CLIFFHANGERS
HOCK & AWE: New Cats boss plans to stay in flag hunt, avoid a big fall and build future
Cameron all missed chunks of the season.
The club was fiercely defensive of Cameron playing despite tight hamstrings in July, but the bottom line is the club’s star recruit didn’t make his club debut until round 6, suffered repeat injuries and kicked only five goals in three finals.
“The best ability is availability,” Hocking said.
“We had so many players unavailable at different stages. We have work to do on that front. It’s an improvement area for us on fitness and medical.
“It is critical. You have to have all those parts working. You can’t have the best coaching model without having all the other parts working as well.”
NEW COACHING BLOOD
HOCKING won’t critique Geelong’s risk-averse ball movement last year, deferring to the coaching staff.
“The important thing for me is that I don’t get too deep into footy,” he said.
“It’s quite clear we are going to have a new coaching group. The evolution of the game plan will be part of that.”
But he defends the club’s selection policies, which saw Nathan Kreuger and Jordan Clark depart because of lack of opportunities.
“What I would say is, as far as the young talent goes, they also need to recognise they have to push through as well,” Hocking said. “How do they go beyond some of the senior cohort?
“Hopefully it’s a balance of what is important on match day but also the development program that supports the young stars we need to develop. We are very committed to that.”
The Cats are open to considering whether they actually appoint line coaches to govern defence, midfield and attack, with Shaun Grigg to step up from development and James Kelly, Shane O’Bree and Nigel Lappin all part of the coaching panel.
Eddie Betts will join the club in a part-time capacity, with Geelong also appointing Chloe Wegener as the club’s new Indigenous liaison officer.
The Cats are comfortable bringing in former Adelaide small forward Tyson Stengle, despite a trio of offences that saw him sacked by the Crows.
“We have a strong history at Geelong in supporting players,” Hocking said.
QUICK RECHARGE
Hocking inherits a club that now has a 12-month-a-year business with an AFLW team, as well as a group of staff exhausted by two solid years of work through a pandemic.
He has ambitious plans to revitalise his staff with shorter breaks in-season rather than long holidays through the men’s off-season, believing the Cats can “get ahead of the game” with scheduled breaks.
And while he was part of an AFL administration that made savage cuts to football departments, he won’t use that as an excuse for failure to innovate at Geelong.
“Innovation and strategy has been one of the things
that has been left at the door pretty quickly (across the AFL) because we got so focused on the soft cap and my first week or two in the building the comment was, ‘We can’t do that.’ I would reply with, ‘Why not?’” Hocking said.
“The comment was soft cap. We have a bucket of money to spend, what are we going to value, what are we going to spend it on?
“It’s changing some of that language in being caught up in where we have been and where we want to go. I am a future-focused person.”
The same staffers and coaches who stumbled to the line – exhausted by months interstate these past two years – might feel aggrieved to be told to work harder and smarter after all they have given.
But it is Hocking’s way – challenge the status quo, ask the hard questions, occasionally put noses out of joint, but relentlessly push forward to improve his organisation.
And the criticism that will come his way?
He couldn’t care less as Hocking believes the end result justifies the means, as we saw with the league’s sub rule, as well as other rule changes that he believes helped make the grand final such a rollicking adventure this season.
So, 38 years after he rocked up at then Kardinia Park to play 199 games as a back pocket, Hocking is back and ready to have an impact.
And anyone who has spent any time with a player who four times won the club’s most determined award knows very little is going to get in his way.