SPEAKER_06: 0:00

Before we dive into today's episode, I've got some exciting news. FutureLab, Australia's first longevity supplement range, is now available at chemist warehouse and leading health food stores. Now, this is a lot more than a regular supplement range. It really is a mission. The experts at FutureLab have developed formulas designed to support your well-being today, tomorrow and beyond. Welcome to FutureLab, where we explore the cutting edge of healthspan and longevity. I'm Danny Urbinder and And with me is my co-host, Dr. Denise Finesse.

SPEAKER_05: 0:32

Hello, everyone. I'm going to hand it straight over to our next co-host, Trevor, because I'm really excited to speak to our guest today.

SPEAKER_04: 0:40

Yeah, you're excited. I'm excited. So firstly, we often do two different types of episodes. So we do a masterclass where we could pick Denise's brains or someone from around the world or find out more about products to really get the information straight into people. Then we've got Life Masteries where we invite someone along that we find inspiring someone that we feel has done some pretty cool stuff and we could all learn a lot from, even just in their story. So for those that are listening, it's a life mastery today. And we've got a really special man, a very special, he's not liking the fact that I keep calling him master, but special. He's

SPEAKER_00: 1:18

blushing a little bit. It makes me feel like an old man, you know, like a wise man with a big beard is what I feel like at the

SPEAKER_04: 1:22

moment. Yes, because spiritually we're the same age, right? Yeah, spiritually, yeah. We act the same. But he's a, He's a wonderful, beautiful, amazing friend of mine. An interesting story is that for people that are listening from outside of Australia, the AFL, the Australian Football League, is the biggest sport in our country. And Denise, for example, and myself, we've grown up just idolizing teams and players and everything else. So a lot of people spent their whole life watching AFL or wanting to play AFL, and it's a big deal, particularly down here in the southern states where we're at the moment. We're in Victoria, Melbourne. It's the front and page of the paper all the time.

SPEAKER_05: 2:01

It was VFL when we were growing

SPEAKER_04: 2:03

up. The Victorian Football League and then went to the Australian Football League. It's truly national. It's pretty impressive. So I wanted to state that from the start. But where I met this gentleman was through a curious story of how he ended up in this country. But I'd just like to say at the start that it's his birthday tomorrow. So that's pretty cool. Turning 34 tomorrow. Don't need to say the age, mate. I'm 56. You've got plenty of age on your side. And he actually arrived in Australia, flew in the night before, went straight to the mantra on Jolimont and walked down in his club clothes the next morning because he knew he had to go. He had a bag waiting for him, whatever, to turn up for his first day at his new job as an athlete, which we'll get into. But when he walked downstairs, I was working for Collingwood Football Club and I was sitting there having breakfast and I saw him come in and I knew all about Mason arriving. I'm not supposed to give your name away just yet, but... Everyone knows anyway because they know the episode. But in comes this very tall man that I know pictures of anyway. And I stood up and I said, hey, Mace, I'm Trevor. I work at the club. You know, welcome. And I said, would you like to have breakfast with me? And we sat down and had breakfast together and then walked over to the club together. And I walked you in and introduced you to the development coach at the time and the head coach. And the development coaches ended up being the head coach. There's a whole story we'll tell there.

SPEAKER_06: 3:27

What did you talk about though? So you– You've just landed. You've got no idea what's going on. You've come from the US. Have you even seen AFL before? What did you

SPEAKER_00: 3:36

do? I mean, did you just say, shit, mate, I am shit scared? So I always tell people, try to put yourself in my position. So Mason Cox. Thanks for being here. Thanks so much for having me, first of all. Six foot 11. Six foot 11. So 17 shoe. It's a whole thing. But no, I think like I always tell people, I try to put yourself in my shoe whenever I first came here, right? Like I didn't know a single person from Australia. I didn't know anything about it. I knew that like the Sydney Opera House and the fire. works for New Year's. That was it. Kangaroos, koalas, deadly stuff. Right? Typical things overseas people say. And koalas. And koalas, yeah. And I came here and I had no idea about anything. And, you know, Trevor, like you said, was seriously one of the first people I ever saw in Australia. And we sat down, you know, and I kind of was like, oh, there's this random guy that says he's part of the Collingwood Football Club. And I'm trying to like, you know, you first meet someone, you're trying to suss him

SPEAKER_03: 4:23

out. What do you do?

SPEAKER_00: 4:26

And I can remember talking to you about, you know, you're like, oh, you to, you know, be an athlete and I'm just kind of like, all right, what'd you do? And you kind of start talking about what you did and I was like, I didn't even know that was a professional sport. Like, I had no clue. Did you watch

SPEAKER_05: 4:38

Baywatch? He was

SPEAKER_00: 4:39

on Baywatch. I was looking at him. He still could be, to be honest with you. And it's one of those things that I think it was just like, there's so many things along my journey that I've just had to pick up and just try to understand and, you know, it's through a bit of ignorance and hopefully people don't take offense to it, but I just didn't know people and what they have done and everything else. So it's been a massive learning experience for me and I think whenever I first met you anyone that meets you has this amazing kind of comforting feeling from you you give the biggest hugs which is also amazing and I think everyone just has this incredible positive energy that you give off to people and as soon as you meet someone like that you instantly just feel connected with them and that was I think the biggest thing whenever I first met you coming up to me you know reaching out to someone who you had known I knew nothing about this experience I was quite nervous and anxious about everything that was about to happen and you kind of come over as a very calming personality and say you know This is what I do. This is what I'm here to help with. And like any way I can possibly, you know, help you get to that next step in your career. Like I want to help you out with it. And that was something to me, you know, I was like, wow, Australia is a very giving culture. And like this guy right away is showing that. And something I'm very appreciative of.

SPEAKER_04: 5:45

It's funny because almost divinely orchestrated, because probably the two most welcoming people in the club at the time would have been me and Fly. And it was, I welcomed you and then took you straight over to Fly, you know, and that process started. So it was obviously someone was looking after you to say, oh, we'll give you the people that will make you feel welcome first. Because it

SPEAKER_05: 6:03

was by chance. You weren't there waiting to...

SPEAKER_04: 6:05

No, I was just having breakfast because I stayed in the hotel because I don't live in Victoria. So I was traveling down. I just happened to be one of my days at the club. And we walked in. We ended up doing Chi Gong

SPEAKER_00: 6:16

at lunchtime on the bank of the Yarra. Was that new? No, I was like, this place is so holistic. This thing is wild. I was like, I'd never done meditation at that point. I was just like, America is known to be quite a Ruth place you know like none of that stuff really kind of

SPEAKER_05: 6:31

you're not doing that

SPEAKER_00: 6:32

in sport no chance in heck you would ever be doing that in America but I was like wow this guy just like fully bought into it you know whenever you do something for the first time you're kind of like you know hopefully this makes sense you know like and hopefully what I'm doing is right you kind of look a bit awkward and that was definitely me as people were you know I'll never forget we're doing you know that next to the river and there's people on these boats just like you know paddling through and stuff and there's some guy with a microphone screaming at them on the boat and we're sitting there doing this real zen meditation it was that no it was cool It was one of the cool experiences I first got

SPEAKER_06: 7:00

here. Sorry, when you met Trevor then, so what did you know about the game? What were you expecting in terms of what was expected of you?

SPEAKER_00: 7:10

Zero.

SPEAKER_04: 7:11

You'd been to, you came over, you got, you can tell us the story about it. Yeah, give me a bit of a back story. Actually, go back a little bit for us. You started off soccer, basketball.

SPEAKER_00: 7:21

Yeah, so grew up in Dallas, Texas. Texas is a very heavy NFL gridiron kind of state. And I played soccer throughout my time. time there, play at the highest level, and then went to university to study mechanical engineering and did a business management minor while I was there. But three years into that degree, I ended up getting spotted by the basketball team. I'd never played basketball at this point. I picked it up while I was in university because I had friends that did it, and I just went to a local rec gym. This person that was part of the women's basketball team, actually, firstly came up to me and said, hey, would you be interested in helping us out? We need someone that's very tall, that can emulate a person called Brittany Griner, who's very famous in the WNBA, and she was in the... So you were Brittany Griner. Oh, it was Brittany Griner. Brittany Griner's the reason I'm here. Wow, that's pretty cool. Yeah, yeah, it goes back a long way. Hopefully she hears this at some point. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that was kind of the first time I got into, I guess, like a high level of basketball. I did that, and...

SPEAKER_04: 8:16

So you went down to practice, to women's practice, and you're basically in their way, you're blocking, and you're doing all that, but you're also like spinning around, doing a few shots, and mucking around.

SPEAKER_00: 8:25

Yeah, I mean, I'd never really shot a basketball too much, so I just stayed within the paint you know just you know play to your strengths right and height was my strength because i had no skill whatsoever so now we did that and it was more just like defensive stuff they could run plays against us and things like that so they could you know feel comfortable on the weekend once they match up with someone and you know i was there and one of the i think it was a year and a half two years into it and the men's team training the same place and they're like hey who's that tall fellow over there you know like we're looking for someone that might be able to play that position and help us out and um you know i went from the women's team to then the men's team and we started taking private jets around the country to different games and stuff and i was like wow this is really feel bougie you know and it was awesome we got free clothes and all this kind of stuff and that's kind of how the basketball side started and I didn't expect anything of it I was like a walk-on which in America is kind of like the very bottom of the totem pole and I sat behind the bench I didn't even get a spot on the bench that's kind of how bad it was but it was an incredible experience I never thought you know my athletic career would kind of go past that but

SPEAKER_04: 9:21

you did actually play though

SPEAKER_00: 9:22

yeah well the first year was like very much learning what like you know basketball was I'd never checked into a proper game at this point like in my life and so what are

SPEAKER_04: 9:30

you playing for at this stage

SPEAKER_00: 9:32

Oklahoma State yeah so that's the

SPEAKER_06: 9:34

university did you or anyone else that was around you think it was weird that you'd never picked up a basketball

SPEAKER_00: 9:39

very odd yeah I mean I was six foot ten or six foot nine at the time or something I've grown a little bit since then but they all kind of looked at me I was like how did you not play in high school you know but I grew six inches in the summer over my last year of senior year so that was kind of I played soccer my whole life and that was kind of my direction and what I was passionate about and all my friends were there so I just continued on with that retrospectively I probably should have played basketball to be honest but it's landed me here and I'm very grateful and the soccer

SPEAKER_05: 10:08

probably helped with what you're doing now even

SPEAKER_00: 10:09

though it's a completely different sport the beauty is the things in life that kind of lead you to where you're at so I played the men's team for essentially two and a half three years and by the last year I was six man which was like the first person off the bench was having to play legit minutes against guys that were going to the NBA so people that know my AFL story it's gone from from zero to kind of the experience I've had now was basketball was kind of similar. Like it was kind of, I'd never really played it and then all of a sudden I'm playing on TV in front of the biggest stage and the biggest players. Let's pause for a moment because

SPEAKER_04: 10:38

how bloody cool

SPEAKER_00: 10:39

is that? That makes no sense. My life is like seriously ridiculous. I'm still thinking about

SPEAKER_05: 10:42

the private jet.

SPEAKER_00: 10:43

Yeah. So college

SPEAKER_04: 10:44

basketball is huge. Bigger than the NFL. It's massive. Really? Yeah, bigger than the NFL. Without even actually having a history, you got to that stage.

SPEAKER_00: 10:53

That's pretty cool in itself. I was deer in the headlights. I was just like amazed I was having this experience. Like I was like, holy smokes, like, You can see me in the background on television. It does strike

SPEAKER_06: 11:02

me, and I think we can talk about that a bit later, but I think the difference between you and probably most people is you accepted the challenge. Most people go, no way, I've never done that in my life. Yeah, that would be scary. That's something I want to talk about. We'll continue on going back to what you said.

SPEAKER_04: 11:15

So you're now coming on, you're playing serious minutes, you're shooting hoops. I've seen some footage. You're playing some key roles in key moments. What was the highlight in the college basketball? What was the game? or the moment where you thought to yourself, oh, I just contributed there?

SPEAKER_00: 11:33

Yeah, I think the first game, I kind of really got the respect of the coaches, and that was a big thing I had to, I mean, both AFL and basketball really. But we played University of Texas in Austin, and I think it was almost out of frustration the coach put me in. And then I did everything that he had been looking for, and then he was like, whoa, whoa, whoa. And then the media caught on, and the media was like, well, why don't we play this guy? And there was a whole thing behind the scenes that happened. But that was kind of like the breakout game of like, this guy plays a role that we need to play, to be filled within the team he does it well he's not a scorer he's not a guy going to the NBA he just is a guy that's a hustle player that gets us rebounds gives it to our star players and they score and that's all we needed at the time so it wasn't like I needed to be some incredible basketball player it's like no just play this specific role really well and you can get minutes and that's kind of how the whole thing started

SPEAKER_04: 12:18

well I can actually so I haven't sat with you for that part of it before but I can feel I can see the pattern that then played out again in AFL because you became that player that set up so many other people. One of the things I love about when I'm watching footage is I'll say, did you see Mason's hand just then? Like there'll be a contest where four or five, six people are going up and you'll get a hand to it and you'll very clearly deflect that ball to exactly who you see running past. And not a lot of people, certainly not a lot of talls do that because they want the ball, they're going to mark it, they've been aiming their whole life to kick the goal. A lot of times you will defer from trying to take the mark that you're not sure of and you'll just see this movement, this flick of the rear or whatever else. Black and white person. And of course, we'll get on to where you've also starred. I want to talk a bit about that. But your ability to play a role and support others to go and star I think is one of the really powerful things about you.

