S3E45 · Jake Lever

Jay Cleaver, welcome to the Virtus. Podcast. Thank you very much for having me. I'm actually looking forward to this. It's good to have you here. We've wanted to get you on since you first walked into our facility. I think after the 2021 premiership with you and six of your premiership teammates. Ever since then we've wanted to get you on so we appreciate you coming and you know taking your time. Thank you very much. Yeah I love this place to be honest. It's every time I drive into the car park. It's a bit of my sanctuary. I like to, you know, I love training obviously.

I'm a bit of a footy enough but also I just love the physical side of the game. So in terms of training, I hate going into the club in the off season. It's actually one of my pet hates and I think the physio and the strength and conditioning you know staff they know that because when they ask me to see me in the off seasons it's usually a flat out no. I just tell them that I'm there for nine months of the year so you can see me then but yeah they normally have to come

and try and find me from you know somewhere like this because yeah I absolutely love this place and I love going to other gyms and and seeing what they provide and yeah it's just a different atmosphere rather than being at the footy club all the time. Thanks for the pump up. I didn't even have to bait you there. Just straight into it. What's been your favorite thing about training at Virtus? Or favorite thing, actually it's funny because you know a lot of footballs talk about you know having a gym at home and and you know

post footy what are you going to do you're going to try and set up a gym at your house and all that and ever since I've come here I've always said that no I just want to be at the local gym with that community feel and every time I walk in it's funny every time I walk in I've got my air pods and I never ever put them in like I walk in and think to myself you know I've got to really focus today and and put them in and it's always like I get chatting

to someone and then it's like a 20-minute conversation and then I might you know start talking to Lockie or or you or someone else and it's like it's amazing how much like a 45-minute gym session almost takes me an hour and a half to do when I'm here but I actually love that part of it because I think sometimes as a footballer especially me when I talk to people you know I would say out in the wild out in the community I sort of always am a little bit reserved on potentially like what they want

from me and it's a really bad habit that I've got what do you mean by that it's almost like I go into the conversation I guess they know who I am and then potentially it might be oh can I get a signed footy jumper can I get that and it's like it's probably like it probably happened to me once in a hundred times but ever since that moment it's like you're always a little bit reserved and you know you never want to put your foot in anything so when someone asks you a almost a controversial

question you're always a little bit more reserved on what you want to say but as I said when I come here it's like I'm just you know Jake lever the person it's never about footy when I come here as well like it might be a little bit about training but then it's you know how are my kids what am I doing you know chatting to some of the other people that work out here it's always about you know what they're doing for work what I want to do after footy like it's actually quite amazing that

it hasn't really been you know something that I've said to you guys that I don't want to talk about footy it's just sort of happened naturally and it's definitely something that I love doing yeah we've appreciated you having here and I'm sure our members have appreciated having you and your presence in the gym so good to be back playing footy like you you've had a few weeks off yes yes no absolutely so yeah I was pretty lucky this pre-season to be honest last year you know you go back to the 2021 season you know that

was obviously an amazing experience and then I never thought I'd be like this but almost yeah in the off season of 2021 going into the 2022 season it's actually really hard to train I guess as an individual athlete you know as yourself you have these goals of what you want to achieve in your career and for me as a team like I just wanted to win a you know premiership that is number one focus on any like it doesn't matter if you're talking to a first year player or you know someone that's been at the

footy club for 15-20 years like it's about winning a premiership but then you've also got your individual stuff that you want to achieve in your career and for me like I just thought to myself you know I just want to be an all Australian premiership backman and I felt like I had the capabilities to do that and it's funny that in 2021 I'd literally achieved all those things and I probably just didn't have the motivation that I normally would have and it's funny it's the first time you know that I've ever experienced it in terms

of you go to training after you know two weeks after the grand final and you've won and you love that feeling of winning the grand final but you go god like what more do I like I've done well you've ticked it off I've ticked it off and it's funny like not until it's almost like you play your first bad game after the grand final as an individual as a team until you go oh god like how good is winning so yeah it's funny like I go back to those days of like coming in I didn't

really have much motivation but yeah in terms of in terms of the the gym and everything like it is a little bit of a sanctuary for me and I do getting away I do enjoy getting away from footy and this place definitely provides me with that yeah I love it like is it do you almost forget how hard they are to win now that you have been at the top yeah yes that was the big reflection last year you win it and then you come back and then we're 10 and 0 and we're probably not

playing great footy as a team we're sort of just playing well and you could sense sort of the feeling of oh you know when are we going to click into gear you know we've got another level to go when can we play better when are we going to play better and it's it's funny because I reflect on that time and I think it was a massive missed opportunity for us as as players and and me sort of being a leader of the footy club I just don't think we realized how hard it was to win

and not every week you have to be this dominant side that you know absolutely flogs everyone and you know we should win by 50 60 70 points every week because reflecting back to the 2021 the three finals that we played against Brisbane um Geelong and Bulldogs were probably the best three games that a side has ever played in a row it was huge it was like Brisbane we'd beaten by 40 points but we should have beaten them by more like we just couldn't score that night and then the Geelong game was max he was yeah

I don't even he was kicking goals playing on snapping them from the boundary and the right like it was outrageous um and then the grand final obviously there was ebbs and flows in the game but from geez it would have been 10 minutes in the third quarter like I don't even know what I think it was like 96 to 4 or something that we'd scored like it was crazy and you you reflect on that and you go that's how we have to play all the time now and then you get as I said 10 rounds

into the season you're 10 and 0 and if you had told me that we were 10 at the start of the year you would have been like oh wow like how is this here yep absolutely give us 10 and 0 but you could sense around the footy club that it was it was almost like oh geez it almost felt like a five and five team like you're like we're there but we're not playing our best footy but I just thought it was a massive missed opportunity we're talking about a lot that it is so hard

to win an afl footy now um when I first got into the league in I think my first year was 2015 there was honestly some games where you were like we're gonna win but it just depends on how much like when I was at Adelaide like we were a pretty good side when I first rocked up it was like if you went and played like when we played Gold Coast when they first started to come in it was like we're either gonna win by like 40 maybe 80 and if we play really well we're 100

so but like there is nothing like that anymore like it doesn't matter if you play like the bottom sides now like North Melbourne West Coast Hawthorne like on their day they like they play some genuinely good footy and if you're five ten percent off like they can actually like roll you and you're like wow so every week's so challenging um so as I said like I think last year we just didn't take you know I'd think about my individual mindset of like not being able to get motivated and a lot of people might have been

like that there's definitely some guys that just love playing footy all the time and they can find that internal motivation and um they want to be great and so do I but it was funny that it's sort of then filtered into the season of not actually taking um those 10 wins that we had in a row um for what they were and they were tough hard wins um and then I think that's where it's sort of our season did derail a little bit last year. Where did you find the motivation from then this year what made you pick it back up?

Yeah I think it's uh failure like um you know you see all these amazing quotes about failing and how it you know drives success and you're sort of reading you go oh yeah but it's not until you actually do and obviously going out in straight sets was super disappointing but it's funny like my body wasn't holding up last year like how I wanted it to um and it started from pre-season I had a little bit of plantar fasciitis um which to be honest I was I think it was like the week before we went back

and it was like you know I wake up in the morning it was a bit sore and I'd limp around for a bit but like as a football like it's not like I wake up every day and bounce out of bed like I'm sore I'm stiff like my back sore legs sore foot sore whatever it is but this was sort of just hanging around and um I end up snapping it like literally three days before round one so like I was you know trying to persist with it over pre-season and it'd sort of be like

Monday would be all right Wednesday no good Friday all right and then like it would be the opposite next week like it was just very tricky um and I end up snapping it like three days before round one which in the short term 2023 this is no this is 2022 yeah 2022 um and which short term terrible thing like I can't walk like that and it was funny like they tried to get me up for round one uh like three days after snapping it and they were like we did the captain's run which is a

day before the game session and they're like oh all right we'll just get you to start and like I did an a skip and I couldn't do it like I'm like I can't play like um so I end up having like a couple of weeks off and then just the whole season like was sort of yeah just I was chasing my tail a lot I end up I end up having a stress fracture in my foot for the last six weeks trying to play um and I was it was okay like I was out there

and and I'm sort of of the thought that once you cross the white line you're 100% fit you're ready to go but it's funny when there's a number of your teammates that are in the similar boat to you um it's just it's too hard to win especially in finals so um as I said failing um coming back that preseason it's funny like after the grand final I had two weeks off running and probably a week of that I was still at the gym like like week of celebrations and I got back to Melbourne um obviously

because it was in Perth and you know I was already at the gym like doing stuff but it was sort of like I was forcing myself to do that and I remember this pre-season so obviously we went out in the second week of finals and I promised myself I said I'm not going to do anything for four weeks like go to the gym in like the third to fourth week but that was genuinely just to make myself feel a little bit better that's funny because I remember that's a conversation we had in after the 2021

premiership no sorry in 2022 that you reckon you come back too early from that premiership yep definitely like and that was definitely the the feeling of it like pre-season it's funny the AFL these days the industry it's like the further you go in finals you still come back the same time so you know guys that don't play finals um they come back the same time as the team that played in the grand final so it's like six weeks potentially different um holidays but as like there's only one winner so like if you are runners up

in the grand final um you're coming back the same time as the team that finish 18th you've had six weeks less break I would say and still you're probably expected because you've been runners up you're expected by the club and even like from your teammates like to come back in pretty good condition because you're ready to go and I think that's where we probably um you know I don't I don't think we stuffed up in terms of the footy club getting blokes back early but like you could see the motivation was to do it again

but it was funny like I think we peaked a little bit too early and then it was like god halfway through the year like I'm just knackered like mentally as well um that's probably the one thing that um I've been working so hard at um for probably a year and a half now ever since last year um that physically like my recovery you know most weeks you're gonna get up and play like unless you hurt yourself like your your body naturally just adapts to being sore post game and then slowly over the week building up

to the game but mentally like I don't think enough players um really worked out that oh god like you almost need to move on from that game so quickly and then actually come out whether it's mindfulness whether it's you know doing whatever helps you but being the best team from the year before it's funny like every team's hunting you so that was probably the thing that mentally we weren't able to really deal with um as a footy club especially like back half of the year um but yeah it's funny like the the way that yeah

the footy club um was able to you know do what we did in 2021 and then 2022 the difference it's funny like the motivation now this year is purely based on the failure and knowing where we can actually get to yeah good what sort of changes have been made to sort of help you and the other players sort of mentally rejuvenate and prepare for what's to come yeah good question I think um probably just having more of an awareness of it um we normally talk about you know as being at the footy club yeah you

