Almanac Life: AFL Lost Boys

 

Peter Baulderstone is a long-time contributor to The Footy Almanac project. He has written many articles which address the moment, always challenging and stimulating, and underpinned by a sense of compassion (and sometimes frustration). Many of his articles are written with social purpose in mind. Given his personal and professional experience in the field of mental health, he has penned this piece in response to recent days.

 

Some deaths hit you harder than others.  Adam Hunter was an Eagles favourite in the early 2000s.  Could play anywhere – mostly Centre Half Back but often swung forward in a crisis.  Strong overhead mark; weightlifter physique and accurate drop punt kick.  Crazy brave.

He was a South Bunbury product which placed him in the WAFL zone for my club Swan Districts where he played 65 games spread over 8 seasons (1999-2011).  Pre and post AFL career – and during an era where players went back to their State League home clubs due to injury or form.

I never met him but my Swans memory is of a wounded warrior in 2011 when shoulder injuries meant he couldn’t lift his arms above his shoulders and he was robbed of his elite marking power.  Echoes of Hunter as a Wayne Carey mini-me at many levels.

After that, he bobbed around different country and metropolitan “amateur” leagues up to 2018.  But his name mostly popped up in the media in the court pages – drugs; domestic violence.

Trying to make sense of Hunter’s death in the immediate aftermath of Troy Selwood’s had me thinking of West Indies post-colonial critic and cricket author CLR James in the preface to Beyond A Boundary “What do they know of cricket who only cricket know?”

In our context “what do they know of life beyond football – who only football know?”

Of course, none beyond Hunter and Selwood’s immediate circle know the particular factors involved in their deaths. But if we don’t honestly examine threads from their lives and similar ‘near misses” we are doomed to repeat sad history.

Looking through a broader lens the most obvious issues are head injury (CTE) and mental health.  Both men were brave to a fault – qualities we admire until the bill becomes due 20 years later.  Concussion protocols were nowhere near as strict when they played, but we know it’s the repeated “small” knocks that do the damage more than big hits that draw scrutiny. Local clubs and players still grizzle about the loss of key players with forced rest and consequently the incidents are still under-reported at levels below AFL.  It’s a long term culture change – like reducing smoking – but these deaths are a good opportunity to shove it under the pre-season noses of today’s players in local competitions.

Risk and reward is always a balance rather than a conclusion. I’d be giving my grandkids a round ball to play with – but hey I’m old and fortunate enough to have survived the crazy years (sorry – decades).

“Mental health is the last resort of the scoundrel” (author – adapted from Samuel Johnson).  Lawyers, CEOs, do-gooders, social media pundits and confused family and friends use the term all the time in a hundred different contexts. It’s broad enough to be both important (thereby limiting further debate) and practically meaningless.  

Forty years experience of living it; working in it in policy and direct service provision; and continuing to volunteer in it – means that I grapple on a daily basis with trying to describe the elephant that it is.  Mental health is the soup we swim in – psychologically in how we subjectively interpret the world; physiologically in terms of our bodily ability to process as others do; and existentially in how we find meaning and purpose in our lives.

If that all sounds a bit complex and heavy in a fast-paced, competitive, social media saturated existence then no wonder we all need a bit of escape.  Fast lives demand fast solutions.  Drugs – both legally prescribed (doctor knows best?) – and illegal reality benders are readily available in every bar, school and street corner.  

Transactional relationships – what have you done for me lately?  New clothes. New look.  New partner.  New experience.  New government. New someone to blame.  No time for anything to mature and adapt. Above all – little time for reflection and shared learning from our common struggles and confusions.  

“Everyone is pretty normal – until you get to know them better.”

Which brings me back to sport – “football is the opiate of the masses” (K Marx).  Footy in all its forms is a societal release and cohesive shared activity in an increasingly fractured world.  My experience is that most of the social positives from sport are at the local club and individual level – where it is still a largely voluntary and less-structured activity.

Professional sport where all the dollars and media attention go, is a ruthless, highly profitable (media, administration, gambling, players and coaches) entertainment business.  It’s a precarious, narrow pyramid with great exposure and rewards at the top for the 1% and a slippery slope for the remainder.  

My recent experience has been doing a little WAFL mentoring – sometimes with players returning from AFL lists after not making it to the top level after a few years.  What struck me is how remarkably naive and stunted they mostly are in their personal development.  

Professional sport is an individualistic hero/warrior culture. The mindset? “I’m going to make it.  I have to concentrate every aspect of my time and energy onto succeeding as an AFL player.”  Media and family/friends intrusion means they have naturally retreated into the protective cave of club culture.  Occasional education events and (PR driven) charity/social engagements are “yeah, whatever” to the necessarily hardened shell of a professional sportsman.  There are individual exceptions with broader perspectives (but few in their early striving years) and they mostly serve to prove the rule.

When I talk to those players I nearly always find them intelligent and engaging.  When they reflect on their AFL experience and how they are transitioning in football, work and study to “civilian” life – they mostly describe it as coming wide-eyed out of a bubble or cocoon.  As if the time in the AFL system is a period of stunted, arrested development – where they grew physically but were frozen both emotionally and inquisitively in terms of living in the real world.  Jobs, money, wider interests and relationships are all a bit of a mystery.

