Inside the moment Jonathan Brown realised ‘s**t, I can make this’ before courageous pack mark against Hawthorn
As Jonathan Brown hurled himself toward the pack, it dawned on the Brisbane Lions forward he was in trouble. What he did next went down as one of the most courageous moments in a career punctuated by sheer bravery.
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The greatest misnomer, says Jonathan Brown, is that there is an absence of fear.
He still bristles at the tag attached to some of the marks which became the most indelible images of bravery in 150 years of AFL football.
Crazy brave. Dumb courage.
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The one thing Brisbane champion Brown — or those like Ken Hunter and Nick Riewoldt who shared that particular brand of bravery — has never been is fearless.
Those connotation from those descriptions is that the stars of the game didn’t have the intellect to actually anticipate the almost certain collisions coming their way.
That day at the MCG in 2002, which will live forever in football folklore, he knew exactly what was coming when he ran headlong into a pack of approaching players.
“If you weren’t scared or didn’t feel anything you would be in a mental hospital,” Brown told the Herald sun this week of those collection of back-with-the-flight marks which defined his career.
“The fact of the matter is you have to learn to overcome your fear. Part of the deal is that there is going be great uncertainty. Now and then you are going to be caught in a reckless situation.”
Brown’s determination to thrust himself to the centre of those moments was actually a trained response dating back to under-13 days as a colt from the ‘Bool, then honed under the ruthless Leigh Matthews.
The way he puts it there were maybe five times a year when the ball drifted over his head and he had that sick feeling in the pit of his stomach.
Is that ball for me at centre half forward or for Alastair Lynch or Daniel Bradshaw sprinting from full forward to intercept it with maximum velocity?
For Brown, now a Fox Footy expert, there was no choice about going or taking a dozen shorter steps no one would notice to pull up and get front-and-centre for the contest.
He just went. And went and went until the bone-snapping fallout from those marks literally ended his career.
Brown says the backdrop that 2002 mark actually came the previous year in the famous “Predator” game against Essendon.
If Essendon bled it could be killed, but someone from Brisbane had to cause mortal damage in a contest that would kickstart a 16-victory run leading to the premiership.
“Leigh was big on this, that it was a habit that to be formed. I had under-13 coach in particular who was very big on committing 100 per cent to the ball or you were more likely to get hurt,” he says.
“Then gradually as you watch Derm (Dermott Brereton) and Duck (Wayne Carey) you watch them play and see how they commit to the contest and if you aspire to be a centre half forward, you just have to do that.
“In that ‘Predator’ game, Round 10 of 2001, I felt like I went back with the flight in a moment where I wasn’t quite sure what was coming the other way.
“And I suppose as a younger player — 19 years old, 20th game — I survived. I survived the moment. The physical moment, but mentally in a big moment for the club and you take confidence from that and know you can do it next time.”
Next time was Round 17, 2002, with Brown by that stage a premiership player hungry for more.
Brisbane is 13 points ahead of Hawthorn halfway through the third quarter and just as Robert Harvey’s shanked SCG pass put Nick Riewoldt in mortal danger, Aaron Shattock sets up the boy from Warrnambool.
“If it was Nigel Lappin I would never have made it with his low darting kicks, but it was a really high ball, almost a rushed clearance from the centre square,” says Brown, warming to the tale by now.
“I reckon I was nearly standing next to him when he kicked it, he kicked it so high.
“Initially I was getting down to support the contest, and it kept hovering in the air.
“I had forced (opponent) Jon Barker to the front position, and I had a clean run at it. I knew the pack was moving that fast, so the further I went, the more it was, “Shit I can make this”.”
Brown and Hawks defender Barker are jostling for position on the run, with Lynch and his opponent Jade Rawlings bustling to take the mark at the drop of the ball.
Only in that last instant does it dawn on them that Brown, legs pumping with that familiar gait, has never considered pulling up.
He explodes into pack with stunning force then bursts through it gripping ball to chest as he sprawls to the ground, leaving teammate Daniel Bradshaw clapping in the foreground with the sheer audacity of it all.
“Obviously I was a happy man when I realised Alastair wasn’t going to kill me,” says Brown.
“It happens fast and it’s almost like you reach that point like a plane about to take off, where you have to commit or pull out and once you commit, you go wholeheartedly or you will get hurt. It was that moment — “Shit I am committed now” — where you have to go with everything you have got.