know there's so many people doing jobs that I guess even potentially from the outside you don't see whether it's our high performance staff whether it's our um our football you know admin people working at the schedule where we're going to be and everything like that um and it's funny like it's we break it down basically to like five days six days seven day eight day breaks and potentially every now and then you get a nine day break if you play on a Friday and then play the Sunday like that's probably the most like the rarest

um but I think it's like it actually goes way more than that now like whether it's a travel um giving more time off to guys um at home because you know we've got guys now I think we've got like six or seven guys that have families um and when you go traveling and then you come back it's a lot of pressure on your partner um your family do they get to come with they do sometimes um I'm a little bit I don't know if it's old school but it's a real performance trip when you go

away and I never sort of um my wife's amazing like you know if we went away she'd most likely stay in a different hotel with the kids like we're we're pretty like she's pretty um respectful of what you sort of go there to do but as much as that like the footy club we try and spend as little time sort of away as possible um so you don't really have a lot of free time sort of you fly over there in the morning you train um you have like meetings in the afternoon you do your

recovery that sort of stuff that you'd normally do and then the next day is game day and sort of game day for everyone's different um I don't really you don't really want to compromise that with you know chasing your kids around the beach you know in the gold coast or um catching up with people that I used to you know be friends with in Adelaide like you've actually got to sort of stay focusing on the game so um my wife comes to and the kids come to you know maybe one or two away games a

year because it is good experience like and I guess like when I finally do retire I'll probably look back and you know if I don't take the kids any to any away trips I'll be like oh that's a really missed a big missed opportunity but um yeah as much as I love you know spending my time with them it is sort of pretty um it's pretty intense when you're on an away trip because you're sort of around everyone and I'm also of the of the um impression and I think that it's actually a really good

time to bond with your teammates without that because at the footy club you're there and it's and again talk about the mental side of the game you're there for like very minimal time um at the club at the club like it's it's during the year it's you know pre-season you're there all the time running and weights and whatever it is and during the year it's more about you know recovery meetings and then obviously the there's still the training side of things because I think it's important to still train but you sort of then go home

and spend time with your family like we get if it's a Saturday to Saturday game we're sort of Sunday off which has been a change from the footy club not doing a scheduled recovery because I think that blokes are pretty meticulous with their recovery now it's not like you know blokes don't know what to do like everyone knows what to do so that's Sunday sort of to rejuvenate spend time with family um yeah get a sleep in if you can that sort of stuff and then Monday we're only there for half a day Tuesday's the

exact same half a day um Wednesday's our big day our main training day and then Thursday we've got off Friday we're there for three hours um and then Saturday's game day so you can see there's a lot of time off um it's just about how you actually educate players to spend that to be able to then mentally recover because if you just sit there playing playstation it doesn't actually work yeah so um yeah it's funny like it's it's just about giving guys tools to be able to use that mental recovery because it is such an

important part yeah that's fascinating I think myself and I know a lot of other people probably would have held the assumption that it's actually the opposite during the season that you're there all the time and that was going to sort of lead into my next question sort of how do you balance that with being a father and a parent and a husband to Jess yeah I think yeah it's funny like I as I said like you get a lot of time away from the footy club um and uh talk about before like meticulous with my

recovery I'm fascinated by recovery like I absolutely love it we know you spend a good amount of time in our friends the private sea yes so I'm at the private sea um I love the float tank there yeah before the game bit of magnesium in the water and just an hour to myself so I love the float tank I've just purchased it um I won't say the amount because it was pretty expensive a sauna um at my own home um these boys have saunas now yeah so me and maxi actually got the same uh company

so they drip saunas um I think actually Ed Langdon's onto them now is that infrared or like hot stone hot stone yeah good stone so um the traditional uh finish sauna I think they're called so and I just purchased a um actually purchased a chest freezer and turned it into a uh an ice bar love it yep so I'm into that and then I've got the cold shower outside like I I love my recovery um so it's funny like as much as I'm away from the footy club like even this morning like we didn't start

till nine o'clock this morning at Casey um Casey field so it's probably 40 minute drive for me 35 minutes on a good day um and this morning like I set my you know my saunas quite fancy you can set it on your on your phone when to turn it on um yeah no it is it is pretty fancy so um I turned it on at 5 30 this morning um got up did a sauna at seven o'clock this morning um did an ice bath like did all that so as much as you are away from

the footy club like you're still spending time on you know your recovery and everything like that but talk about balance um it's funny I actually question myself now what the hell was I doing before I was a father in my spare time because right now it's like I get home from the footy club um and I love spending time with my kids and playing with them and trying to get them outdoors as much as possible you know that um because I grew up in Romsey and um my whole life I was outside um you know

I love my playstation I was great at AFL live 2007 like I was a classic I was a gun um but um I spent a lot of time kicking the footy outside loving spending you know my house had a goal posts and um you know we had a cricket net like there was a lot of stuff like I was on 15 acres um so I tried and spend that time outside with the kids as well because I wanted to give them that exposure that I had um because I really enjoyed the outdoors and um now

it's like I get to like 7 30 and the kids are in bed and I'm like just take a breath I'm like oh all right now I can relax for like an hour hour and a half and me and my wife we yes we sort of like watching tv shows and we get you know we try and watch the same ones because it's a good topic of conversation bonding um yeah it's bonding um so yeah it's funny like that balance I think my kids just give me that balance anyway um and it's a little bit

of a joke within the footy club because a lot of guys like play golf and you know all this sort of stuff and everyone just reckons that um yeah I just love being a dad like they're just always like oh what do you do yes I you just love being a dad so you just want to spend time with your kids and I do because like nearly every day off I've got swimming lessons um and Lockie obviously here um his daughter also does our same lessons that they're not the same class they're uh same same

same facility um so yeah we do swim swimming lessons on our day off my son plays oh he's doing like soccer I saw that in your story the other day yeah very cute he's uh he's loving the soccer at the minute he can't he can't get the footy at the minute he can't drop the ball onto his foot but we've got it how old is he he's only three so I should give him some I should give him some uh credit but yeah and then my daughter does dancing my son also does gymnastics so I'm

just trying to you know when I get the opportunity because I've only ever taken my daughter once to dancing and she's probably been 20 times and I've never taken my um I've never taken Jayce to gymnastics because it just my schedule doesn't work so when I get a day off um the feeling for me is like now I get to spend time with time with my kids and it's finally like you know I always go to post career and think about you know what I want to do in that and it's almost like my life

um I just want to sort of be able to watch my son and daughter do whatever they do so whether it's Jayce my son whether I get to watch him play footy on a Saturday like it's almost like I'm thinking of a job that doesn't work on a Saturday I'm like what can I do or like you know watch him at training on Thursday nights and um yeah it's funny like I I always think about that because yeah in the end like it's it's kind of what I why I play footy like um in my

first couple of years when I had Jayce so he was born in 2020 pure COVID baby like literally he was born in February and we got locked down in March so um yeah he sort of only knew me with a mask on um for his first couple of years like it's amazing like to be able to tell those kids some of these stories um Did he go up with you into the hub? He went up to the hub so he was three months old when we went up into the hub um slept in a bathroom

um for those 100 days that were there but um that's because that was the quietest room um in our in our place like we were very lucky like it's funny like we you know we're jumping around a bit here but COVID and the hub um the hub was the best three months of my life like it was awesome like it's like a living Maruchador a walk away from the beach like there's a lot of people that complain about the hub and I totally get it like it was tough like for some people they didn't have

family there and like I was super lucky that my wife and my son got to come up um but like we were a walk away from the beach one of the like the most beautiful beaches in Maruchador like um it was absolutely amazing cafe there like 25 degrees every day if there was a sprinkle of rain you'd be like what the hell is going on like it's like well everyone's stuck in lockdown here um like I actually felt terrible for people that were here and like my wife's friend my friends like it was like I

couldn't even imagine what was going on back here so I think for us like we had so much gratitude to you know one continue to play football and hopefully give people at home something to look forward to on the weekend but two like we got to live um not normally because we weren't allowed out of the resort and everything like that we weren't allowed to go to um restaurants and that the cafe couldn't go down the street like the cafe was you know there um the cafe was there um on the site on the site

where where we stayed so they moved the shipping container in one of the cafes down the road and made coffee there for us so yeah like we had a pretty good experience in the hub um but yeah again like that's probably where yeah the first two years of um Jase's life like he never really got to come to the footy and like looking back now like I just love where like this weekend 435 game perfect Jase and Scarlett my kids can come to the game like they'll be in the rooms after the game like that

is just perfect like do they love it they love it yeah yeah yeah Jase um like he's obviously the oldest Scarlett doesn't really get it she just looks for dad and yeah comes over and um you know jumps in in the song when we win um after the game that's awesome for you though oh for sure but Jase like I don't think he gets it yet um he doesn't understand why dad goes to footy training every day like he just always doesn't understand how big it is yeah every day he sort of says to me

oh have fun at training um where it's not like have fun at work like he gets that you know pop you know Jess's dad he he goes to work nanny goes to work mom obviously my Jess doesn't work but she's a teacher um so it's always like go to work but dad goes to training he's sort of like every now and then he you can see that he's confused why I go to footy training all the time um but yeah like as as you said like it's amazing to be able to see them after the

game because whether I've played shocking we've lost whatever it is it's like as soon as I see them it's like it's just like you put into perspective of of what um you're actually doing as much as I love winning and I'm competitive like once I see them it's almost like I've forgotten everything and um yeah it's it is a pretty good lifestyle that we live but um at the same time it's bloody hard sometimes and um they definitely it's funny like you talk about how much I love my family but they do take a back

seat at times like and that's why you know my wife and I like I can never not repay because you don't really repay like I don't really believe in that but the gratitude that I have especially for my wife to be able to let me do what I almost do what I want like whenever it's something to do with footy it's never a complaint it's like you know I want to go and spend an hour at the float tank in Mornington it's never like oh god you just got home from training for seven hours like

it's like everything is just yep that's fine yep that's fine like to be the best I can be um and that's why I think that um I've had a successful career so far because in the end the people that are around you like if you're if you're worried about you know doing extras or worrying about you know spending a lot of money on a sauna and an ice bath like it ends up being um too hard and you start overthinking things so um yeah I know my kids can't really tell me no anymore I know

yet so like they can't say to me no dad we want you to stay here but um I'm sure in the future like they'll get that um the only way that you're gonna get anywhere realistically is if you work hard and you do all the extras and there's a football program at our footy club but if you just do the football program you probably won't get anywhere realistically like you've got to be you've got to do way more than the program to become Clayton Oliver at our footy club like we finished two hours ago he's

