Jonathan Brown should serve as an example to every young player in Australian sport, not just Australian Rules. This might upset some mothers, who commit their children to football for fear of little Timmy being hurt in a bruising game like one of the rugby codes or AFL, but it’s true.
I’m not for one instance arguing that every young player should blindly throw themselves into a pack with the aim or foreknowledge of getting concussed and stretchered off.
There’s no glory associated with permanent brain damage or a career-ending injury.
There is glory, however, in sacrifice for the team.
The most important element in team sports is, funnily enough, the team, despite the pay packets of some modern players or the mad scramble during trade windows in some sports. Browny epitomises this.
At no point when careening backwards for the ball against Geelong would Brown have thought “This will make headlines.” He also wouldn’t have thought, “This is going to hurt, better back out,” or, and just as importantly, “What will the players think of me doing this?”
He just did it. Why? Because he could, and the situation demanded it. His team need a player to run back with the flight, he did it because he was in a position to do so. End of story.
Acting on instinct for the good of the team is a value every young sportsman needs to be taught, whether it’s going hard at the ball in footy, bravely tearing out of your keeper’s area to get the last-second tackle even if it exposes you to failure, or even putting the ball out of bounds in lawn bowls because that’s what your captain needs.
Its selflessness that creates a great player, and that’s certainly what Brown is.
No player deserves what Brown has suffered this year, and I wish him the best – but he’ll never change, and nor should he.
Being selfless for your team in need doesn’t always manifest itself into a season-ending injury. It can be gut running or enduring absolute fatigue or cramp. But committing your body to either is vital. The two acts are exactly the same, not in severity but in mindset.
If Brown stopped his kamikaze ways, as they’ve been called in the media, it would result in him taking no pack marks, not chasing, not handballing, and taking a breather on the pine every time he was hurting.
A selfless player is just that, and all kids should learn the value of playing and committing regardless of what the result is for the individual. It’s the team, and what the team requires at that time in the game, that matters.
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