If you haven’t seen Mark “Jacko” Jackson’s Open Mike interview from earlier in the week, you really should rectify that situation as soon as possible in order to fully comprehend the former VFL spearhead’s worldview as of 2016. In the meantime, here are our observations from this season’s most discussed episode of Mike Sheahan’s award-winning talk show.
Jacko is far from stupid
He does a pretty good impression of someone who is not entirely of this earth (what is a “toilet trained” journalist, exactly?) but when Jacko started talking about the art of bringing the ball to the ground for small forwards – and granted he did seem to be adding a lot of mayo to the Gerard Healy anecdotes – he was genuinely engaging. It’s a pity we didn’t get to hear him expand on those ideas and talk more about the actual football. Jackson was after all coached by Tom Hafey and Ron Barassi – clearly some of their wisdom sunk in.
Actually, Jacko might be a little bit stupid
There’s not really much one can add to Jackson’s scattergun criticisms of the new AFL women’s league. Just, ah, yeah... If you’re opposing the existence of such a league on the basis that players might get hurt, perhaps the argument might carry a little more weight coming from someone who is not a star attraction on the Biffs, Bumps and Brawlers video collection.
Jacko possibly needs better marketing advice
Apologies to the rest of the staff at Hedland Mobile Windscreens in Pilbara (is Jacko their boss? If so, even deeper sympathies) but a 40-minute verbal assault on a respected journalist perhaps might not achieve the brand outcomes hoped for when their highest-profile employee donned the company polo shirt. The good folk at Energizer have probably dodged a bullet here.
Jacko’s memory might be shot
Of all Jackson’s wild claims in the show (Barassi “couldn’t coach pigs to be dirty”, journalists “banished” him from the spotlight, Hawthorn are “imposters”), the suggestion he was never paid to play was by far the most ludicrous, even granting his theory that the money might have been going out the door faster than it was coming in on account of the fines he’d racked up during an eventful career at Richmond, Melbourne, St Kilda and Geelong.
Yet according to his own 1986 book, Dumb Like A Fox, Jackson’s contract when he first moved to St Kilda was a sizeable $107,000 spread over three years – more than Collingwood was paying their superstar Peter Daicos. The problem, of course, was that he simply didn’t hang around long enough in any one place (just 10 games in half a season with the Saints) to reap the full benefits of his considerable talents, going through more clubs than Arnold Palmer. But in each bust-up there was only one common denominator.
Jacko really needed to elaborate on his ‘hit list’
Though it might need more than a 40-minute interview to get through the lot, Jacko’s “hit list” needed a little more air-time than it got. There’s still something a little bit hilarious, even tragic, about the idea of a footballer publicly declaring a list of people he wants to shirtfront. But that’s exactly what Jackson did in the mid-80s, and it was among the more unhinged passages of Dumb Like A Fox. The hit list was inspired by Jackson’s former coach Mal Brown, who told him he kept a little black book containing his own list of “wanted men” (otherwise “you can sometimes forget an idiot over the years”). Slightly less subtle than Brown, Jacko used a texta to scrawl his on his locker.
At the top of the pile sat Trevor Barker (Jackson once stuck a brick under his then-team-mate’s brake pedal and who also claims to have urinated on him in the showers as Barker spoke to the club coach and president). Barker’s main offence was to be a “wimp” and a “trendy” type, begging the question as to what he’d make of the top-knots and tattoos of current players. Bill Duckworth got a nod “because he’s an average unit”, while “Lard head” Rick Kennedy was simply a “particularly annoying individual”. Graeme Teasdale, said Jacko, could have won another Brownlow “if he could have played football as well as he talks”. You don’t get soundbites like that anymore.
Jacko has changed his tune on journalists
For all Jackson’s talk of “toilet trained AFL media people” and Sheahan’s ilk “poisoning” players “out of the game”, Jacko hasn’t always been so hostile towards the fourth estate, and perhaps did better than most players of his era in leveraging his media profile into a lucrative post-playing career. “I’ve always been aware that being in the news is better than being out of it,” he wrote in 1986. It’s been a while, but he’s certainly back.
If Jacko behaves like this on national TV, what must his touring shows be like?
Oh...
Quote of the week
I don’t think you pay $1 million (a season) on potential... You pay $1 million a season for results and blokes who have got the runs on the board. In my view, you don’t reward a kid who may or may not turn into something special.
- Nobody knows the pressures that come with being a young and highly-scrutinised key forward like Cameron Mooney, so it was interesting to note the former Cats star tearing into millionaire Bulldogs rookie Tom Boyd this week.
Photograph of the week
Speaking of the AFL women’s league, this week saw the unveiling of marquee players for the new new and existing sides, with Carlton selecting Darcy Vescio and Briana Davey, Melbourne signing Melissa Hickey and Daisy Pearce, the Bulldogs nabbing Katie Brennan and Ellie Blackburn, while Collingwood took Moana Hope and Emma King.
Bits and bobs
Perhaps things just can’t get worse for the Bulldogs from here. Earlier in 2016 we thought the loss of captain Bob Murphy for the season would be their worst week of all, but then calamity struck again in round 18 too with the loss to sickening injury of young midfielder Mitch Wallis and then the disappointment of a third knee reconstruction for Jack Redpath. In the wake of those disasters, a trip to Kardinia Park is hardly what you’d hope for, especially with Jimmy Bartel celebrating his 300th game and fellow stalwart Corey Enright breaking Ian Nankervis’s club record of 325 games. But that’s what the Dogs face tonight. A win would be a near-miracle.
Ditto Richmond’s trip to Manuka Oval to face the Giants, who in addition to their potent midfield options also now boast the the resilience that comes with experience and an ability to dig when things aren’t going right, as in the first half of last week’s win over Port Adelaide. Carlton are no cinch for any side this year and almost pinched it from Sydney last week, but Hawthorn should be too strong for them at Aurora Stadium. On the same afternoon at the MCG, Collingwood can take motivation from West Coast’s dismal Melbourne record and perhaps put a dent in the Eagles’ top four aspirations. The most interesting statistic in that one will be the crowd figure.
On Saturday, Port Adelaide head to the Gabba with a mathematical chance of playing finals football, while the Lions enter the game with barely a scientific possibility of pleasing their fans in any way. A far juicier contest will take place at Etihad stadium, where ninth-placed St Kilda take on eighth-placed North Melbourne and record-breaking Brent Harvey. What an epic spoil it will be if the Saints get up in that one.
Plenty of disillusioned Melbourne supporters will be on hand when the Demons face Gold Coast at the MCG on Sunday, and after fluffing their chances last week the home side will have a decent task on their hands containing the Suns’ potent mix of tall forwards, even if Rodney Eade’s side has been more down than up this year. Fremantle have home ground advantage but few others as they face Sydney, while to finish things off Adelaide should go to town on the Bombers at Adelaide Oval.
