Before anyone shouts me down, I acknowlege that I'm possibly getting ahead of myself here.

I was just reflecting on the recent success of the Bulldogs and what it has meant to their community of supporters and their past players. In short, it's meant a lot and they've handled it well.

And so I then thought about our club.

All the signs are super promising for this club going forward: the coaching group, the list, the back office, the facilities and, most pleasingly, the culture. It is now a professional club. It has momentum. And it seems united - all of the stakeholders are finally marching in the same direction. With enthusiasm and genuine positivity.

What we have done previously as a club though, among a long list of super amateur things, is treat past players poorly. James McDonald, Cameron Bruce, Shane Woewodin, and possibly also Brad Green, Adem Yze, Brent Moloney, Jared Rivers and Robbo. The list goes on.

Add to that players like Peter Vardy, Stephen Powell and Chris Dawes who, whilst not necessarily treated badly, played for this club but also for other clubs prior to the Demons. I wonder who they barrack for now?

Given that we are on the verge of sustained success (in my opinion), I'd like to see the club start bringing these past players back into the fold somehow. It just feels like something they've now got to do a bit more.

I know Junior McDonald's heart still beats true. Robbo's clearly does. I'd be interested to know what some of the other former players think of the club. Are they as excited as many supporters here as to what's now happening at the joint?

 

Ron,

a good post indeed. The era of players from our last success (e.g. John Lord, Noel McMahon, etc) all remain passionate Demon supporters and are well respected. Maybe these past players who are involved with the 'past players association', could be part of an initiative to develop one of the strongest past player groups in the AFL?

A bit of a whipping boy on some sites, but David Cordner's heart still beats true.

I always smile when I read about how much Jeff Farmer still loves the club.  Still my all time favourite player after all these years.

John Lord and Bryan Kenneally are both heavily involved with the MCC as tour guides and are still passionate Dee's supporters.

I met Noel McMahon at a function last year and he is also still a passionate supporter of the club. How many former players who on retirement revert to supporting the club they followed as a kid, I don't know, I'm sure a few do, however I'm equally sure the camaraderie of playing a sport at such an elite level would leave its mark. For instance, would Nathan Jones upon retirement go back to supporting StKilda? I doubt it. However someone like Chris Dawes who has been something of a journeyman in football my go back and support the team of his childhood, Geelong.

9 minutes ago, Spirit of 26 said:

A bit of a whipping boy on some sites, but David Cordner's heart still beats true.

I reckon his family would excommunicate him if he didn't.

1 hour ago, Wiseblood said:

I always smile when I read about how much Jeff Farmer still loves the club.  Still my all time favourite player after all these years.

Is that right? The Wiz still supports the Dees?

I remember him kicking a goal after the siren for Freo against us many years ago to win the game, and he celebrated as though he'd just won the Granny. I kinda hated him after that.

 

I know my namesake is still a passionate Dee. 

All we now have to do is harness all this passion to create the greatest past players group the World has seen.? Maybe a project for our Marketing Department? 

I remember Greg Wells saying that he always kept an eye on Melbourne matches when playing for Carlton. And he still follows the Dee's with passion.

Someone may be able to answer this: Stan Alves seems to hold a grudge against Melbourne. Why?

2 hours ago, Ron Burgundy said:

Is that right? The Wiz still supports the Dees?

I remember him kicking a goal after the siren for Freo against us many years ago to win the game, and he celebrated as though he'd just won the Granny. I kinda hated him after that.

 

Ron, the Wiz has a son called Kobe, who is tearing it up at junior level in WA, keeps dropping hints for the Dees to come look at him, the Wiz is still a big fan, having a 'cousin' called Nev Jetta at the club helps

 

6 minutes ago, Dee Dee said:

I remember Greg Wells saying that he always kept an eye on Melbourne matches when playing for Carlton. And he still follows the Dee's with passion.

Someone may be able to answer this: Stan Alves seems to hold a grudge against Melbourne. Why?

Basically marched out the door in preference for Big Carl.  Was pretty unceremonious from what I can gather and would love a rather sour taste in your mouth.  This was in the middle of the really bad old days.

 

If Brock McLean had a heart, I’m sure it would still beat true for the red and the blue….

3 hours ago, Leoncelli_36 said:

I know my namesake is still a passionate Dee. 

Yes, he loves the Dees. He's a top bloke.

He has a Youtube clip of him kicking the winning goal against Adelaide on his mobile phone!!

There is a group of ex-players that regularly meet up for a beer before a Dee's game. I have seen them at the Corner Hotel on at least a couple of occasions. It's bit of an eclectic mix because they played in different periods and some of them are involved at other clubs. It generally includes Rod Grinter, Brad Green, David Neitz and Paul Hopgood, and I've seen Steve Tingay with them. David Schwarz also goes to games when he can with his old mate Guy Rigoni.

10 hours ago, Ron Burgundy said:

Before anyone shouts me down, I acknowlege that I'm possibly getting ahead of myself here.

