Marcus Drum opens up on short-lived AFL career and where the game has taken him
Twenty years after being selected at pick 10, Marcus Drum opens up about the moment he knew his AFL dream was over and the unexpected silver lining that followed.
Marcus Drum had a revelation during the second year of his AFL career.
“In juniors I’d never not been picked for a team, never been dropped once I’d been in a team, I’d captained teams and was always sort of seen as a bit of a leader,” he remembers.
But the game had just started to feel difficult.
“I reckon in my second year at Freo where I was like, okay, footy’s not as enjoyable as it was … People say you play footy for fun, but f***, footy’s hard.”
It’s 20 years since the Congupna raised Drum was drafted – taken by Fremantle with their prized number 10 pick in the 2005 National draft.
He hit the ground running too. In his debut season Drum played five AFL games in a team that was bound for a preliminary final.
But he also picked up his first serious injury that year – a 20cm hamstring tear after slipping on the notorious Marvel Stadium turf. And it was an injury that would become one of many across his career.
Drum was a star at junior level. A tall key position player who could run, he’d been an Under 18 all-Australian in 2004 and his May 1st birthday meant he missed that year’s draft cut-off by mere hours. But he was always going to get drafted in 2005.
“I was just very fortunate, everything sort of went my way as a junior,” Drum says now.
“So by the time I got to my top age it was sort of a matter of where and when. Not if, and that’s not with a big head and all that.”
And Drum’s career started as many successful AFL careers do – biding his time in State league footy until he got a chance in the big time in round 13 and holding his spot until that hamstring tear in round 17.
“I just remember thinking: Players get injured all the time, players come back from injuries … I’ll move on, hopefully never do another hammy in my life.”
Unfortunately for Drum, that wouldn’t be the case.
And it wouldn’t just be hamstrings. he injured both quads, suffered broken noses, had ankle ligament surgery and probably most seriously of all, a detached retina.
“That was the first injury where I sort of went, sh*t, this could affect the rest of my life,” Drum says.
“All the other ones, you sort of go, yeah, rehab it, get back, let’s get back to play football.”
But the problem was, with that number of injuries, even when he did get back to playing footy, he couldn’t get the continuity necessary to play regularly in the AFL.
After four years at Freo where he managed just 22 games, Drum crossed to Geelong hoping for a change in fortune but, if anything, his luck got worse.
And so, at just 24 Drum came to a crossroads in his footy career – and life.
With the Cats on the eve of another finals series and ultimately a third premiership in five years, Drum pinged another hamstring at a Friday afternoon captain’s run.
“At that moment, that’s when I knew I was done,” Drum remembers.
“I was just sitting in the rooms, flat, and Cam Mooney came in and just put his arm around me.
“I remember calling my girlfriend at the time, she’s now my wife, and I go, ‘I’ve done another hammy, I think that’s it.’”
“So I had the weekend and then I called Scotty.”
On the Monday, Drum sat with the Cats’ first-year senior coach Chris Scott at the Kardinia Cafe to inform him of his decision.
And while there was some talk of a possible rookie list position in 2012, Drum doesn’t remember there being too much resistance to his call.
“He didn’t try and talk me out of it.” Drum remembers with a laugh.
By this stage, he had already started to plan for his life post-footy.
“The decision I had to make was: do I want to put myself through all that again or can I use all the experiences I’ve had into a career? And that sort of excited me.”
His extended periods in rehab and while injured allowed him time to study and he’d developed a passion for player development.
These days, Drum is a regional manager with the AFLPA where he works with players from Carlton, Essendon and Collingwood.
And this is the time of year when he feels he is most useful – when players have just finished up and are transitioning out of the AFL system.
“Players are at their most vulnerable and I feel like that’s where I probably have my most impact is through this period of uncertainty.”
You could excuse Drum for feeling some bitterness that his dreams of a long AFL career didn’t eventuate, but there is none.
When he sat down for a chat with Code Sports recently his love for the game was still as strong as when he was first drafted.
“Footy’s never owed me anything,” Drum declares.
“I’ve gotten so much out of it and so I think that does stop me from looking back going, ‘Why didn’t I get more?’ ‘Why didn’t he play me then?’ I just feel that would probably be pretty exhausting.
“I just feel grateful that footy has allowed me to get out of bed every day and enjoy doing what I do now but equally enjoyed what I did as a player.”
These days, Drum’s greatest footy passion is watching his hometown team, Congupna, play.
“I take my kids there because … that’s where my team is and that is where I feel that sense of ‘that’s my club’.” Drum says.
“We went back last year when they won the flag by a point and I’m there screaming, I’m riding every wave. I don’t get that when I go to a Freo or Geelong game.
“I just get to go back as a supporter of a club that started everything that gave me what I’ve got today. And that’s where the joy comes from.
“And I get more nervous watching them than I ever did before an AFL game. It’s unbelievable.”
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