SPEAKER_00: 13:11

Yeah, I think I've changed that perception probably over the last four to five years of it used to be almost like 100% or 0%. You either take the mark or you don't get anything out of it. Where now I've kind of got to this point where I'd rather have 80%, 100% of the time than that kind of ratio where I know that the majority of the time we're going to be able to get what we want out of it. It might not be me getting the statistic of a mark, but it might be us being able to get to the next person, which allows us to go another 50 meters, 100 meters up the ground. So that's the

SPEAKER_04: 13:37

old goals are calling with goals thing rather

SPEAKER_00: 13:40

than it's my goal. I stopped caring about stats a long time ago. I tell people all the time, if you put me in your supers coach, you're an idiot. Stop. Don't. I just kind of got to that point now where in my career, I've been able to have an incredible amount of success and experience and everything else. Now, for me, I just want other people that are around me to be able to experience something similar.

SPEAKER_05: 14:02

Can I ask, how did you go though from basketball in the US? I feel like we're missing a beat. There's a lot to it. I was like, I still

SPEAKER_04: 14:11

don't know. Bring us back to Craig McRae. Who saw

SPEAKER_00: 14:14

you? Bring us

SPEAKER_04: 14:14

back to the combine that you went to when you first had the ball. That was wild. And then come to Craig McRae if you could.

SPEAKER_00: 14:19

So you can imagine I was studying mechanical engineering. I'd finished my degree almost and basketball had just finished and I was like, cool, I had a job at Exxon Mobil, number one. one fortune 500 company in the world at that point very good job coming out of college locked that in still at about three months till I graduated and basketball finished up and then I got this kind of like weird email kind of thing actually it was a Facebook message is what it turned out to be and this guy said hey would you be interested to play this sport called Australian rules football there's a combine Los Angeles we can fly you over there all expenses paid to be able to go to this combine see if you're any good and I kind of thought it was like a spam message at first you know like come on this doesn't this doesn't happen you know like a Facebook messenger okay like where are you from you know and it was legit and the guy got in contact with our media people and stuff and then you know I was kind of towards the back end of my college experience and I had these kind of all I do is just finish final exams essentially I already had the job locked up so I was like well there's nothing really to lose so I was like well is it all expenses paid trip and he's like yep no worries I was a broke college kid eating rum noodles every single night and I

SPEAKER_03: 15:21

was like

SPEAKER_00: 15:22

free flight free hotel what do I do he's like a few runs few jumps and then touch a football and try to do this and that And I was like, sold, man. I'm in. So I told him, I said, as long as I can stay an extra day, go hang out with my friends in LA, then I'll do it. And that was the motivation thing, was to hang out with my friends in LA. It wasn't actually to do the combine, because I didn't think anything would come of it. I'd never heard of the sport. And we fly over there. Had you

SPEAKER_06: 15:44

seen even a snippet of the game?

SPEAKER_00: 15:46

Nothing. Never even heard of it. Nah, I didn't even know Melbourne existed. AFL, you thought it was Arena Football League. Feeling great here right now. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, that's good by you. I thought it was Arena Football League, which is indoor gridiron. I thought that's what AFL was in the where people first, you know, told me that acronym. And I was like, okay, yeah, cool. I guess they play gridiron in Australia. Like, I don't really know. And so that's kind of how it all kind of started to come together. And then we flew over to Los Angeles. And, you know, I seriously did not think anything was going to come from it. It was just a free trip. Like, I was here just to have a bit of fun. And then from that, like, did really well. So tell us about

SPEAKER_04: 16:19

Decker.

SPEAKER_00: 16:20

Yeah, so Derek Hans. Yes. He's the recruitment manager, I guess is probably the terminology for him at the time. Just retired, is that

SPEAKER_04: 16:27

like the last few months?

SPEAKER_00: 16:27

Yeah, just retired. and he's one of those people that's been massive in my career like massively influential and he was there and they'd flown out to you know check out this American talent there's about 20 or 30 of us and he's there and he brought this other guy named Chris and Chris was this hype man you know like this African American fella who was just like just you know real hype guy like really energetic and I was like heck yeah man I like this guy and like I said put yourself in my shoes I don't know the difference between a Collingwood a Port Adelaide a North Melbourne like I didn't even know what the league was much less any teams in it so

SPEAKER_04: 16:56

Melbourne as you said you didn't even know

SPEAKER_00: 16:57

Melbourne yeah I didn't know Melbourne Melbourne's in Florida right yeah Melbourne's in Florida that's great and I do this combine and Derek's kind of you know pissing in your pocket I think is the way Australians would say it right and you know and then there's kind of you ask a few questions and stuff and you get this feeling of like Collingwood's got a bit of pull right like Collingwood's a bit you know got a bit more money Collingwood's got a bit more like you know they're trying to tell you all these details in front of like this many fans and all this kind of stuff they've got an

SPEAKER_05: 17:26

amazing

SPEAKER_00: 17:26

fan base incredible fan base and I think like you start to kind of understand I guess the differences between each team that was there there was five different teams there and you know Derek was definitely pushing Collingwood obviously being the recruitment guy there so he kind of you know was able to sales pitch me and eventually what happened was he actually ended up offering me a free flight to Australia at the end of this combine that day so I'm sitting in this like what you call a little like hut out the back of this hotel next to the and he starts chatting me for an hour and stuff, a little pegola, and he's going, what are you doing tonight? I said, I'm going to have drinks with my friends. That's the whole reason I did this combine, to be honest with you. I'm not even here for the footy part of it. I'm not here for you. No, exactly. I mean, it sounds like a fun time. Don't get me wrong. And he goes, hey, we want to take you back with us, get in the car with us. We'll buy your ticket at the counter, and you come back to Melbourne, and we'll show you what AFL is. And I was just kind of like, that's absurd. I've got two days' worth of clothes on me. I won't even be able to get to the other side on the clean clothes that I've got. It takes two days to get over there. we'll buy you

SPEAKER_04: 18:29

some clothes

SPEAKER_00: 18:29

oh it was well yeah it was tough to find a guy that's 6 foot 11 man but yeah so he offered it and I was kind of like the first probably realization that this is a bit bigger than I probably expected or understood for someone to offer a flight like that that I knew was thousands of dollars to buy was pretty crazy to me so I was like oh okay that's my first inclination maybe this is like a legitimate thing and I didn't fly back that day because you still had to see

SPEAKER_04: 18:53

your friends the sole

SPEAKER_00: 18:54

reason why you went to LA more importantly according to my mother I had to finish my final exams so I had to finish my degree so yeah so I went and I kind of was like blown away by this whole thing I had to call up ExxonMobil and say because there was a bit of media that came out with it you know and I had to tell them like I'm still committed to you and your you know your job don't like cancel that on me blah blah blah like I'd already moved my stuff to Houston so like my whole thing was set up apartment everything was sorted and this whole thing came out of the blue and I went and hung out with my friends for the night and I was kind of in this whirlwind of what just happened got back and then my brother Nolan and ended up being my agent who has zero experience as an agent but it was a bit of fun for us because we're like what do we have to lose we don't even know the sport exists he wanted the slot too yeah well that's what ended up happening he had a bit of extra

SPEAKER_05: 19:38

support

SPEAKER_00: 19:39

yeah so he became my agent while I was studying for finals and he dealt with the AFL the different teams got everything organized for this two week trip for me to come over to Australia to figure out what the sport was to have this experience and the AFL sorts it out they got us a premium economy seat and I was like that's fancy that's real fancy leg room yeah exactly and then yeah I called him up and I realized I put all this effort in to get me there and I said yeah you know I just wouldn't feel comfortable if I didn't have my agent there with me you know so then I just you know weaseled my way in to get my brother to get a free flight also to have free two weeks trips so this free flight and free experience in LA turned into a free trip and experience all the way to Australia a very high level negotiation yeah I'm sure from his zero experience that he had so it turned into both of us being able to come over to Australia and have an incredible two weeks and Derek Hans was a big part of that and you know got to see what AFL was and experience it because I thought it was like a you went to multiple clubs right so you talked through that so I went to what four clubs there was five clubs interested so we had Port Adelaide Fremantle Richmond North Melbourne and Collingwood were the five the AFL didn't allow me to talk to anyone else because they wanted to pay back the people that came up to the US combine and so Richmond yeah went there awesome great great experience Dima was awesome he was so nice loved him Damien Harwick the coach at the time Damien Harwick yep so he's I always have a massive amount of respect for him Port Adelaide same with Ken that was over there yeah the Scott brother was at North Melbourne he was awesome and then Fremantle I didn't get to meet their coach at the time but they sent over a representative to Melbourne and I kind of told him I said realistically if I'm going to do this like move my life literally half a world away like I kind of want to be in the mecca of AFL and that you know being in Perth was very isolating and I was like I know it's going to be tough to move over here from a personal perspective so I can't want to be where it's a bit of a vibe, bit of things going on, you know, no offense to Perth.

SPEAKER_05: 21:33

But it is Melbourne, you know, that's where they're strongest, where it started. I guess it is national now and there are fans all over the world, but Melbourne is where more clubs are.

SPEAKER_06: 21:42

It's a home of eight.

SPEAKER_05: 21:43

Yes.

SPEAKER_00: 21:44

You walk out to the MCG, like Collingwood took me out to the middle of it and just said, you know, this could be your office. And I was just like, it's a lot better than the cubicle I was looking

SPEAKER_04: 21:52

at earlier. So who have you got with you at that stage? You've got Derek. Who's walking you out on the MCG?

SPEAKER_00: 21:57

So it was AFL reps and staff and then Derek and then I don't think, I don't know if Bucks was out there with me at the time. So Nathan Buckley was the coach at the time. And this is the funny thing, right? Like, once again, I'm ignorant to everything that's going on. So one of the first meetings I had with Collingwood was Nathan Buckley, Eddie McGuire, Derek Hines, right?

SPEAKER_02: 22:13

Yes.

SPEAKER_00: 22:14

And I'm walked in there and I'm going, great to meet you. What's your name? I'm Eddie. Great to meet you, Eddie. What do you do? What do you do? And there's a great story behind this. I always tell this story. So I'm in this meeting. We go through this whole thing. They give you the whole kind of experience of like, you're going to be the next Nick Natanui and I'm like who's that like I don't know who that is like okay cool that guy sounds cool like he's got fantastic name I was like oh it sounds like fun and tells you all these kind of things you know and it doesn't probably cut through as well because you're just totally ignorant to it all and there's so nice meeting and they walk you around show you the place and everything else and then we walked out and got into the taxi or sorry the Uber and there's a taxi in front of us you know and I'm sitting there and on the back of this taxi is this advertisement as taxis do you know and it's who wants to be a millionaire and it's got Eddie's face. That looks like my brother. That's the guy we just met. He's the Regis Philman of Australia. He should have introduced himself like that. And that's when we realized, okay, maybe Collingwood's a bit bigger deal than we thought. So that was kind of our first impression.

SPEAKER_04: 23:14

And you being, I don't think you seek this so much, but being big and you're happy in the limelight in the sense of you don't mind shining and standing out. A lot of people have seen it as an American thing, but your personality is, no, I'm going to take it on. I'm going to have a crack at things that must have started to appeal to you the Collingwood thing a little bit well if I'm going to do this I might as well go to the club that's actually why not go to the top

SPEAKER_00: 23:39

yeah I think like I came over here and you know I guess one of the things in my life I kind of think of is like go big or go home

SPEAKER_02: 23:44

yeah

SPEAKER_00: 23:46

that sums it up if I'm going to come to this country give this a go and like essentially forego the best job you can get coming out of college I'm going to try to do this to the best possible you know sense of it and try to make the maximum amount of whatever this experience is going to be and you know playing in front of 80 to 90,000 people on a weekly basis and you know the MCG and Collingwood being a big club like it really came down to two and it was really Richmond and Collingwood I was thinking

SPEAKER_05: 24:11

that I thought Richmond you know we're lucky to get you because Richmond is also you know a really well-known club and I loved that you just said about both of you like Collingwood being biggest and best but I'm sure there are lots of listeners right now that are getting really antsy because there is this you

SPEAKER_00: 24:26

know yeah well Richmond fans hate me for I I think one specific game mostly. We'll get to that later. But it's a bit ironic to me because I had a chance to go to Richmond. I'm like, oh, I might have three gold medals. Things were a bit different. That could be four. But at that time, I think they were like 17th in the league. So they were a very different team to whenever two years after that and then winning all the success and everything else. So that was kind of a crazy experience those two weeks and I had to get my head wrapped around the whole thing and then decide whether or not I wanted to give up a job that I'd worked for years for and got a degree and all this stress that came with trying to find a job and get that and be able to be successful in that sense. Do I want to give that up for this opportunity to be an athlete for a living that I never thought existed nor knew in a place I don't know with no friends, no support group, no nothing and play for a team I've never even heard of? A ball I've never held. Yeah, a ball I knew nothing about. So it was a

SPEAKER_06: 25:21

risk. So it was a risk but what was the pull? What was

SPEAKER_00: 25:24

the

SPEAKER_04: 25:25

pull? I want to hold that question right because first there's one more story in amongst the visiting clubs your brother plays a key role in the whole thing so there's two stories the second one is what your brother finally said to you which I think might answer the question but before that could I just I just love people to hear the meat pie story wow

SPEAKER_00: 25:49

people

SPEAKER_04: 25:52

are going to

SPEAKER_00: 25:57

me and I'm definitely not getting a sponsorship from 4 and 20 anytime soon my first experience right going to a game right America baseball hot dogs those two are associated with each other right footy it's meat pies and football so I'm up there watching North Melbourne play in Geelong out of their GMHBA stadium where it was called at the time and one of the guys that's with North Melbourne that's looking after me goes hey we got to get you a meat pie I said yeah no worries like what is that and he kind of goes I'll show you walks me down gets two meat pies for myself and my brother walk down to the rooms at halftime and we're sitting there and it's a group you know a bit like a table like this there's about six people in this conversation I haven't had a bite of this yet I don't know what to expect I'm a bit nervous like they've hyped this thing up I'm trying to impress these people I'm trying to get them to sign me and pay me so I need to make these people happy so in this conversation my brother's straight across from me right and you can imagine like they're trying to talk to you so there's a little bit of eyes on you and stuff and through the conversations one was like hey try the meat pie you know so I was like how do I do this so you kind of undo the wrapper and they're like show you put the tomato sauce or ketchup as I would have called it on top you know and like my brother's kind of doing it at the same time and I go to take the first bite and I like bite into it and I don't know I assume everyone's kind of had this experience the middle was cold