probably still there doing something at the footy club he's just a freak Christian batrak at the same thing it's like he's almost got to go and like actually spend time away from the footy club because he just loves it and you know all the great players are the exact same and yeah there's a number of examples of um especially NBA you think of Kobe all the stories about him about you know what was it it was like I'll meet you there at four and they like slept four hours a night or something yeah it's like

crazy and now all it is is about oh get get more sleep get more sleep get more sleep but it's like it's funny like the blokes that actually get up early are probably the most successful so it's funny like it is definitely a balancing act but um yeah I just love playing footy for my family especially and to see their face after the game let's talk about Jess yep how did you meet her Jess I met her um so I finished school so I was born in the first four months of the year I was

born in March so I started school early um and after my bottom age football year um there was a fair chance that I was going to get drafted um and to be honest I didn't really know what I was going to do after footy um after school sorry um so I just did a um it was called an AFL Sports Ready um traineeship and what you do is basically like how I explained it was I was an assistant PE teacher so if you're the PE teacher I'd be you know I'd go set up the cones

or organize what the lesson's going to be and what class and everything and I did it at Mount Ridley College in Craigieburn which happened to be right across the road from Colter Cannons um which is that where you were playing which Colter Cannons I was playing yeah so um I actually did my knee that year but I still went to training every night because it was there and I had my license and everything I did my rehab the whole time that I was in um at Colter so basically I'd go from work straight to training

home um and then yeah so basically Jess was a teacher at Mount Ridley College and that's how we met and um yeah we would have met in probably March um and then yeah got drafted in November and then uh she came over with me to Adelaide um so big move for her yeah um yeah massive move for her really how long were you together before she moved so I was like no 10 months yep yeah nine months um yeah so it was obviously a big decision to come over but um yeah we sort of saw

um yeah I wasn't really a footballer before you know it's funny like you think to yourself oh it's not long and everything but you know I knew Jess didn't really she didn't really love me for being a footballer like she didn't even know at the start when we met like it was I'm sort of a person that I wasn't boasting too much about it and um I was just a kid that worked there and um yeah she was like first year out of uni so she would have been yeah 22 23 um and yeah we

just met through there and end up being together and then move in Adelaide like I'm so glad she came over with me because it would have been really hard um yeah just moving over by herself and I have a lot of sympathy for kids that do that now so well that was going to be my next question like yeah what pick 14 or so yep moving to Adelaide like did you move in with in with anyone or was it just you and Jess so I was actually with Paddy Dangerfield for the first month um live

with him and his wife Marty um they've got three kids now I think so and uh Jake Kelly um who plays for Essendon now who was also at Adelaide he lived with Paddy so um I moved in with them for a month and was just with you no so Jess was still so the transition period it was basically I think the draft was on like the 25th of November and so between the 25th and Christmas it would have been a month um I just stayed with Paddy because um I think you know we still do

it now and it's funny because because I learned so much from Danger and Jake Kelly especially about you know how to live um because you you're just an 18 year old kid being at school like you sort of get told what to do whereas now it's like you you're an adult and you get thrown in the deep end of like being at meetings on time eating the right things trying to cook like so you know Danger and um and Marty obviously did a lot of that for me but um even to be able to just

learn from them like it was pretty amazing it's funny like now I always put my hand up to have like a draftee kid like I've had uh James Jordan live with me um Trent Rivers and Blake Howes so they're my three little kids um little sons as I call them at the club so um yeah it's funny like to be able to just learn from them um or a guy like Paddy who was you know then best player in the competition and you know still on his day he's the best player in the competition so

um yeah that was pretty amazing but yeah then Jess moved over with me and um it was tough because like we just moved straight out Jess hadn't lived out of home I hadn't lived out of home so we get thrown into the deep end it's like every night oh crap what are we having for dinner like what are we cooking you don't even think about it yeah no and and like you know it wasn't like I could just go out and eat whatever I wanted like it was like you know you have to be a

professional athlete at the same time and Jess got a job as well she was a teacher over in Adelaide um at Blackfriars which was sort of about 30 minutes away from our house so you know like it was yeah it was it wasn't you know I'm not saying it was tough and we were living you know paycheck to paycheck or anything like that but it was like you just had to learn and you sort of just got thrown straight on the job yeah and and also like I'm then trying to prove myself at the footy

club on you know why did we take this kid we pick 14 like I wanted to play straight away and um yeah it was um it was a tough transition period but like I played pretty early like I I've sort of my career I was pretty lucky that there was actually no one in that position at Adelaide whereas I look at some of the kids now that come into Melbourne and I'm like oh man that guy's not like he's not gonna play for like he's not gonna play for like four years like it's like I

even think of it like you know a player and don't want to embarrass him but like Blake Howes like Blake Howes is an absolute gun like a like he's going to be such a good player but like for three years now he hasn't played but it's like whose spot is he taking like we've got one of the best midfielders in you know in the competition like we've got Track, Clary, Jack Viney, Tom Sparrow, James Jordan like Luke Dunstan's are still a great player like all these guys and it's like it's really hard and that that

and that's why you always talk about good clubs always lose those younger players and we saw it with like guys like Rich you know from Richmond um even Geelong when they were up and going Hawthorne like it's actually hard to keep those players because they're looking at you know I think um Blake Howes's best mate is Finn Callahan who plays at GWS he's looking at him going he's playing every week but he might be a similar or you know better player than him so he's like sitting there going like why aren't I playing but it's

it's funny like it's just where your club's at which positions are filled properly so well it's a credit to the club and the culture there to be able to retain a player like that that's not getting a gig he just wants to stay around and try and crack in absolutely and I think that we really value those players like especially in the vfl program like yeah they get a lot of pump ups and um I think it's important that players like I used to think to myself um you know when I was at Adelaide if

there was a player similar to me playing in the sandfall and he played well like I'd always be like oh shit god like he's coming for me here but um yeah now I just love like teaching young guys in our footy club like whether it's Daniel Turner um who you know he played on the weekend but um you know I used to be almost like worried about him playing well but whereas now like I just think I get so much out of actually helping him and coaching him and then as you said like then they

want to stay around then they don't want to leave and then in three years time when you know Stephen May's he's 31 now when he's 34 and he can't go on anymore like we need Daniel Turner and I need him to be able to play well so it's funny like how it you know a perfect example is Harry Petty. Harry Petty got to the club same year as me and when I first got there I was a bit like oh man these kids good like he could take my spot where it's like now it's like

I love that guy like he's like I want to play with him every week and he helps me so much so it's like yeah it's funny how um just through your career like your perspective changes on on what's important and um how much help you can give those younger guys that look up to you um without you really knowing it like you know I guess I know that I'm a leader of the club but like disco Daniel Turner he's probably watching me what I do every day to be able to then emulate that and then

hopefully that transitions to on field so yeah it's funny that how much senior players help the younger players and then therefore like they want to stay around. Take us back to living with Danja what was the biggest takeaway or learning that you took from living with him as a young guy? Yeah so um that you've then perhaps imparted onto the young guys at Melbourne? I think just like um he he had a great balance between off field and on field and whether he was at training or at home but um I was actually living with

with Danja at the time that um he was trying to lose like eight kilos and like for me being a young skinny scrawny kid like I just didn't get it like I was just like worried about like the size of him like he's massive man and like he's fit as and he's powerful and I'm like what's he need to lose eight kilos and then when he did you could see what happened and I think from then on I was like if there is something that you want to do and you work hard at it and

therefore like you achieve it like actually what it can do for you like so I think of my own game like this year like I'm I'm pretty naturally luckily pretty naturally like long distance fit like you know I think this year I've only ever come off to the bench once like I'm pretty lucky that I like a sort of like I can play out the game and I'm fine but the one thing that I'm not great at is like my agility and my speed sort of like that's not my go and I just wanted to

work on that the whole off season and if I reflect back on it it's probably what danger like that lesson is like if you just work so hard it because I work so hard at it like throughout the whole off season it was almost like my motivation was like that's what I want to be good at and then like you get back and you start training you start doing match play and then you do these other things and you're like I think it's actually working and then people start saying to you like oh my god

like wow like you're moving well like you look more like agile and you're like wow like it's funny like the lesson is that you work hard at that and you have a clear focus every single day of like what you want to achieve and what you want to do and then when it finally comes out that satisfaction is like oh nothing better it's like how good is that like I don't know I could imagine it'd be like in the gym I'm pretty lucky that I don't at the footy club we don't we're not saying that

oh you have to deadlift 200 otherwise you're not playing but I could see that like in the gym it's like you continue to get better at it and like the kilos keep going up and you know bench press 100 it's like the satisfaction is like yeah what's next yeah there's nothing more motivating than actual measured objective progress and growth definitely so there's a lot of talk about how Melbourne's like yeah it's the big footy capital and a lot of players want to get away you were in South Australia which is a huge footy capital as

well I have a theory I reckon it's arguably a bigger more intense energy because they've only got their two clubs that are like so beloved you've lived in both Melbourne and Adelaide what's your opinion on that was that a more intense energy being over there or was it a bit different oh no way more intense yeah it's funny like as you said it's people talk about Melbourne being the footy capital which I think it is because there's so many teams and so many more games and we get the grand final and everything like that but

in Adelaide like there's a small story like like I walked into Westlake shopping center like four days after I got drafted I had to go and get something and like I got asked for a photo and it's like it like I haven't even played a game yet first round draft picks here unless you're like number one you know someone like Nick Dacos like before he played like he might get a photo but it's like I was a nobody and you know like first round pick like obviously they they want good things out of you but

like it's like yeah there was like people saying hello to me in Westlake like four days after I got drafted I was like man what is this like and that was generally somewhere where like you'd go out and it's like you'd have to try and hide in the corner because otherwise like and like I'm talking like it wasn't like I was you know top five players in the comp where you know I think of someone like Max Gorn like Gorn if he goes out like I actually feel bad for him sometimes like because he's big

he's got a beard everyone knows yeah yeah so like everyone knows who he is and and he gets hassled a lot but yeah Adelaide it was like that everywhere for every player on the list like it was crazy like it was it's definitely much more intense and then obviously the year that I left like I was out of contract and I hadn't signed and like yeah there was rumors of me going back to Melbourne it was like talk about intense like that was yeah that was pretty bad yeah there's a lot of talk about booing

at the moment when you moved like it was at 28 and you moved to Melbourne did you cop in that when you went back to Adelaide and do you still cop it now yeah yeah cop the booze but I think it makes me play better so yeah did it get to you at all nah I don't think so nah my first game against Adelaide was actually in Alice Springs so lucky enough it wasn't back at Adelaide Oval but then I did eventually go back to Adelaide Oval um I think I I love playing at Adelaide

