GIVE JONES AFL AWARD
Mooney column
THE stunning career turnaround of Liam Jones should prompt the AFL to consider creating a new award.
There’s the Rising Star for the best young players, the Coleman Medal for top goalkicker, the Brownlow for the best player and a raft of other awards that celebrate the superstars of our game.
But what about “the most improved award”? Footy clubs give them out each year, so why not the AFL?
There has hardly been a career resurrection quite like that of Jones.
When I was a part-time forwards assistant coach at the Western Bulldogs, I saw Jones up close on the training track every week.
This was a bloke who, when you saw him at training, had everything you could possibly want from a key forward — explosive power, quick on the lead, a great leap, nice hands, a pretty good kick. He had all the traits.
Then you watched him on the weekend and you thought “why can’t this kid do the same on the footy field?”
Obviously, at training you can get away with one effort and then have a breather, which was probably Jones’ limit. One effort and he was stuffed. His fitness was below par for an AFL footballer to the point where I used to do some of the runs with him and I used to beat him.
Fitness was never my strong suite, let alone after I had been out of the game for a couple of years.
So slowly you just saw his career falling away. Carlton took a punt on him and you couldn’t help but think it was a wasted punt because you just knew that as a forward he didn’t seem to have what it took to be a consistent force at AFL level.
But whoever at Carlton came up with the idea to send him to defence needs to get a massive pat on the back. It started in the VFL, where from all reports he dominated week after week, which earned him his breakthrough AFL call-up.
It’s no exaggeration to say that since then Jones has been one of the most consistent performers in the game.
You hear about “the penny dropping” for blokes — and the penny has well and truly dropped at 26 years of age for Jones, rewarded with a twoyear contract extension after he was 99.9 per cent destined for the AFL scrap heap.
Every time I watch him, I think back to how I was just banging my head against a brick wall at the Bulldogs.
There is a lesson in this and that is that sometimes the best place for a struggling forward is to go to defence.
I was a struggling forward by the end of 2003 and one of the greatest things I did was go back into defence.
That’s because you play on a forward who will teach you a high work ethic, they teach you where to run, how to compete — and you can see the game unfold in front of you.
The thing is, as a defender, you’re so much more accountable to your effort than as a forward. If you don’t make an effort, or you go halfhearted, or you’re not concentrating, or you’re in the wrong spot, the result is your man kicks a goal on you, and it’s just so embarrassing.
Whereas when you’re a forward, if you don’t do any of those the ball just gets kicked away. These days coaches demand more defensive pressure from forwards, but the reality is the consequences of not going hard enough for forwards are nowhere near to not going hard enough as a defender.
This week Jones is likely to take on Buddy Franklin in the clash against Sydney. On the lead, I’ve got no problem in saying that Jones won’t get beaten much, if at all, because he’s got electric pace over the first 20 to 30 metres.
Furthermore, he won’t get beaten in a genuine one-onone because he’s got such a great leap and he’s backing himself.
His problem might be if Franklin just goes nuts in a 10-minute burst. I will never forget when Lance Whitnall tore me apart in a 10-minute patch in 2004. Whitnall was one of the smartest forwards I’ve ever played on.
I learnt more in that 10-minute patch on Whitnall than I did in a whole preseason of doing video edits and talking with coaches. There were double leads, triple leads, banging bodies at the right time, subtle things, obvious things.
But it was a great learning curve.
So, anyway, well done Jonsey on the back half of this season. I look forward to seeing you in action this weekend. And the AFL should look at a new award, inspired by your career transformation.