2012 Brownlow Medal
| 2012 Brownlow Medal | |
|---|---|
| Date | 24 September |
| Location | Crown Palladium |
| Hosted by | Bruce McAvaney |
| Winners |
Trent Cotchin (Richmond) Sam Mitchell (Hawthorn) |
| Television/Radio coverage | |
| Network |
Seven Network Fox Footy |
The 2012 Brownlow Medal was the 85th year the award was presented to the player adjudged the fairest and best player during the Australian Football League (AFL) home and away season. The award was won jointly by Sam Mitchell of the Hawthorn Football Club and Trent Cotchin of the Richmond Football Club, each of whom polled 26 votes during the 2012 AFL season.
Jobe Watson of the Essendon Football Club originally received the medal by polling thirty votes; however, Watson and thirty-three of his Essendon team-mates were later found guilty and suspended for using a banned substance during the 2012 season under the club's sports science program, a scandal known as the Essendon supplements saga. On 15 November 2016, four years after initially receiving the medal, the AFL Commission ruled Watson retrospectively ineligible for the award due to the suspension he received, and awarded the medal to jointly to Cotchin and Mitchell, the players with the next most votes.
* Watson was deemed ineligible to win the Brownlow due to his involvement in the Essendon supplements saga.
** Pavlich was ineligible for the medal after being suspended during the home-and-away season.
The three field umpires (those umpires who control the flow of the game, as opposed to goal or boundary umpires) confer after each match and award three votes, two votes and one vote to the players they regard as the best, second best and third best in the match, respectively. The votes are kept secret until the awards night, and are read and tallied on the evening.
As the medal is awarded to the fairest and best player in the league, those who have been suspended during the season by the AFL Tribunal (or, who avoided suspension only because of a discount for a good record or an early guilty plea) are ineligible to win the award; however, they may still continue to poll votes. Notable players who were ineligible entering the count this season included, among others: former Brownlow Medallists Jimmy Bartel, Simon Black, Chris Judd and Adam Goodes, as well as Fremantle captain Matthew Pavlich.
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