Oval so um I think the boos had justified them which I don't absolutely like I'm fine with like if a player leaves your footy club and then therefore you know they come back that's part of footy yeah but I think yeah the topic of conversation would be like the Lance Franklin one the Jason Horn Francis like that one it's just like it's almost like people just don't like getting told what to do so I don't boo it's a rebellion yeah like oh you can't tell me what to do kind of thing whereas I think this

for myself it's like that's just silly like for your booing Lance Franklin like he's honestly like I still walk past Buddy Franklin when I'm on the field I'm like this is sick this is sick like it like we had a player this year Judd McVie um absolute gun 19 year old if you had told me that he'd be playing this year last year when he was playing like I would have laughed at you like he's come so far in so little um whereas now like he's like a genuine fixture in our team like he's a

gun and he's a boy from Geraldton in Perth and we were playing Sydney this year and Stephen May was playing on Buddy and he's sort of like he's and Judd he's coming back he's walking back and you could see Judd like look he's like looking at thing and he like looks down and he like looks at him again amazing he's like yes Judd that's Buddy Franklin now go and go and stand on that guy like so it's it's funny like it's like those guys are like champions of the game and like Jason Hornfrance is an

absolute gun so for me it's like unless it's North Melbourne booing him like I think that everyone else it's like I don't even know what you're achieving there like um it probably played like I think every time Hornfrance has been booed he's been best on ground like the same killer one like he's dominated so it's like it's not really working for those guys um but yeah I definitely get the ones where your players left the team or you know an incident happens in a game where someone cleans someone up and then you boo them for

the rest of the game yeah that's part of footy but when it's just genuinely like I think yeah I think of Adam Goodes like he was my favourite I was a Sydney fan growing up and he was by far my favourite player and like right at the end of his career when he was getting booed every week like it was like yeah I just look at that and go like this yeah especially even with like you think about like mental health and and everything like that these days um I think like you just don't want

like that's just not necessary especially every week for a champion of the game two-time Brownlow medalist like number of all Australian I think he was all Australian in every position or something he's like rock forward back like an absolute gun so like yeah for me I don't really see why people boo but yeah it's pretty fascinating to me that as you said the ones are the first to cry mental health they're probably the first to uh boo a champion yes um last thing on the Adelaide chapter before we move on um grand final like a

lot of people say a grand final loss you never quite think you never quite um forget about it it's always in the back of your mind since you've had the success in 2021 do you still think about it or have you pretty quickly moved on um I still think of it um because I would have loved to win the grand won the grand final as my last game for Adelaide because I still loved my time at the Adelaide footy club um you know people always ask me how do you still you know you hate text

yeah whereas like text is actually at the time I think like there was things said that he probably regrets um I probably regret not telling anyone or how it got out that I was leaving um but now like text you know he's got three kids as well like I've got two he's got three wheels talk about you know on instagram about kids whether it's photo of it or whatever it is and out in the field like we always have a joke like out there like we will play on each other for like five minutes and

um you know I'll tell him that I'll beat him like I used to at training he'll be like you know oh mate I always used to be your training so like things like that it's fine but um yeah like I would have loved to win a grand final um frad laters my last game and um god in the first quarter it was definitely looking like that and I was a tikes fan and yes it was looking scary when Eddie Betts kicked that second goal I was like fuck here we go yeah and then to Richmond's

credit what a great side they are and um I'd probably one of the worst days I have to play on Jacob Townsend um and he pinched me and punched me for like three hours and I was like man this guy is just an absolute weapon and we'll do whatever it takes to win a football game and like um he played on me a few more times when I played Richmond and like I've got so much respect for him because he was just a genuine like yeah just loved winning and would do anything for the team

and he it's almost like I hated playing against him but man I wish he were on my like if he was on my team I'd absolutely love him so um yeah in the end we lost and um yeah and then it all of a sudden it's like then it comes out that I'm leaving and um people are heated and it's like yeah there's I'm assuming that you know there's things that were said that people would regret but in the end um it is what it is I moved on as you said like I end up

getting success at Melbourne and um I'm telling you right now halfway through the third quarter I thought it was happening again to me that I was going to lose another grand final I was like g0 from two that's not good um how am I going to and then the boys went back and then I didn't have to do anything for 45 minutes and it was great um but yeah like as as you said like um yeah my time at Adelaide I absolutely loved and I would have loved to win a grand final and um every

now and then I do think about it like yeah you do like the first thing in my mind about grand finals I won one but at the same time like I think that yeah losing one definitely motivated me more and I knew that um I just guess now I think to myself that I know that I you can come back from loss and then you know get more motivation and win so um yeah I love my time in Adelaide and um yeah first first year I left Adelaide I watched every week hoping they'd lose but

now like I actually love the way they play and obviously Darren Burgess is there who I still talk to a lot um he was such a pivotal part of what we achieved for Melbourne and you know we've got a great replacement now but um yeah when he left you know I think all the boys were pretty shattered but um you could see like the way that they play it's a great way to play and you know Tex is obviously playing good footy and then they've got like some new additions so um yeah I don't hope they lose every week now I just like watching him play and um yeah I think it's better like that.

Who was the mother of the Jacob Townshend players that you look at and you think shit I'd love him on my team? Bruzzy Maynard from Collingwood um we were actually talking about this in the gym the other day um the replay of Sidney Collingwood who was on and it just seems like every time there's an argument he's always first there I don't know if he sniffs it out or he's the instigator but um he's someone that just yeah like you'd love to be able to play with him and go to war with him um yeah

absolutely like it's just those role players that um you know he's he's a great player he's an Australian player but like they just you know that everything they do is revolved around the team um and they're the guys that you love playing with and um you've got so much respect for and I think it's funny like you that's why you see a lot of um like best and fairest winners you're like oh wow like he won the best and fairest like I think of um like Jayden Short like Jayden Short winning best and fairest for

Richmond like the premiership year it's like it's like you get it he's a good player but it's like the he's probably doing things that the footy club loves so much that then he doesn't really get the recognition you know externally that say I don't know someone like Dylan Grimes would like captain all Australian player like he gets a lot of credit because um you know the media focusing on him but Jayden Short might be doing his role every week and then he wins the best and fairest like oh wow that's amazing like joking that man

it's a case that club BNFs are substantially more important than any uh AFL award yeah I think so um I think the Brownlow the Brownlow's a midfield award I can't believe it agreed let's get a let's get a forward or back to win it we need a defender award yeah yeah the defender award used to be Spud Frawley's golden fist everyone used to fire up about that but um yeah I think uh yeah that or the coaches votes like the club best and fairest is obviously super um and it just depends how the club do

it like sometimes the club do it weirdly where like you could get like 100 votes a game and it's like man where are these votes coming from whereas um I think we do it well I think we get like a maximum of 40 a game and it's like each line coach votes um so you could get 40 out of 40 or you could get you know 10 if you played no good so um I think that's a good way but the coaches votes association award is like they're the ones that like they watch the game

live then they re-watch it and then they vote so it's like I know what they're talking about they know what they're talking about so I'm assuming like and you always see like it does have a little bit of a correlation towards club BNFs or Brownlows or all Australians and that but yeah I think they're that's probably one of the most um yeah important awards because those coaches do watch footy hard. You've moved back to Melbourne a lot of like the media talks about um the fun loving and inclusive nature that successful clubs embrace and it

was talked about with Melbourne and Richmond was that the case the whole time and it's only like magnified and highlighted and talked about when you're actually successful or is there a clear shift in culture pre-premiership and then leading into the premiership? Uh yeah good question I think 2018 when I first got to Melbourne so I did my knee in like around 11 so I didn't play the back half of the year and then in the finals but I think in 2018 we were so immature like we had so many guys that were like I think

like I was 21 I might have been 22 and like you look at outside now there's a lot of guys around the same age so you think to yourself that's five years before that like there's a lot of 22 year olds 23 24 don't really know what they're doing in terms of in big moments big games we just sort of got on a bit of a role um and then you talk about the culture like in 2019 I think we won like four games like it was a horrific year for the footy club like we

just we'd lose every game but like 25 points it was like every week it's like oh yeah we lost about 25 points every week but it's like it doesn't matter if it was the 17th ranked team or the first like we'd win we'd lose by 25 points it was like we couldn't get past this you know mental barrier but um culturally I think the shift really happened after the hub in 2020 and I think that that definitely helped us that the hub because we got to know each other and we got to know each other's

families and um yeah you could see why blokes were playing footy whether it was for their partner whether it was for their family whether it was for the kids whether they just absolutely love footy I think that's where it comes from in terms of you see a lot of clubs trying to do it now like you're deeper why you do things um and from then on um I know Max has spoken about it a bit but footy clubs are great for banter but sometimes that banter um I almost call it like professional banter which you

shouldn't really go into which is if you're trying to deadlift and you've got a crap form and I just keep telling you look at his form look at his form like that's not really like rather than like I don't know like oh my god how bad are your shoes are you wearing today like that's fine and it's funny like the the the contrast in banter that we had at the footy club there was a lot of professional banter and I know Max has spoken about it a lot but um there was one example that I

was a part of that it would be like um you know I might have taken 10 intercept marks in a game which is like I think the record is 10 like it's like Jake's walked off he's like wow geez I've played well today and then like someone's like oh wow you played so good today 10 intercept marks but oh you didn't even play on anyone like that's that's where it sort of went to and that's a natural thing for you know football clubs because it is like competitive environment but it's also like the greatest part

of a footy club that banter and that's what I think a lot of people miss when they leave but it's it's actually sort of it's almost like death by a thousand cuts like it might be once it's like oh yeah that hurts and then it's like and it just keeps getting worse and worse and worse and worse and that's and until like that person actually then thinks themselves oh maybe like they're right maybe or suck like do I actually am I actually not playing on anyone or you know this this and this and it's like

it's funny that just having one of those conversations the guy like I don't even know if you would know him but his name was Aaron Vandenberg and he was the one person that brought it up when everyone sort of was a bit like blase about it everyone was like if you when he said it everyone was like wow this guy's right like well what did he actually say so he just got to stop or well yeah he's just like that we sort of have a cultural day every year and we had it at the settlers

run golf day and we just play golf and then we do a little bit of a cultural thing that what what this year looks like and what we want to look at what we want the year to look like and he just got up and he was just like you know this is one thing that I've noticed from the footy club and I think that you know the guys that get it the most are pretty strong people but you can see that time at times it does affect them and I'm a bit like that I'm

