Because the highlight adopted Geelong’s dejected gamers strolling from the MCG on Saturday night time, a membership legend quietly left the stands with out important fanfare.
Tom Hawkins — the membership’s video games file holder — had watched on nervously all through the sport, hopes nonetheless alive {that a} grand remaining berth may preserve the flickering flame of his profession alive.
However as that remaining siren bellowed across the floor, the fact struck that it was throughout. A profession that stretched 18 years and three premierships, quietly extinguished within the background of one of many nice preliminary finals.
Tom Hawkins watches on from the stands, as Geelong fell heartachingly wanting showing in one other grand remaining. (Screenshot: Channel 7)
If Buddy Franklin was the unstoppable pressure of the previous 20 years, Hawkins was the immovable object.
With a body extra suited to the bullocking brutality of yesteryear, Hawkins by no means had the velocity nor the leap of his extra spectacular contemporaries in Franklin and Jack Riewoldt, however as an alternative bullied his opponents into submission with an retro mixture of power and ahead craft.
This was not a profession of particular person highlights.
There was the occasional sturdy pack mark right here, the odd fluky purpose there, but the sum of all Hawkins’s achievements on the sector has, fairly appropriately, been one which basks within the shared glory of staff success.
A participant simply as more likely to hand a purpose off to a teammate as he was to take the shot himself, the massive lump of a lad from the farm not often wanted to be the match that lit the dried tinder of the fireplace pit.
He was the log that glowed with a radiant warmth all through the night time, sometimes sparking into flame, however principally retaining that rhythmic pulse of the gradual burn that ensures the fireplace as a complete does not exit.
And like these chunks of firewood, it took time for Hawkins to achieve his ignition level.
Nice expectations and lofty comparisons
The strain lumped onto these broad shoulders of a teenage Hawkins when he arrived at Kardinia Park was immense.
A decade on from the sheer brilliance of Gary Ablett Sr proudly owning the important thing ahead place, the Cats had tried, and failed, and tried once more, to fill the spot with all method of sins.
There have been recycles from the West in Brett Spinks, Mitchell White, and David Haynes.
Tom Hawkins in motion for Geelong in opposition to North Ballarat throughout a VFL match in 2007. Hawkins performed 9 video games and kicked 12 objectives in his debut AFL season. (Getty Pictures: Mark Dadswell)
Out of place experiments in Ben Graham and Clint Bizzell.
Pre-debut hype that by no means got here to fruition in Cameron Roberts and Marcus Baldwin.
And naturally, the unfairly maligned Kent Kingsley, who managed to kick 227 objectives in 110 video games for the membership, regardless of being an undersized key ahead usually compelled to play a lone hand, whereas being fed by an inexperienced midfield.
In Hawkins, Cats followers noticed the good hope of a goalkicking behemoth. The reply to all their mismatched and mis-hit ahead woes.
Rated as arguably the perfect participant in his draft yr, he arrived at Sleepy Hole in 2007 nearly totally free as a father-son choose, simply earlier than the bidding system for father-sons had been created (partially as a result of how straightforward it was for the Cats to get Hawkins).
After the Cats misplaced a deflating season-opener to the Bulldogs, coach Mark Thompson was fast to convey the 18-year-old into the fold.
And the affect was prompt.
Booting three objectives on debut in a 78-point demolition of Carlton, Hawkins’s efficiency earned the very best reward of Blues coach Denis Pagan after the sport.
“He appears to be like a probable sort,” Pagan mentioned after the match.
“And I could not assist however suppose he’s an 18-year-old Tony Lockett.”
In sport one, Hawkins was already being in comparison with the best goalkicker the league had ever seen — and never by the nuffiest of followers on footy boards — however by a coach that very a lot knew what he was speaking about.
The next video games can be hit or miss. Luggage of 4 in opposition to the then lowly Demons and Tigers. Goalless performances in opposition to the then finals sure Kangaroos, Eagles, Pies, and Bulldogs.
He can be within the staff for a stretch, then out, then again in once more, then finally out for that magical drought-breaking premiership, as Thompson favoured a ahead line spearheaded by Cameron Mooney and Nathan Ablett.
The subsequent yr can be a lot the identical. A handful of video games, a handful of objectives, and finally a choice for Mooney and Tom Lonergan to tag staff up entrance.
By 2009, he was the constantly picked sideshow to the Mooney essential act, exhibiting potential, however not often brilliance, as he kicked 34 objectives and performed a vital function within the spectacular grand remaining victory in opposition to St Kilda.
By 2010, although, refined little accidents in a nonetheless rising physique would drag Hawkins again within the pecking order behind the lately recruited James Podsiadly, managing simply 21 objectives from his 18 video games, together with one main in three finals, as Thompson experimented with utilizing him within the ruck.
