You’ve just won the Norm Smith Medal ... Don’t drop the F-Bomb.

Lake had just closed out his first season with the Hawks in spectacular fashion, taking 10 telling marks and having 22 disposals as part of a defensive wall that stopped the ‘Purple Haze’ of Fremantle.

He knew he had played well.

But when long-time AFL official Patrick Keane – so often the bearer of good news on Grand Final day – moved across to him in the moments after the Hawks’ 15-point win, he quickly figured out what it meant.

He was about to receive word well before anyone else that he had won the Norm Smith Medal, the first key-position defender to do so this century.

“He (Keane) comes over pretty early and taps you on the shoulder and says ‘Brian, you have won the Norm Smith’,” Lake recounted in the Herald Sun’s Sacked podcast.

Long before a former Prime Minister used the term ‘loose unit’ to describe the man trying to take his job, Lake had been referenced in the same context.

He could be unpredictable and impulsive, which was both good and bad on the football field, but often bad off it.

The man who had created ‘Brian’s Bargains’ carved out an outstanding footy career in an age when characters were few and far between, so even he could understand why AFL officials wanted to keep him on script as much as possible in such a key moment.

“My kids have run out on the ground and I’ve given my wife a kiss and I’ve said to her ‘I’ve just won the Norm Smith’,” he said. “She was like ‘What are you talking about?’

“I think she just thought I was being arrogant.”

After three agonising preliminary finals losses with the Bulldogs and a move to Hawthorn, Lake knew the magnitude of winning a flag in that first year at his new club.

“You get judged when you change clubs for success. If you don’t get success, it’s just ‘a complete failure’,” he said. “But to get over the line in that (2013) Grand Final, to get it out of the way out was such a relief. People say ‘Are you excited?’ But it was (like a wave of) relief that went through my body. I remember thinking, “Thank God this has happened.”

‘WHAT HAVE YOU SOLD ME HERE?’

Twelve months prior to his Norm Smith Medal moment, Lake was at the MCG, drinking frothies with some mates from Adelaide, barracking against Hawthorn in the 2012 Grand Final against Sydney.

He knew then he was headed to the brown and gold the following season, but couldn’t tell anyone, under strict orders from his manager.

It had all been arranged. The Dogs were going to deal with the Hawks on a trade, but he feared if Hawthorn had won that day, the transaction would become too messy – hence his support of Sydney that day.

“A part of me wanted Hawthorn to lose because I thought it would have been an easier trade to happen if they lost to Sydney,” he reflected.

“I had friends over from Adelaide and we had the Grand Final ritual of parking the car there and having a couple of beers in the esky in the back of the car. They (his mates) were a bit tight and they even came out at half-time for a couple. I might have done that myself as well.

“Derm (Brereton) walked past and I said ‘Hey, Derm, How are you going buddy?’ He said: ‘What are you doing here having a few beers?’”

The Swans upset the Hawks, baring Alastair Clarkson’s need for a power defender even more stark. Lake was ready, willing and able, having already had a clandestine meeting with the Hawthorn footy hierarchy and been ticked off from a medical perspective.

The move, Lake recalls, went through on day one of the trade period and he set about getting to work with the Hawks in the pre-season … until a serious hurdle in January 2013.

On a weekend off, he and his wife Shannon were locked up after a drunken verbal encounter at the Portsea Polo.

The Hawks were ropeable their new signing was in trouble before he had played a game.

He said the hardest part was having to ring then Hawks footy boss Mark Evans and Hawks skipper Luke Hodge to explain his side of the story when coming back from Portsea.

“Clarko said to (his manager) Marty Pask ‘What have you sold me here?’ and there were probably a few more swear words in there,” Lake said.

“It’s definitely not easy walking into the footy club on a Monday morning (after that).

“It was nerve wracking, with some of the issues you’ve had at the Bulldogs and then to come over (to Hawthorn) and have an issue straight away.”

But Lake knew the club would be a little more understanding once they had heard his side of the story.

“It’s not a great look being locked up for three hours to sober up, but it wasn’t like it was a fight,” he said. “What happened is that they got the footage from the pub on what had happened and there were no other issues to go on with.”

