Geelong coach Chris Scott says Mark Blicavs is the gold standard for young players wanting to learn the game
Geelong coach Chris Scott says Mark Blicavs reaching 250 games is one of the “extraordinary stories of the modern era”, after initially thinking he’d be lucky to play one senior game.
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It was initially a one in a million shot, and after closer inspection, it was probably closer to a billion for Geelong coach Chris Scott.
Back in 2011, the Cats had recruited a greener than green but athletically gifted Mark Blicavs with pick 54 in the Rookie Draft; a friend of now Cats veteran Cam Guthrie whose father, Andrew, had coached back in juniors.
However, it was an off hand comment from the senior Guthrie which filtered back to Scott that made him consider there could be an opportunity for the youngster.
But it would take some time before that punt from master recruiter Stephen Wells would be proven correct.
“The way it was relayed to me (was): ‘The best player in our team back in the under-11s was this guy who’s now 198cm and is trying to run middle distance at the Olympics,” Scott said at GMHBA Stadium on Thursday.
“If he ever went back to footy, I reckon he’d be OK’.
“That’s one of the hallmarks of the way Stephen Wells has approached his job over the years, the one in a million is worth pursuing if it means that one is Mark Blicavs playing his 250th.
“He’s been critical to the way we’ve played.
“It’s a remarkable performance ... it’s one of the most extraordinary stories of the modern era.”
The 33-year-old will play his 250th game against the Western Bulldogs at Adelaide Oval on Saturday; a world away from his inauspicious beginnings where even one senior game seemed unlikely.
On Thursday, Blicavs said adjusting to the physicality of Aussie Rules took some time to adjust to after years out of the game.
“Initially, it was just getting used to contact sport when I first got to the club,” he said.
“That was the big challenge, coming from a non contact sport.
“When I first got to the club, I remember Maxy Rooke telling me: ‘This is the best you’ll ever feel in your football career, you’ll be sore all the time’.
“Early days I got a corky in my leg and I think I was out for three weeks.”
Fortunately, Blicavs had some strong allies in Rooke and key defenders Harry Taylor and Andrew Mackie, and a curious nature.
“I just continued to ask questions,” he said.
“I just wanted to understand everything because I didn’t understand anything when I first got to the club.”
Scott wasn’t as optimistic.
In fact, if it wasn’t for the category B rookie mechanism, Blicavs would not have come near an AFL list, in his mind.
He said it was impossible to foresee at the time Blicavs would play one game, let alone 250 in the hoops.
“He couldn’t play at all, to be honest,” he said.
“I had serious doubts right from that start, because he was coming from so far back.
“We went in with low expectations (laughs).
“The first season it was unlikely he would be a short term benefit to our senior team.
“It is difficult to explain just how far back he was when he came in, this was the throw at the stumps sort of situation.
“And to be frank if the rules weren’t the way they were with the category B rookie situation, he never would have ended up on our list.
“Without it we wouldn’t have seen Mark Blicavs play AFL footy at all I suspect, much less 250.”
Scott said Blicavs had spent his athletic career learning how to endure pain, but it was a world away from what was required in Aussie Rules.
He thought if the experiment was going to work, it might take four years to achieve.
However, Blicavs had another skill in his tool kit that perhaps Scott had overlooked or simply not seen to that point: a determination to learn.
And Blicavs’ improvement was “extraordinarily quick”, making his debut in Round 1 in 2013 and never looking back.
“He was never out of the team after that,” Scott said.
Scott said Blicavs was the gold standard when it came to application, adaptation and “his capacity and desire to learn”.
“To the point of being really annoying early days, he’s like a three-year-old, everything was ‘why’,” he said.
“Why do I do this, how can I get better?
“If ever a young player wanted to learn how to learn, I’d be suggesting that he goes to ‘Blitz’.”
Blicavs is something of a trailblazer, inspiring the club to take chances on other “long shots”.
However, when asked if there was a game where everything clicked, he admits he’s still a work in progress and that moment hasn’t come yet.
“It probably still hasn’t,” he said.
“I still try to improve and learn, work on my kicking and everything else in between.
“I’ve tried to keep that attitude .. even up to this week’s game.
“There probably wasn’t a decisive moment when I felt it click.
“I’m very fortunate, Scotty, the Geelong footy club, ‘Wellsy’, ‘Balmey’ at the time, gave me that opportunity to learn and play footy with this club.
“I’ve tried to learn as much as I can from everyone around.”
Originally published as Geelong coach Chris Scott says Mark Blicavs is the gold standard for young players wanting to learn the game
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