SPEAKER_04: 27:14

like

SPEAKER_00: 27:15

still hard and I was like in this mindset where I didn't know any difference so I thought this was what

SPEAKER_04: 27:21

it

SPEAKER_03: 27:22

was so

SPEAKER_04: 27:22

I was

SPEAKER_00: 27:23

like I guess meat pies are cold in the middle in Australia and I'm sitting there looking at my brother directly across me right we are making eye contact straight to each other while we're eating this going this is the most disgusting thing i've ever tasted in my life but we have to put a smile on act like it's delicious

SPEAKER_04: 27:37

was his cold in the middle

SPEAKER_00: 27:38

as well as cold as yeah i thought you were gonna

SPEAKER_05: 27:41

tell me it was too hot and then you bit it and it went all over you or i thought you were gonna tell me it was the sauce because i've had even with my son he did the tomato

SPEAKER_00: 27:49

sauce i don't know what's worse to be honest with you but so then i'm sitting there i've had this first bite and in my mind i'm going okay i can't upset these people i need to kind of buy into this Aussie culture right so I'm like I've got to just fight through it I'm just going to fight through it bite bite bite get it down and then we'll just talk about it later so you know I go for the second one I see my brother and my brother just all of a sudden like takes this step back out of the kind of circle we're in I'm kind of looking at him like what's he doing but everyone's still chatting to me and I'm still going and my brother sits there and I'm watching him as this happens and no eyes are on him they're all on me and he takes a step back takes the full meat pie that's like nine tenths of the way still there and just puts it in the bin next to him drops it in there and just keeps the wrapper and I'm like what is he doing like what the hell so I have to go second bite third bite this is delicious and then Nolan just interjects out of nowhere and he just crumples up the paper like the wrapper like he just ate the whole thing it's

SPEAKER_03: 28:46

like and he goes that was amazing oh my gosh you guys do it so well

SPEAKER_00: 28:51

in Australia and I've watched this whole thing play out in front of me and I was like you're the biggest jerk I've ever heard in my life I'm just sitting there looking. I'm like, I will kill you as soon as we get out of this change room.

SPEAKER_05: 29:01

So were the other people having a pie as well? No, just us two. So now I understand because I was thinking, why did the other people, if they were all cold, say sorry?

SPEAKER_00: 29:11

That's okay. But he wasn't so

SPEAKER_04: 29:13

self-conscious. He would have said, is it meant to be cold?

SPEAKER_00: 29:14

I was like, I guess it's just how they do it. It's all eyes on you, right?

SPEAKER_05: 29:18

You're trying to put on a

SPEAKER_04: 29:19

good show. You've got to try to impress people. So you and Nolan, take us to Dan's question. What was the draw? What happened in that conversation?

SPEAKER_00: 29:26

Yeah, so two weeks was a bit of a And you can imagine like your life is either going to go in one of two directions, right? You're either going to take this job you had previously in Houston. The known, the safe, the well-organized. Or the extremely unknown of moving to Australia and just giving this crazy life experience a go. And it was on St. Kilda Beach, one of those moments in life you just never forget. There's moments that stick with you forever. And it was probably the first conversation I had with my brother that was like really in-depth, serious, kind of like man-to-man kind of conversation about your life. and we had seen all the kind of clubs and we sat down and said you know kind of like where are we at you know what do you think like come on you're a bit of my sounding board here like what are you thinking and he goes you know I've worked in the real world I've sat behind a desk for about you know four or five six years at that time and he goes look there's nothing special about it really like to be honest you can do this whenever you're 40 you can do this whenever you're 50 you can do it whenever you're 60 and he goes I'll tell you one thing you can't do is go play sport at 40 50 60 years old and he goes your degree that you've just got that degree is never going to expire you can always go back to that an opportunity like this is a finite amount of time that you can do this and be able to be successful at it and just give it a go and that was kind of this moment in my life where I was like holy smokes I think things are really going to change and it's this incredible like I've got goosebumps now I'm emotional when you say it you talk about like a big brother and someone you look up to giving you advice and if I didn't have him there who knows where my life would be you know like who knows what direction would have took and what would have happened and like that moment on the beach talking with him and having that first kind of like serious conversation changed the whole trajectory of my life to now give me everything I've been able to experience today

SPEAKER_04: 31:11

what is the feeling you get right now when you reflect on it and you sort of sit with that feeling of that moment and your brother and the importance

SPEAKER_00: 31:18

I think it's just an extreme amount of gratefulness to have someone like that I know not everyone has someone that they can you know feel like they can go to in those kind of tough moments of those tough decisions yeah um and to have someone that no matter what the situation is they're always looking out for the best of you yeah um that's an incredibly beautiful feeling he did yeah and then it's not to say that you know we did by no means thought it was going to be easy and it wasn't like he knew just as much as i did that it's going to be a damn hard trial to get out here and to do this kind of thing to pick up a sport you knew nothing about and try to be successful at it like it's not the easiest route the easiest route just go back home act like this never happened you know like you definitely you have to realize that there's going to be you know amount of amount of risk and amount of you know stress and anxiety and everything else that kind of comes with it but if you can get through that and get out to the other end there might be something absolutely incredible that you could do that no one's ever done before and not many people I feel like in this world can say they've been able to do that

SPEAKER_01: 32:14

yeah

SPEAKER_00: 32:14

and it's pretty amazing I'm super grateful that I was able to have that advice in that part of my life and that timing to be able to send me on the right direction I think my life was supposed to go in

SPEAKER_04: 32:25

yep why calling it the last moment.

SPEAKER_00: 32:28

Why Collingwood? Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 32:30

Because you've decided you're going to do it and now you've got to nut down.

SPEAKER_00: 32:34

Yeah, I think it came back to Derek and the biggest thing that was, I mean, what the AFL did was they said, you know, I think it was three of the five, I'm sorry, I told Perth, I'm sorry, I told Fremantle now, Port Adelaide didn't give me a contract and the other three gave me a contract. And what happened was the AFL said, we want you to choose the place that you feel like you best fit in. All the contracts will be the same financially the same all the benefits are going to be the same but we want you to choose a place that you are going to be the most successful at and feel the most comfortable and loved at and that was Collingwood because of Craig McCray so Craig McCray who's now our head coach this is the beauty of the universe coming back full circle and he was the development coach one of the first people I ever met at the club so I mean I remember I sat down with him and he was like hey these are the skills we're going to teach you this is what's going to go on and you know he talked about all this kind of footy stuff but you got this general sense of talking to him and everything else that came with him that he's also going to love you as a person you know it's not going to be purely business he genuinely means that as well he does and for someone who's coming over here with no support network at all and doesn't know anyone that's important like without him I would have burnt out in a year or two and I would have been done with footy you would have never heard of my name and I would have been another statistic that's just come and gone but the fact that he was so loving caring took me in as his own took me in as like kind of family like I look at him as like a father figure for myself you know and the ability for him to do that was one of the not one of is the reason I was successful within my career and it's cool now to be on the other side of it to know that I wish I had 10 years left in my career but realistically I don't and Craig's kind of in the beginning stages of his career as a coach where he's second or third year in or third fourth year in and it's an incredible thing to be able to try and give back to someone that gave so much to you in the early part of your career and be able to reverse those roles and say look whatever you need I'll do it I don't really care anymore like as far as like all this other stuff that comes with it I'm just here to try to get you to where you want to be and it's a great experience to be able to feel like you can help someone do that and winning a premiership with him was like just that amazing feeling of saying you forever now have that in the history books as a premiership coach

SPEAKER_04: 34:40

and we'll get on to the premiership a little bit later more but that hug with him after you won the premiership

SPEAKER_00: 34:48

not many people know this one yeah bit funny right so you win a premiership absolutely exhausted right you fall to your like knees and you're just like oh my gosh this just happened very stressful, close game and everything else, right? Yeah. The first thing I did, I fell down, I stared at the ceiling, I was like, oh my gosh, and it's like, dude, go celebrate. Yeah, don't let him grab you. But I was so physically exhausted, I couldn't even pick my feet up off the ground really and I kind of get up, I run over and I kind of hug Bobby and a few of the other guys and I was like, oh my gosh, I gotta go hug Craig, you know, and I remember sitting there and like, I go hug maybe for five seconds, whatever it is, hug the players and I went over to the bench and everyone's congratulating each other and hugging each other and I just sat there for probably, it would have been like 30 seconds I just kind of sat there and just waited and just waited for everyone else and gave him one of the biggest hugs ever and just like man this is incredible like this guy that you know essentially gave so much in the early part of your career to get to where you're at to now see him you know reach the pinnacle was just the most fulfilling moment I think as a player you can possibly have

SPEAKER_04: 35:44

man the emotion just sitting there under the surface for you as well you know I feel like he was like a bridge you've gone across the world and you've stepped way out of your comfort zone and I feel like he he was like a bridge between the loneliness and the success because the loneliness could have killed you but it informed you like the loneliness made you make the most of the situation because it drove you to not waste it you know if I'm going to be this lonely I've got to actually really have a crack at this but he it was like he met you over on the loneliness side of the river and held your hand over to the other side where it all turned into something magical

SPEAKER_00: 36:21

yeah it's incredible I think you know people can't say I'm a bit of the coach's pet I guess but I kind of look at those early years and like Craig was a development coach he used to come to like my house I had a two bedroom apartment I had one other friend pretty much in all of Melbourne he would sit there and do Thanksgiving dinner with us and be like six of us at this little apartment table that we'd make shift out of nothing and it's like it's things like that of him taking the time out to know that that was a big deal for me as an American and like that stuff goes a long way people don't realize that probably don't see that kind of stuff don't recognize it but that stuff's the things that underlie you know that make the connection and the personal relationship what it is and just shows to him as the character of human being he is also and I think that's things people probably look past because they see all the things that catch the media's attention and all things like that and it's the little things like that that I know since day dot he's always kind of looked after me and he'll forever have my you know genuine best interest at heart and I can have an honest and direct conversation with him knowing that you know he's going to be there for me good bad or ugly

SPEAKER_06: 37:22

yeah no we were fortunate enough to actually have him in an interview late last year and what you have just described those qualities definitely shone through he

SPEAKER_04: 37:31

walked out and you guys are gone oh my god he is especially

SPEAKER_05: 37:34

i'm not sure if it was cut out of the podcast or not if it was that was fine because i didn't think afterwards yeah i mean i was on the plane the way i'm going god i wish i didn't cry but i sat next to him and it was almost like a presence and that was not what i was expecting you know as someone that comes from an afl background i mean i've dropped off afl a little bit i live now i live a different life i've lived overseas but i grew up as a young child in a very Collingwood house it was the most important thing in my dad's life honestly so having Craig McRae there sort of meant a lot but I was thinking of him as like the footy coach and he just it was so different he's just he's just an amazing human and I felt really lucky to be able to do that podcast with him and I walked away just like wow wow he's yeah he was very different to what I expected

SPEAKER_00: 38:20

and I think he's like this new era of coaching right like he's very much that and I think Chris Fagan who just won the premiership last year is very much a similar personality and it's more about being able to connect with your players so they want to play for you rather than the direct feedback of I need this this and this from you you know I think there's a bit of a an extra power and you know motivation that comes with wanting to play for someone that you genuinely know has your back

SPEAKER_05: 38:44

was it good human he kept using a word or being your best it was something Trev I'm sure that you and him yeah yeah winners on and off the field you know I think they were the things that just really hit you it wasn't just about footy it's not about performing it's like being being a great husband being a great father yeah but it was like oh wow you know and that's what you know we're all about improving health span living your best life being healthy but that too it's that holistic approach and you know not just being you know praised for what a great footballer you are but being a good human so also when you walk away from the game too you know that you are loved and that you have those connections and that was one part of your life but there's so many other parts of your life as well and And yeah, it's really important.

SPEAKER_04: 39:28

It's a cheap reference, but the Ted Lasso reference with Fly, so many people know around the world, such an endearing character, but he's so close to that, even though he was that before there was a Ted Lasso, you know, like he's literally the embodiment of someone that uses humour, vulnerability, everything else. It's an absolute joy to work with him.

SPEAKER_05: 39:45

Without the accent.

SPEAKER_04: 39:47

Yeah, without the accent. Well, he's got an Australian accent. Maybe he's got an

SPEAKER_05: 39:50

accent to you, whereas Ted Lasso has got a strong accent

SPEAKER_02: 39:53

to me.

SPEAKER_04: 39:53

Very strong, yeah. So you've got Fly, his nickname's Fly, you've got Fly in your corner and you're starting to feel looked after and you're playing VFL. Tell us about the experience on the first game. I think your breakout game was it versus Richmond? VFL?

SPEAKER_00: 40:08

Was it the five guys? Yeah, versus Richmond actually too, sorry. This is what I'm curious about.

SPEAKER_04: 40:13

Just tell us quickly about the first game experience and that breakout game because I think you realised you belonged by the time that Richmond game happened.