“They do their research to find out if you are telling the truth. We got it all done pretty quickly and we moved on, which was good. But I had to earn my stripes again.”

PETRIE SLEEPER-HOLD

An incident with North Melbourne’s Drew Petrie in Round 16, 2014 – Lake’s second season with Hawthorn – thrust him right back into the spotlight for the wrong reasons.

In a flash of frustration, Lake had his arms around Petrie’s neck in a sleeper-hold while the Kangaroos forward was on the ground.

Lake told Sacked: “He had kicked a couple of goals early and he was up and about, so you try to bring him down and be a bit physical. You could feel his body tense up and you think he is about to wrestle with you.

“I was thinking ‘We are losing this game, I am not going to lose this wrestle’.

“I wanted to hold him down and make sure he didn’t move. I was reasonably close to his neck and he did gag for air at that stage.

“You can (then) see me reposition my hands, change and move it, but I didn’t move too much. My ambition was not to try to strangle him; it was to show authority.”

Lake was suspended for four weeks for the incident. He knows it was not a good look for the game, but insists he never meant any harm.

“There was no real build up to it, I was just having a crap game, we were struggling and he had kicked some goals early. I thought ‘Stuff this, I will get into a wrestle.’”

‘GET TO HOSPITAL STRAIGHT AWAY’

Lake had some injury issues in 2014 which almost cost him the chance to play a role in Hawthorn’s back to back premiership assault.

He had calf surgery earlier in the season and then suffered a hip injury in the club’s first final that put his Grand Final aspirations in jeopardy.

“We had an ultrasound in the rooms, so we decided to ultra sound it. I thought ‘let’s drain it, just run it and see if that relieves the pain and the swelling,” he said.

“We got about 100 mills of fluid out and taped it and tried to compress it as much as possible and they sent me home.

“I went home and was tossing and turning and could not sleep. It’s about two or three in the morning. I couldn’t sit or sleep, so they (the doctors) said ‘Get to hospital straight away’.

“I had a nice Holden Commodore station wagon so the wife had to put the back seats (down) and lay me down in there because I couldn’t sit up at that stage.

“I had burst a blood vessel. I had emergency surgery to put a stent in. I was holed up in hospital and I think it was Father’s Day.”

The Hawks thankfully advanced straight into the preliminary final, giving Lake time to recover, even though it was touch and go.

He would go on to play in the preliminary final win over Port Adelaide and played a significant role in shutting out Kurt Tippett and at times Lance Franklin in the Hawks’ stunning Grand Final success over Sydney.

Lake revealed on the Friday afternoon before the Grand Final Clarkson and the coaching staff showed vision of the Swans celebrating after the 2012 flag win over the Hawks.

“They were not talking about redemption or payback, but they decided to (show the vision) and let it burn.

“I obviously didn’t play in that game, but when you are watching the video, you can understand what it would have meant to a lot of those guys in terms of the hurt and frustration.

“It was just complete silence … the hairs on the back (of your neck) just stood up.”

The Hawks kicked five goals to two in the opening term and went on to win by 63 points as Lake collected his second premiership medal.

FLAG NO. 3

When Hawthorn lost the first final against West Coast in Perth in 2015, many pundits figured their hopes of a three-peat were over. Lake wasn’t so sure.

He knew it could be a different story if they could take on the Eagles at the MCG on Grand Final day.

“When you have got such a mature and confident group, you just knew we were still going to come,” he said. “If we could get them back at the MCG, it was going to suit us.”

The Hawks did it the hard way but swept through to the premiership decider against the Eagles. It was Lake’s 251st – and final – game and his desperate goalmouth smother on his former teammate Josh Hill summed up the Hawks’ desperation that day.

“I played a fair few years with Josh and I knew he would be reasonably goal hungry,” he said. “I just tempted him, but there was a bit of luck involved.

“I’ve actually played against him a couple of times in local footy. He is at St Albans and I’m at Caroline Springs and it’s been mentioned a few times.”

