THERE are a few things that lend themselves to my weekly poke at all things ridiculous in the world of sport. The EJ Whitten Legends Game is one of them.
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Every year, about 10,000 seriously-eager fans pack Etihad Stadium to the absolute rafters to see a motley collection of ex-AFL footballers, sportsmen from other codes and two lucky country players compete in a game which really counts for nothing.
Wednesday night, we also got the chance to see not one, but three ex-Australian Idol stars, including Rob “Millsy” Mills, the only person I ever voted for after his performance of Free’s All Right Now.
Before you mock me, I’d like to remind you it was 2001, I was an impressionable tween and I thought eyebrow rings and pleather jackets were cool.
Of course, it wouldn’t have been a legends match without Strauchnie.
Comedian Peter Helliar refuses to let the joke, funny about a decade ago, die a dignified death.
Helliar continues to trundle out the blonde mullet wig, six years after using every possible joke he could in “autobiography”, Bryan Strauchan – My story: The rise and rise of a genuine superstar of Australian sport.
What’s more of a laugh than Strauchnie (pretty much everything) is the sight of these ex-football players, who we remember as the epitome of fitness, struggle to pull their Victoria and All Stars guernseys over their pots.
Having said that, there were a few who, even in their peak, were sporting shirts a little on the snug side (Lance Whitnall).
This year’s line up also included the man who epitomises Collingwood’s toothlessness (Damian Monkhorst); a man who is one errant elbow in the head away from a life ban from any form of football (Steven Baker); and a man whose hair contains enough bleach to disinfect a hospital (Dermott Brereton).
There were also some participants who seriously stretched the definition of “legend”.
I don’t believe you could call Brodie Holland, Jess Sinclair, Tarkyn Lockyer or David Mensch anything more than good ordinary players.
And then there’s Barry Brooks. How he gets a gig in this match is a little beyond me.
Not many people but diehard St Kilda fans would remember 198 centimetre ruckman, nicknamed for unknown reasons as “The Cactus”.
Unfortunately, the memory of him burns in my brain and heart.
The 2000s was a dark decade for the Saints’ ruck stocks, our desperation leading us to sign any ageing, discarded, relatively tall man including Monkhorst, Trent Knobel, Matthew Capuano, Cain Ackland, Matthew Clarke and Michael Gardiner.
We also traded picks six and 31 to Port Adelaide in the 2002 draft for King Island’s finest, Barry Brooks.
St Kilda had already received picks 6 and 22 from Hawthorn in exchange for Peter Everitt.
For the record pick six of the 2002 draft was Steven Salopek (Port Adelaide), pick 22 was Matthew Ferguson (St Kilda) and pick 31 was Joel Perry (Kangaroos).
Brooks’ career spanned eight unmemorable games over a frustrating five year period.
The only legendary thing about him is that in his first seven games, his highest disposal count was six.
EJ Whitten would be turning in his grave.