{"id":499750,"date":"2026-04-21T21:05:56","date_gmt":"2026-04-21T21:05:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=499750"},"modified":"2026-04-22T03:25:57","modified_gmt":"2026-04-22T03:25:57","slug":"eddies-plea-to-afl-after-embarrassing-butters-fiasco","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=499750","title":{"rendered":"Eddie's plea to AFL after 'embarrassing' Butters fiasco"},"content":{"rendered":"

Eddie McGuire<\/a> has implored the AFL<\/a>\ufeff to make the roles of those who run the tribunal full-time, while James Hird<\/a> has defended juror Jason Johnson over his conflicting commitments in the Zak Butters<\/a> case.<\/p>\n

The Butters tribunal hearing held this month<\/a> turned farcical when it became apparent during the virtual proceedings that Johnson had hopped in his car to drive somewhere.<\/p>\n

According to McGuire, Johnson, who is also a real estate agent, agreed to make himself available for the hearing but told the AFL\ufeff he must head to an inspection at 5.30pm.<\/p>\n

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Tribunal chair Renee Enbom also agreed to work the hearing but told the league she had another appointment to go to, as well, McGuire said.<\/p>\n

Last Tuesday's tribunal hearing, regarding Butters' alleged abuse of umpire Nick Foot, was re-scheduled several times.<\/p>\n

\"MELBOURNE,<\/p>\n

McGuire delivered a pointed message on Nine's Footy Classified<\/em> on Tuesday night.\ufeff<\/p>\n

"Why don't we have full-time people?" the former Collingwood president said.<\/p>\n

"They've got enough people at the AFL who can do these things.<\/p>\n

"It's like the umpires. When are we gonna have some full-time umpires so you don't have to work at Sportsbet or whatever the case may be?<\/p>\n

"Take the pain out before it comes.<\/p>\n

"This was always going to happen. Always. And then when it happens everyone goes, 'Oh, what's happening here?'<\/p>\n

"Just sort it out, nice and easy."<\/p>\n

\"Bartel<\/p>\n

Butters was fined $1500 for allegedly saying to Foot: "How much are they [St Kilda] paying you?"<\/p>\n

But Port Adelaide challenged the decision and the\ufeff AFL appeals board sensationally quashed the matter, citing "a miscarriage of justice and an error of law".<\/p>\n

Johnson has copped widespread flak for his decision to drive to the inspection mid-hearing but Hird believes that criticism is unwarranted.\ufeff<\/p>\n

"I think Jason's been unfairly criticised," Hird said on Footy Classified<\/em>.<\/p>\n

"… The meeting moved around two or three times during the day.<\/p>\n

"It just doesn't look like a professional outfit at all.<\/p>\n

"It's not the problem of the actual people on the tribunal \u2013 it's the system that's been put in place."<\/p>\n

Garry Lyon slammed the tribunal hearing as "embarrassing".\ufeff<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Eddie McGuire has implored the AFL\ufeff to make the roles of those who run the tribunal full-time, while James Hird has defended juror Jason Johnson […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":499752,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499750"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=499750"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499750\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":499755,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499750\/revisions\/499755"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/499752"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=499750"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=499750"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=499750"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}