The Hawks won by 46 points and Lake earned his third premiership medal in only his third season at the club.

SACKED

Lake knew his chances of winning one more year at Hawthorn were remote, but it still didn’t make the blow any easier when he was effectively sacked by the club on Mad Monday.

There were no hard feelings though. He was 34 and understood the club that had provided him with the chance of tasting premiership success was looking to the future.

“It’s all a bit of a blur when it happens,” he said. “I had spoken to Marty (Pask) halfway through the year and said the body’s going all right, I think I could push for one more year.

“But the club wanted to wait until the end of the year, so I thought I am in a bit of strife here.”

That’s why he savoured the moment when he was soaking up the 2015 premiership, knowing it was likely to be his last hurrah.

“My meeting (with the club) was meant to be for 12 or one o’clock, but it got pushed back to one of the last ones,” he said. “I knew I was in strife.

“Then (in the meeting) all of a sudden they all come in – the coaches, the fitness staff and it’s like a funeral. I was like ‘It’s all right guys’. They said ‘You could try your luck at another club, but after three flags in three years, we think it is a good time to finish up’.”

He thought about playing on again elsewhere, but chose not to.

In the January of the following year, after the Essendon sports supplements scandal had wiped out half their team for 2016, Lake took a phone call while he was holidaying down at the Collendina Caravan Park.

He was “quite literally” eating a sausage roll at the time.

“Marty rang me and said ‘Are you interested in playing for Essendon (for) $180,000 and match payments?’ I was like ‘Leave it with me for a couple of hours.”

Lake ended the conversation, polished off the rest of the sausage roll and closed off any thoughts about an AFL comeback.

SACKED: THE MOMENT LAKE NEEDED OUT OF BULLDOGS

Brian Lake put his body through hell to be one of the game’s best defenders. But when the Bulldogs leadership group turned on him, he knew it was time to get out.

Throw a brick at Brian Lake because in his 11 seasons as a star Western Bulldogs defender there was little he could not withstand.

He overcame a childhood sleep apnea disorder to make the grade and was drafted in front of only eight other players at pick 71 in the 2001 ‘superdraft’.

He was regularly in skirmishes that saw him sidelined with suspension; he pushed through the pain and countless painkilling injections to take to the field when other players wilted.

Lake conceded he was partly to blame. He could find trouble without having to look too hard and he wasn’t as driven from a fitness sense as the more dedicated players forming the bulk of the Bulldogs’ leadership group.

Yet it was for good reason that his coach Rodney Eade handed him an added burden most weeks as well as tasking him with standing the game’s great forwards.

He knew Lake had the inner resilience to stand the white-hot heat of his famous sprays for the good of the side.

Sometimes he wanted to sharpen Lake’s wavering focus but often his star defender would step up to the role of whipping boy because Eade knew he had the fortitude to keep calm and carry on.

“My problem was that I responded when he used to do that,” Lake told the Herald Sun’s Sacked podcast. “He used to get the message across to the side through me.

“If he wanted to send the group a message, he would use it on me because he knew I could handle it and I would respond to it.”

Eade once told reporters post-game that Lake “forgot to turn up” to a match against Sydney at the SCG. The Herald Sun highlighted Lake in a photograph from the game, saying “We found him.”

“I can’t remember a lot of what he used to say … because I was trying to keep eye contact,” he said. “There were three times in that game when he had a go at me. He would berate me and walk off and then he would come back when he remembered something else. He just kept coming back.”

Through it all, Lake won a best and fairest in 2007 and back-to-back All-Australian blazers in 2009 and 2010.

So when the proverbial hit the fan in 2011 you can imagine Lake’s disappointment at questions over his attitude or capacity to play through pain.

He had knee, shoulder and hip surgery that ruined his pre-season, yet members of the leadership group were openly critical and wanting him sent back to the VFL.

When assistant coach Brett Montgomery questioned his mental toughness in dealing with injury during a press conference, Lake knew he couldn’t stay.

“The leadership group turned on me a bit when my performance dropped … and with what Brett Montgomery said, he didn’t say it to me personally, he said it in the media,” Lake said.

