1) Took incident to tribunal, lost and appealed.
2) Both Maxwell and Buddy had the option to do something different than bump McGinnity & Cousins.
3) Both collected the bumpee high.

This is what I was focusing on that these two incidents will change the rules of the bump for ever.

The Maxwell-McGinnity and Franklin-Cousins incidents are as “slightly different” as spring water and Jack Daniels, Jermayn!
.-= aussierulesblog´s last blog ..Flexibility required in head contact decisions =-.

If I was arguing this at the tribunal two parts of my argument would be:
1) Cousins didn’t have clear possession of the ball so Buddy felt if he tackled (with the way the umpires hate him) they would have paid holding the man
2) He played the ball. In fact his elbow hit the ball away from Cousins and it spilled out to his team mates who scored the goal.

You can always let the tackle slip if Cousins lost control of the ball, from what I can see Cousins had enough control of the ball to be tackled. I would say most coaches would have preferred him to tackle, as it would open the opportunity for holding or illegal disposal.

and I cannot agree that he played the ball, if he did, he would have tackled but instead he went for the man (bump). It is the same as Glass’ bump on Westhoff a few weeks back but the difference is that Glass did NOT collect his head.

Agree that the situations between Maxwell and Buddy are slightly different but what is similar is the different views of the bump, high impact contact (broken jaw & concussion) and from a high profile club which will argue the case in the media if needed.

Lastly what exactly is the change in the law??

I hope though, that he gets off. I note in your piece that you mention that the rule states that if he options, like tackling, that he would be in trouble, but you didn’t mention the other option that the rule mentions and that is that he could play the ball. If I was arguing this at the tribunal two parts of my argument would be:
1) Cousins didn’t have clear possession of the ball so Buddy felt if he tackled (with the way the umpires hate him) they would have paid holding the man
2) He played the ball. In fact his elbow hit the ball away from Cousins and it spilled out to his team mates who scored the goal.

As for your reference to the Maxwell case there are a couple of important differences (for the reason of completeness I mention them):
1) Cousins was up right trying to handle the ball, mcGinnity was bending to get the ball
2) Cousins was touching the ball at about the time he hit, McGinnity was a few meters away from the ball
3) Maxwell got off because the Tribunal made an error of law in the tribunal case that gave the Appeals board the chance to give their opinion of the case and they found it wasn’t an offense
4) (and most importantly when considering why the Maxwell case is in no way related to the buddy case) The laws where changed after the Maxwell case meaning that it has no precedence to this case

Hopefully buddy gets off, but even if he does, I think the Bombers are likely to be too quick for us anyway.

GO HAWKS.
Molly
.-= Phillip Molly Malone´s last blog ..AFL Teams – Round 21, 2009 – Nobodies Perfect, Not even a perfect Fool =-.