“I was actually in a pretty good position from a protective point of view. You are trying to tuck yourself in like a cannonball. I didn’t have the greatest jump and I was going flat out to get there and in that situation you are going headfirst so that’s what scares you the most.”
Lynch has never got sick of recalling that stunning moment given what it meant to Brown and the Lions.
“It happened every week. This mad young centre half forward coming back with the flight,” he said.
“At times it was get out of the road and at times it was hold my man out so he didn’t cave Browny’s head in. You knew if the ball was remotely near him he was going to go for it. It was an unbelievable mark at the MCG. He came from such a long way out.
“It was, “Here comes this mad bugger again”.
“That was his determination to get to the ball. He didn’t concern himself with his own welfare or anyone else’s. It got him in the end. Mitch Clark hit him at the Gabba and he fractured his cheekbone and he had a few nasty ones later in his career where he got hurt badly, but he was just incredible.”
The bloke with the best seat in the house is still stunned 17 years on.
“I could tell the story in my sleep,” says current Blues assistant Barker, one footy’s most gregarious characters and a damned fine player in his time.
“My foundation is modesty but I am happy to say I got nutted on this one. I did say to Schwabby (senior coach Peter Schwab) I wasn’t going to let him take a mark all day and he would have to take Mark of the Year to take a mark on me (laughing).
“But there came a point where we realised we got close enough to the contest where I thought there is no way he will get there and history tells us what he did.
“Everyone has that same fear. Everyone knows the consequences. It’s just that there are some guys who have the ability to grit their teeth and fight their way through what is going on in their mind.
“He lives near me and I have seen him a couple of times and he tells me he is more than happy to drop me off a DVD of the Mark of the Year.”
For Brown, the ultimate accolade came from coach Matthews at his retirement testimonial lunch where the AFL legend said of him after that mark: “You conquered your fear”.
His favourite marks come from uncle Billy Picken, one of the VFL’s great exponents of the high mark, but he says Riewoldt’s SCG mark still stick in his mind.
He loves the symmetry of a player who reeled the most 2944 marks — ahead of Gary Dempsey and Stewart Loewe — also boasting one of the game’s greatest.
“The poor bastard, two years before I won the Mark of the Year so they probably didn’t want to give two Marks of the Year to the same style,” says Brown.
“It was just the awkwardness of the way he landed. It’s the worst position to get caught in, when you are in the air and going to land on your back.
“You don’t know where the ground is and that’s the scariest situation. You carry a fair bit of fear when you go for the mark but you are more fearful when you are flipped onto your back.
“He has the double danger of being petrified in the air and petrified coming down. I don’t know what’s worse.
“Rooey was genuinely courageous in all facets of play, not just marking and I think it’s a nice reflection of his career as the greatest mark-taker in the game.”
The 12-person judging panel will announce their No. 1 mark next Wednesday.
Dermott Brereton
Five premierships with Hawthorn and 211 total games as well as the man whose 1989 Grand Final mark with a chest full of broken ribs defines Grand Final courage.
David King
Two premierships and 241 games at North Melbourne and the best view in the house as Roos Wayne Carey, Winston Abraham and Brett Allison battled for aerial bragging rights.
Paul Roos
356 games with Fitzroy and Sydney and the Swans premiership coach literally not daring to look as Leo Barry flew for the mark that would break Sydney’s premiership drought.
Jason Dunstall
Four premierships and 1254 goals with the Hawks, forming a masterful partnership with his “beloved” teammate Dermott Brereton
Alastair Lynch
306 games and three premierships, and won the 1989 Mark of the Year as well as having a front-seat view of Jon Brown’s 2002 mark back with the flight.
Garry Lyon
The Melbourne captain and 226-game centre half forward as well as joking he is the human step ladder to Shaun Smith and Jeff Farmer’s stunning leaps.
Mark Robinson
Herald Sun chief football writer.
Jon Anderson
Herald Sun senior writer.
Glenn McFarlane
Herald Sun senior writer.
Danny Russell
Herald Sun sports editor and Carlton tragic.
Michael Warner
Herald Sun senior writer.
Jon Ralph
Herald Sun senior writer.
Originally published as Inside the moment Jonathan Brown realised ‘s**t, I can make this’ before courageous pack mark against Hawthorn