SPEAKER_00: 40:20

It's an interesting one. The first game I actually played I think was up in Bendigo in what was called NAB cup of yeah I know I'd never heard of a place called Bendigo in my life it's got a beautiful

SPEAKER_05: 40:32

gallery for anyone listening it

SPEAKER_04: 40:34

does have a lovely gallery it's a beautiful place referred to as barely go barely go

SPEAKER_00: 40:39

there that's a good one but no that was I think my first experience was like a nab cup like preseason game and I played for half a quarter sorry half the game and I was legitimate two months into ever hearing of AFL ever ever touching a football player or a football and it It was kind of funny to me. I went through that whole experience and had a few hit-outs and stuff, and then the game finished, and Darcy was walking next to me, Darcy Moore, our captain now. He was a first-year player at the time, and he walks over to me, and I had this conversation with one of the, we were playing Carlton, one of the Carlton players, and he goes, man, just want to let you know, good luck on your career. Just want to wish you all the best. It's an incredible story, and just want to wish you all the success. It's kind of weird to me because I didn't understand how footy worked. In between the sirens, you hate each other, you punch each other in the chest. you have all this stuff and then after you're all these kind loving humans I was like you just literally like punched me in the chest like 10 seconds ago before that siren happened like what's so special about that siren you know and I was sitting there and this guy was like you know all the best on your career and I kind of was like oh thanks so much man you know and kind of just walked off and I walked over to Darcy who kind of you know gave me a bit of background on AFL history right and I said that guy over there really nice fella you know like he was so kind and endearing and everything else and he goes that guy with both his shoulders strapped yeah yeah he goes Chris Judd? I was like, yeah, I guess, yeah. He was like, I kind of looked at him based on his answer. I go, should I know that guy? He goes, yeah, you should definitely know that guy. I was like, okay, so I was locked in my memory now. I've got Chris Judd, okay. But that was my first impression. And that happens all the time, right? Because I just didn't know anything. So that was kind of my- It could be a blessing in disguise as well too. I think it is, yeah. Like when you met Eddie, there are

SPEAKER_05: 42:19

some people, in our last podcast, we talked about anxiety and when you get nervous and stuff. There would have been some situations, even though you had- had a lot of nerves and anxiety with the whole trip, but some interactions with people that may have been a little bit more relaxed because you didn't realise they were a big deal. Yeah, being

SPEAKER_06: 42:32

overwhelmed by, I mean, if you knew who they were and what they represented, the overwhelm could have been

SPEAKER_00: 42:38

substantially more. I mean, no offence to Australia, it's still a small pond. But I think one thing I've learned throughout my life, no offence to Australians, sorry, that was really rude. I'm just saying 13 times as many people, so it was a population thing. But I think, no, throughout my life, I've been incredibly fortunate to meet some people people that you know are very well known and the one thing that we all have in common is we're all just ordinary people we all come from the same genes and some same genetics really mostly and it's just

SPEAKER_05: 43:05

99.99% we're all the same

SPEAKER_00: 43:08

and you talk to someone and if you have a one on one conversation with them like you wouldn't know if they're the most famous person in the world or they're just another block off the street

SPEAKER_04: 43:16

you can occasionally pick up an aura though you can pick up a sense of something and you go oh nice guy oh wow strong presence and then you work out after a while what do they do

SPEAKER_00: 43:25

yeah There's definitely like, I think, um, yeah, people's posture and the way people kind of act and interact, you know, there's definitely something that you can feel, but talking to them, like if you take purely just the audio from it, like he wouldn't know any different based on the experience with it. So yeah, I think like the people I've met in Australia, I've been incredibly fortunate to meet some of the, you know, I guess biggest names in Australia and stuff. And you're kind of just like, Oh yeah, everyone's really nice. I've met also people like Joe Biden, who's a bit bigger pond outside. Um, a bit more worldly known. Um, But yeah, it's just everyone's like, I don't know. I think it's this incredible experience to realize that no matter how much success or power or whatever it is in life you have, we're all just ordinary people just with different jobs, doing different things that might have different ways that people react to them.

SPEAKER_04: 44:10

And isn't it fascinating that football, Australian rules football, has afforded you the opportunity to meet not only these people in Australia, but all these people, these famous people back in the US. Because you've been promoted back in the US as the guy that's made it. You're on 60 Minutes in the US. you know all this sort of stuff like a really really cool story how this crazy little small pond over here has given you so much I'm never going to hear that I'm going to bring it up in every question I want to make a link for you you talked about Darcy Moore and you just flippantly said he's now the captain he's the son of Peter Moore who was a legend won two Brownlow medals as a ruckman at two different clubs just probably one of the last ruckman second last ruckman maybe to win a Brownlow medal which is the premier thing I used to run around the street with Peter Moore's number on my back, you know, as a Collingwood fan and everything else. So Darcy comes in, he's in his first year. Now you go through quickly, I'm going to keep this link in there, but you go to the Richmond game. You're starting to get a feel for it. You've played how many games of VFL now?

SPEAKER_00: 45:13

Probably 12. 12 games. It's

SPEAKER_04: 45:15

pretty bloody quick. Half

SPEAKER_00: 45:16

a season. There were some fun times through that.

SPEAKER_04: 45:19

Yeah. And then all of a sudden, and fill in any bits you want, but tell us about that game where you got your hands on the ball. a lot

SPEAKER_00: 45:26

yeah I think like you can imagine like I didn't know and had never played in a game so an umpire points one way you run the other way like I didn't understand that right so there's like every little tidbit I was picking up every time I played a game so there was something new I had to learn about the the rules or the way the ball was moved or the way players would have to play and it was just like really just thrown into the deep end and tried you know learn as quickly as possible so you know you get to about halfway through the VFL season kind of playing and also kind of had this idea not like I I got sales pitch to the MCG and 80,000 people, right? And I'm playing at Victoria Park in front of, you know, there's dogs running around before the game taking a deuce on the field. So it's kind of a bit of a different experience than what I was expecting.

SPEAKER_05: 46:09

It used to be a big deal. Big Park, my dad's ashes are in the square at Big Park. So Father's Day, we will go and eat. If I'm in Melbourne, I'll go and eat a meat pie. I don't like meat pies, but I

SPEAKER_00: 46:20

will have them for hot. Extra hot. But yeah,

SPEAKER_05: 46:24

that's where dad, so my dad had a, spot there was when he had his funeral at Vic Park there was a whole big yeah anyway we can talk about that offline but yeah Vic Park used to be a really big deal and for people like my dad original Collingwood it yeah he was sad when they went to MCG he's like that's not real football you should stand in the rain

SPEAKER_00: 46:42

but I think there was like that's part of ignorance right the history that comes with the Victoria Park and yeah I remember like that game that Richmond game you know you get your hands on it you take a few clunks you kick a few goals and like I mean I was still trying to figure out what my routine for goal kicking was I was like I was trying to sort all this out on the fly and you know you kick I think it was like four or five goals in that game you're kind of going no it's five yeah because I remember I learned what a bag was never heard the terminology in my life and I was like yeah I kicked a bag and I was like what was that you can tell I never played footy

SPEAKER_05: 47:12

even though I'm talking about this history I don't know

SPEAKER_00: 47:15

what a bag is either I was kicking five goals apparently

SPEAKER_04: 47:18

four goals is four goals five is a bag

SPEAKER_00: 47:20

there

SPEAKER_05: 47:21

you go learn something

SPEAKER_00: 47:21

yeah so I think like that was kind of the start of saying okay I now understand this game and now it's time to try to excel at this game and that was kind of like my first experience I think of understanding that like I can be above that VFL level and that was yeah you can stand out and you can be you know someone who's best on ground or like you can influence the game in an important way so that was probably my first experience doing that and that's about the time you start going like okay like I can see this being a successful journey and up to that point like you kind of you have your doubts and you have your trials and tribulations around am I over here doing the right thing what am I doing I can't even kick a ball and I'm sitting there trying to you know do this and I'm training next to people like Travis Cloak and Scott Penderbury and Dane Swan these guys have been doing it their whole life and they're Hall of Famers and I'm like how do you kick you know like I hadn't even kicked a ball so it was such a you know distant thing to be able to be the success of someone like that that sometimes you just thought oh it's unfathomable like I'm never going to play an AFL game

SPEAKER_05: 48:19

did you find it hard because if you played soccer you know so like you can't touch the ball was there an element for a while where you just had to grabbing the ball or that was okay because of basketball and it was all just different

SPEAKER_00: 48:29

well that's I think that's the beauty of there's so many things that had to happen in my life to land me to where I'm at now and the playing soccer as a kid growing up all the way to 18 and then playing basketball from 18 to 23 just casually 18 to probably 20 and then like high level 20 to 23 and those are the two that cross over the most when it comes to footy and especially playing as a ruckman so it was kind of this weird thing all these things that I had previously had previously had experiences in my life were now coming back to you know help me in the next journey of whatever it was and it was kind of cool I was thinking you know maybe this experience that I've had is meant to lead me to this position of being able to use all these resources to be successful at what I'm doing based on my past experiences so I think it was kind of one of those cool moments you're going wow okay like everything seems to be kind of falling in line in life and like everything seems to be having a reason like back before I didn't really understand why all this was happening and maybe this is what it's all accumulating to

SPEAKER_04: 49:24

right you're starting to see a picture forming

SPEAKER_00: 49:26

it almost seems

SPEAKER_06: 49:27

fortuitous it

SPEAKER_00: 49:28

almost seems like it's been preordained yeah it's crazy and so yeah so that Richmond game was probably the first time I've felt like okay I've got this confidence now I know what I'm doing and now it's time to try to take the next level of trying to get an AFL game and that was probably the first experience of thinking like I could maybe be at AFL level now

SPEAKER_04: 49:45

yeah

SPEAKER_06: 49:46

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SPEAKER_04: 50:08

So moving forward a little bit, we come to the following season. Yeah. Right. So you finish off that season pretty strong. That's the first year. And you come to the following season. April 25 is Anzac Day, isn't it, April 25? And so Anzac Day, Australian New Zealand Army Corps, we celebrate our efforts of war and union, the way we came together to fight big battles. And in the 1990s, it's the 30-year anniversary this year, so 1995, Kevin Sheedy had the idea to put this game, Essendon versus Collingwood, the two massive clubs on the MCG on Anzac Day to celebrate, you know, from everything from the haunting... playing of The Bugle beforehand, Last Rites. Is it Last Rites? Is it Last Post? Last Post. Last Post. Not Last Rites, Last Post. I hope not. And so this game is massive. And the minute of silence. You've got

SPEAKER_05: 50:58

100,000 people being silent.

SPEAKER_04: 51:00

So you've got the AFL Grand Final that has 100,000 and then you've got the two preliminary finals that get you into those three games, the two prelims of the AFL Grand Final. Most people would say, that is the game I want to get. I just want to get into a prelim or play in a Grand Final. But the other one is Anzac Day. Only two clubs get to play this game and so you end up at the club that's going to play that game and guess what happens is that Mason gets the call up to play his very first game of AFL really on Anzac Day I was there last year so his mum and dad get flown over mum and dad get flown over from America it's the whole thing you're experiencing you're standing there the last post everything else and the games were in the first quarter we're just into the game and then enter Darcy Moore and tell us tell us a little whatever you want around this but

SPEAKER_00: 51:50

yeah I mean you can imagine like I mean I was pushing for AFL and I knew I was close and for those kind of weeks leading up I knew there's maybe a possibility and I think my parents are the first people I found out because they had to fly over here and that took obviously 24 hours to get over so they had to like tell them so they could expedite a flight out to get out to Australia in time and so yeah so I mean the whole family actually ended up coming out and incredible moment like I never in my life kind of through this experience knew if my family would ever be here at the same time or we'd ever be able to kind of share this experience as one I always talk about family being a big part of why I do AFL if you ever meet my parents you'll understand and my brothers they love it absolute legend but yeah they were all there and it was kind of this incredible experience you can imagine like I was a year and a half into essentially ever hearing of AFL like still was very young and understanding what was going on and everything that goes around it and then you get thrusted into this experience of playing on Anzac Day and it was kind of this huge

SPEAKER_05: 52:46

game and it's an honor I would imagine

SPEAKER_00: 52:48

yeah 100% like in America we're very passionate about the people who serve and stuff you know and this was Australia's version of that so I knew kind of how important it was and it's an incredible thing to be a part of to be able to give a platform on the day to all the people and what they sacrifice not only them the families everyone else is involved there's so many incredible stories we hear about and they come to light on that day and it's awesome to be you know a small part of that and to be able to create

SPEAKER_04: 53:12

keeping that awareness alive

SPEAKER_00: 53:13

yeah exactly and create like something that you know I'll talked to a lot of people that are involved in it that are part of our ANZACs and they love being a part of it and it's such a cool thing to have that platform for them. But to get thrusted onto that day, I remember sitting there before the game and you can imagine how nervous I was. I'd never played an AFL game. You're playing on what is one of the biggest games of the year in front of a massive crowd and you have this whole experience of the pin drop in the last post and then they play the national anthem and I remember sitting there and the camera comes and goes past every person. I never Everyone's singing except you. Camera goes past everyone. Everyone's singing, you know? And then it goes, us in first, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang. And then I'm 46, so I'm on the very end. So I'm the start, I think, of the Collingwood group. So it goes straight to me, and I just had to go, I just kind of moved my lips like I knew what I was talking about. I didn't know a word of the national anthem at that point. No disrespect. And I'll just remember that moment. I kind of had this circuit breaker in the experience where I was like, kind of laughed to myself, and I said, who would have thought you'd be here doing this? Singing the Australian anthem. I'm like, you freaking idiot. Yeah. you know I just kind of had a bit of a chuckle yeah relax me because I was I mean I was all over the place at that point you know just trying to impress and trying to break this mold of saying he's a project he's a project he's just an experiment trying to be an AFL football player yeah and you're just trying to impress the coaches to gain the respect of you know your playing group and also the coaching staff and everyone else because you know being a guy who'd never heard of AFL from a different country like you had no respect whenever you first came here because you didn't even know what it was so you're just trying to prove to these people this whole time and yeah it's quite an but within three or four minutes, I can't remember what it was, of the first quarter, fortuitous moment again is three people I got drafted with, which was Jordan Ngoi, Darcy Moore, and myself. Jordy handballs to Darcy, Darcy turns around, hits me on the chest and a lead out.

SPEAKER_04: 54:59

So let me explain that. Darcy's running down the wing, receives the handball, which is the middle of the field, just gets his kick, sees you leading out of the goal square towards sort of two-thirds of the way out of the 50, and you're leading, doing what you've been taught to do, and you're coming and he just hits you.

