Jordan Lewis - a retrospective

[At Least I Saw a Flag 5,276]

Jordan was the type of player who invariably played well against us when he was with Hawthorn. Having said that plenty of players did.

He was however pretty much cooked when he came to MFC. His on ground form wasn't great when he played with the Dees. He was pretty slow, often went to ground and was undisciplined.

So, was signing him worth it? 

I think so. It sent a message to the football world that a high profile player (albeit past it) was happy to come to the Club. And his background (4 flags) and football knowledge (learnings, hah) helped educate his teammates. Apparently he was pretty good directing traffic on the ground and emphasizing good training standards.

[dazzledavey36 55,362]

Yes

[whatwhat say what 22,950]

100% worth it

[Sir Why You Little 37,151]

Not even worth debating. He helped to ingrain a culture of hard work and discipline 

[Bang Bang Bang 5,839]

I will sit on the fence a bit here.

On one hand, he cost us next to nothing in terms of draft picks and may have brought a raft of intangibles to the club during his three years. Also, there's an argument that every single recruiting decision we made from 2013 onwards contributed positively in some way to what eventually happened in 2021.

But... his on-field performances fell well below initial expectations. He brought finals experience with him, yet was one of our worst performed players during the 2018 Finals Series.

Conclusion? It probably WAS worth it because of the minimal costs involved in getting him across. However, I think he was underwhelming, even factoring in his age at the time.

Jordan himself could count himself a little unlucky. He chose the Demons based on his expectations of us becoming a major force within a couple of years. He just missed misjudged it slightly. I think if he had his time over again he would have gone to Richmond who nobody could have predicted to rise the way they did at the time Jordie was exploring his options. 

[Dee Dee 1,117]

I’d put Daniel Cross in the same category: not a premiership player but came to the club with a very professional attitude and IMHO greatly helped revive our fortunes.

[DeeZone 10,146]

Jordon Lewis knew what it would take to become a Champion team, he and his former teammates had already achieved the ultimate goal on four occasions, he chose us and our young champions were like sponges soaking up Jordons knowledge and work ethics. Yes Jordon Lewis was worth every cent.!!!

[shoguner 99]

Absolutely worth it. Any time you can get a player of Jordan's calibre without losing much in return, it's a win. Even if his performances on-field left something to be desired, we can't really quantify the impact he had on guys like Petracca and Oliver. My guess is that he had a really positive influence on them and the culture in general.

[Fritta and Turner 4,541]

Yes.  

I saw him at training and he led from the front.  He seemed to be respected by the playing group.

[hemingway 7,631]

Definitely a yes from me. He was well past his best but he instructed and lead others on the field. His leadership on the ground was akin to Jake Lever today. 

His move to the Demons was also one of those small steps that started to change people’s perception about the club. That others viewed us as an up and coming team, no longer the basket case that players would avoid. We suddenly had Melksham and Hibberd, and then Lever etc. 

Lewis also talked us up helping to create a positive image of an improving club. From a marketing perspective a win win. 

[Marty 419]

Definitely!! From memory, he didn’t even consider another club. When Clarko mentioned looking elsewhere, he contacted Todd Viney. Deal got done, bloody quick cause Hawks didn’t want to lose him and Mitchell, just 1. But they lost both😂

[jnrmac 20,189]

36 minutes ago, DeeZone said:

Jordon Lewis knew what it would take to become a Champion team, he and his former teammates had already achieved the ultimate goal on four occasions, he chose us and our young champions were like sponges soaking up Jordons knowledge and work ethics. Yes Jordon Lewis was worth every cent.!!!

This,

Who else had premiership experience?

Our fortunes improved as a club when we started getting people that had been to the top in recent times including Choco and Yze

 

 

[DeeSpencer 26,083]

I'm trying to stick to a resolution to be a bit nicer since the premiership but so far in this thread there's 2 posts that strike me as being based in actual reality and then a whole lot of over the top praise.