By 2010, Mark Thompson was utilizing Hawkins within the ruck extra, because the Cats tried to nail down their ahead line construction. (Getty Pictures: Mark Dadswell)
Within the outer at Kardinia Park, the criticism was beginning to be bellowed with larger assurance. Too gradual. Not pressing sufficient. Not sufficient ahead strain. A common look of perceived disinterest in comparison with the ever fiery Mooney.
They had been unfair aspersions on a 22-year-old nonetheless studying his commerce — and in simply over a yr, he was about to show to why.
Tony Lockett he was not.
Tom Hawkins, he was about to turn into.
Hawkins arrives on the largest stage of all
With ten minutes to go within the first half of the 2011 grand remaining, James Podsiadly fell to the MCG turf exhausting, shattering his collarbone and the hopes of Cats followers across the nation in a single painful second.
The mature age recruit had been Geelong’s focus all yr, main the membership goalkicking for the season as Mooney was phased out of the staff by new coach Chris Scott.
Hawkins, once more, had performed a minor sideshow function, with simply 24 objectives to his title because the Cats took on the may of Collingwood.
Down by 10 factors as Podsiadly was carted of the sector in extreme ache, the Cats had been compelled to show to plan B — hand Hawkins the ahead 50, cross your fingers, say your prayers, and hope that one thing went proper.
What adopted would go down in footy folklore.
On paper, it was simply three second half notches within the objectives column of the Footy Report to Hawkins.
However within the flesh, it was the making of a participant who would turn into a Geelong legend.
Handed the liberty to manage the ahead 50 to his liking, Hawkins bullied opponent Ben Reid, utilizing sheer power to push him away from the drop zone of the ball time and time once more, exhibiting indicators of turning into the participant that those that knew footy the perfect had predicted he can be.
“Hawkins once more!” Anthony Hudson would scream on the commentary because the Tomahawk plucked a one-handed seize early within the remaining quarter.
“Oh that is wonderful — who is that this man?”
Hawkins and Joel Selwood maintain the premiership cup collectively, after the massive ahead dominated the Collingwood defence to assist flip the sport. (Getty Pictures: Mark Dadswell)
On the largest stage in footy, Tom Hawkins had launched the footy world to the participant he would turn into for the subsequent 12 years. A monster. A spearhead. A rock.
The immovable object had properly and really arrived. And the Geelong ahead line was his to personal.
The large child turns into a membership legend
For the subsequent 11 years Hawkins would lead Geelong’s goalkicking, including a Coleman Medal for good measure to his title within the disjointed 2020 season.
However all through all of it, the final word success had eluded a Cats staff that had continuously proven it was adequate to make it to the finals, however not adequate to beat generational groups like Hawthorn and Richmond when it actually mattered.
To name it a drought can be unfair to these groups that skilled true extended heartache — however by the point the 2022 grand remaining had arrived, to many it had felt like a lifetime.
In membership land, nice gamers had come and gone. Stands had been demolished and constructed. Accidents endured and mended.
Outdoors of membership land, followers and gamers alike had seen life change for higher and for worse.
There can be new discovered relationships. Marriages began and ended. Nephews, nieces, sons, and daughters can be introduced into the world.
Dad and mom and grandparents would depart it.
A decade is a very long time in footy — nevertheless it’s rather a lot longer in life.
And on that remaining Saturday in September, in a sport the place he had once more dominated with brute power and footy smarts, the toll of life confirmed on Tom Hawkins’s face.
An emotional Hawkins embraces his very long time mate Selwood on the finish of the 2022 grand remaining, 13 years after they gained their first premiership collectively. (Getty Pictures: Michael Willson/AFL Images)
Embracing his greatest mate and very long time teammate Joel Selwood on the remaining siren, the tears flowed freely.
Since that day in 2011, on the sector he had turn into a Geelong legend.
Off it, he had turn into a husband. A dad. And he had misplaced his mum, Jennifer, to most cancers — a second that had him contemplating whether or not he had the desire to maintain going along with his footy profession.
Time, as at all times, had confirmed it was each the unstoppable pressure and the immovable object.
And for a lot of Cats followers, this whole journey with Hawkins has been about extra than simply footy.
For greater than half the yr, yearly since he debuted — and having possible by no means met the person — Geelong supporters have welcomed him into their lives as if he’s an outdated buddy.
Hawkins with spouse Emma and his children at Kardinia Park having introduced his retirement. From an enormous child to a husband and pop, his life and soccer profession have been intertwined.
(Getty Pictures: Justin Chadwick)
His retirement is an odd feeling of loss. Richmond followers felt it when Dustin Martin known as time. It will likely be felt on the Crows when Tex Walker says goodbye, and on the Pies when Scott Pendlebury decides sufficient is sufficient.
A brand new period now begins at Geelong as probably the most essential figures within the historical past of the soccer membership hangs up his gigantic boots. And it has been one hell of a trip.
For an immovable object, it is a testomony to the participant and the person that the profession of Tom Hawkins has managed to maneuver so many.