Now that is true for all of us in our teens and twenties, but for ex-professional sportsmen it’s as if they have fallen behind their peers in those years.  And when your imposing presence and physical appearance has always given the impression of superiority it’s hard to be vulnerable and ask for (or accept) help.

Footballers often fall back on the risk-taking search for substitute highs to those that gave them gratification on the way up.  Drugs, alcohol, gambling (my area of personal experience – for good and ill) and multiple relationships.  Risky businesses.  Always chasing the dopamine dragon.

With good support and good foundational values the majority “snap out of it” and find productive lives.  At the Eagles, I have always admired Norm Smith Medalist Dean Kemp walking away from footy and celebrity to found a business, family and surf in Margaret River.  But the walking wounded from 1990s and 2000s means there will be sadness in the coming years.  The club has learned and moved on, but my sense is that the wider AFL industry and local leagues have not.  

Professional sport is one of those distorted, crazy mirrors we used to look into on Sideshow Alley.   We see ourselves reflected but with a tiny twisted head, bulging chest, muscled arms, flabby waist and spindly legs (or if you’re over 60 – the bathroom mirror).  These things are in every workplace and many families and social circles.  We just choose to largely ignore them until direct personal experience shoves them in our face.  “Someone oughta do something about it. Blame the schools and the bloody useless government.”  It is just that the examples are more extreme, prevalent and obvious in professional sport.

What we can do better is always difficult.  Resources and priorities have to be weighed and balanced.  Collective responsibility – club, league, media, government, fans and family – weighed against personal responsibility and freedom of choice and expression. “You can lead a horse to water – but you can’t stop it drinking.” 

If I ever get off my arse and write the book scattered in laptop fragments “Gambler in the Family – What Help Helps?” a major element would be on the crucial role of connection and community in fostering a productive life.  It’s the antidote to individualistic hero culture.  We all need a safe place to fall.  A shared environment for voicing our fears and uncertainties and learning from peers.

What might that mean in an AFL/NRL context?  Giving team a structured meaning beyond a playing career.  Here’s a thought experiment trying to combine the practical, effective and motivating:

• The most effective intervention for anyone struggling is connection and community.  That’s why AA, GA and other 12 Step self help groups proliferate quietly in thousands of community and church halls around the world.  Voluntary. Cheap. Informal. Take what you need and leave the rest. Egalitarian – no “experts” beyond school of hard knocks. Ongoing shared vulnerabilities and life challenges. Shared experience and peer examples. No “you should”.  Proven effectiveness if you commit to staying involved (which can be criticised as self validating – but hey we’re trying to improve lives not get PhDs).  Professional help has it’s place in validating a problem but medical and psychological interventions are often expensive and partially effective at most.  

• Professional sportsmen are highly paid.  Deservedly for short careers, sacrifices and the commercial revenue their exploits generate. The average AFL player salary (excluding rookie list) in 2023 was $441,000 or over four times the average male salary (and a much greater multiple of salaries for 20 somethings). Let’s say the player gets 80% and 20% to go into a Trust Fund conservatively and professionally money managed through the Players Association.

• From 2 to 12 years after retirement release 2% a year.  Average careers are less than 6 years – so allowing for rookie years – an average Trust Fund might contain $400-500K (tax and investment earnings would have an impact).  Annual disbursement of $40-50K over 10 years.

• Requirement for dollar release would be participating twice a year in Club/Players Association small group peer support.  Facilitated by past player mentors with some professional support (expert input as requested by the group).  Post retirement footballers are moving from an extremely structured environment to entirely personal “choice”.  A lot have had no exposure to what they want in life and how to use their time effectively.  Sharing and learning with largely familiar peers is the best environment for maintaining ongoing attachment to a healthy culture and continuing to grow. It moves past player reunions beyond beer and back slapping.

• Defensiveness and breaking down barriers are inevitable but with a good confidential structure and basic facilitation skills training it can effectively be peer/player led.  Think of it as a full day “R U OK” session with processes for follow up and ongoing individualised support and development.  Twice a year is not onerous and players that don’t personally need it benefit from contributing to the group.  Participants are effectively being well paid from their Trust Fund for their time and input.  Logistical issues around players with multiple clubs; interstate relocation; and confidentiality with new coaching roles in other clubs would be challenging but could be worked through with technology and trust.

Is it an imposition on player ability to choose what they do with their money and time? Yes. But superannuation doesn’t help until age 60+, and this is a program to develop life skills and ensure basic financial security.  Players have managers, but they can only advise, and their remuneration is at least partially dependent on telling players what they want to hear.

 

Always interested to get feedback, comments and hear others ideas and experiences with fostering a productive life beyond footy.  

Go (Black) Swans. 

 

 

 

Lifeline  https://www.lifeline.org.au/Get-Help/  is a free and confidential support service which can be reached on 13 11 14.

Beyond Blue  https://www.beyondblue.org.au/ can be reached on 1300 22 46 36.

Our writers are independent contributors. The opinions expressed in their articles are their own. They are not the views, nor do they reflect the views, of Malarkey Publications.

 

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