“They put a media ban on me. It was like ‘you guys can talk, but I couldn’t get my point of view across’.

“It was probably my fault as Rocket (Eade) allowed me to get away with it all those years. His thought was ‘if you are playing good football on the weekend, whatever you are doing off the field must be working‘.

“If I wasn’t going as hard in the weights room … I wasn’t big on training on the day before a game. That was my routine and it wasn’t like the leadership group’s routine.

“Then 2011 hits and Brian’s performances were not going well, Rocket was under the pump. He admitted that when he came in and said: ‘You have to go back to the VFL for a week … the guys are pushing for it. My hands are tied … I can’t do anything (about it), Brian’.”

Asked if that snub stung, Lake said: “Yeah, especially after what you had put your body through … I think Rocket coached 162 games and I reckon I played 146 of those games.

“With all the injuries I had, I still managed to play. I would hate to think about how many anaesthetics I had, I put my body through a lot and to say that I came off three surgeries (leading into 2011). To get your knee drained in the morning and then getting a local (anaesthetic) put in it on a Saturday to play … I think I was pretty mentally tough.”

Lake limped through a frustrating 2011 season, but honoured the final year of his contract under new coach Brendan McCartney in 2012.

However he had already made a decision to start looking around.

“The relationship with (some of) the players and staff at the footy club hurt. It hurt me a lot, but it was probably not going to be fixed …

“I had a discussion with (his manager) Marty Pask at the time and said ‘I think I am going to be in a bit of strife with the new coach’.

“I told him to find me a new home.”

SLEEP APNEA AND ABATTOIR

Lake’s cousin wanted to “toughen” him up after he left school, giving him a job at an Adelaide abattoir.

It was a means to an end; all he wanted to do was play AFL footy.

“It was very robotic, physical work,” Lake said. “I wasn’t doing weights at that stage, but I was pushing a lot of beef which ended up helping me in my footy.”

Lake was playing at the lower levels at Woodville-West Torrens, but his hectic schedule and a sleep disorder conspired against him.

“I was working in the abattoir from about 4.30 or 5 in the morning and I would get home at about 1.30 or 2 in the afternoon,” he recalled.

“Before training, I would have a little snooze. You would end up waking up at six or seven o’clock and you would miss training and get a bit of dinner. Then you would go back to bed and you would be up again at 4.30 and do it all again.”

At the 2000 draft camp, he was so “crook” he struggled through the interviews with clubs, owing to his interrupted sleep.

“I missed out,” he said. “I thought ‘my opportunity is probably gone’.”

But a sleep apnea diagnosis and a medical procedure reignited his footy dreams.

“Brenton Hart was good friends with (Bulldogs recruiting manager) Scott Clayton,” he said. “He tapped me on the shoulder and said ‘They’re pretty keen on you … we will get your off-field stuff organised.”

Lake had surgery which resulted in more sleep and the opportunity of a lifetime loomed with the Bulldogs.

“You go in and get your tonsils and adenoids taken out and that really helped me,” he said. “They actually got them tested … they were that big … you could really feel the difference.”

PLUGGER AND THE BIG DOGS

Imagine playing on Tony Lockett in your first game … at VFL level! Then imagine, if you can, volunteering for the onerous role on the game‘s most prolific goalkicker.

Lake did both in early 2002.

Lockett was on his comeback trail and returning to football via Port Melbourne, Sydney’s VFL side. Lake was working through the ranks at the Bulldogs’ VFL side, Werribee.

“I think I only had a 12 month contract at that stage,” Lake said. “I went in and spoke to (assistant coach) Chris Bond and said: ‘Mate, I want to have the opportunity to stand (Lockett)’.

“I thought ‘stuff it, if I am going to be sent back to Adelaide within 12 months at least I can say that I stood Tony Lockett’.”

While Lockett kicked three goals, Lake learnt some valuable lessons.

His AFL debut came with limited game time in Round 21, 2002, which was Terry Wallace’s last game as Bulldogs’ coach.

His successor Peter Rohde dropped him the next week but the following year he would go on to play on some of the best forwards.