[Mazer Rackham 14,971]

2 hours ago, Winners at last said:

I think so. It sent a message to the football world that a high profile player (albeit past it) was happy to come to the Club. And his background (4 flags) and football knowledge (learnings, hah) helped educate his teammates. Apparently he was pretty good directing traffic on the ground and emphasizing good training standards.

Yes. It was the signal that we were a real club again. To us as much as the rest of the comp.

[Demon Jack 6,930]

2 hours ago, Dee Dee said:

I’d put Daniel Cross in the same category: not a premiership player but came to the club with a very professional attitude and IMHO greatly helped revive our fortunes.

To this day, I still say that we should've given Crossy another year. 

[Little Goffy 14,645]

Absolutely.

He gave us two years of being solidly in our best 22 and one further year of being a kind of 'playing assistant coach.'

Standard setter and a substantial part of the sheer weight of effort that it took to turn the culture towards professionalism.

One of the best veteran trades made.

Nods to Daniel Cross, also, who gave an uncannily similar contribution.

Unlikely we would have a premiership without what those two added to our club.

[bing181 9,330]

3 minutes ago, Little Goffy said:

Absolutely.

He gave us two years of being solidly in our best 22 and one further year of being a kind of 'playing assistant coach.'

Standard setter and a substantial part of the sheer weight of effort that it took to turn the culture towards professionalism.

One of the best veteran trades made.

Nods to Daniel Cross, also, who gave an uncannily similar contribution.

Unlikely we would have a premiership without what those two added to our club.

Also, though perhaps in a lesser measure, Bernie Vince. I think people forget how lacking we were for senior players of any kind of quality across that period.

[Pates 9,660]

100% was worth getting and I personally think his on-field output was more than worth it, combined with the leadership and experience he brought to the club. He was able to bring across all his wisdom, I also vaguely remember that the year he came to us we had a really solid win/loss record with his playing (ie the games he wasn’t playing we were a much weaker team). I’m also pretty sure he was immense in the Cats and Hawks finals matches in 2018 (no one played ok vs WC). 

[sisso 2,580]

He was worth it and I’ll think he’d be very satisfied as a 4 time premiership player who came to a struggling club and helped set a culture that resulted in breaking a 57 year flag drought 

[Diamond_Jim 12,628]

Not his fault someone couldn't push him out of his spot in his second and even more so in his third year.

When drafted most were hoping for two years tops and the third mainly at Casey. We also had few senior (post 28 yo) players

We definitely got what we paid for

[Rodney (Balls) Grinter 10,890]

1 hour ago, bing181 said:

Also, though perhaps in a lesser measure, Bernie Vince. I think people forget how lacking we were for senior players of any kind of quality across that period.

Bernie was a star for a few seasons and I love the larrakin attitude, energy and hardness he bought to the team when he arrived. It's just a shame he dropped off at the end and didn't make the team for finals in 2018

[TeamPlayedFine39 8,510]

4 hours ago, Sir Why You Little said:

Not even worth debating. He helped to ingrain a culture of hard work and discipline 

This.

I honestly didn’t think anyone had any doubts about this at all.

 

[Rodney (Balls) Grinter 10,890]

Thought Lewis was a good player for the MFC and certainly added to our team at the time.

I used to hate the guy at Hawthorn, but these days I quite like him after playing for us and enjoy his commentary on Fox Footy.  I think that partly because I've almost erased any memories of him playing from Hawthorn from my mind and just remember him in a red and blue jumper.

[BoBo 2,941]

Does anybody know of or remember anything other Dees players said about Lewis?

I just did a quick google search and I can’t find much on what they thought.

I’m not implying anything here, would genuinely like to know what the players had/have to say about Lewis.

[Nasher 33,617]

1 hour ago, bing181 said:

Also, though perhaps in a lesser measure, Bernie Vince. I think people forget how lacking we were for senior players of any kind of quality across that period.

Bernie for me was the sugar hit to make the medicine palatable. While Lewis was there to help plant the seeds of work ethic and attitude, Vince was there to make us immediately better, which he did.

Both excellent signings at the right time.