SPEAKER_00: 55:14

Just straight on the chest. the chest

SPEAKER_04: 55:16

like right out

SPEAKER_00: 55:17

and i mean you can imagine from that you're nervous just to play the game and you're like oh first kick for goal

SPEAKER_04: 55:22

yeah

SPEAKER_00: 55:24

yeah so you've never touched the ball first touch yeah first mark first

SPEAKER_04: 55:27

any any statistic at all and there's a famous club that is the first kick first goal so someone the first kick in the afl picture goal no

SPEAKER_00: 55:35

pressure here's the big american who barely even knows what the sport is doesn't 100 know all the rules of the actual game still at this point so what are

SPEAKER_04: 55:43

you kicking for goal from about 40 45

SPEAKER_00: 55:45

I'd say 30, but I'll take 45. Okay, okay, 35. And I remember just going back and like in your mind, you're kind of going, oh my gosh, like, okay, yep, just go back to what you've been taught. The simple things of like, what is your routine? What do you do every single time you kick a goal? Go through that and that will lead you to success. And like, that's kind of what, you know, Craig had taught me, you know, as being the development coach. So, you know, you go back and you kick the goal and went through and you're kind of like.

SPEAKER_05: 56:13

Did you get the goal? Yeah, I first kicked the first goal and I just was like. straight through the middle. I did not know that. That might have been that. I dropped out of footy for a few

SPEAKER_04: 56:20

years. That is amazing. Sitting there like with their jaw dropped waiting to see what he's going to do. Like, oh my God, talking to each other like, first kick, you know, and he goes back, just plum kicks it straight through the middle and everybody went nuts. That's

SPEAKER_05: 56:30

amazing. So can I ask, you've obviously got support from Craig McRae and I'm sure that many of the Collingwood players are trying to support you. They want you to do well. But was there an element of unease, jealousy, something? You know, there are people that... that have grown up and their whole life just wanting to play football and then you just kind of come in. Was there

SPEAKER_04: 56:52

any of that? What's the

SPEAKER_00: 56:53

diplomatic answer to this? How do I not get in trouble here? There was no one, I don't think anyone from the club. As you can imagine, playing in the most scrutinized position of the most scrutinized club in the biggest sport in Australia, there's going to be opinions. And playing a guy who's an American that barely knows what's going on, credit to Nathan Buckley at the time, that was a bit of a risk by And he dropped a Hall of Famer in Travis Cloak to play a guy who barely even knew what the sport was on Anzac Day. That takes guts. And I'm very thankful for that, obviously. Pretty incredible. Sorry,

SPEAKER_06: 57:28

I'll let you finish. But it did spark a question in me. I'll ask you later.

SPEAKER_00: 57:33

But to go back, I think there's been a lot of hate towards me in the sense that I've been given this opportunity without going through maybe the trials and tribulations that people have as a kid trying to make it. I've just been thrusted into this thing and I've made it work And what people don't see is probably the hard work that goes behind it.

SPEAKER_05: 57:49

Well, I imagine you might have had to work harder. Harder because, one, it's a new sport, but also harder because there would have been that around you. There's some people a little bit not happy to

SPEAKER_04: 58:00

go, yeah, you're here. I reckon hate was the flavour that came, but resentment was the vehicle. I think people resented that you made it and you made it easier and everything else. Hate was the flavour that it came across with, but really it was a personal thing for them. They didn't like the fact that you got something they couldn't get.

SPEAKER_00: 58:16

That was someone playing their game.

SPEAKER_04: 58:18

Their game, you know, and not even respecting and appreciating it much. Because one of the things that you did well, given your situation, was you stayed pretty flippant around the whole thing. You're like, oh, I'll kick them through the sticks. And they're like, no sticks, they're sacred goalposts. It's not AFL, it's called Australian

SPEAKER_00: 58:35

rules. Yeah, like me when you go, oh, Vic

SPEAKER_05: 58:37

Park, like I was just playing in Vic Park. I was like, oh my God, Vic Park means a lot to me. You could imagine the

SPEAKER_00: 58:42

reactions. It's kind of like what, I mean, at the beginning of this, I said, like, try to imagine yourself in my shoes. And I think a lot of people probably don't do that and they don't, and that's maybe why they misunderstand me, but it's not out of like disrespect or anything. It's just out of ignorance. And I find it kind of funny that I'm still here to be honest and doing what I'm doing. And I find it an incredible experience, but you know, I'm still learning as a person every single day, you know, Australian culture and everything about it. So, you know, I don't, I don't mean to be disrespectful to anyone or upset anyone, but like, this is just me trying to learn exactly what's being around me. But I think you

SPEAKER_05: 59:14

being so open and saying things also, though you can see there's a genuine authenticity and it doesn't come from a place of actually wanting to you know make someone feel uncomfortable it's just you just I mean we get it in America too so I'm a bit of a joker and sometimes I'll say something that I think is hilarious and we don't

SPEAKER_02: 59:37

tell

SPEAKER_05: 59:39

stories if anyone's listening and they know Mark Hyman we won't go into the story but I made a joke with Mark Hyman that I thought was hilarious and he actually thought I was a stalker. And it was so, it was interpreted, I thought, and so just, yeah, sometimes. The

SPEAKER_06: 59:52

difference in humour, sometimes. It's the miscommunication.

SPEAKER_03: 59:55

Oh my God. I thought I was trying to do the biggest jokes in the world when I first came here. Yeah, because you know, you're

SPEAKER_05: 1:00:00

being funny and you say something and you just, you think you're connecting, but actually you're not connecting because there's different thoughts and feelings and experiences and so much that happens behind it and when you are coming in so new. So I'm interested to know, how did you get through that I mean is it the support of the club you know mentally you need to have a certain level of resilience and belief because you've still got a smile on your face you've still got this flippant you know how did you how did you

SPEAKER_00: 1:00:26

maintain that it's not always like that but I try my best yeah I think through the first probably year year and a half two years is probably the hardest bit because you're still trying to figure out your inner circle to be honest the only people I knew was at the club then you're going can I trust these people with you know having a vent every once in a while or I'm going to get backlash from that and it's going to go to someone else who you know might take a judge on that and you kind of like walk on eggshells everywhere you went for that first two years and then and that's kind of you know like the importance of having something outside of football and having your kind of group outside of football that's something I just never had and you know the people that did fill that role like we talk about the Darcy Moore we talk about you know Craig in that sense like I remember you talk about Peter Moore right like I met Peter Moore I had the same thing I go hey how's it going what's your name he goes I'm Peter and I said oh great to meet you you must be Darcy's dad you know he was known as Darcy's dad he was known as Peter Moore the footballer I didn't I didn't give a shit about his like sorry excuse me language but I didn't care about his career you know like I was about the person that was in front of me not what he's done in his past like you know he was such an incredible person him and Jane and you know I think that kind of support group definitely helped me where it was it was a very much a struggle for my first like two years with mental health and trying to understand like I remember breaking down like multiple times out on the football field with Craig because I couldn't kick a ball straight you know and that's the most frustrating thing you're like man everyone else makes it look so easy and it's like such a hard thing for me to figure out and yeah There's so many of those times, but, you know, it's always this belief. And one of the most powerful things in this world is to believe in someone and what they can actually produce and do in their lifetime. And Craig's always kind of provided that with me. He's always said, you know, it's tough now, but, like, you're going to get through this. Now at the other end, you're going to be amazed at how quickly you'll pick this up. And I don't really have great patience at times, but, you know, throughout the whole experience, he's like, you're doing this so much faster than we expected. You know, you're doing this at a high level now. Like, you're able to hit kicks on the run, which we didn't think you'd be able to do for months, you know. and there's so many little things I think he kind of provided that belief and that support and everything else behind me to be able to give me that confidence to say like you might have a bad day here or there but like overall throughout your whole career like you're heading in that right direction and this trajectory is going you know at a massive pace you probably don't even realize but yeah I think like away from football definitely was hard and it was incredible having played like people like you like Trev that you know you know just have your genuine best interest at heart you know and most people that's their family but like my family was half a call them up i could do that but to actually physically see them in person was something that was not available to me

SPEAKER_04: 1:02:50

even even me like i was on the gold coast so i'd drop down have dinner and come over or whatever but but i'd be on the gold coast then you'd come and visit or yeah i'll go crash in your basement like seriously like you know we just had five days together over christmas year which was which was awesome you know but um but still that's someone else you can like but i was 2 000 kilometers away as well yeah you know a lot of the time so

SPEAKER_00: 1:03:10

and there was i mean there was people like i always have to give credit to this guy because there's some really tough times in my career and we might talk about them later but he was always there for me and it was Eddie McGuire who was the president at the time one of the first people I met here and very you know popular man and you know he's had his things that have happened whatever but he's a very busy man as everyone knows but he always made time for me and like he would always every Christmas you can imagine like I'm away from my family I don't have anywhere to go and stuff he would make sure that I would go to his house he'd look after me have this amazing dinner with his wife Carla and his family and you know that's become a tradition of ours and it's those little things that like makes such a difference for someone like myself who's so far away from the people you would experience that with and whenever you see everyone else here that has their families and is enjoying their time away and stuff and you're sitting in your home by yourself and you're going what am I doing like to have those people reach out and say no no no come in come in with us you know come have come have dinner with us like we want to make sure we look after you tonight

SPEAKER_04: 1:04:04

what a curious little thing that Eddie's son is going on to win you know college national championship national college football championship after you spending so many Christmases with them And he's reversed over and gone over to what you do, college basketball. So proud of him. He's won the ring in college football. Massive

SPEAKER_06: 1:04:21

deal. Yeah, just going back to what you said that Nathan Buckley took a risk on you, that the club obviously took a risk. I mean, apart from your height, there are other people that are tall. What do you think they saw in you when you had no skills and no knowledge of the game? What is it you think they saw in you that they thought they could develop?

SPEAKER_00: 1:04:39

Yeah, I mean, height definitely helps. I'm the tallest AFL player to ever play the game, which is a cool little fact that I can still hang my hat on it. at the moment there's going to be someone that will take it over I'm sure soon but yeah I think like if anyone knows me and my mom says all the time is I'm a competitive prick like I don't like to lose and you know you put a line in a corner it's like I'll fight my way through it and I think that's one thing like you know Bucks always told me he said you're your harshest critic and like that can be negative don't get me wrong I totally understand that but I think that also shows the drive that you have to want to be successful at the same time and that was the thing that really I think allowed me to continue to try to get better and not give up. And you think they saw that in you from the very beginning? Yeah, there's definitely some stories I could tell around certain moments that happened and you kind of go on, okay, this guy's not going to just fall over. He's going to sit there and fight to the death. And there's moments in that where you get that opportunity whenever everyone's watching and the coaches are there to kind of make your stamp on the ground and say, no, no, no, show me some damn respect. I'm going to actually make it in this thing. And I think there were certain times I did that and there's certain times that you start to see the opinion of you start to change from people. And then you went from that project experiment to, oh, shit, he might be an actual AFL player. Yeah. And I don't judge them because I think previous experiences they've had and the AFL had maybe had was like they had never seen an American be successful at AFL. So what was going to be a thing that was going to make this experience different?

SPEAKER_04: 1:06:05

When you were first explained or described to me by Decker, he said, oh, he'd be the tallest player to ever play the game. That was the first line. But then straight away behind that was he's got elite hands. He's got amazing speed and agility for a tall guy. You should see his ability to get down to the ground and get back up and all that sort of stuff. He explained you as this tall guy that can actually move really well, like really fast. He sort of talked about your speed, all that sort of stuff. So there was a lot athletically that they saw in you. I want to take you through as we get sort of closer to the end of this rolling chat is that before we get to two pinnacle football moments and i'm pretty sure you know which two they are they're a season apart no they're so many years apart but um but um yeah actually let's go with let's go with the um the prelim final first yeah so preliminary final richmond the club that you're possibly going to go to won the premiership the year before they're on top of the ladder they're almost unbeatable all year bucks devises a plan you guys are getting pretty confident and you go into this game and it's at the mcgs 100 000 people it's a crazy crazy level And this is to play the grand final. This is the game where Richmond eliminates Collingwood because, you know, Collingwood just snuck into the four, Richmond, you know, but not in you guys' picture, not in you guys' mind. And the footage of this, the Bruce McIverney commentary, everything of this moment is like we're watching history here. Just give us your summary of what sort of happened on the day there because this is your moment, which becomes like a source of commentary. later in life

SPEAKER_00: 1:07:46

people remind me of it all the time I don't mind it I don't mind it yeah it's a defining moment in my career that's for sure

SPEAKER_04: 1:07:54

you've kicked some goals you've had some starring moments you've taken some big marks

SPEAKER_00: 1:07:58

yeah I think like that year I won the Queen's birthday match best on ground which was the Neil Danaher trophy and kicked a bag in that game which was cool that was the only time I've done that in my career but you know I kind of had like a breakout year and I think we played West Coast in the first game game lost to them played gos in the next game and then we got to richmond and richmond had won 20 odd something games in a row at the mcg like they seemed like unbeatable just won a premiership and you know they were the team to beat in the competition and and i kind of love a bit of the underdog i mean my whole life experience has been the underdog right um no one's really kind of counting me in at times and you know just you fight your way through it so i kind of i kind of love that experience um of you know being disrespected maybe a little bit and uh Yeah, I remember going into that game and I thought, you know, I never even thought about the grand final, like making a grand final. I never made it into my head. The

SPEAKER_04: 1:08:52

fullback, all Australian, elite fullback for Richmond that you're playing against.