pretty thick-skinned like I love the banter of it I I give out as much as I get but I think then when it starts to become actually what you're working on and what you want to be as a footballer like it actually does hurt a lot like it might be a midfielder where you're like oh man you got 35 touches but so did you man you're playing what you didn't defend all day win a hardball it's like win a hardball like it's like things like that so it's like it's that um yeah it's just like

the the professional banter that you don't really want to be hearing all the time because in the end like you're there to do a job and you're there to try and get better and if someone's taking the piss out of you what you're trying to work on then like you've got no motivation and then you've got no confidence and then you can't play well so that was a big shift in our in our culture and so that was just to put a stop to that that was just a stop and and you know what it

still happens now but at least you've got it in the back of your mind like you might say something and then you just like instantly like Gorny talks about it all the time like he's an amazing leader amazing captain he talks about it all the time like he'll say something and then like you know I'm one of his you know best mates and I'll just look at him and go that was it watch yourself that was it and he's like oh yep yep and then like it's like it's just actually holding people account accountable and

um ever since then you can see that like whether it still happens and then it's like ah okay then it just gets rained back in and it's like there's a difference between banter in terms of like telling a midfielder he needs to defend better in a jokingly way when you're walking past him in the corridor in front of everyone to embarrass him or you actually go to him and be like mate like as a team we need you to defend better we need you to do this like one-on-one in the chat and it's like there's

a difference um and then as I said like the banter about like his haircut like surely he didn't pay for that haircut mate like that's a horrific haircut what have you done um like there's that difference like it's like he's not really worried about his haircut like I walk into the footy club I've got a haircut and someone says to me surely you didn't pay for that like that I'm not worried about that because I'm not worried about I'm not a hair stylist or you know something like that so yeah that was a big cultural

shift and um it's literally been one of the best things um for our footy club but at the same time another thing that was culturally shifted that year was Mark Williams came into our footy club and what year did they come sorry 2021 him uh Burjo came 2020 and then uh Choco came 2021 and I remember I remember um we talk about like role players all the time and being a great role player and sort of as your footy career goes on you go I just want to be a role player like that's what people

value I want to be a role player but it's like to be a great team yes you need role players but they actually need to be great at that role so Choco um Choco comes in and is like no no no like yeah yeah you want to be a great role player so for me like I want to be the best teammate possible was probably for two years one of my things that um I want teammates to say like I like he's getting picked first every week like that was something that I wanted and he's

a great role player and he plays his role well but when Choco come in basically what my then thing was was no no like be a great player so I changed my you know my motto or my um trying to think of what we called it like development plan like the thing that over um was on top of everything was I want to be the best intercept player in the competition so like your mindset instantly changes to I'm just going to role play and just punch a ball out of bounds no no like I've got

the capabilities of to be the best intercept player in the competition so why don't I like try and achieve that and like I was lucky enough in the first year that I did and when I do start to struggle that is the one thing that I come back to it's like well that's what I know that I can achieve so hopefully that I can do it um but yeah it's funny that like that to those two little things just shift the culture and then everyone starts to buy into it and then it's like it's funny

like it's takes 21 days to create a habit or whatever and that's what it was like it was like it was like three weeks of culturally changing that language and then mindset around being great at everything that you do and then it's like instantly it's like you could see the training standard like go through the roof yeah people being competitive with spots and then it's like wow like I need to outperform this guy and then it's like you just keep getting better and better and then in the end like we end up winning the premiership and I think that those two were like very clear reasons why.

What sort of changes did you implement to become the best Inset player in the game like what like upside from mindset and shifting that language around success like were there any other changes that you made? Oh I think like you can say that and as I spoke to you before like I could probably sit as the spare defender and we play seven defenders and I could just sit there all day and try and mark the ball and but you actually look at like at your best like what do you do so for me like at

my best when I'm playing on someone and I just read the ball quicker than them that's when I intercept whereas when I'm actually the spare I'm actually just sort of standing there like I don't know what to do like I'm not it's like oh Jesus what's happening so actually I actually looked at what when I'm at my best what do I what am I doing and what is my patterns what is my mindset what is you know little things like what does my footwork look like what does my posture look like like things like that

so it's like in moments because there is moments in games where it's just in flow and it's like oh man like geez I've just had five intercept marks in like one quarter like and I've just like I haven't even thought about it but there is moments in games where you're like oh what am I doing um geez I'm just standing here oh no the ball's up and then it's like in those moments like I try and go back to what do I look like at my best and it's like it's a little flick of a

switch and I think that's why you do so much mindfulness because that's what it basically is it's like being able to identify the moment that you've switched off and then whether it's come back to your breath where it's come back to what you do it your best whether it's come back to the feeling your feet on the on the ground in that moment like I just tried to do that all the time and um that was definitely one thing that I focused in on and then just yeah as you said my mindset like I always

used to get worried about getting beaten like um whether it's a one-on- one or like I'd always be like oh geez I just hope I don't lose this right yeah you see it's an opportunity to fail rather than just succeed yeah yeah so it's like oh god I hope I don't get beaten here and then it's like then you get beaten then you're like why was I thinking like that um and it's funny like the longer that my career has gone on um I just appreciate so much more playing um the day like game day

everyone always used to say game day is the best day and to be totally honest I did not agree with them because I used to be so nervous about stuffing up whether that's not playing well whether that's making one mistake in a footy game of 120 minutes I'm telling you I'm making at least 10 and if I make 10 mistakes I've probably been best on ground like it's like that's how many mistakes are in a game these days like what what you're doing whether it's you ran the wrong way or you missed the flight of

the ball or like you've missed a handball like it's like it's amazing how many mistakes are in a game but like I used to there was some games where like you just loved playing like when I was at Adelaide like I used to love playing in the showdown like it's like I I can't wait to play today but there's other games where I literally thought to myself I'd rather fast forward the next three hours and just hope that I played good like got a standard game like I'd want to fast forward like on your afl

2007 just simulate it just simulate it and be like oh yeah you played all right today like that's sometimes what I'd rather because I used to get so worked up about making a mistake and not playing well and lucky that's I guess that's like performance anxiety basically which I've never really thought about that I had but you know reflecting on those times it's like that's exactly what I had like it's like I'd just rather just like right now it's like you know if I was playing Hawthorne this week I'd get to Saturday morning be like

if I could close my eyes right now and just fast forward 10 hours and it's at the end of the game I'm driving home and I've just played okay I'll do that right now whereas now like I just love and rather than just fail yeah yeah and but now like I just love playing so it's like Saturday is like my favorite day and like I think you do have to work yourself up into that moment because you're always going to have anxiety like I get nervous before every game like people who don't get nervous like

Clayton Oliver, Track, Vines they never get nervous for games like I speak to them they're like no I'm nervous it's like I get nervous it doesn't matter if I'm playing the worst team or the best team or round six at you know Tasmania stadium against Hawthorne or like the grand final like so I'm the same nervousness like it's amazing that like I just haven't ever been able to shake that but I think it just shows that like I just love playing footy so much and I care about the result but at the same time it's

like you've actually just got to let go and be like because in the end that's how I play my best and it's how everyone plays their best is letting go and actually just playing football because you're good at it like you've trained so much for it so yeah it's definitely something that I've been trying to work on yeah it shows you how powerful of a tool like visualization and imagining what winning looks like is you touched on mindset like what sort of things did you implement to help you sort of get over that hump like

are you a journaler do you do some breath work meditation like yeah so I'm meditation every day a lot of it's around my breath a lot of it's just yeah like probably 10 minutes in the morning we have scheduled times at the footy club that a group of probably I think it's about eight of us do meditation every morning so and it's great because a lot of people talk about it but then it's like you've actually got to implement it in the schedule and give times for you know blokes to do it because otherwise they

won't do it like realistically it's like you say do your meditation but there's no time between eight and four to do it in our schedule then blokes are like well it's obviously not that important to us so actually then and then you know reflecting on actually how you feel in those times like I know that when I do meditation at night so I try and you know talk about the 7 30 like I'm sort of going through a period now where I've got a I've got the sauna so I I'd go out into the sauna

and that's my meditation like I do my breathing and that in there but there was a time where I was doing meditation at like 7 30 at night and then my sleep was phenomenal like it was amazing like I just do 10 minutes and I'd almost fall asleep in it but then like I noticed that my sleep was amazing and then when you don't sleep well it's like okay what actually helped me sleep well so like I do a lot of meditation breathing visualization I do I try and probably more before the game again there's

a 10 minute meta mindfulness practice that we do before the game about two hours before and our psychologist who runs our meditation mindfulness stuff yeah he basically goes through a visualization of when you're at your best what does it look like and then obviously see yourself today you know and like for instance this week like I'll picture myself against Hawthorne like whoever I'm gonna play on it's like might be me taking a hanger on him or bodying him out and marking the ball or me doing a good kick like it's actually like really helpful like

yeah it's very powerful so they're some of the things that I've I've tried to implement and then I think the third one is just probably just getting away from the game as well and sort of I actually delete Instagram I actually delete Instagram two days before the game sort of 48 hours I try and like it's just a bit of a buffer for me because my feed is full of footy stuff my do you follow like footy pages or anything footy pages yeah like I have seven afl because I am a footy head like I

love knowing you know what Port Adelaide have done or have they won who's played well like I do enjoy that but I don't think that I need to like watch footy and then go on my phone and then it's on footy and then I'm thinking about my game and then it's like so Instagram like just deleting the app like 48 hours before is something that I really have done all this year and it's actually like I do go into the games more like fresh and open-minded and so it's just a little thing like that yeah

but I think just getting away from the game is probably that third pillar that I try and do and like getting off my phone because I believe that a lot of the things or habits that I have away from my phone are good like nearly everything that I do away from my phone is good so sometimes like your phone you need your phone because I think I'd be stressed without it as well like I you know for instance when I go away it's not like I can just throw my phone away for three days and

like because I'd be thinking how's Jayce how's Scarlet how's Jess like it's like it's natural like I can't they can't contact me blah blah blah but it's like actually when I'm at home being present because it's funny like we have like group chats from the footy club and then like there's things you have to do on your phone like we do our HRV every morning our wellness so it's like just being on your phone like you might think that you're away from footy but you like you get a message from demons 2023 and then you're

like thinking about footy but it's like if you actually just you know I try and put my phone on charge spend time with the kids and then when I'm actually doing something like just putting my phone like leave my phone in the car when I'm you know down at the skate park with the kids scooter park with Jayce something like that like just actually just leave my phone in the car rather than just sitting on Instagram and be like oh good work buddy and head back down like I just try and be present because yeah

