My Two Cents: How a 33-year-old Crow rose from good to great
Taylor Walker was on the bench when the Crows selected the team’s best 22 players of the past 30 years. He should be in their starting line-up now, writes Andrew Capel.
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That’s it, the debate should be over.
Taylor Walker is a Crows great.
Long time chatter about where the star key forward sits in the Adelaide pecking order should be put to bed.
Two years ago, when the Crows - with input from their heritage committee - picked their “best 22 of the past 30 years’’, Walker was selected on the interchange bench.
Dual premiership player Matthew Robran was named at centre half-forward, with high-flying superstar Tony Modra the obvious selection at full forward.
But after producing the season of his life at 33 - the age when most players have either retired or are a mere shadow of their former self - Walker has not only elevated his game to a new level, but jumped into Adelaide’s all-time greatest 18 as its undisputed best centre half-forward.
His 76 goals this year is a career-high, eclipsing the 63 he booted as a 22-year-old in 2012.
After booting nine goals against West Coast in Perth on Saturday night, Walker led the Coleman Medal race up until the final game of Round 24 when Carlton star Charlie Curnow kicked three to beat him by two.
Prior to this year, no Coleman Medal winner had hit the 70 mark since West Coast’s Josh Kennedy (80) in 2016.
Walker has had such a standout season that he should be a certainty to be selected in the All-Australian team for the first time, which would be a remarkable achievement at his age.
Walker, who has played 260 games since debuting in 2009, is Adelaide’s all-time leading goalkicker with 612, a significant 172 more than fan favourite Modra, who played only 118 games for the club from 1992-98 before moving to Fremantle.
He leads the Crows goalkicking club record having won it seven times - in 2011, 2012, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023.
Affectionately known as “Tex’’, Walker has taken more marks than any Crow since Champion Data started compiling statistics in 1999.
His 1423 are a whopping 219 more than the next-ranked Crow, 2005 All-Australian full back Ben Rutten.
At 194cm and 102kg, Walker’s statistics this season illustrate his all-round effectiveness.
Apart from ranking second in goals, which included a career-best 10 against the Eagles in Round 13 (when he became just the fourth Crow to boot 10 goals in a game), he is one of only two key forwards, along with GWS’s Jesse Hogan, to rank as elite for contested marks (1.9 per game), forward 50 marks (2.9) and forward 50 ground ball gets (2).
Walker ranked fifth in the AFL for one-on-one mark win percentage at 22 per cent behind Geelong’s Tom Hawkins (40 per cent), Richmond’s Dustin Martin (29), Melbourne’s Max Gawn (26) and the Western Bulldogs’ Jamarra Ugle-Hagan (23).
His 41 contested marks for the season were the equal third-most in club history, behind former key forward Kurt Tippett’s 44 in 2010 and 42 in 2012.
His 173 score involvements ranked seventh at Adelaide, 15 behind midfield ball magnet Scott Thompson’s club record 188 in 2012.
They are truly remarkable numbers for a key forward who gets up and down the ground and also attends some ruck contests.
Only Modra has kicked more goals in a season for the Crows, booting 129 in 1993 and 84 in 1997.
Walker, one of the best two-sided players the game has seen, this year won his first Showdown Medal for his matchwinning seven-goal haul (equalling the most goals kicked in a Showdown) against Port Adelaide in Round 20.
No player has kicked more Showdown goals than Walker’s 51.
He was so dynamic against West Coast on the weekend, where he torched four-time All-Australian Jeremy McGovern, that he had 19 shots at goal for a return of 9.4.
The major honour missing from his CV is a premiership.
Robran won two (in 1997 and 1998) in his 130-game, 110-goal career with Adelaide from 1993-2001.
But Walker, who has signed a one-year contract extension to play for a 16th season next year, went very close, captaining the Crows to the 2017 grand final - the year they won their second minor premiership - before losing to Richmond.
Only eight men have played more games for Adelaide - Andrew McLeod (340), Tyson Edwards (321), Mark Ricciuto (312), Ben Hart (311), Nigel Smart (278), Simon Goodwin (275), Mark Bickley (272) and Thompson (269).
All made the Crows’ greatest 18.
Adelaide coach Matthew Nicks marvelled at Walker’s season, saying: “I just sit there and smile on the bench sometimes with what he's able to do.
“I have been lucky enough to watch some of his best footy and he’s really important to our group both on and off the field.
“Taylor sets an example for our young players in how to prepare and perform on game day and to be playing the type of footy he is into his 30s is a real credit to him.’’
It is time he was given the full credit he deserves.
NUMBERS GAME
9
Goals kicked by Adelaide’s Taylor Walker and North Melbourne’s Nick Larkey in Round 24 -the first time since 1996 where two AFL players have kicked nine or more goals on the same day.
17
Port Adelaide wins this season - its equal second-most in a home-and-away campaign.
QUOTES OF THE WEEK
“We’re going to be in a pretty healthy position come the first week of the finals.’’
Port Adelaide coach Ken Hinkley.
“There wasn’t a lot of need for motivation this week.’’
Adelaide coach Matthew Nicks.
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