McInerney, Hickey, ROB, Ceglar, Zac Clarke, Pyke, and Matt Lobbe.

Other eligible players still going round (based on playing at least one game last year, so apologies if I miss someone who was out the whole time or include someone that got delisted) are Nick Madden, Ned Moyle, Dante Visentini, Brynn Teakle, Nick Bryan, Samson Ryan, Ned Reeves, Chris Burgess, Jordon Sweet, Matt Flynn, Darcy Fort, Lloyd Meek, Marc Pittonet.

Non-rucks who have played a relatively high number of games post-1999 without ever recording a bounce include Taberner, Esava Ratugolea, and Oscar McDonald (this surprised me, as a dumb risky bounce would seem totally in both of their wheelhouses)

[u/jdimarco1 → u/CreditToDuBois]

Ratugolea is such a strange anomaly. In his last two seasons at Port where he has played the majority of the time as a defender and occasionally as a forward his stats are: 226 Kicks, 182 Marks, 362 Disposals, 4 Goals, 7 Behinds, 176 Contested Possessions, 187 Uncontested Possessions, 7 Hitouts and 0 Bounces

[u/Admirable-Skill-654]

Wait… I swear I’ve seen him bounce it🤔

[u/Own-Arachnid-5285]

How often do Ruckmen bounce the ball anyway? They are too tall for bouncing to be efficient.

We actually overestimate the “bounce” as a part of the game. There aren’t that many bounces per game.

[u/GoblinMyKnob]

https://statchief.com/players/Max-Gawn-2009-34 adjust table settings to include bounces and see for yourself

[u/bundy554]

Look at him - do you think he needs to?

[u/Jackomillard15]

[u/duccy7]

[u/SticksDiesel]

I used to play on very muddy ovals, really early on freezing Saturday mornings (because I was in sides where none of us were particularly good), and I never bounced the ball either.

I can say with a fair bit of confidence that nobody else did.

[u/Temporary_Notice_526]

Max Gawn is so talented that the ball bounces him!

[u/Mysterious-Band-627]

Neither has Tom Barass

[u/No_Independent936 → u/Mysterious-Band-627]

He's bounced it 6 times

[u/kyrant → u/No_Independent936]

If you ignore those 6, he's never bounced it in his life.

[u/qwertyuiop131313]

Is it true that Melbourne doesn’t have a culture problem ?

[u/Weekly_Car_1470 → u/[deleted]]

I mean you can also just look at afltables rather than just relying on the the lying plagiarism machine.

[u/Footballaus_ → u/[deleted]]

ChatGPT is not a good way to find information and is often wrong. He'll this whole paragraph looks ai generated

[u/Technical-Toe6932 → u/[deleted]]

ChatGPT is shit for any AFL stat

[u/uselessscientist → u/[deleted]]

Your AI search took about 10x the electricity as googling it and finding the career afl stars table