I've watched and loved the Dees for 60 years.

Nothing compares to Robert Flower.

4 hours ago, ElDiablo14 said:

Don't get me wrong I love Clarry as much as the next guy, however his kicking can be off sometimes and it is not as damaging as Petracca's ( IMO ).

Still an elite player and deserves a Brownlow medal.

Whenever i think of Clarrie now, it is always streaming into goal, with that long kick. The Final BANG…

Clarrie can kick. It’s just that most of the time he is under serious pressure. He’s not always balanced for the perfect kick

Mighty hard to limit myself to just 5 having watched the demons at their peak in the fifties. I have seen so many absolute champions.

 

Overall

1. Ron Barassi

2. Robbie Flower

3. Clayton Oliver

4. Don Williams 

5. Max Gawn

Plus another 50 who could be on this list. Petracca, Stuart Spencer, Laurie Mithen etc etc etc. 

Been watching since 1972

Best of all time for sheer football iq, competitiveness, slight of hand and a club changer has to be Clayton. From the very first bounce he has been differently special. The closest player in regards to skill I can think of is Diesel. 

1.

 

2. Max : He captained the boys to the holy grail. Culture changer. Superstar for a decade.

3. Robbie: An incredible player but was prone to injuries which has to be a factor. Just an out and out legend.

4. Petracca: Everything we ever wanted and more. Franchise (hate that word) player

5.  Jack Viney. By far and away the most ferocious player I have seen. Sets the tone. I rate that. 

 

Special mention. May, Neita and Lyon

 

Live and love what we have now as it wont last forever. We have had our fair share of spuds.

Clayton Oliver amazes me. I have never seen anyone who contests the ground ball like him. 

He has a will to win that drives him to continually harass to get the ball, even when it looks like the opposition is going to win.

Once he gets it - for a literal microsecond- it is handballed to a teammate before the opposition can react.

I have seen some very good players who scrap, but none to the level of Clayton.

In no particular order:

Oliver

Flower

Farmer

Lyon

Petracca

Until recently I would have said:

1. Flower

and then daylight before whoever I had thought was second.

Oliver has closed that gap significantly by his sustained excellence.

So, for me it is now:

1. Flower

2. Oliver

3. Gawn

4. Lyon

5. Neitz

Petracca is probably 6th and may jump into the top 5 if he maintains or even improves his output.

 

11 hours ago, layzie said:

Ox had a successful comeback from the knee recos but if you didn't get a chance to see him play before them then you really missed out.

His agility pre injury was something that had to be seen to be belived. It was probably his no.1 attritlbute and for a 195cm guy that notion is absured but he really did move like a midfielder. 

Spot on.

14 hours ago, ElDiablo14 said:

Don't get me wrong I love Clarry as much as the next guy, however his kicking can be off sometimes and it is not as damaging as Petracca's ( IMO ).

Still an elite player and deserves a Brownlow medal.

But you posted he needed to be more consistent ? That's what I queried? 

I do agree he is not as damaging generally with his kicking as Trac. But he is elite in most other things. 

3 minutes ago, 58er said:

But you posted he needed to be more consistent ? That's what I queried? 

I do agree he is not as damaging generally with his kicking as Trac. But he is elite in most other things. 

I meant consistency in his kicking nothing else. As said before, elite player.

11 hours ago, tilly18 said:

I've watched and loved the Dees for 60 years.

Nothing compares to Robert Flower.

Agree. Nothing and no one.

David Schwarz was as good as, if not better, than any comparable player (Carey, Hart) in his prime and would have dominated the 90s. His marking, strength, mobility, ground play and general football smarts had to be seen to be believed.

After three knee recos he came back and still managed to win a club B&F, be influential in finals and play in a grand final.

In my memory, no-one who has suffered similar injuries has ever achieved this level of sustained comeback brilliance.

On 3/12/2023 at 10:32 PM, McQueen said:

Good call on Tingay mate. I was considering him as well. 
Being a young teenager during his playing days, I was drawn to him due to his physique. I reckon he was one of the more likely to resonate with young Demon supporters like myself at the time. 

