Sturt legend Colin Casey recalls the first time he laid eyes on a teenaged Brodie Grundy and knew straight away there was something special about the now Collingwood star
As Collingwood prepares to battle GWS for a spot in the AFL grand final, the man who signed star ruckman Brodie Grundy to Sturt’s junior development squad reveals his first impression of the basketball star who had yet to play a game of footy.
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It was late February in 2010, and while outside the office window, the last heat of the Adelaide summer was making way for autumn, Colin Casey’s phone rang.
As the manager of the Sturt Football Club’s Centre of Excellence, this was not unusual, Casey’s phone rang regularly enough.
But this call was different.
On the other end of the line was a mother — she introduced herself as Jenny — and she went on to say that her son was looking to have a go at footy.
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Casey replied: “Oh yeah, tell me a little bit about him”.
“And she said: ‘Well, he’s in the South Australian Sports Institute for basketball, he’s 15 years of age and he’s 198cm tall’.
“And then I said: ‘Where do you live?’ And she told me their address in Hawthorndene and I said: ‘I’ll be there in 15 minutes’.
“But I told a porky pie. It took me 17.”
On the other side of the front door of that Hawthorndene home was Brodie Grundy. Then, a young basketball champ whose only footy experience had been a couple of kicks in primary school.
“When I met him and shook his hand I thought: ‘I love that handshake, this lad’s got a bit of character’,” Casey recalls.
And from that initial meeting began Grundy’s transition from Adelaide’s basketball courts to its footy ovals.
“Probably that was the best phone call I had,” Casey says with a laugh.
Casey, a Sturt legend who embarked on a long career in football coaching, development and administration following his retirement after playing 251 games for the Double Blues, signed the teenager who had “a kick that needed a lot of work” to Sturt’s eight-week, under-16s junior development program.
And considering his height and size there was no doubt in Casey’s mind that this 15-year-old lad could turn out to be quite the ruckman.
“Brodie was the biggest young lad in the under-16s … we convinced the (state) selectors that he was a bit special because he had a terrific work ethic and he wanted to learn and wouldn’t take no for an answer,” Casey says.
“He was a bit fortunate from what I hear with (state) selection: he wasn’t in the (SA) side going up the stairs, but he was in the side when the selectors came down the stairs.
“He went on to have a terrific (national) carnival in Brisbane, in fact I distinctly remember this terrific mark overhead in front of the grandstand to stop the Vics’ attack in the dying stages of the game, it was just a one-grab clunk and that won the game for us.”
However what really impressed Casey about Grundy was neither his height, his weight or even his kick that rapidly improved with non-stop practice.
It was his dedication and fight to get better.
“I distinctly remember at the start of the year, the SANFL put all the players through their beep test, jumping, all those sorts of things and the physios wanted to see how many one-armed press-ups each player could do.
“So the big bloke was doing his and in the meantime, we’d cleaned up and everyone had gone and he was still doing them.
“And I said: ‘Everyone’s gone’. And he said: ‘Well, I haven’t finished’. I said: ‘Well, I’m going home’ and I kicked him in the ribs and said: ‘Just go’.
“But he wouldn’t stop. He has that drive to succeed and you can see it in the way he plays today. It’s a credit to him.”
Casey agrees there’s something special about basketballers who make the code switch to the oval ball (think Collingwood’s Scott Pendlebury, Crows’ Hugh Greenwood, Erin Phillips and Tom Doedee and Hawthorn’s Chad Wingard).
“They’re agile, have good eye-hand co-ordination, their hands are quick. I know the shape of the ball is different, but the basics are still there of thumb behind the ball and the fingers spread so you don’t break them, that sort of thing.
“And quick on their feet and they normally can jump so that’s all helpful and they have a quick movement and work in small spaces which you see Brodie do now, for instance, he gets after the footy in that short space very well. And you’ve got to have a bit of talent as well, not all basketballers are going to be good footballers.”
But this particular basketballer has sure transformed into a damn fine footballer. Today, Grundy stands at 203cm and weighs 100kg. As an 18-year-old he was drafted by Collingwood at pick No. 18 in 2012, debuted the following year and has played 131 AFL games including 2018’s losing grand final. He’s now considered one of the AFL’s most influential players and is in solid contention for this year’s Brownlow Medal.
Put all of the contract speculation (will he re-sign with the Pies? Will he be lured home by the Crows?) aside, football fans from either side of the border will love watching Grundy ply his trade on the MCG on Saturday afternoon when Collingwood plays GWS for a spot in the AFL grand final.
The two sides have faced each other only once during this season, in Round 18 on July 20. In that game, played at Giants Stadium, GWS were convincing 47-point winners, but Grundy had a blinder.
According to the AFL’s statisticians, Champion Data, that day, he had season-high contested possessions (22), clearances (11) and tackles (nine) while having second-most recordings for disposals (31) and score involvements (11).
He will match up against the Giants’ big Shane Mumford on Saturday and while Grundy is ranked by “elite” by Champion Data for disposals, contested possessions, hit-outs, clearances and score launches, Mumford ranks below average for disposals, average for contested possessions and above average for hit-outs, clearances, score launches.
Of course, anything can happen in finals footy, but Mumford has his work cut out for him and if there’s one person who can’t wait to switch on the TV and watch it all unfold, it’s Casey.
“I don’t get to see (Grundy) him too often, but when Collingwood is on, I just love watching him run, the way he attacks the footy,” he said.
“I always go back and think: ‘Cor blimey, he’s come a fair way’.”
And that might just be the understatement of the season.