I was just reflecting on the recent success of the Bulldogs and what it has meant to their community of supporters and their past players. In short, it's meant a lot and they've handled it well.

And so I then thought about our club.

All the signs are super promising for this club going forward: the coaching group, the list, the back office, the facilities and, most pleasingly, the culture. It is now a professional club. It has momentum. And it seems united - all of the stakeholders are finally marching in the same direction. With enthusiasm and genuine positivity.

What we have done previously as a club though, among a long list of super amateur things, is treat past players poorly. James McDonald, Cameron Bruce, Shane Woewodin, and possibly also Brad Green, Adem Yze, Brent Moloney, Jared Rivers and Robbo. The list goes on.

Add to that players like Peter Vardy, Stephen Powell and Chris Dawes who, whilst not necessarily treated badly, played for this club but also for other clubs prior to the Demons. I wonder who they barrack for now?

Given that we are on the verge of sustained success (in my opinion), I'd like to see the club start bringing these past players back into the fold somehow. It just feels like something they've now got to do a bit more.

I know Junior McDonald's heart still beats true. Robbo's clearly does. I'd be interested to know what some of the other former players think of the club. Are they as excited as many supporters here as to what's now happening at the joint?

 

Like the tread Ron, an excellent topic.

As a slight aside, when you say "treated past players poorly" do you mean players finishing their careers, or the way we treat retired players? Because IMO the only one of those players who might have got a raw deal from us whilst a player is Junior, and even then his body was close to shot. It's important to differentiate between players who we treated poorly and players who were upset at the end of their time. I look at what happened with Jordie Lewis at the Hawks and can't remember a player who was still near their peak that we shafted. Junior might have an arguable case, though. Some might say Stef Martin, but he reached his peak at the Lions rather than with us.

Back to your topic, and I believe Ingo still follows our progress, despite a successful and acceptably distracting career in women's swimsuit design.

I say the following given posters' responses to the worthy OP, which indicate a healthy - and fairly evident, it seems - following of our Club by its past players:

My sense is that a couple of specific things make it seem that the Bullies were 'better' at this than us: 1. The presence and feelings of their past players became public as they surged to the granny and responses were being sought by the media; and, 2. The Bullies' sizeable and recent run of near misses gave those feelings and responses extra 'substance'. Might we not look forward to similar from our past players, at least when factor 1 occurs? (we haven't had the 'pleasure' of factor 2)

18 hours ago, Moonshadow said:

Like the tread Ron, an excellent topic.

As a slight aside, when you say "treated past players poorly" do you mean players finishing their careers, or the way we treat retired players? Because IMO the only one of those players who might have got a raw deal from us whilst a player is Junior, and even then his body was close to shot. It's important to differentiate between players who we treated poorly and players who were upset at the end of their time. I look at what happened with Jordie Lewis at the Hawks and can't remember a player who was still near their peak that we shafted. Junior might have an arguable case, though. Some might say Stef Martin, but he reached his peak at the Lions rather than with us.

Back to your topic, and I believe Ingo still follows our progress, despite a successful and acceptably distracting career in women's swimsuit design.

I think you're confusing the 'distracted' player with Craig Ellis.

Ingo is in the building trade I believe

9 hours ago, joeboy said:

I think you're confusing the 'distracted' player with Craig Ellis.

Ingo is in the building trade I believe

Yes, you are spot on. Thanks.

On 11/11/2016 at 7:24 PM, Tough Kent said:

There is a group of ex-players that regularly meet up for a beer before a Dee's game. I have seen them at the Corner Hotel on at least a couple of occasions. It's bit of an eclectic mix because they played in different periods and some of them are involved at other clubs. It generally includes Rod Grinter, Brad Green, David Neitz and Paul Hopgood, and I've seen Steve Tingay with them. David Schwarz also goes to games when he can with his old mate Guy Rigoni.

Neita, Hoppy, Tingay and a couple of other former Dees from the "same era" are all very tight and do a fair bit of business together as well. They actually network with each other very effectively as well as support each other. It's really interesting seeing how keen they are to work together post-footy, and the bonds they all have, even with blokes that only played a handful of games, it's one of the really special things about footy.

 

On ‎11‎/‎11‎/‎2016 at 7:24 PM, Tough Kent said:

There is a group of ex-players that regularly meet up for a beer before a Dee's game. I have seen them at the Corner Hotel on at least a couple of occasions. It's bit of an eclectic mix because they played in different periods and some of them are involved at other clubs. It generally includes Rod Grinter, Brad Green, David Neitz and Paul Hopgood, and I've seen Steve Tingay with them. David Schwarz also goes to games when he can with his old mate Guy Rigoni.

'Hoppy' and 'Balls' were our opposing coaches for 'Play On The G' last year. Apart from their friendly rivalry being one of the event's many memorable aspects, their involvement is also another small insight for the OP's theme that they happily put in the time - at the mid-week training session at Gosch's, on gameday, and in the post-match festivities - for what was, unashamedly, a Club fund-raiser.