as much as I get to spend a lot of time with them compared to people that probably work nine to five I just think that like the time that I've got with him right now is before they go to school and everything like that is pretty precious so that they're probably the three things that I definitely try and do was the move to the peninsula part of that's trying to get away from footy as well yeah yeah so yeah I lived in Q with Jess we bought a house in Q when I first got back

to Melbourne we lived there for three years and then COVID hit basically went up to the hub still had the Q house come back and then we were going to move out to Casey like two times a week so it's going to be basically like two or three times a week at Casey two times at Amy Park in the city and Max who's Max gone one of my close friends he was down at Blairgowrie and he sort of was in my ear saying oh like you know you try to move down the peninsula I was

looking down there but it's a long way like it's a long way down there so I thought to myself oh no I don't really like there but like I don't know maybe somewhere else and I was looking in Mount Martha and I was like oh it's still a little bit farther further than where I'd like to be and then Mount Eliza came up and we were looking looking looking and it was literally like every single other person in Victoria had the same idea because we could not get even like an interview or a scheduled appointment

to get in a house and we were just talking to some lady and she rings me at 9 30 at night I'm like who is ringing no boundaries I was like who's ringing me and I answer and like I'm really bad at answering the phone because a little bit like we spoke about right off the top like of like is this someone trying to get something off trying to give me the shits hello she's like hello is this Jake and I was like uh yeah who's this she explained who she was she's like oh you

were looking at another house that we had um online but we couldn't get you in but there's this house um do you want to come and have a look at it tomorrow morning at 8 30 and I'm like it's 9 30 at night my kids asleep like 8 30 like what time do I have to leave I'm trying to work it out like we had just had jace or jace was like just starting to sleep through and I was like oh yeah I was like nah not really she was like oh okay no worries and

then I was sort of me and my wife were talking in bed and then I was like oh actually let's go like let's just go have a look couldn't find anything online of photos and that because like straight away I typed in the address looking at photos nothing like no like couldn't even see it on google maps I was like what is happening so like I'll ring her back and we're like yeah we'll come down she's like oh that's great no worries came down the next morning fell in love with like the rental property and

we're like oh my god this is great um end up getting it like amazing like amazing that we got it because like yeah as I said it was very hard to try and get a house and then from then on like it's just been the best move that I've ever done and like that's not just me that's my wife um that's my two kids like I don't they don't know any different but um even like my in-laws now are down in Mornington like they lived in Essendon or Keilor right next to the airport their whole

life for 35 years it's like now they're like live in Mornington with us so um it's just been great to be able to yeah move down here and then it's like as you said it's like to get away from footy it's funny like it's a it's a big drive like to the club when we train at train at Amy but and that's what everyone always says they're like oh yeah but like after a game like you drive from the MCG to Mornington like what time do you get home I'm like you know what that is

the best time that I have in the car because it's like Hawthorne and that are amazing areas but it's like it's too busy like for me that's me that's like it's not a it's not a one size fits all it's like it's just for me I'm just a bit like it's too busy for me and it's like that 50 minutes in the car from the MCG to my house is like it's like the last 25 minutes I'm like yeah like I go through Frankston and like I can go one way or I can go the

beach way every time the beach way I like just go have a look at the beach see like I just drive along the beach drive up the hill um and then like just keep looking out at the water and I'm just like how lucky am I like and it is a bit of like gratitude it's like how good is this and because you can I can get into the habit of like why do I live so far away from the footy club like it takes me so long to get home it's so easy to take

it for granted yeah so like last night we left at 445 um from the footy club we trained sort of from about 10 30 to 445 and 445 horrific time to drive on the road like it doesn't matter where you're going like it's a terrible time but it's like last night even then I was a bit like I just had to keep thinking to myself like you're fine like look where you're going back to and like the house that you know we have is like that we end up buying in Mornington moving from Mount Eliza

to Mornington but um like it's like you're near an amazing cafe like it's a walk to the beach like you walk literally to the beach and then walk along the whole way like it's like you just have to sometimes have like yeah the gratitude to that because it is it doesn't matter if you're the richest person in the world or the poorest like if you don't have gratitude you won't enjoy your life like it's you still really do have to um take those moments and um live with them because they are uh yeah they are

precious and if you just keep living by what's next like you just I'll just lose my mind like if I'm thinking like even right now like we're eventually going to knock our house down um that we're living in at the moment because it's sort of like an old ish house um and like that's why we bought it's a lovely block um from where it is and then like it's yeah as I said it's almost like I've always explained it like my grandma's house like it's like it's like your grandma's house three bedroom two bathroom like

sort of small like and like me being a big person like every now and then I feel a bit claustrophobic but um like we end up knocking it down and everyone always comes like when are you gonna knock it down and I'm a bit like I don't even know you I just love it I love it than you are yeah like yeah they're like when are you gonna do it's like oh no I don't know like after my career I think like that's what my plan is like unless something happens beforehand like um but like

yeah it's funny like I've just always I've never ever wanted to be that person of like what's next what's next what can I do next what's going to make me happier next because if you don't like if you can just live in that moment and be like this is what we've got right now it's actually everything's okay everything's fine what is your absolute favorite thing about living in mornington is it the beach is it the lifestyle is it being away from the city like um my favorite thing to do is to wake up in the

morning on my day off and I walk past dreamer cafe which is right around the corner from my house on dava drive and I get a coffee usually a sneaky bacon and egg roll get my kids a baby china or a chocolate milk depending what mood they're in walking down to the beach and there's like you walk down the path and there's a playground there and every morning I have to convince my son and my daughter that no every morning we walk past the playground then we go on the playground on the way back and

they're like no every morning they're like no no we don't want to go on the playground now no we have to go on the playground on the way back and so I walk over the beach and I just there's this like bench seat it like a two benches and a table and I sort of just look out at the water and I just admire the water and so I think that's definitely my favorite part of being in mornington that I can just walk straight to the beach and I never thought I was a beach person

growing up in romsey which like closest beach would be like an hour and a half away but I've just learned to love the love the water and looking out um do you surf no uh no and I would never surf I'm petrified of deep water like is it a shark thing yeah shark thing definitely a shark thing um and me and my wife don't help each other because anytime there's a shark anywhere within I don't know a thousand kilometer radius of us straight up in cans we're like look look told you a shark in the

water it's like yeah no crap there's sharks in the water but um yeah I just love going I do love swimming in the beach um as long as I'm not pretty safe in the bay yeah as long as I'm not the furthest person out that's my theory I think like if there's someone out further than me they're in yeah good luck to you um but yeah like I love I love the beach and then also just yeah the space and going somewhere at nine o'clock and not having to worry about like how long it's going

to take me like if I just want to go down to main street like I can just drive there and know that it's going to take me five minutes and then five minutes back or um you know if I want to go somewhere else um close down to the peninsula I know that it's only going to take me a certain amount of time not having to worry so um yeah they're definitely my favorite parts of it and obviously I've got a big block of land like we're 800 square meters which in queue and that like

you're not going to find many 10 million bucks right 100 square meters so um we've obviously been pretty lucky but yeah I think they're definitely the the favorite things that I love what's the best thing that Jason Scarlet have taught you oh what has Jase taught me oh I think I think both kids um like talk about like gratitude like the best thing that kids can do is like the joy they have for such like things what we think are little things yeah you just think are so little um and I remember I watched a

video on instagram or my wife sent me a video on instagram and it was like it was a reflection on what you think as a person you um the amount of things that you have like going through your mind of like oh I've got I've got to work today how much money do we have to buy groceries like there is a thousand thoughts a day that you have thousands and thousands and worries and everything like that and there's one thing like imagine just being a little kid and my son's three years old imagine there's one

thing in the world that you want and all it is is the attention of your mum or your dad in that moment and it's like I always think of that so it's like if I'm on my phone and Jase is like dad come play with me come play with me if I don't reflect on that I'm like yeah yeah I will in a minute mate like and everyone does it it doesn't matter like if you you tell me that you're a parent and you don't do that you're lying to me because there's like multiple moments

a day where you're like all right I'd just love to just sit down on the couch for like five minutes here without anyone talking to me but like in the end it doesn't happen with little kids and I think that's probably the one thing they like that they've taught me is like it like it's almost like to be able to take their thoughts of like they don't care about anything else they don't care about if the walls are wider or cream they don't care about you know what we're having for dinner tonight like until the

moment but it's like that all they want is your attention like imagine just the whole time you're just like all you want is my attention and like for me not to give it to you like it's just like oh god like I can't even think about it now like I every time I think about it it's like I'll throw my phone away I'm like straight in and playing it with it so I think yeah just what they've taught me is like that and also the fact that like there's things like my wife yesterday built a

aeroplane um out of cardboard boxes and I don't think my son has shut up about it for like two days the coolest thing ever she got like she cut out like cardboard box um little tickets for the plane and like we're going on a plane trip like she's very creative because she's a teacher and um like I feel like my kids are pretty lucky um with the mum that they've got in terms of the activities that like she does for them and everything but um yeah like cardboard boxes like it's like honestly like it's like

they were going in the bin when I got home and now they're probably going to sit in my lounge room for like five weeks just being the aeroplane with the things yeah so I think they've just taught me to yeah be grateful for the little things in life yeah yeah when you put it in that perspective it makes you realize like yeah you understand why they sort of crack the shits over what we think are little things like that's their whole world yeah definitely I've got one more before we move on to some rapid fire

fan questions yep Jess we'll swing back to Jess what's your favorite thing about her what she taught you um I think that oh she's definitely taught me a lot about parenting um because obviously she dealt with a lot of kids all the time with it she primary or secondary she's primary yeah yeah prep too so she loved the preps um I think like she's she's definitely taught me a lot about like yeah like the patience with kids because as I said to you before like even me saying that jayce can't kick the footy yet like

it's like come on mate he's three years old like give him a spell but I think being in a professional sport environment you're always like yeah like I'm trying to teach him and he can't learn and I'm like looking at him like are you fucking serious are you joking me mate like I'm teaching you how to do it and you're not listening and then he just walks off he's like I don't want to do this anymore it's like and I get kind of like I get frustrated and but like I'm not a very angry person

you ask anyway like I don't really get angry all too often but um like she can sense my frustration so like little things like teaching me that but um I think that what I spoke about before in terms of her just allowing me to do um things that I want to do in terms of anything that's going to help my career like she just allows me to do um I think it's taught me to actually do that to other people too so like whether that's my son like you know I would love jayce to play