SPEAKER_00: 1:08:58

And Dylan Grimes is like, you know, he was playing on me. David Asprey was also playing on me. Alex Rance. Alex Rance. Like their back line was very good. And, you know, we go into that game and there's so many different storylines I guess you could write, but most people wrote us off right away and said Richmond's going to make it to a grand final and probably win the whole thing. thing and um and we're getting into that game and yeah that kind of like disrespect left a bit of a bitter taste in my mouth and um you know we went out there and i think it wasn't just myself i think a lot of other people were the same and you know i had that moment of like flow we talked about everyone hopefully in their life has experienced flow state of some sort right whether it's like just smashing out emails through a day and you get to the end you go man i just was so efficient today like absolutely killed it you know a bit different going out but you know that was my version out there but you know you just kind of felt in that flow state and I felt like everyone was so connected on the day and you know whenever you kind of have these things you know confidence is built and grows the more it happens right and you know you get your first mark of the game bang you feel like you're in it you know you get your second your third you go okay maybe I'm on here when you get your fourth and your fifth and you're going today's going to be a pretty good day and that was happening you know and I think I kicked like three goals on the day and you know I think even Jordan to go he kicked three goals on the day he probably doesn't get the credit I think you had

SPEAKER_04: 1:10:17

equal most contested marks in a prelim

SPEAKER_00: 1:10:20

you

SPEAKER_04: 1:10:21

ran out of the thing with so many people all over you and you were just rising it was like your story was playing out on the football field there was all the stuff going on but the vision I've got is of you rising above the whole thing you like emerging out of this sea of confusion and your head hands rising above everyone and taking these marks so clearly

SPEAKER_02: 1:10:42

and

SPEAKER_04: 1:10:43

it was like your whole story played out in that prelim final in those moments and when you'd land on the ground you'd land and you'd turn around and you'd give the

SPEAKER_01: 1:10:52

let's give a bit of

SPEAKER_04: 1:10:52

the FU or whatever you know and it was like and Bruce McEvaney the greatest commentator of our time in the sport maybe AFL or Australian sports greatest commentators is going oh cocks you know like this and then you've kicked one goal two goals three goals and he's going the American he's making history we're watching history and writing front like it was like but I saw the symbolism for me you know it was like that was every single thing that you'd worked on the culmination culmination because literally there's people around you trying to keep you on the ground yeah and not allow you to go to your full height call that symbolic you're not allowing you to be your full version and you are like today's my day you get your first goal first kick on Anzac Day you get your best on ground five goal bag on Queen's birthday which is the you know the big game the big freeze you come out in the preliminary final the second biggest game of the year and you absolutely tear it apart Collingwood are leading like 70 to 16 or something on stage or some crazy amount like something ridiculous so that you must have had the experience of the euphoria of the moment did it occur to you as it slowed down you had to think about grand final but did you think to yourself what just happened

SPEAKER_00: 1:12:10

yeah I think in the moment you're so focused on the next thing right you're so focused on where you need to be what's going on making sure you try to take the next mark things like that that you don't really take in the moment as is like I mean people sat there and one of the things I think people talk about that comes out of it is this USA chant that comes through the MCG and like you know the crazy thing is like that happened on the day I didn't even recognize it I was so in the game like so in the flow so I didn't even acknowledge that it was happening because I was just so focused on the next thing next thing next thing you

SPEAKER_04: 1:12:38

had 100,000 Australians chanting USA and

SPEAKER_00: 1:12:40

I totally missed it

SPEAKER_04: 1:12:43

and just a small pond

SPEAKER_00: 1:12:44

yeah Crazy to say that, yeah. But yeah, I think there's like so much that happened on the day. And it wasn't until you get to the end of the game and it's pretty locked up with two minutes to go, you know, you're going to go to a grand final and you're kind of sitting there going like, oh my gosh, this is incredible. And you also have, you know, the craziness of, I don't know how many Collingwood fans that would have been there, probably 40, 50, 60 odd thousand Collingwood fans absolutely giving it to the Richmond fans because they were underdogs on the day and just going absolutely nuts. And it was like that energy, that you get from that kind of people and 100,000 people and everything else is unlike anything else being in the middle of that and feeling everyone screaming over the top of you and you can't talk to the person next to you and it's a euphoric feeling it really is and yeah it wasn't until probably like the end of the game you know the siren goes and you're going oh my gosh like we did it we did what no one thought we could do and at that point I knew I played pretty well but I didn't know like how big it would kind of become and you always know you played well whenever the the uh the reporter comes and goes straight b-lines to you you know and you're kind of going how's it going they're like oh my gosh you're like okay maybe i did really really well you know like and not really sure but um yeah and i just remember like you know getting through that game and it was an incredible experience you know both my parents were there which was uh something that was super meaningful for me and um you know i just i probably didn't understand the depths of how big that would be for my career maybe not even

SPEAKER_04: 1:14:12

appreciated fully what was happening right no

SPEAKER_00: 1:14:14

I don't think so and to me it's always just kind of been like I look at this whole thing and people always say it's been a life goal for me to play that's not my experience my experience is like this is a journey this is an experience for me and I'm going to try to maximize it and have the best time as much as I can well you

SPEAKER_04: 1:14:32

respected it but you didn't have the gravitas attached to it

SPEAKER_00: 1:14:35

no and I don't have I remember sitting there and you get four tickets to a game as a player and I remember you got 100,000 people all screaming at you and I remember in the middle of this game I'm kind of sitting there thinking there's four people in this whole stadium of 100,000 that genuinely know me like genuinely know who I am and just to

SPEAKER_06: 1:14:51

that point because this is like it's come to my head a few times I'm thinking your parents what did they think when you said this is what you wanted to do

SPEAKER_05: 1:15:00

I'm so glad you asked that I've been wanting to ask and then you took the

SPEAKER_06: 1:15:02

first mark and took the first goal at the Anzac game the Anzac Day game and then preliminary fight what were they thinking and how did they feel I mean maybe the beginning and now look where you came

SPEAKER_05: 1:15:13

being at the Anzac match too what a great starting

SPEAKER_00: 1:15:15

point yeah crazy mom was real nervous yeah like you can imagine being a mother right like you know that you're not going to go I always say whenever I first came into it I said you're not going to come out of football the way you came into it your body's going to be different you're going to have injuries you're going to have tough times like all this stuff's going to shape you as a human physically emotionally everything else right and I think that side of it probably was a bit hard for mom like to say like hey my son's going to get injured have surgeries and stuff and I'm going to be 24 hour flight away and I can't be there for him and that's got to be a tough thing as a parent right then you got the other side which is my dad he's a bit of a lyrical right like a bit of a funny fellow happy genuinely like one of the best humans if not the best human I will say the best human I've ever met like we'll put that out there happy for that

SPEAKER_05: 1:15:58

he's gonna love that

SPEAKER_00: 1:16:00

if you meet him seriously you'll look at him like yeah 100% yeah and he's always kind of been the fan he's always loved the experiment you know and the experiences that come with it and he thought basketball was crazy like my parents to give you an idea of just how supportive they've been they used to work a full-time job. They'd get up at 6 a.m. in the morning. They'd drive to work. Get there at 8 o'clock. It was two hours through traffic. They'd work until about 6 p.m., get home, feed us dinner, go back to bed, do it again. I went to university. They were still doing this at the time. They would somehow fit in two games a week to go to Oklahoma State or go down to Waco, Texas to go watch me sit on the back of the bench, not even play, just to be their support. That's a four-hour drive up to Oklahoma, four hours for the game in a four hour drive back in the middle of the night and then get up in two hours later for two hours of sleep and go to work like it was insane like looking back now that's easier than 16

SPEAKER_04: 1:16:51

hours

SPEAKER_00: 1:16:52

oh yeah exactly I mean like the commitment they gave to me to be able to see them in the crowd and see the support like it was awesome and I'm incredibly grateful for that and I forever will be and it's cool for me now and I remember like in times where I wanted to quit footy and stuff like that I looked at my parents I'm like my dad's still getting the love out of this he's still enjoying it he's still like I'm like I gotta do it for him he's really getting the enjoyment out of it you know it's like I want to I want to give back in some capacity for what they've done for me to be able to provide some happiness and excitement and experience in their life. And whenever I see my dad, my mom, and things like that, my dad will walk around the whole city of Melbourne. He'll be here for a whole month. I'd never once see him without a Collingwood thing on his body. His hat, shirt, shorts, everything's Collingwood. He's waiting for the one person to go, you a Collingwood fan? No, duh. I saw him.

SPEAKER_05: 1:17:37

I would talk to

SPEAKER_00: 1:17:39

him. And he'd talk to you for five hours. I'd be like, Collingwood, and then it would start. Yeah,

SPEAKER_05: 1:17:43

exactly.

SPEAKER_00: 1:17:43

It's cool because to me that gives me a bit of purpose. It gives me a bit of excitement that comes with it. And to see how proud he is and to see, and my mom too, my brothers also, the whole family, that gives me purpose. Purpose is always important for anything you do. And to see them get so much excitement and everything else has kept me going for a long time.

SPEAKER_04: 1:18:05

Quick story about your dad is that he comes over, mom and dad come over for, they're going to get a couple of games in. So they're going to do the Gold Coast game up north. and they're going to come down and do a Melbourne game before they head off. So a couple of chances to see some games. And your dad gets a house on the Gold Coast and you come down, we're hanging out, we're connecting and you're like, oh, bring him over, bring him over. So he's having a barbecue lunch, I think, or something like that. And he drops the lid of the barbecue, it drops down, hits him square on the head and splits his forehead open, right? So he's got a split on the top of his head. Like he was looking inside, he's going whack and hit him. So he's got a big split on his forehead and he comes over and I'm like, oh you're right you know we're having a great time and everything i said so do you want to go for a swim he goes yeah yeah yeah yeah absolutely go let's walk down we rode down did we ride the bikes down we rode down the beach to go body surfing so we're body surfing

SPEAKER_00: 1:18:55

to give you a bit of backstory my dad is from illinois illinois does not have ocean around us right like my dad has barely seen the ocean he's like he's hyped he's like oh my gosh there's like water and it's like expansive and never ends

SPEAKER_04: 1:19:06

it's giving him the bit of the backstory like you're gonna go you're going with trevor like this is going to be pretty cool he's gonna take you to the ocean

SPEAKER_00: 1:19:12

you know he's an iron man i was like trevor's gonna have a big deal here

SPEAKER_04: 1:19:16

this is his thing I get down there and I go oh it's a bit sucky the shore break's a bit sucky but anyway we teach him we catch a few waves we're having a bit of fun and then finally I ride a bit of a porpoise wave so rather than body surf on the wave I'm body surfing under the wave and he goes that's that's cool how do you do that and I go well what you got to do is you got to point your face down and you ride the wave and the swell picks you up but you've just got to make sure that you don't ride the swell into the bottom you know because he's already split his head he's already split his head right he's got this cut and so we're doing a couple and we're having a go at it and then finally we see him he's like he's obviously got the travel going the wave crunches and he stands up and he's like oh like this and he throws his arm in the air and he's kind of also spinning around going like this and we go home we go what the hell's going on he's got blood pouring down his face he body surfed into the sandbank grazed his face down like this I think nose

SPEAKER_00: 1:20:10

as well wasn't it face and nose blood everywhere blood everywhere

SPEAKER_04: 1:20:13

I've taken him back to your mum, back to our place and gone, uh... Here you go. I took your husband surfing. Here he is. He goes to the next Collingwood game in Melbourne. Of course, the TV will always want to speak to your dad. So he's doing this interview and he's got this massive cut on his forehead, this graze and his thing. He's like, it's really good to be here supporting Max. I'm watching from back on the Gold Coast going, oh, no. I wish

SPEAKER_05: 1:20:37

he had said a story that he was out there body surfing with you.

SPEAKER_04: 1:20:41

He might have referenced something like that. But he

SPEAKER_00: 1:20:43

does. it with a smile and he was like so happy I don't even think he realized he was bleeding at the time all through his face and he was just like that was

SPEAKER_04: 1:20:48

incredible oh my gosh he was like so excited we're looking at it with wide eyes still running down

SPEAKER_00: 1:20:54

we're like you might have a shark coming after you so we're gonna get out of the water but another

SPEAKER_04: 1:20:57

symbolic thing is you know the way he handled that a little adversity was like who cares what time of my life yeah it's probably where you get it from can I

SPEAKER_05: 1:21:05

ask you mentioned about your mum and the injuries and I have to admit as someone that watches footy I'm getting back into it so before dad passed he lived with us for a little while so that brought the Collingwood back in we're watching it every week as you probably heard most important thing but I would see you you know you take off your top you know you're at the end of the quarter or whatever you're on the bedroom and you know you're strapped up here and you're strapped up there and you've got goggles on so I thought you were going to have glasses so I have seen you on TV looking like there is a lot you've walked in looking great if the people aren't watching YouTube you look super healthy I said you look really young and fit and healthy but I've seen you looking very banged up and lots of straps everywhere Everywhere. And what's going on with your body? Are you okay?

SPEAKER_00: 1:21:47

Yeah. I mean, I think what people don't realize is like how much AFL players probably have going on in the background as far as injuries that they just don't say. Tape all over your shoulders,

SPEAKER_05: 1:21:57

legs, everywhere. Your whole body had one around your stomach, I think. You had tape around your stomach?

SPEAKER_00: 1:22:02

I've been, yeah.

SPEAKER_04: 1:22:03

Let's take this true because the prelim final was a high point. You lead the grand final right through the last few minutes. You lose that game. You probably didn't understand how hard it is to get there. at the time but then after that you drop off the face of a cliff because you go through a series of big experiences back to Denise's question tell us firstly the ones that you went through the big the major ones the visits to hospital because there's a couple I'm thinking of that are major because there's a high there's a high height at the end of all this but I think you had to go through this other stuff to get the last little bits of who you really are to be ready to play the role you played later so to Tell us what happened.

SPEAKER_00: 1:22:45

Yeah, I mean, I obviously wear a bit of accessories, as you're saying, on the football field. And one of the biggest ones is the glasses that I wear. And that was accumulation of something that happened after the grand final. So the first thing is in the grand final, I had someone, a brass had ripped at my eye as a bit of an incident in a contest with his hand. Yeah, it just got into my eye.

