I've been thinking about this more, because some of the numbers just seem whack.
Doig voting criteria, as per the 2015 Doig winner story from club site:
Sandilands takes out second Doig Medal
The club's greatest ruckman caps off a brilliant season
In 2023, it was just the 4 coaches awarding votes. That means that this season a player could earn up to a maximum of 460 votes (5 votes x 4 coaches x 23 games). It also means that Serong, who played 22 games this season (=440 max) and earned 222 votes, was awarded only a fraction more than 50% of the maximum votes, averaging 10.09 votes per game played (av. 2.52 per coach per game). Given how consistent he was all season, it seems unlikely that Serong was at any stage awarded more than 3 votes per coach for any given game.
In 2022, Brayshaw — winner of the AFLPA MVP — earned 273 votes from a maximum of 600 (5 votes x 5 coaches x 24 games (22 H&A + 2 finals)) or 45.5% of available votes, averaging 11.38 a game at 2.28 per coach.
Harsh?
"Brayshaw had two 20-vote games in round six against Carlton and round 12 against Brisbane.
He polled votes in every game and had 15-votes or more on 10 occasions."
Andrew Brayshaw wins the 2022 Doig Medal
22-year-old Andrew Brayshaw is the 2022 Doig Medallist
In 2019, Fyfe — Brownlow medalist — earned 272 votes, ahead of runner-up Michael Walters (238), from 20 games (=500 max), or 54%, averaging 13.6/25 and 2.72/5.
2.72/5 for the Brownlow medalist! Allowing for three or four off games, we can surmise that the coaches were either largely handing out 3/5 for his performances, or a number of 4/5 offset by some 2/5. At any rate, it seems that 4/5 is about the most that a BOG performance from the eventual Brownlow medalist could hope to earn, given that Walters "was the only player to be awarded a maximum 25 out of a possible 25 votes in a single game for his six-goal and 25-disposal performance against Port Adelaide in round 13." (Walters averaged 10.81/25 or 2.16/5.)
Fyfe wins third Doig Medal
Nat Fyfe has won his third Doig Medal on Saturday night
Is it just me, or is this just a bit whack?
All of this also means that Frederick, say, who came in 10th this year with 112 votes from his 19 games, averaged 5.89/20 or 1.47/5 from each coach.
It looks like most players in any given game get no votes. Possibly, a different story in a winning season (Lobb at 10th with 161 votes last year; McPharlin at 10th with 198 in 2015), but it still looks like Doig votes are no more plentiful than AFLCA votes.