football but if he doesn't want to play football like that's not that's that's not the be-all and end-all and scarlet is the same like I would love scarlet to you know be a netballer for Australia like that's like you know any parent wants your daughter or son to succeed but um just actually you know giving them the tools and actually allowing them to be able to do that I think is definitely one thing jess has taught me but um yeah she's definitely taught me how to be romantic too um and how important mother's day were

you not a romantic before oh no no no no I never thought about anyone other than myself I think before I met jess um she spoils me rotten on my birthday and I always like I'm like I always have to try and like not do better but like I'm always like really like mother's day I'm sure if this comes out jess won't want to listen to me for an hour and a half she always listens to me anyway but um like mother's day like I've like had to try and like plan so much like I

printed out like a menu the other day of like what's for breakfast and like it's like if this was me five years ago I was not doing that so gifts your uh love language uh no it's definitely hers though yeah definitely hers um yeah do you have to have the same one no I think I think it's actually not that I'm a fucking love guru I think it's ideal to have you know not the same one I think hers is definitely gifts I think mine's um what like what they do for me uh words of

affirmation or nah it's um there's gifts and then there's something there's another one yep and it's similar to gifts but it's like what so uh it's like it's almost like chores like I enjoy when I get home from footy training like her cooking dinner like and I sort of just roll in acts of service that's what it is acts of service like all little things like if I need a new drink bottle like instead of me going from training going to get a drink but I'd love to come home and she's got the drink bottle

for me like kind of thing so um yeah I think she's definitely definitely taught me how to uh yeah buy gifts and that because yeah I think growing up like you know you don't really buy gifts for anyone I've never seen anyone in my whole entire life get more enjoyment about buying gifts for other people than my wife and like all our friends talk about it like every time they've got a birthday like it's like I'll just sort of be like oh happy birthday give him a bunnings gift card or something like that whereas Jess

has like thought about this present and bought it so like I think that's definitely something else that she's taught me yeah how to uh how to treat someone that yeah that you love um and give them gifts and um in the end like even Mother's Day like I'm actually excited for Mother's Day whereas like my first Mother's Day for her I was like oh no what am I doing like I'm so nervous like I don't know what to get her like what am I doing whereas now like it's like I'm actually excited to be able

to because you can see the enjoyment out of the face it's like the kids like you see the enjoyment and um you like to be able to do that yeah I'd love to one day be a be the person that can give good gifts to people that deserve it like my dad's got a bunnings gift card for probably the last 10 years definitely definitely um oh speaking of Jess your wedding did you have BT at your wedding roaming BT yeah BT is a uh family friend so Harry his son I actually played colder cannons with

and they lived in um they lived in riddles creek and I lived in Romsey um so they lived on a farm and we used to drive Harry home from training when BT was as busy as he is um so yeah he came came to my wedding and it only happened real late I was sort of a bit like who do we want to MC and um I end up getting the getting the balls to ask him um and like as the man that he is he was all for it and he was very excited did

his did his research and uh yeah he did a bit of roaming brian which uh was possibly other than jess walking down the aisle it was probably my favorite moment of the night yeah it was great got a handful on this list of fan questions that have just responded to the uh the story that I whacked up on insta actually I've got one here that I didn't want to forget about first so firstly I'm just going to do some teammate word association I've got 10 words here first teammate that comes to mind not allowed to

think first one that comes to your mind funny you're joking jake milksham bizarre Clayton Oliver in what way in every way he's just a unit snags bailey fritz yep beast track white line fever jack viney any white line fever stories from jack viney oh he's just or he's just a maniac yeah he's got small man syndrome too so he's he hasn't got a great combination yeah he's just an angry angry man when he walks onto the field and um no real stories another person would be mazy he's obviously you've seen yeah white line fever from

him oh yeah positivity positivity would be uh Alex Neil Bullen reliable Stephen May young gun Judd McPhee veteran last one Michael Hibbard yeah he'll help he he will hate that I said that got a handful here from the audience first one speaking of macy from Ben Resenberger would you rather 1v1 pig or may I'd rather pig why would I rather play on pig or would I write uh 1v1 so I don't know if that's so in a beef or yeah I hope it's not in a beef um more like on the footy field I don't

know on the footy field who would I rather verse is I'd rather verse pig because mazy would just grab me and I wouldn't be able to move I feel like I'd be able to hopefully try and get around pig um beef um that's from Dave Ryan thank you hey look at that um I don't think I want to fight either of them yeah 1v1 I don't want to fight either of them fair enough they're scary men oh both of them what do you love about James Jordan from Lockie Kennett what do I love about James

Jordan I love that he's his little smirk when he thinks that he made a really funny joke to you but it's not funny at all so he as I said before he was my first child that I had at my house so um yeah we've got some fond memories me and JJ and like it's funny like because every time you have someone live in your house for a week even though it's only a week like you just get to know him so much more and um yeah he's an absolute champion and um on the field

like just so reliable and everything he does but yeah he thinks he's funny sometimes but he's not a funny man yeah when it's all said and done would you consider a move to the MPNFL in particular Frankston YCW no not Frankston YC not Frankston YC no to be honest I don't want to play local footy when I'm finished because I just like imagine me going to play local footy one I'm not playing in defense I'm playing at full forward and imagine like blokes just heckling me from the goal square like I just I what I

go and watch local footy a little bit and like to see the XAFL players what they cop um I just think to myself you know what I don't really want to achieve Jared Grant's running around in the MPNFL for Frankston bombers and I think why would you do it yeah no you're putting the target on your head uh from Tess Rolley and Dave Ryan you are a country music man which is up to my disappointment we've had a few conversations about that on the gym floor what's your favorite country song my favorite country song right

now would be five leaf uh five leaf clover from Luke Combs um all time oh hunting fishing every day from Luke Bryan's good Luke Bryan um yeah I so three massive artists I've got is Morgan Wallen Luke Combs and uh yeah Luke Bryan would be the third one so anything from there and I'm just like yeah I can't appreciate some Luke Combs um When It Rains It Pours by Luke Combs is like yeah I'm actually seeing Luke Combs in August here so um yeah we recently there's a there's probably three or four that love country

music so me Clayton Oliver um Kate Chandler and Harry Petty went to see Morgan Wallen when he was here um again like unbelievable night like it was absolutely amazing so he was at Rod Laver like phenomenal like again you're talking about you know that you're not a massive fan of country music and I actually thought that um that was a large majority of people I thought there was only a small circle of country music like Rod Laver literally like I've never it was so packed oh like this guy's like there's a lot of closet like

yeah country music enthusiasts yes and then like I wouldn't have picked but then they're not closet when they get there they've got bloody boots on and cowboy hats and I'm like looking at it like I just had like is that you or do you just had a bit of a flannel on and I was like sort of like trying to fit in and I was like I couldn't believe the outfits that were coming I was like gee whiz like this is right into it who's got the worst music taste at the club when they get

on the uh tunes like in the gym or whatever yeah look everyone everyone would probably say me because it's either country and as I said there's only like four or five of us or my other favorite um band or just genre is Nickelback like okay yeah Nickelback is like I just go straight like if I've if I've got the speaker it's I can get around Nickelback and I think people will only hate Nickelback because it's a pylon yeah yeah they don't actually hate Nickelback definitely not every every time I'm on the music like Nickelback and

to be honest it's only really like the 18 19 20 year olds that sort of like oh what's this song like it's like hate Nickelback whereas like when you're like 30 or like you know 25 26 27 in the group like because we do it with like defenders so the defenders there's like a little bit of a mix and then everyone loves the Nickelback but all the young kids are like what's this song where's they'll come around but it's funny because I listen to their music and I think to myself this is terrible like what

is this song like it doesn't even have any words like but they love it so like who's got the worst music taste it just depends who's you're asking because if you ask k chandler who's got the best music taste you'd say me but like if you ask christian betraca he'd be like someone else so I'd say it's funny that um I can't handle the I can't handle music with no words that doesn't really do it highly subjective um like for me as long as it's not like death metal screamo shit yeah I'm not too fussy

like even with country I'll get around it um a lot of rogue ones a lot of ones about mustaches does the mustache hold secret powers mustache care routine how does no mustache care routine if you believe it or not like literally I don't even trim it like I think it's kind of gross but sometimes like when I'm nervous I think I like bite it and it must like trim the sides or something I don't really know but I just honestly I've never touched this since I've grown it and it's like four years so I obviously

have to shave my beard but um yeah never ever had to yeah like even doesn't even hang over my lip that's what people kept asking me like how doesn't it grow I was like I don't actually know why it doesn't I was um I was doing a google image search to get you so I could um put you on my story and promote the podcast and I saw a picture of you without a mo and it fucking they freaked me out when it was uh unnerving like are you are you prepared for when you do

eventually shave it that your kids aren't going to recognize you or they're going to cry or I think they won't recognize me they'll be like what the hell is that um because I've shown Jase photos of me without one I'm like who's this and he's like I don't know and I'm like oh god it's really but it's funny because I reckon I'm about eight out of ten people say never ever shave your mustache off but then there's the two out of ten every now and then and be like oh man you look so young with

your mustache why don't you shave it off like um so it's funny there was a there was a photo actually or there was like this poster at Casey Fields and it was me at uh a place called uh Bungeel Place in like um like near Casey we did a clinic there and the poster was like community and I was like around two kids with the footy jumper and I had no mustache and one of the days um it's always there it's always just sitting there it's been there for like five years and like there's a

few comments every now and then about it and I said to one of the young kids his first year I was like oh what about that what do you think about that with no mustache and he turned around he's like what I don't get it he's like I don't understand what you're saying I was like look like no mustache he's like who is that and I was like looking at him I was like that's me and he's like no it's not I'm like I promise you that's me and he's like oh my god it is

you and so it's like it must be a real uh yeah I get noticed way more with it I think that's what like when I didn't have it it was sort of like people might see me and be like hey that looks like that guy that plays footy and then be like oh no probably not um uh the best one I've ever had with my mustache is a kid a kid walked past me and he was about six or seven and he had a Brisbane jumper on and he's like um he said something he said

something like sort of to his dad next door and his dad looked at me he goes how funny is that he thought you were a footy player he thought you were Joe Danaher and I just kept walking and my wife was just losing it and I was like oh he thought I was a footy player that's funny and I just kept walking and he was like yeah I thought you were a footy player I thought you were Joe Danaher and I was like yeah I know yeah anyway so I do get noticed much more with

it it's like I guess it's like the maxi maxi gonna bald head and beard like it just makes you a bit more distinct yes it does it does last one from the fans and you can feel free to go as deep or don't go into it as deeply as you want um when was the last time you cried or felt overwhelmed emotionally oh I cried both times my kids were born which I never thought I would like I think that um not that I'm not an emotional person um I think that when I think of

