Running Aussie Rules thread

The Grand Final was tonight on FS1 but you didn't miss much. It was 1980s Super Bowl bad.

Geelong leading Sydney 15.9 (99) to 4.3 (27) late in the third quarter.

 

20.13 (133) to 8.4 (52) final. Oof.

 

Cats slaughter Swans. Good on ya, mate.

 

Happy to report that, not only is the Grand Final this weekend but Brisbane, the club I developed an interest in during COVID, is one of the finalists.

It'll be the Lions against Collingwood (kickoff 11:30 p.m. Central) for the flag at the MCG. Here's a primer for all two of you who will read this:

The Lions, who finished second (of 18) in the regular season with a 17-6 record, have made Finals (the playoffs) in each of the last five seasons but this year managed not to screw up in the tournament for once, quickly dispatching third-place Port Adelaide in the qualifying final, then overcoming a bad first quarter to dump Carlton out of the preliminary finals.

Brisbane won the Grand Final three years in a row from 2001-03 (and was runner up in 2004) but has not been back since. Among their best players are Charlie Cameron, an Aboriginal player who often celebrates goals by revving a pretend motorcycle, Eric Hipwood, who is 6'8", and Hugh McCluggage, who has a terrific name.

Collingwood was the minor premiers (regular season champions). They are generally treated as the Yankees of the AFL, as they've been in the Grand Final a record 42 times (not counting Saturday), but very much unlike the Yankees, they tend to screw it up (a phenomenon known as the "Colliwobbles," when they went winless in eight straight Grand Final appearances from 1958-1990). They're 15-27 in Grand Finals and are 2-4-1* since 1990. Their most recent win was in 2010, which is denoted by the asterisk. That Grand Final vs. St. Kilda ended in a draw (those have since been abolished) and the Magpies won the replay handily.

Collingwood includes Mason "Coxzilla" Cox, a 6'10" Texan who was discovered as a walk-on on the Oklahoma State basketball team and was on (American) 60 Minutes earlier this month. Pat McAfee thinks he's awesome. Also, he has special dispensation to wear glasses on the field because he gets poked in the eye so much.

Game will air live on FS1.

 

… assuming somebody at the Fox Sports broadcast center remembers to flip the switch. (Don’t laugh. It happened a couple years ago.)

 

Good Old Collingwood Forever!

That was my team from the 1980s and overnight ESPN in the summer, back when it was still the VFL and having a team all the way out in Sydney was considered a novelty.

 

Found this of interest: Collingwood (which never had a population north of 10,000) no longer exists as a municipality or as a home playing site. The City of Collingwood was annexed by the City of Yarra in 1994, and the club now plays at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.

Collingwood is also one of the LGBTQ meccas in Australia.

 

Back in the 80s I thought every Victorian club played at the MCG, like city high schools sharing a stadium. What I didn’t realize was that it was just the Mecca for the important matches each week.

 

Aussie Rules are easy to suss out. You'll do so within the first 20 minutes of watching.

 

Four of them still do, and I think it was more before they built another large stadium in another part of Melbourne.

 

Lots of kicking at narrow posts IIRC.

 

Just surfed past FS1 and it's shirts vs. skins.