Rise of Reid: Six players on their way to major paydays in 2025

Clubs can always find a midfielder or flanker but finding a key piece of your premiership build is worth its weight in gold. And it’s why a rising Bomber is set to become a highly-paid star.

Zach Reid doesn’t have to look very far to find inspiration about how 10 great weeks of football can make you richer than your wildest dreams.

His defensive partner in crime Ben McKay had an injury record at North Melbourne to rival his own list of back stress fractures, hamstring tears and ripped pectoral muscles.

And yet the final 10 games of his 71 in eight seasons at North Melbourne proved he was talented (and finally durable) enough to win a six-year $4.8 million deal that front-ended $2.5 million of that contract in his first two seasons.

Essendon free agent Sam Draper was on track for that kind of contract trajectory until his achilles tendon gave way, with the 26-year-old admitting he cried for days at his latest setback.

Zach Reid is earning himself a fair pay rise. Picture: Michael Klein

His accountant might have shed a quiet tear too.

Reid has recently changed representation to Mercury Management - which has also nabbed Collingwood’s Dan Houston.

There isn’t even a question of whether he might jump ship given his loyalty to the club that has worked so hard to get his body right since he was taken as the 10th pick in the 2020 national draft.

But if he can finish the season with the kind of form he has shown across eight games he would command a massive pay rise with plenty of options about the length of the deal.

In a competition where everyone wants elite key backs, he could sign a three-year deal to free agency or a long-term deal past 2028 to lock in even more guaranteed money.

There is always a big gap between prices to stay and go.

But St Kilda is offering up to $900,000 for Leek Aleer, Tom Barrass arrived at Hawthorn for something not far short of that figure, and the intercepting key backs (Sam Taylor, Jacob Weitering, Jeremy McGovern, Darcy Moore) are footy’s new million dollar men.

At the very least he could ask for something around the $700,000 mark for the next three seasons with a range of lucrative incentives included so both parties have some protections based on whether he becomes a top-50 AFL player or battles with injury again.

Ben McKay got a big deal with a similar history of injuries. Picture: James Wiltshire/AFL Photos via Getty Images

Against Sydney he reeled in a season-high five intercept marks, took 14 total marks and had a career-high 27 possessions.

It was only the latest piece of evidence to show he could dominate the Dons backline for the next decade.

He wasn’t perfect - Essendon’s former great white hope Aaron Francis had him dead when he sprinted around him into the goalsquare only to botch one of the misses of the year.

But having a defensive pillar like Reid will allow Jordan Ridley to play as the third tall, to free McKay against teams with only one star forward, will mean Mason Redman rarely has to play tall.

Brad Scott would be giddy with excitement with the 5-3 start to the year and the emergence of a 10-year-key forward (Nate Caddy), a genuine small forward (Isaac Kako) and a star defender (Reid).

Clubs can always find a midfielder or flanker but finding a key piece of your premiership build is worth its weight in gold.

Originally published as Rise of Reid: Six players on their way to major paydays in 2025