“I’ve looked at the stats in my first couple of years and I’d touched the ball four times here, five times there, and six times there. It was probably like a Simon Prestigiacomo role.

“But I wanted to do more. You have to be able to touch the footy, when you play AFL football you want to have 15 or 20 touches.”

A broken hand saw Lake unable to clench his palm to punch across 10 weeks in 2004, so he started to back himself in and go for the mark.

Lake, the attacking defender, was born.

Incredibly, he played in only one win from his first 17 games.

“We were in a bad spot … (chief executive) Campbell Rose came into the footy club and said everyone had to take a 15 per cent pay cut or these five or six players will have to go.

“You can’t really take 15 per cent out of nothing, so I was OK with it. But when you have got Chris Grant and Scott West sitting there, you are talking about a fair bit of money.

“It probably affected Nathan Brown a bit because after that, he goes over to Richmond.”

NAME CHANGE

Brian Lake was Brian Harris for the first 25 years of his life before the impending birth of his first child made him seek a name change at the end of the 2007 season.

He explained: “I took my mum’s maiden name Harris at birth. My parents were still together and they were on and off for a period when I was younger.

“They ended up getting married when I was about 11 or 12 and my mum changed her name to dad’s name, so they gave me the option of changing it to Lake as well.”

He chose to keep Harris at that time as he didn’t want to attract any further attention at school or in footy teams. “In hindsight,” Lake said, “they shouldn’t have given me a choice.”

He played the first 97 games of his career as Brian Harris. But after winning the best and fairest in 2007, he embarked on the rest of his career as Brian Lake.

“My wife was pregnant with our first child and I thought I had to keep the old man’s name going,” he said.

“I still get stuff from CityLink that says ‘Harris’ and I just don’t worry about those messages.”

STOP ROO …. AND THAT FREE KICK

Lake revealed the Bulldogs had a pre-game plan to stop St Kilda forward Nick Riewoldt ahead of the 2009 preliminary final.

“He (Riewoldt) was in the gun for that game,” he said. “We knew he was super fit and we thought if we could just get in his way 20 or 30 times, we would just knock him.

“We thought if he was getting tired, we could stop him. We thought if we could do that, hopefully in the last quarter, he would be getting fatigued.”

The Bulldogs held a narrow advantage at halftime of the game, leading by seven points … then came the most controversial moment of the match.

Riewoldt was sensationally paid a free kick after Lake made slight contact with him, with the Saints’ skipper accentuating the impact.

He kicked a game-defining goal with the Saints going on to win the match by seven points.

“He might have said something like ‘I am getting some off the ball treatment here’ because they (the umpires) were looking at it straight away. Whether he deliberately ran across me or not, (I don’t know). I just laid a little bit of a bump and you watch the way he falls.

“There is not much contact in it really and they have blown the whistle for a free kick.”

Lake verbally copped it immediately from the Saints.

“Kozzie (Justin Koschitzke) was really strong on it … he was like ‘you’ve just cost your side a Grand Final spot,” he recalled.

“It was only the start of the third quarter and I was like ‘There’s still sixty minutes to go mate, turn it up’.

“We had plenty of other opportunities … but 2009 was probably our best opportunity.”

HEARTBREAK IN LAS VEGAS

One of Lake’s last acts as a Western Bulldogs player in late 2012 was to help organise the club’s footy trip to Las Vegas.

He “had a fair crack” one night and went to bed in the early hours. He slept deep into the next day.

When he emerged at the club’s meeting place at the Bellagio the next evening, he couldn’t believe how the mood had changed.

“You walk in and you see Jarrad Grant crying and I said ‘what’s going on here?’ They said: ‘A Port Adelaide player (John McCarthy) has died’.

“Adam (Cooney) said that he had tried to get hold of me (when he had heard an AFL player had died in Las Vegas). He said ‘I thought it was you for a second’.

“My partner Shannon was coming over at the end of our trip and she had only heard that an AFL player had died in Vegas. It wasn’t until she landed in Vegas that she knew it wasn’t me.”