Cooper Stephens opens up on journey as a first round draft pick to delisted at 23 and keeping his AFL dream alive
Cooper Stephens had a long term injury in his draft year of 2019, but the late Troy Selwood believed in him and, Stephens says, was a ‘big part’ of getting him to the Cats.
At 24, Cooper Stephens is still deep in the footy grind.
When the number 16 pick in the 2019 National Draft takes Code Sports’ call, it’s 6.30 on a sunny Perth morning.
But Cooper has been up for hours.
“The sun comes up early here so I was at the club training at 5am and now I’m heading home before I start work.”
The club is East Perth, Stephens’ home since he moved across the country to re-start his footy journey after a seven game, two-club AFL dream came to a premature end in 2024.
It was a dream that started early in life for the talented kid from Colac.
“I was in the schoolboys Victorian team at under 12s and then the same thing in under 15s,” Stephens remembers.
“I was pretty lucky that I was able to be selected in both of those teams and I suppose it probably gave me a taste from a young age of what professional football looked like.”
As an under 18, Stephens was a member of the AFL Academy which came in handy when a a broken leg ruled him out of football for his whole draft year.
“I ended up having a pretty good last 6-8 weeks and from there I kind of knew that like obviously nothing’s guaranteed but I was going to be a higher chance of getting drafted next year if I kept my head down and bum up.”
Being a part of the Academy also brought him in contact with Geelong, the team that would ultimately draft him, and the late Troy Selwood.
“I think he was a big part of getting me to the Cats’ eyes,” Stephens remembers.
“Everyone who gets drafted to a football club has that one person that really likes and really believes in him and he was probably mine at Geelong.”
“He was just a big believer in me and I think you need a couple of them throughout your young career to even get on a list and yeah, he was one of mine.”
Come the 2019 National Draft, Stephens was confident that he was going to get picked up, but believed his name would be called in the later rounds due to the long term injury.
So when his name was called at 16 by Geelong, it was a pleasant surprise, one that unlike most first round picks, he could share with his family at home.
“I didn’t get invited [to the draft] so I didn’t think I was much chance of going on the first night,” Stephens remembers with a laugh.
“My family still came over and we watched it together, but we weren’t really watching too intently, if I’m completely honest with you.”
Stephens’ first year with the Cats was in Covid lockdown in the Queensland hub and his second year was destroyed by ankle surgery that was supposed to be a six week injury.
“We did miss it slightly on the MRI, so there was a fair bit of damage in there,” Stephens says.
“It was getting worse if anything…so I ended up having to get surgery and it was pretty much the year done.”
After two frustrating years and some strong form in the VFL, Stephens’ chance came in 2022, breaking into a Geelong team that would ultimately win the Premiership.
And his AFL debut was all he’d ever dreamed it would be.
“In the end it was kind of 10 years of work really for myself, my family, my friends and stuff,” Stephens remembers of his debut against GWS.
“It was just obviously the time since I was 11, 12 years old with my dad driving me to Melbourne and back from Colac every second weekend.”
“I think it was nice just to reflect on all those times and think of all the hard work that my family had actually done to get to that point and mum and dad and my two sisters came up to Canberra where I did debut and it was pretty amazing.”
Stephens played all seven of his AFL games in that season before an opportunity to move to Hawthorn as part of the three-way deal that sent Tom Mitchell to Collingwood and Ollie Henry to Geelong at the end of that season.
Stephens is remarkably circumspect about his time at the Hawks - delisted and re-rookied after one year and let go for good after another without a senior game to his name.
“I think that’s just the industry to be honest, I wasn’t able to break in and…if you can’t get your body right before you’re 23, 24, I think they’re going to back in a younger version so that’s probably what happened.”
Stephens betrays no resentment towards the Hawks and how his time ended and he has nothing but praise for how his situation was handled by coach Sam Mitchell.
“I got on really well with Sam.” Stephens says.
“He’s a great person and he’s very honest and open and just wants the best of you even if that isn’t at Hawthorn he was happy to assist and let me know exactly where everything stood.”
Stephens’ hope of a fresh footy start in Perth was put on hold last year after a season ending knee injury, but the Colac kid has no regrets about moving across the country to keep his AFL dream alive.
“Even without football I absolutely love it over here so definitely no regrets on my end,” he says.
“I’m still contracted for this year coming and I’m really looking forward to getting through the pre-season and seeing what I can actually do.”
And his AFL dream?
Stephens is taking a realistic approach.
“I think it’s going to always be there, because as we spoke about, it didn’t really pan out exactly how I would have liked, so I’d love one more crack at it,” he admits.
“I’ll be 25 before the start of the next season, so it’ll purely just depend on the first four to six rounds and if I can put in some good performances.”
“I might be a chance [for the mid-season draft] and if not, well it’s probably dream over, but I’m just going to play it week by week.”
Originally published as Cooper Stephens opens up on journey as a first round draft pick to delisted at 23 and keeping his AFL dream alive
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