SPEAKER_05: 1:23:05

On purpose? No,

SPEAKER_00: 1:23:06

he's just going for the ball. It's just these things happen. And I didn't think of anything at the time. You know, you're in the grand final. you say just play through it this is an incredible experience get through the game and all the best you know and then we get into the next season and you know I had a really bad eye injury where a player in a rock contest had stuck his finger and got actually like behind my eye and it was one of those there's a poke in the eye and there's like a real kind of trauma to the eye and it happened I started seeing all these dots flying everywhere my vision was totally different out of my left eye and I'm going this is a bit odd but I didn't feel a lot of pain so I was like I'll just fight through this you know and I got to halftime and I walk into the change rooms and I go to the doctor. I say, hey, I've been poking the eye before. This is a different feeling. This is not the same as it's happened before. And I said, can you just check this out real quick? So he pulls me into the doctor's room while everyone else is doing the line meetings and stuff. And he kind of, I don't know if you've ever been to a doctor and something traumatic kind of happens. There's a bit of a different feel in the room all of a sudden. And I remember sitting there and he looks at my eye and he just kind of like goes a bit quiet and he says, I was like, yeah, we all good, you know? He's like, no. He's like, we're going straight to the hospital. You're done for the day. I was like, no, I'm fine. I feel all right. There's no pain or anything. He goes, no, this is a lot more serious than you realize. We need to go straight to the hospital. At that point, he put me in the back of a car. We drove to the Eye and Ear Hospital on a Sunday afternoon. I'm in full kit still, just sitting in the hospital room, just hanging out. They give me a full test and stuff done. They do it for both eyes. The guy comes back and he goes, man, I've got some really bad news. I said, yeah, just lay it on me. He goes, you've had half your retina detached like half your eyes essentially you know open and then I said oh man like okay like and as a football player what does that mean you go okay what's next you know what's next let's move on come on like what passes the past can't change it move on like what can we do to fix the future he goes I need to tell you something else and I said yeah what's that and he goes well you know this eye obviously is really damaged but your other eye which is your good eye also has a detachment in it and I said what are you talking about and so I was poking that eye he goes now like both your eyes are seriously damaged you need to get some proper help. And it was kind of a bit of a humbling, sour moment. It was the other eye that Barass got. Yeah, and I was ignorant to that at the time until the other one happened and I realized, I guess, the seriousness of both of them and what was going on in that moment. So from there, you essentially go, okay, I went from that morning be totally okay to that night realizing that I need to have surgery on both my eyes and I'm going to go through a very, very dark time and trial in my life. to be able to try to get one of my senses back. And we all use eyesight every single day and we're very fortunate to have it and we rely on it quite a bit. And I was just putting my full faith in these doctors to be able to bring it back. And so to give you a bit of context around it, the first surgery was put a heavy liquid in there and then I had to spend two weeks and for those two weeks, every hour I could spend 45, sorry, I could spend 15 minutes of that hour walking around, going to the bathroom, something like that, but I had to spend 45 minutes of every hour for two weeks straight on my back facing the ceiling in a position that I couldn't move and in a dark room I couldn't do anything else

SPEAKER_04: 1:26:23

that's insane

SPEAKER_00: 1:26:26

it sounds like saying the words doesn't sound too much but to sit there for two weeks that's 24 lots of an hour every day it was essentially bed ridden and at that point I didn't have family over here I didn't have I had a decent friendship group and I still do Like, I've got some amazing friends that really look after me and they kind of came over and stuff. And, you know, you lose your eyesight. Like, I didn't have any sight whatsoever. And, you know, the thoughts go through your head in this dark room of going, like, am I ever going to see again? Like, am I ever going to play football again? There's all these kind of questions you start questioning about your life. Thinking I should have

SPEAKER_05: 1:26:59

taken the job and sat

SPEAKER_00: 1:27:00

in the office job. A hundred percent, yeah. So in

SPEAKER_06: 1:27:03

that recovery phase, you had lost your vision, is that right?

SPEAKER_00: 1:27:05

Totally lost my vision. Couldn't see anything. Like, you'd pick up your phone. I couldn't answer phone calls because I didn't know who it was. Couldn't see what was on the phone. And everything was just completely... like blur and it's just like nothing was visible and um you know you kind of go okay well hopefully this gets better you know and for those two weeks you know you have all these negative thoughts and all these things coming into your head and um you know it's a very tough time and i talk about eddie previously with the christmas stuff like one thing that you know i have incredible respect for him during that time was like there was not a ton of people that reached out during that experience but eddie being one of the most busy people i've ever met he was the one person that consistently checked in on me i felt like every single day asking me like can i do anything can and food can I like stop over and just check in on you whatever it was and it was that little effort that meant a lot for me at that time in that dark period of knowing that someone looks after you and knows doesn't know the extent probably of what's going on but just still wants to make sure you're okay and that's something that will forever I think like connect us and I'm forever grateful and we'll forever have that experience to have that connection with them yeah and I understand like you know he's he's had some everyone's got their opinion of the man and stuff but like my person personal experience going through that kind of stuff and having someone like that support me has, I feel like, bonded myself and him for life and it's something I'm extremely grateful in those really dark times.

SPEAKER_04: 1:28:24

So take us into Ruptured Spleen.

SPEAKER_05: 1:28:28

So Kenneth, so the eyes, the vision has obviously come back. You're not wearing glasses. I thought you wore little goggles because I used to play netball and I wear glasses, so you know, prescription. So I thought you were wearing prescription goggly things that we wear in sports. So you're not wearing prescription goggles you're wearing something to protect your eyes

SPEAKER_00: 1:28:46

yeah so I mean the way this all kind of panned out was the AFL you can imagine it's a bit weird doing something that someone's never done before right and I tried all these contacts out nothing was fitting and got to this point it was kind of a determinant point in my career of saying like you got to fix this you can't mark a footy without seeing and like I was playing games at that time during COVID and stuff and I was playing games where I couldn't see the ball over 10 meters in front of me I would just body up the person hopefully that he's reading the ball well and then would try to take a mark whenever it came 10 minutes or 10 meters in front of me so there was that whole thing which was like kind of crazy within itself trying to play like that and I got to this point I said man like you're never going to have a career doing this like you need to make a decision and wearing glasses was not something anyone ever did in football you know and it's not you know I mean people judge you and people are going to say those things and make fun of you and all this kind of stuff that comes with it right like there is that critique of people and I remember it was a very nervous thing to go out and like present yourself with these things on in the middle of training everyone's looking at you going is this is this a joke because I

SPEAKER_05: 1:29:50

wear glasses at all never as a child but I would never wear my glasses playing netball and I shoot and my husband was like I think you need to you know do something your eye because he's like I was like I play really well and I'm not playing at your level anyway found out that you know obviously how much better I was when I was wearing glasses but I saw you those and I was like okay I'll get

SPEAKER_00: 1:30:07

a lot of people didn't it and that's I think that's one of the most beautiful thing that things that's come from it so you know I I took this risk to do this that no one had really done before and you know and it's a bit of like a bullying kind of sense that it can come with this right to people that do wear glasses whenever they play or train or even in life and you know I decided to kind of go through that that kind of bullying from the media the bullying from other people and stuff like that oh of course yeah from

SPEAKER_05: 1:30:32

the media

SPEAKER_00: 1:30:32

the media didn't understand why they thought I was just doing something because I thought it was fashionable and I was like mate I've had both my eyes ripped out like yeah and you had two different shades on these glasses you need to be

SPEAKER_04: 1:30:42

lens slightly different to be able to help you counter the lights so you could see

SPEAKER_00: 1:30:47

so I've had my left eye looks a bit different on my right because my pupil doesn't constrict anymore because of the surgeries you can probably see it looks like you know I've had a bit of a big night so but yeah it's a bit of effect that's going to stick with me for the rest of my life so I have to have one that's a bit darker than one that's a bit lighter and then you know there's correction in each one of them I've even gone to the people at Oakley headquarters over in California and talked to them about this and what I do and you know shared ideas back forth and stuff like that and you know that first part of wearing and was quite nerve-wracking and kind of like you know judgmental i guess of like how are people going to take this you know like this is a different look and like didn't really know and you know you fight through that kind of negativity and then it kind of became okay this is just part of him this is the part of the visual of what he looks like now and people started to understand you start telling stories on podcasts of what you've been through and they're like oh my gosh this is way more than i actually i had no

SPEAKER_05: 1:31:38

idea i thought you just wore glasses and that's what you did and i don't like contacts i was like oh he doesn't doesn't like contacts so he wears these I had no idea of the story

SPEAKER_00: 1:31:46

yeah so there's a lot more that kind of goes back to it but the beauty I'll go back to the beauty of it is I think like once I kind of started wearing him like AFL games and stuff I started having so many parents like reaching out at Auskick clinics or on social media wherever it was and they're like my kid now has someone to look up to at the highest level that is doing the same thing and wearing these glasses and he's always been picked on and like always kind of felt like he was the odd person out or she was the odd person out and now they have someone to be a role model for them at the highest level. And it was kind of this beautiful thing that came out of something I didn't expect. And I'm super grateful, and every time I see a kid wearing glasses, I always go over to him and be like, you look cool, man. You look cool, brother. But I think that was kind of one of the beautiful things out of taking a risk and doing something different than someone else that no one had really done before. And the beauty, there is backlash that comes with it, but I think once you get past all that, there's a bit of light at the end of the tunnel and beauty within it.

SPEAKER_05: 1:32:43

And you need to be able to see when you're playing.

SPEAKER_00: 1:32:45

That does help, yes. And you need to be able to see

SPEAKER_04: 1:32:47

after you're playing too. You know, you want the rest of your life. Yeah, yeah. Mate, you've made a lot of lemons out of lemonade, that's for sure. Sorry, lemonade out of lemons. The spleen. So the spleen, just go to that because I want to sort of wind you up and go somewhere with this finish here. But

SPEAKER_00: 1:33:03

yeah, that was big too. That was pretty wild, yeah. So that was, I think it was 2023 when we played in the grand final. So yeah, we're playing Port Adelaide MCG. I think we're beating them by like 40 or 50 points at a time and I kind of was running on the field and had someone come up to me and kind of lower the body to kind of like check me. Yeah, hip and shoulder, man. I tried to kind of match him and he got me in this spot and as soon as it hit me, I go, oh geez, what's going on there? And it was this like neural pain through my whole body and I needed to kind of essentially expel from the top and bottom half of me at the same time and I was just like, what in the world was that? Like I've broken ribs, I've done all these injuries, I've never had this feeling before. I'm sitting there, I run around, of course, the next contest comes, a ball comes flying into you. You sit there like aching in pain going, I'm just going to throw my body at this thing. And, you know, I get off. At one point, you know, I play for the next four or five minutes. I call myself off and I said, man, something's wrong. Like something's going wrong. I don't know what it is. And they kind of look at you and they're like, no, no, you'll be all right. Like just kind of keep, I just play through it. We'll figure it out later. You might, I think you just have a broken rib. I was like, oh, okay. So I played through the rest of the game and stuff. Didn't play as many minutes and stuff. I played through the rest of the game. That's Dermot

SPEAKER_06: 1:34:07

Brereton stuff

SPEAKER_00: 1:34:08

right there. It's stupid. And you look at people like Christian Petrarca who had it last year and it's like I kind of reached out to him and I was like man like look after yourself like make sure this is not something to kind of try to fight through this is like serious stuff and yeah so I played the rest of the game and then you know I go back to the rooms and like oh I think you just have a bit of a bruised rib go home just relax and stuff so I went relaxed and I woke up on Sunday morning I said you know something's wrong I don't feel like something's right like I'm still in quite a bit of pain I'm starting to get this like bloating in my abdomen I never had that before and I was like what is going on and I said I didn't ask the doctor for an x-ray I told him I'm getting an x-ray today like I'm going in and so I went and got a CT scan and stuff and I mean this is probably something I don't know how much of a legalities around this I can tell but essentially they came back and said yeah you're good you just have a bruised rib and I said okay all right you know it's an x-ray I trust an x-ray you know and so and x-rays

SPEAKER_05: 1:35:04

more bones too

SPEAKER_00: 1:35:05

yeah x-ray CT scan I can't remember what it was it was a scan of some sort yeah yeah and I just I was like man something just doesn't feel right but okay like I trust the people that are you know in the system and so I go back and you know we've got about five days till our next game I think we're playing Richmond actually on a Friday night and you know we get to Wednesday and I hadn't done the main training and you know I'm sitting there and they're like hey we gotta make sure you can actually get through this pain to be able to play if you're gonna play on Friday so so Thursday we came up with this plan we said okay we're gonna do a bit of like a captain's run you're gonna run around do a few up downs do a few ruck drills kind of bash bodies a bit and we're just gonna pump you full of painkillers and a pain patch and everything else we're just gonna try to get you to fight through this kind of broken rib so I was like okay so I went out and I did that you know and I went through all this kind of stuff and then you know I walked off and said all right cool like I'll fight through it I'll get through it but it's gonna be a long day I might need a few more rests than normal but I'll be able to get through the game and he goes yeah no worries I said I just want to bring something up it's a bit weird but I've got this like weird kind of neural pain in my shoulder and he kind of was like oh that's a bit odd like that's kind of different so then he goes oh we'll check the scans again so he goes back to the scans and The scans show that I've got a lacerated spleen that's been internally bleeding for the last five days.

SPEAKER_06: 1:36:16

Bleeding internally, pouring it into your abdomen.

SPEAKER_00: 1:36:21

What are you talking about? He goes, it all makes sense now. You've got the abdomen stuff and everything that's going on. I was just like, what the hell? Same thing. As an athlete, you go, okay, what's next? How do I fix this? What's next? How do we keep moving forward? He goes, we're going to talk to a spleen doctor and stuff. I call the spleen doctor. He comes straight into the Epworth, chat to him for a over the last 24 hours and 48 hours and five days.

