Kyle Hutchison speaks on his special career that has grossed eight premierships

Kyle Hutchison has crammed four careers into one, and it’s not over yet. He charts the early days, the glory days, regrets, his move to East Brighton and the best players he’s played with and against.

Kyle Hutchison. Pictures: CRAIG BARRETT

Then Frankston YCW coach Scott Mathers would only have to look at Kyle Hutchison in a certain way for the star midfielder to know exactly what he had to do.

Hutchison, the winner of eight premierships, had four senior coaches in his time at the Stonecats and says they each taught him different things.

His most recent – Wayne Capp and Paul Goonan – were modern coaches, who gave more responsibility to the leadership group to drive standards and expectations.

Anthony “Bugsy” Barry, Hutchison’s first senior coach, knew how to use his burning competitive edge to the team’s advantage.

Mathers and Hutchison shared a “special trust and connection”, that when the chips were down – albeit rarely – they wouldn’t need words.

“Bugsy knew how to motivate me in a way that used to piss me off and he used to make me angry because of the things he’d say, moves he would make,” Hutchison says.

“It would motivate me to almost want to prove him wrong, and that’s the mindset of a coach I suppose, he was doing that because he knew how to get the best out of me.

“Scotty (Mathers) came along – who was my under-18s coach – and we had a really special trust and connection.

“To the point that he would look at me in the third quarter when we weren’t playing great, give me a look, wouldn’t even have to say anything and I knew what it meant, I knew what I had to do.

“Cappy (Wayne Capp) and Gooch (Paul Goonan), the next two, they had trust in the leaders to drive the message.

“They have all taught me different things but early days it was probably Bugsy and Scotty that moulded me into who I have become.”

Kyle Hutchison looks for a target. Picture: CRAIG BARRETT

Hutchison says 2015 was one of his best years. Pictures: CRAIG BARRETT

While Hutchison was influential in each of the eight flags, he was at his most imposing in 2015 and 2016.

He won the club best and fairest in both years as well as the league medal by a landslide six votes in 2015.

Hutchison says it was a culmination of dropping cricket, maturing both physically and mentally and the lessons he learned from fitness coach Rick Mirabella.

“It got to a point where Bugsy just said: ‘you won’t get the best out of either sport if you keep juggling, you have to pick one’, so I chose footy,” he says.

“And then he was on me about my fitness and it probably took me to the 2012 season where I could play midfield and perform.

“That next three years I started to do more work on my own in the break between footy finishing and pre-season starting.

“I think that three years culminated into that 2015 season where I had myself as fit and as strong as I’d ever been and it kind of just happened – everything just seemed easier.

“The fact I was able to kick goals from the midfield that year, I think that’s what took me to another level as well.

“It was a very good season and probably one of my best for sure.”

2016 was the second time Hutchison took out the Stonecats’ bnf in a premiership year. Picture: David Trend

Hutchison (batting) chose footy over cricket.

Hutchison’s thirst for finals success has those externally thinking he times his run for the matches that count.

One opposition coach thought he was a different player come September as he would “just go bananas in finals”.

Hutchison reckons all players in some aspect wait until the bigger stage to find another gear.

“The way I play looks semi nonchalant where it just looks like I am not trying, don’t care, whatever it may look like,” he says.

“But every game I have ever played I have never not given 150 per cent, it’s just the way I may be portrayed.

“Finals comes and that’s when I would like to think I have been able to lift my game to another level, luckily I had the experience from an early part of my career that I can then help young guys that are experiencing it for the first time.

“It means a lot more, people say it’s another game, it’s not, there’s way more responsibility, there’s way more on the line, but as long as you’re calm and stick to what you know then it’s all good.”

Hutchison sticks a tackle playing for the MPNFL against Geelong on the MCG. Picture: Mark Dadswell

As a six-time interleague and two-time Victoria Country representative, the only thing absent from Hutchison’s rich footy resume is a stint at state-league level.

He has no doubt he could have – and at times should have – gone to the VFL and says it played a role in his decision to move on from Frankston YCW after 26 seasons this year.

“It probably will be one of my regrets looking back on everything and, to be honest, one of the reasons I have decided to do this move (to East Brighton) now,” he says.

“I didn’t want to look back and think maybe ‘I should’ve done it, why didn’t I go somewhere else, experience another club, experience another culture’.

“Even down to playing on different grounds and that type of stuff.

“With what I have done I have no doubt that I probably could’ve and should’ve played VFL and there was a few years where I almost did.”

But he says it “all came back to YC and the journey” the Stonecats were on at that time.

“Yeah I might regret not playing VFL but when I look back and have the friendships and reunions from all the success, that’s probably going to stick out more than if I was to play 20 games at Casey, Sandringham or wherever,” he says.

“I had a few of those (relationships) already (after 2012) and then the next crop of guys came through, I have got friends from YC that range from 40 to 19.

“That’s probably because I was always there for that amount of the time, able to form these friendships with different people which I would’ve maybe not have had if I had gone somewhere else.

“The bonds and friendships that were made over that period, on top of the success we were able to have, was most of the reason as to why I stayed.”

Hutchison feels his departure will benefit the Stonecats, who will now hear a different voice.

“They (YCW) might’ve needed a change of voice, a lot might say that’s not true but if you hear the same people saying the same thing for so long, it might need a change every now and again,” he says.

“I just thought the time was right and thought if I didn’t do it now, I mightn’t ever do it.

“Once the decision was made and I told the boys it was a massive relief because it was easily one of the hardest decisions I’ve made to do with football.

“Leaving a club that you’ve been at for 26 years, it’s not going to be an easy thing, but it’s done now and I am stoked and excited by what we’re going to do.

“Hopefully we can give it a shake, make finals, hopefully double chance it and once you have that double chance I think anything is possible.”

Young Hutchison celebrates his first of eight flags.

Now 34, Hutchison isn’t going to put a timeline on when he will retire.

But he says “the body is as good as it’s ever felt” and that’s again largely due to his wife Polly.

“Without her I wouldn’t have got my body through to where it is now,” he says.

“She drags me along to F45, pilates, a run, she’s pushed me to get into the shape I have been able to maintain and probably turned me into someone that likes to go for runs.

“I have done a couple of half marathons now and a 10km run is actually nice, I love going for a long run and kind of zoning out for 45 minutes or whatever it is.

“The body is feeling good so I am excited to get a couple more years in, I don’t want to put a number on it, it’s a year to year every year for me.

“Once I know I am either half a step off or my hands have gone or I can’t kick the way I think I should, that’ll be the telltale sign for me to stop playing, take a step back and become a full time netball dad or have a kick in the twos.”

Hutchison says he wouldn’t have become the player he did without ruckman Ash Eames.