Whilst I loved watching Robbie Flower as a young teenager, I had a man crush on Stinga like no other (Travis Johnstone did however come close for some of his sublime passes). 

1 hour ago, tiers said:

David Schwarz was as good as, if not better, than any comparable player (Carey, Hart) in his prime and would have dominated the 90s. His marking, strength, mobility, ground play and general football smarts had to be seen to be believed.

After three knee recos he came back and still managed to win a club B&F, be influential in finals and play in a grand final.

In my memory, no-one who has suffered similar injuries has ever achieved this level of sustained comeback brilliance.

How many knee recos has Gawn had? Or were his early knee injuries something other than ACLs?

I feel that Petracca is badly under-represented here. In terms of natural talent and watchability, he's very high in the list of best Melbourne players over the past 20 years. If he improved his goalkicking he'd be absolutely unstoppable.

Edited March 14, 20232 yr by Hopeful Demon

On 3/12/2023 at 11:30 PM, ElDiablo14 said:

Did he play alongside Farmer at all?

I can imagine how great a fwd line of Lyon, Farmer and Jakovich would be! and then throw in Neitz.

Chuck in Schwarta pre knee injuries too!

On 3/13/2023 at 8:55 AM, layzie said:

Jakovich, what a star.

The Greatest Showman

4 hours ago, ElDiablo14 said:

I meant consistency in his kicking nothing else. As said before, elite player.

Just to clarify.. El Diablo was answering my post on whether Clarrie was possibly among the top 5 of all time Demon players.

I said as follows

"If Oliver can add say 10 more goals a season to his performance and get his handball to kick ratio around 50/50 I think he goes close to one of the best of all time.

Remember his opposition is now at a much higher level than those who we normally think of as the best.

His handballs to advantage are sublime. Would like to hear what people think of his kicking to advantage"

Edited March 14, 20232 yr by Diamond_Jim

Since 1973 , for pure MFC enjoyment and excitement at the footy  

1- Robert Flower 

2- Christian Petracca  

3- Allen Jakovich 

4- Jeff Farmer 

5- David Schwartz

Edited March 14, 20232 yr by spirit of norm smith
O

1 hour ago, spirit of norm smith said:

Since 1973 , for pure MFC enjoyment and excitement at the footy  

1- Robert Flower 

2- Christian Petracca  

3- Allen Jakovich 

4- Jeff Farmer 

5- David Schwartz

"Enjoyment and excitement" are different criteria from "best of all time". If my top five is based on enjoyment and excitement, Flower is still number 1 but Jurrah comes in at number 2.

Edited March 14, 20232 yr by La Dee-vina Comedia

Omg I forgot Chunk, and so has everyone else! How could we forget him, probably the greatest clubman the club has seen.

3 hours ago, Hopeful Demon said:

I feel that Petracca is badly under-represented here. In terms of natural talent and watchability, he's very high in the list of best Melbourne players over the past 20 years. If he improved his goalkicking he'd be absolutely unstoppable.

It's tough and most are going with either Clarry or Trac. If you choose both and add Max then that's 60% of the choices gone! haha

 

This has changed considerably in the last few years.

1.  C. Oliver

2. C. Petracca

3.  R. Flower

4.  D.  Neitz

5.  M. Gawn

 

Apologies to Lyon and Schwarz, careers curtailed by injury.

3 hours ago, Diamond_Jim said:

Just to clarify.. El Diablo was answering my post on whether Clarrie was possibly among the top 5 of all time Demon players.

I said as follows

"If Oliver can add say 10 more goals a season to his performance and get his handball to kick ratio around 50/50 I think he goes close to one of the best of all time.

Remember his opposition is now at a much higher level than those who we normally think of as the best.

His handballs to advantage are sublime. Would like to hear what people think of his kicking to advantage"

And I picked him up on his answer re consistency but he has explained he reckons it was only about kicking which I would accept, but definitely not about his form  overall.  Clarry is the very model of consistent form for all others to be judged against. 

I'm not old enough to have seen the careers of the Norm Smith Premiership teams including RDB so I can't include them.  At the present time it's Flower, Oliver, Gawn, Neitz, Petracca for me - but there's every chance that Oliver, Gawn and Petracca will move up when their careers are complete.