emotional people I think of my wife because she cries every time there's something happen bad on her tv show and it's a bit of a joke between us that we're always like um you know she's like oh I'm crying again and like nothing's happened on my tv show but um yeah I just never thought I would and then as soon as jace um was born like I cried and then scarlet was the same thing so um obviously they're happy tears um and you're just like overwhelmed with the amount of yeah emotion that you've got um

at that time but I don't know like it as I said like I I try and look at the positive out of a lot of things um I haven't really had been quite like I haven't had a lot of death in in my family or anything like that so my grandpa passed away and so did my nan but um that was sort of when I was like 15 or 16 um yeah but since then it's probably just been yeah when the kids were born or um I think I might have shed a tear when I

snapped my plane of fascia because it was probably that at that point of like god like it just I'd gotten through a lot of the stuff and then it happened and then it was like I was sitting there for three months training my ass off and then three days before round one I snap it and I was like yeah like gee whiz and I actually ended up having some time off and um just I had like it would have been a week like I just I couldn't come into the footy club I was a bit

like defeated there's a little bit going on outside of football for me that wasn't great too so like I didn't really I wasn't really motivated to come into the footy club and it's funny because I think it's it's coming out more and more that people are beginning to be able to talk about it their mental health and you know we've had a few people this year at our footy club you know either have time off or just mention it and it's it's funny that once it once you actually do mention it the amount of respect

and then therefore like care that those people do get um and I think it's just so brave that people can talk about it because you know like I think that it is such a hard topic to talk about if your mental health isn't at the standard that you want it to be um and being at a footy club like the stigma is like all the perception is and it really pisses me off sometimes that well what are you what are you injured about mental health you get paid well you play footy for a living and

all this and like it really frustrates you because it's a really hard job physically yes but mentally as well like it's um when you're not playing well not only are you disappointed in yourself the coaches are probably writing you about things you reflect all the time on the things that you do in your life like if I rock and this is no disrespect to any other job but if I like my mates right they get pissed on a Sunday night they go out have a few beers they rock up Monday morning and they're an apprentice

carpenter the worst thing they can do is probably shoot themselves in the hand with a nail gun but they're not really gonna like they could probably go under the radar and I know that some of them have done this they go under the radar and get through the Monday easy to push through Monday easy to push through whereas like if we go out Sunday night Monday we've got training and we've got to perform and like I'm not saying that alcohol you know you need alcohol to reset and that but it's like you don't really have

that opportunity to be able to do that and it doesn't have to just be that you're hung over I'm talking like you've got so many different personalities that when someone that is up and about enthusiastic so full of energy and they come in on a Monday and at their mental health they might just be like oh man just like there's a lot of things that's been going on in my life I haven't been playing great football you know I had a fight with my girlfriend last night and you come in Monday like you notice it

so much more because you're there to perform and one they can't perform at the level they can but two like they're just not giving the same energy and vibe that they normally do so then it's like how do you approach that as well like but I'm so proud of definitely our footy club on on how they actually do that and they the care that they give for people because in the end like you can only perform great and you know probably win premierships with happy people and I think it's funny because I think the last

two years the best two teams off field and the ones that have been mentally like at their best are the ones that won the grand final like Geelong last year you could tell that like they were just living their life like Jeremy Cameron like living on the farm and Tom Hawkins you could just tell that they were just like so free in in their life outside of football and then on the field they just like were performing they were in flow and we were like that the year before 2021 we went to the hub but

we actually really made sure that we saw the hub as an opportunity and how good's this and I think the wives even had a little bit of a a pack to be able to feel that too so like I'd talk to my Jess and she was just pumped like she's like oh no everything's fine back home like everything's grey house Perth like pumping it up and wasn't till I got home she was like oh god there was a lot going on back here like Scarlett wasn't sleeping she had to be held to sleep all night

like she's and like we were lucky enough that Jess's mum was around the corner so like you know she come and lived with Jess for the time that I was gone but it's funny that like yeah the mentally yeah the best team mentally and um yeah free in the mind of definitely like stress and everything like that end up winning the grand final um and they might have had things going on at Geelong and even at our footy club that I didn't know about but when you get to the footy club you can every day

you get to feel that vibe and um you can sense if blokes are flat or the team flat or something like that so um yeah it is definitely such a an important part of um football these days but it's equally as important in life outside you can see like mental health um it's definitely being talked about a lot more and I think it's such such a valid point um and such a valid conversation to be able to have because in the end like you're only as good as how healthy you are mentally so how do

you pick a teammate up that is a bit flat oh good question um I think it's different for each person um because some people you do need to sort of let them not vent but like you can sense that um that they just sort of don't want to be talked to um and as I said like we put a lot of resources and time into our so we've got a psychologist we've got a PDM which is a player development manager um Reese Conker is to play at Richmond and then obviously at Freo and he's a

freak like he's so good he's um an amazing person to have at the footy club and our psychologist Steve he's he's amazing and then we've got two doctors um Laura and Jacob like who are equally as good as um both of those people in terms of managing mental health they've seen a lot of things um they've been involved in the footy club a long time so we've got a lot of resources around it but I guess then the most important point is that then the coaches and the players back that stuff up so you can

have a psychologist say that oh you know Tyler's having a tough day that he needs to you know he needs to have the next two or three days off but you know Goody as the coach comes and goes no mate he's training tomorrow he's I don't care how mentally he is like that's not at all our footy club like Goody's is supportive and so is his team of coaches to be able to give players um time off or whatever they need at the time so yeah for me I think that it's just pointing those guys

in the right direction um because some guys deal with it all the time and some it might be like brand new so you actually might have to sort of push those guys towards potentially the psychologist or the doctor or whoever it is um so yeah I think it's just really individualized and um yeah I I guess as a player that I've been there for a long time and I feel like my relationships with guys are good like you genuinely know what's going on with them so a player might walk in he might be flat and

you know that there's been something happening either at home or outside a footy that you know oh shit maybe it just flared up again and you know he needs he needs a bit of a chop out or just a tap on the bum say mate you're all right like everything all good you want to talk about it um so I think it's just actually yeah getting to know people because yeah if your fire blokes up that well you'd be like oh what's wrong with you what are you doing your silk or something like that it

can actually really like yeah it there's I could imagine that there'd be some arguments and some yeah you're fighting yeah yeah exactly so yeah it's definitely um an important point to take everyone individually I guess like every business almost it's a relationship building business and the most successful ones are the ones that can foster really strong and healthy relationships absolutely yeah it's definitely relationship based now like that's what coaches are realistically yeah um you talk about like good coaches tactically and everything like can he give a good rev up or something it's like man I'm

telling you good he's purely like a like it's almost like his whole role or 90 percent of it his relationship yes he's got he's the way that we play uh the team that he picks um everything like that but even those two things the way that we play blokes are only going to play that way if you have a good relationship with them and then they do believe in what you're doing like the team that you pick like in the end it's like the team gets picked because goodie has a good relationship with those players

that are playing like it's like it's funny that everything just revolves as you said back to relationships I'll make this the last one because I do have to go and coach shortly favorite thing about goodie favorite thing about goodie is I think that he's developed so much in terms of I reckon when I first got to the footy club as every new coach I think does wants to control everything whereas the footy club goes out and gets the best people for that role so whether it's the strength coach high performance manager assistant coach whatever it

is they're going out to get the best so why would then goodie take over that person's role and say no no you need to do it like this so the best thing that I've noticed about goodie is obviously his relationships but then his ability to let go and let the people do what they do best and what they specialize in and um I think that's what successful clubs um have um even like Geelong like you can see there like Chris Scott's a coach but like it's like he's never there like he's like you can see

that like everyone else just plays their role and they can uh they specialize in something and therefore um that's what they do and the coach has got to have the ability to just let go so um yeah they're the two things that I think that he's best at is his relationships and then his ability to let people thrive in what they do love it I could sit here for another two hours and just chat with you mate it's been phenomenal awesome to finally get you on thank you um we spoke injuries before little did the

public know you actually nearly suffered a potentially career ending injury here at the hands of one of our members do you know what I'm referring to or alluding to no no maybe you don't know about it but one of our members Dave Ryan the bread man carrying a barbell on his shoulder swung around and I was near at the time but apparently centimeters from well taking your head clean off your shoulders that's all I would have I would have just copped it on the chin and just walked away with it walked away um but I'm

guessing here it says on the bag chef Dave Ryan this is for you he's back to some beautiful Turang Farm sourdough bread for you to take it it's for not probably the best sourdough bread on the peninsula mate yes is he the chef there yeah he is wow that's huge so I need to talk to him I was actually I'm trying to find the I'm trying to find bagels I wonder if they do bagels at Turang Farm I'll ask him on the way out he might be here so uh he'd be willing to ask on

your way out mate beautiful um yeah we don't have the footy show big prize back but you've got some any local mornings and peninsula businesses you want to pump up before we go I love my local cafe dreamer cafe um Ben I think he might have asked a question there Benny Ben Rosenberg is that Rosenberg yeah did he ask a bit of a question yeah he thinks he's funny um Benny no he's obviously runs a great cafe um right around the corner from me um obviously Virtus like virtue Virtus Virtus okay um I love this

place like as that's like right off the top as I was talking about like it's um one of my favorite places to come um and yeah that's about it really I just like to keep it like I'm not I don't venture too far out like I'm very like here um yeah I haven't found a good footy over around here yet though like there's one around the corner but I normally go down to rye footy oval because that's that's a good deck so usually do my off season training there but as I said yeah I'm I'm

pretty uh yeah locally just stuck to dreamer cafe well if you want to trek up the mountain to red hill I hear that's a pretty good footy club up there really yeah yeah you got you'll have me after my career if I just want to coach I don't want to play because you know you'll try and take me out definitely I actually do like the red hill footy over that's right across the road from um one of my favorite restaurants actually red uh red gum barbecue oh yes for the mate we didn't even talk about

meat I know massive massive yeah I'm a I'm a big meat man I can't eat steak close to the game at the minute though feel a bit heavy so okay Tommy McDonald yeah I don't know he's like yeah lunch like two 500 gram steaks like it's phenomenal like I don't know what he's doing but he I don't know how he doesn't feel heavy but especially running around if you're just doing it on the on the go it's fine but uh yeah red red gum barbecue is definitely one of my favorites yeah phenomenal place good mac

good mac and cheese great mac and cheese definitely cornbread unbelievable too simply the best um been awesome to have you on mate I'm gonna get coaching yeah absolutely appreciate your time so much no worries thank you