When football became ‘easy’ and Patrick Dangerfield hit the highest highs on the way to 300 games
Few players have reached the heights of Patrick Dangerfield. Ahead of his 300th game, the speedster sat down with the Addy to reflect on the journey and the road ahead.
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At his absolute best, the game of football became “easy” for Patrick Dangerfield.
Speed, power and brute force have defined the Geelong star’s 299 AFL games, as few players since Gary Ablett Sr have managed to combine it all in one body.
Only a handful have reached the heights Dangerfield has, as the eight-time All-Australian compiled possibly the best back-to-back campaigns of this century in 2016-17, when he averaged 30.83 disposals per game across 48 matches, booted 69 goals and polled a ludicrous 68 Brownlow votes.
Across five seasons and two clubs from 2015-19, Dangerfield won four club best-and-fairests and came second by half-a-vote in the other.
But the numbers don’t quite do it justice.
In those zenith years, Dangerfield could somehow dive on the football, get to his feet with multiple opponents hanging off him and accelerate away from a stoppage.
He embarrassed some teams with sheer magnetism: gathering 43 disposals on Geelong debut against Hawthorn in round 1, 2016 and then booting 5.6 in a half on a sore foot against the Hawks a year later.
This was a man at the peak of his powers, on a level so few have ever touched.
“I think you get into a groove where you feel like the game slows down and it becomes easy almost,” Dangerfield reflected.
“It is a nice spot to be in where you are in that rhythm and you have a really great connection with teammates, physically you are feeling a million dollars and you recover pretty quickly.”
A longtime teammate of Ablett Sr and Dangerfield’s coach at the Geelong Falcons, champion Cat Garry ‘Buddha’ Hocking said “I’m not saying he is Gary Ablett” but “Paddy is pretty similar”.
A teammate and confidant at Adelaide, James Podsiadly is still in awe of Dangerfield’s capacity to burn off opponents.
“He was a player for me that had that unique athletic skill set where he had power and endurance,” Podsiadly said.
“A lot of players probably don’t have that. He was a guy that was great in longer runs or amazing in the pool and then he would smash you over 20-metres as well. I think that is probably the reason why he has been the player he has been because his athletic traits are almost second to none.”
On the eve of his 300th game, it has become clear since he found his feet in an under-16 carnival that Dangerfield was always something special and his hunger remains to snare that elusive premiership.
THE DANGER LETTER
Even when he had just turned 18, Dangerfield was so good, football’s governing body tried to intervene.
Already drafted by Adelaide the year before, Dangerfield stayed east in 2008 to finish year 12 at Oberon High School and carry on playing with the Geelong Falcons.
Reports from that April game at then Skilled Stadium against the Calder Cannons show the burgeoning generational talent had 14 of his 31 possessions in the first quarter before Hocking moved him to the goalsquare.
The freakish teen then booted five goals in the final term to finish with eight for the day.
Dangerfield was so dominant, AFL Victoria sent a letter to Hocking, asking him to be mindful of the other players on the field.
“That was sort of the time some of those tactics were happening in the AFL and I wanted to show Adelaide that he could play one-out in the goalsquare,” Hocking said.
“We ended up getting a letter from AFL Victoria that we were forgetting about the development of the other players.”
Legendary Falcons talent manager Mick Turner said after that game that he hadn’t seen “a kid dominate a game like that since Jonathan Brown” and “if I’m a good judge (Dangerfield will) play 200 games of AFL footy”.
Turner was right, and then some.
Dangerfield’s father John taught at Oberon at the time and would keep one eye on his phone during classes in case Crows coach Neil Craig called to let him know his son was set for a debut.
It was a couple years earlier, at an under-16 carnival, the Moggs Creek kid was always confident he would make it.
“We got smashed as Vic Country but I was our best player in the championships and I was selected in the AIS Academy,” Dangerfield said.
“I was the last player selected and I compared myself to the other 30 and I thought, ‘well I reckon I am better than plenty here’. There was two years to go until the draft but I was confident that my best footy is as good as plenty here so that should give me a half-decent chance of being drafted.”
RETURNING HOME
If you look closely at the tape you can see him fighting back a grin.
Dangerfield had decided in mid-2014 he wanted to leave Adelaide to come home to Geelong, seeking a better work-life balance, but he sat on his decision until late 2015 to see out his contract.
In a twist of fate, the Cats and Crows had been drawn to face each other in the final round of 2015, as Geelong farewelled greats Steve Johnson, James Kelly and Mathew Stokes.
Dangerfield had thrown everything into his final year at the Crows as the club held itself together after the tragic mid-season death of coach Phil Walsh.
But it was an open secret by round 23 that Dangerfield was plotting a move to the Cats and in a moment that has become football folklore at Kardinia Park, he marked the ball in front of the Reg Hickey Stand and lined up for a shot at goal after the siren.
Spontaneously, 26,000 Cats fans broke into a standing ovation, their chance to woo the superstar.
“I was doing my best to try and not smile because how was that going to be perceived?” Dangerfield said.
“I was laughing in my own head but tried to put that out of my mind.
“It does stick out in my head I can tell you, but at the time it was like ‘don’t laugh, don’t smile, be professional’.”
It’s easy to forget now that Geelong was at somewhat of a crossroads that day.
The club was out of the finals race for the first – and so far only – time in coach Chris Scott tenure and could have dropped further down the pecking order.
Instead, after broking the blockbuster Dangerfield coup, the Cats bounced and have finished in the top-four in five of the last six seasons.
Scott has been vocal multiple times in recent years that Dangerfield changed the trajectory of the club as it became emboldened to push for a flag every single year.
Coming to the club on a big deal as the man to reverse a downward trend, Dangerfield said he didn’t really feel the pressure.
“If you take the big deal, the expectation is on you to do whatever you can to improve the organisation,” he said.
“That was the thing when talking to Joel (Selwood) before coming to Geelong, it was like ‘I want to help you get better and I want to you to help me get better’ and that was the philosophy I brought to Geelong.”
THE HUNT GOES ON
Dangerfield has had his best years on field and started a family since his return east, but a premiership still eludes him.
The spectre of that medallion hangs over him perhaps more than any other current player, a running commentary Podsiadly labels as unfair.
At 32 years old and with 15 seasons almost behind him, Dangerfield is “aware of how fortunate I have been” but he is after that icing on his career cake.
Dangerfield believes his Cats are in the best position to go all the way of his time there, and he isn’t afraid to dream of how it might look.
“I suppose it would be the greatest win you have ever had, on steroids,” he said.
“It is what you strive to achieve every year but not every team can do it. It doesn’t mean it’s a failure if you don’t (win the flag) but it certainly would be a cherry on top.
“There is plenty to unfold but for us it’s about embracing that challenge ahead, riding that momentum that we have built, and why not us?”
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