SPEAKER_05: 1:36:45

And

SPEAKER_00: 1:36:46

I said, like, you know, I've pumped full of anti-bleed tablets. You know, I've had, you know, painkillers. I've had a pain patch, you know, and I'm trying to fight through it. And then I did some up-downs and running around. And he goes, you've done the exact opposite of what I'm going to tell you to do for the next 24 hours. And I was like, what do you mean? He goes, I'm going to give you this piece of paper. This has a phone number on it. If you feel like you're about to pass out, hand this to the next closest person to you and tell them to call that number and send you to that hospital. And I said, what do you mean? He goes, well, if someone calls the hospital because you passed out and they send you to the Epworth, they don't have a trauma ward to be able to deal with internal bleeding and a lacerated spleen. They're going to have to send you over to the Alfred, and that might take 30 minutes of just transit that you waste, and that might be your life. And I was just like, sorry, what? And he's like, yeah, this is, like, the fact that you're kind of around right now and, like, just doing this stuff is ridiculous. Like, you shouldn't be in a bed. Like, you shouldn't be doing anything, you know? And he goes, I'm going to talk to the spleen people in the morning. We're going to have a conversation and see kind of where we go forward with this, you So I said, okay. He said, do not stay alone tonight. I live alone. He said, do not stay by yourself. Something happens. You need to have someone there. So I think I stayed at a friend's house. Someone stayed at mine, whatever it was. And I get to the next morning. I'm in a meeting with the club. I'm just kind of chilling. I get this call from the spleen doctor. And he goes, what are you doing? I said, I'm at the club right now. He goes, I had talked with the doctors. How quickly can you get to the hospital? I said, probably 30 minutes or something. He goes, cool. See you in 30 minutes. So I just go to my car, get in the car, drive to the hospital. Before I knew it, I was in the gown. I was put on this tag. and it's like essentially a cross on the table and you got this big x-ray machine over your chest and then you got your arm out to one side and then you got this TV and it shows the live insides of what you are inside. So you've got this live version of x-ray of like your internal organs. You got your arm out there and it cuts your artery and starts feeding this wire. This wire through your body. You're awake for this whole thing. Starts feeding this wire through your artery all the way into your chest, all the way into your chest. It's like two meters long. This thing's insane. And then he gets to the point into the spleen. He finally works his way into the spleen. He goes, you'll feel a bit of pressure. And I said, okay. So then he puts this coil in my spleen and what he's done is he's essentially killed off the availability of blood flow to that part of the spleen and that's the part that was lacerated. So he puts that coil in and he starts stripping it back out of your wrist and you're sitting there watching this whole thing live on the television next to your head. I wouldn't

SPEAKER_04: 1:39:02

be watching

SPEAKER_00: 1:39:03

it but anyway. You're in amazement. This is a medical marvel. Are you kidding me? And the guy's just looking and he goes, you're the 12th person I've done today. Wow. You say today. Today. He goes, I do that many of these a day. I don't even, you know, it's just part of the job. Motorbike accidents. Crazy to me. And I'm sitting there going, this is the most insane thing I've ever experienced. So I go through that. He pulls out, you know, the wire and everything else out of you. And then you stay overnight. And then the next morning you get up and he's like, you know, you essentially can't do anything for eight weeks. He's like, I don't even want you to get like a sweat on. I don't want you to go to anything more than a walk. Like chill out for like seven or eight weeks. And I said, well, what's going to happen? with all this blood. I had like two liters of blood that was sitting in my abdomen, just sitting there. I said, what happens to the blood? He goes, look, the body will magically just soak it all up, go back into your bloodstream, wherever it is, and then you'll start feeling a bit better in a week's time. So for seven weeks, I did nothing. Just sat there and just watched everyone train.

SPEAKER_04: 1:39:57

This is in the premiership year, right? This

SPEAKER_00: 1:39:59

is the premiership year. And I

SPEAKER_04: 1:40:00

remember sending you a message that I spoke to you about recently because I had this little, like a little, almost like a vision. I saw you winning the premiership as the Ruckman, like you're in the center or whatever. And I was like, whoa. And I sent you a text message saying, hey, mate, everything's going to work out. I've seen it. Life's going to

SPEAKER_00: 1:40:18

be okay.

SPEAKER_04: 1:40:19

Life's going to be okay. I've seen it. You're still alive, barely, but you're still alive. It's all going to work out. I've seen it because I was like, wow, how's it going to end up there? I didn't say much in the message, but I saw it really clearly, saw the vision really clearly. So take us forward because we've got to wrap up. But if we come into all of a sudden now, after all these things you've been through in this unlikely story, you're the starting Ruckman for the premiership for the grand final with the development coach is now the head coach. The kid that kicked the ball to you for the very first goal is now your captain. And Geordie Degoe is now the star. And you're lining up for that game. It's

SPEAKER_00: 1:41:05

a bit serendipitous.

SPEAKER_04: 1:41:06

It's so serendipitous. It's so magical. It's so beautiful. It's so divine. You've affected, impacted so many people. Before we touch on that, you know, round this off, tell us about those moments. Tell us about, you know, that game and the finish of that game when that siren goes.

SPEAKER_00: 1:41:25

Well, it's funny you go from this injury early in the year and then you play a few games and then you actually get dropped to the VFL. So before I even played finals, I think it was maybe four games before we started our finals campaign, five games, I got dropped to the VFL and had that very honest and open conversation with Craig at the time. and you know he said look I have full belief in you that you're going to come back and be better than ever and we just need you to go back and kind of find some bit of form and that's a tough thing as a player and as a coach to give you know as feedback but you know make it back into the team towards the back end of that kind of five game period and then make it all the way to the grand final and yeah like to me you know it's like I talk about it's all about the experience and the journey and everything that's kind of come with it and it's such an incredible like I'm so lucky to still have these people involved in my life and still have these people like I'm still kind of having this experience with and then to be able to have the biggest stage and everything else included like Darcy Moore in our first grand final wasn't even allowed to play like he was I think he was injured at the time and now to see him as the captain you know and then like all the stuff that comes with it and then like before the game you know you do the parade and he like holds up the cup and it's like I'm like looking at all this I'm like wow

SPEAKER_04: 1:42:31

five years after the last grand final

SPEAKER_00: 1:42:32

yeah I was like man this is incredible like we were all young in that first grand final experience now we're kind of like a bit more of an experienced group that's played together for a while and yeah just I think like for myself I was like man this is uh an incredible opportunity and there's those moments you know maybe it's the you know you start a new business or you you know do something else for the first time you're like oh wow like this is it like this is kind of that turning moment right like this is an opportunity I don't want to take for granted I want to make sure I enjoy it the most and um yeah I think like going through that day it was uh it was just so cool to be able to see how much it meant to so many people like

SPEAKER_04: 1:43:09

you're sharing the ruck with Darcy Cameron

SPEAKER_00: 1:43:11

who's another incredible story. Great story. But

SPEAKER_04: 1:43:13

you're bouncing around and this means so many stories. There's so much to so many people.

SPEAKER_00: 1:43:19

Yeah. And I think there's, as a Ruckman, you kind of get that first chance to make a statement. That's a pretty cool experience to be in a grand final, be the first experience of it, you know? I don't know if I actually won the first set. I can't remember now, but there's something cool about being like the start of something, right? Like you start, you know, a contest, you start the ball in the middle or you know stoppage around the ground or wherever it is and sometimes being a ruck is a bit of a thankless job I'll be honest with you but to me I've always enjoyed more seeing other people be successful than myself especially towards you know this time in my career whereas I can be if I can help someone else get more touches in the game or if I can help someone else to score like I get more enjoyment out of that than scoring myself now just kind of like a weird experience I feel like and yeah I think like being a ruckman in the premiership and having that faith for my coach to do that is incredible and there's a there's a moment you know the way we played to give a bit of background is like you know I would play for a chunk in the middle and then you know at the very end of the quarter I would come off for like four minutes you know and that was kind of it and I would sit in the bench for the last chunk and I would see us finish a game and we had when I think like seven or eleven games or something like that within like six points it was like crazy like we're winning all these close games I was always like on the bench watching it you know and you kind of feel that like oh I can't do anything but I'm like there and you know like you're like oh it's out of my hands back

SPEAKER_04: 1:44:42

on that Back on that bench

SPEAKER_00: 1:44:42

again. Yeah, back on that bench again. And in that grand final, I remember at one point we had kind of kicked the goal and there was about four minutes left. And I was thinking, all right, my job's kind of done. I'll get pulled off here. And I kind of look over to the interchange and I don't see my number up there. And I'm kind of going, okay, that's a bit odd. I guess we'll go for another minute or so and see how we go. And we kicked another goal, I think it was, and I looked over and my name still wasn't up there. And I think I just had this realization in the time. I was like, oh. snap like he's putting full faith in me to finish this game out like stop looking it's done yeah like you're gonna be the rockman for the rest of this game like give it everything you can possibly do empty everything out of the tank so it was kind of that beautiful moment of like feeling like someone genuinely goes hey I'm putting my full faith in the fact that you can get this job done

SPEAKER_04: 1:45:34

well

SPEAKER_00: 1:45:35

and

SPEAKER_04: 1:45:35

after that whole story

SPEAKER_00: 1:45:36

it's a beautiful kind of thing to like feel that and then to know that probably in the in the time that feeling of that and looking over there and just you know knowing that you're part of that group that is the most trusted to finish the job and there's something cool about that and it was something I probably didn't experience as much throughout the year and then to be in that the biggest moment on the biggest stage to then be trusted in that moment to be able to perform is something that you know you just you don't take for granted you go shit like that's that's pretty incredible like pretty cool to say that you know you can be part of that that group in the middle that you know is trusted to get the job done

SPEAKER_05: 1:46:12

and thank goodness that you saw it that way I imagine there would be some fear like everything you've been through it's scary to go and play after you've had such major injuries such serious things you know this is impacting your body your physical function

SPEAKER_00: 1:46:28

yeah I think the day before I was sitting there and I was doing my laundry or something I remember just having a moment I go in 24 hours your life's going to change in one way or the other

SPEAKER_02: 1:46:39

you're

SPEAKER_00: 1:46:40

either going to be super happy you're going to go with man I went from zero literally never hearing of the sport to then winning a championship and being on top of the mountain or you could go to being extremely depressed again saying I had two chances at this and I missed both of them

SPEAKER_02: 1:46:53

and

SPEAKER_00: 1:46:54

it was that kind of moment of like life's going to change pretty quickly and like try to make the most of tomorrow and try to get some sleep tonight first of all but like understand that tomorrow is going to be a massive day in your life that you'll never forget and it's cool I mean it's stressful It's everything else. But to challenge yourself allows you to have these experiences that you'll never forget and that kind of shape you as a person. If you never challenge yourself, you just continue in the same direction and trajectory and you never grow as a person or anything like that. But to be able to put yourself in hard situations and hard instances that you have to really fight through or really kind of push yourself to be able to be successful at, it changes you and it morphs you into a person that can be able to handle adversity and everything else better going forward. And I think looking at the things I've been through and the experiences I've had me as the person that met Trevor there the mantra over on Jolly Mont is a totally different person to the person I am today and that's a lot of it is the experiences I've experienced in AFL outside of AFL the trials and tribulations I've had the ups and downs of the roller coasters and everything else that's kind of shaped me as the person I am now that I like to think I'm a way better well-rounded person that understands life a lot better than I ever thought I would and now I'm extremely comfortable in my own skin doing my own thing and that was something I just never had before

SPEAKER_04: 1:48:13

mate you know I love you you know and my family it's mutual thank you buddy such an honor to have you with us today I just think the story of you know they talk about the magic happening outside the comfort zone I think that's why there's been so magic because you've been so much magic because you've been so far outside of the comfort zone Craig Fly often says to me people will not know how incredible Mason's story is until he's finished because until they've stop and reflect back they won't stop judging and assessing him and when they look back they'll go holy crap look what he did under our noses the whole time we were actually critiquing him because it's amazing you know you're a big game player big game human you know you do amazing things you come back from the deepest stuff we're going to we'll send you off with some future lab products because for your longevity you know but we'll also get them

SPEAKER_02: 1:49:06

approved so we've got a few more years you've got to keep playing

SPEAKER_00: 1:49:07

with Craig McCray we'll get them approved through Joe I keep telling Fly I was like feel free whenever you're ready to sign the contract

SPEAKER_04: 1:49:11

So we're going to set you up for your longevity. But tell us a question we ask everybody to finish off. With all this incredible wisdom that we're all discovering, if we're able to give you an extra 10, 15, 20 years of incredible health and incredible life force at the end of what you would consider life to be, so maybe into your 80s or 90s or whatever, why would you want that? What would you do with an extra 10, 15, 20 years of growth? right health

SPEAKER_00: 1:49:43

continue what I'm doing I think like I just I'm just enjoying life like I never expected to be here never anticipated anything like that and I feel like I've lived 20 lifetimes in the last 10 years like I really have and if I can continue to do that like and continue to be happy and continue to form connections with amazing people like yourself like it's what life's all about like we're people that love connection human beings love connection and I think that's what brings us joy and happiness and if I can do that for as many people along the way as possible, then I feel like I'm living a fulfilled life.

SPEAKER_02: 1:50:16

Sounds good. The little

SPEAKER_04: 1:50:17

Texan, hey? Little Texans, he's grown. Little Texans, be coming there. Thank you so much for

SPEAKER_05: 1:50:25

sharing your story. I had no idea. As I said, I've seen all the tape and I see all these things, but even for someone that thinks I sort of follow footy-ish, maybe not as strongly as some others, you know, just have no idea what people are going through. And I kind of knew your story. I was like, oh, this guy's come from the US and he played basketball, Never really stopped to think about it, but I feel honoured that I was able to hear all that and, you know, just amazing what you've been through. So I'm looking forward to watching you on the screen now and going, I know him.

SPEAKER_00: 1:50:52

I know him a little bit better than most people.

SPEAKER_05: 1:50:54

We're best friends now, like you and Trev.

SPEAKER_04: 1:50:56

Thank you so much. That's been great.

SPEAKER_00: 1:50:57

No, thanks so much for having me on the platform.

SPEAKER_04: 1:51:00

And I'll see you for work tomorrow, mate. Sounds good. For your birthday.

SPEAKER_00: 1:51:03

That's it. Happy birthday for tomorrow. Happy birthday. I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_04: 1:51:06

Thank you, Mason Cox.