Back Up In The Game
2) Writer’s block: It’s not like I haven’t been trying, ok? I just couldn’t seem to finish anything that seemed original, insightful or even mildly entertaining. Hmm, perhaps I should apply for work at the Herald-Sun. (Take that, mainstream media!) My computer is littered with half-started/half-finished blogs, including 700-odd words on the enigma known as Billy Smedts that may or may not reappear here at some future time.
3) Time: There’s only so much I can dedicate to Big League after travel, work, other writing projects and my rampant alcoholism.
But let’s put that behind us. Let’s look forward… Wait. Let’s look back again.
I didn’t watch Geelong’s only 2012 final. I was sleeping one off in New York and, when I awoke, I checked the quarter time score and immediately began drinking again. As to what happened in that final, you’re all in a much better position to know that me. From some discussions with Mrs Watson and other Big League sympathizers, it appears that The Cats simply did not show up. Were they looking ahead to the week after? Or was it just a bad day? Considering Geelong had beaten Hawthorn, Adelaide and Sydney just a few weeks before the finals, it was a particularly bitter pill to swallow.
The end of the 2012 season for The Cats also marked the end of a few careers, most notably Matthew Scarlett and David Wojcinski.
Wojack will be remembered for his pace and daring from half-back, his perfect Grand Final record (and conversely, his omission from the ’08 team), his impossible tan, the perfect right cross to Jack Viney’s jaw, the string of YouTube videos he inspired which I may or may not have forced Mrs Watson to watched repeatedly and for his “X-Factor-ness”, no small feat in the most successful team in AFL history.
Scarlett, on the other hand, goes down as not only Geelong’s greatest full-back, but the greatest full back in AFL/VFL history. His on-field prowess and the way he essentially changed the way modern defenders play aside (and that’s a MASSIVE aside), his attitude and demeanor came to somewhat typify the amazing ’07-‘11 Cats; team above self, humble but confident, serious but free-spirited, a competitor, a winner.
We leave behind a couple of club legends and a dissapointing, to say the least, 2012 finals series. But we welcome many new faces (more on this to come) in 2013 and hope, as they say, springs eternal. It is a time of great change at the great Geelong Football Club and there is much to discuss.
I’m back.
Ok, first things first. I realize that the previously posted “I’m back!” video may have been a little self-aggrandizing, but considering my first idea was to post this, I think you got off light.
Secondly, my extended absence from Big League has been due to a number of factors, most of which will fall under one of the following three categories:
1) Travel: I’ve been out of the country since roughly around the time Tom Hawkins kicked the after-the-siren winner against Hawthorn and jumped around like a teenager who just won the “Price is Right” showcase. Good times.
2) Writer’s block: It’s not like I haven’t been trying, ok? I just couldn’t seem to finish anything that seemed original, insightful or even mildly entertaining. Hmm, perhaps I should apply for work at the Herald-Sun. (Take that, mainstream media!) My computer is littered with half-started/half-finished blogs, including 700-odd words on the enigma known as Billy Smedts that may or may not reappear here at some future time.
3) Time: There’s only so much I can dedicate to Big League after travel, work, other writing projects and my rampant alcoholism.
But let’s put that behind us. Let’s look forward… Wait. Let’s look back again.
I didn’t watch Geelong’s only 2012 final. I was sleeping one off in New York and, when I awoke, I checked the quarter time score and immediately began drinking again. As to what happened in that final, you’re all in a much better position to know that me. From some discussions with Mrs Watson and other Big League sympathizers, it appears that The Cats simply did not show up. Were they looking ahead to the week after? Or was it just a bad day? Considering Geelong had beaten Hawthorn, Adelaide and Sydney just a few weeks before the finals, it was a particularly bitter pill to swallow.
The end of the 2012 season for The Cats also marked the end of a few careers, most notably Matthew Scarlett and David Wojcinski.
Wojack will be remembered for his pace and daring from half-back, his perfect Grand Final record (and conversely, his omission from the ’08 team), his impossible tan, the perfect right cross to Jack Viney’s jaw, the string of YouTube videos he inspired which I may or may not have forced Mrs Watson to watched repeatedly and for his “X-Factor-ness”, no small feat in the most successful team in AFL history.
Scarlett, on the other hand, goes down as not only Geelong’s greatest full-back, but the greatest full back in AFL/VFL history. His on-field prowess and the way he essentially changed the way modern defenders play aside (and that’s a MASSIVE aside), his attitude and demeanor came to somewhat typify the amazing ’07-‘11 Cats; team above self, humble but confident, serious but free-spirited, a competitor, a winner.
We leave behind a couple of club legends and a dissapointing, to say the least, 2012 finals series. But we welcome many new faces (more on this to come) in 2013 and hope, as they say, springs eternal. It is a time of great change at the great Geelong Football Club and there is much to discuss.
I’m back.
posted by the captain at 11:58 am
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