Opinion Ken Hinkley Envy

[catempire]

Is anyone else suffering from this affliction?

This is no comment on Chris Scott, but there's something about Hinkley that makes me wish we had him. There's something in the way he speaks to his players:

Bell Park 2003 GFL Grand Final
Ken Hinkley pre-game address to leadership group - Round 2, 2014 v Adelaide
Richmond game speech

It's old school, I know. In some ways it's kitsch. But there's something about a coach you know can get his players to rise for an occasion.

Then there's the article by SJ on him today:

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/a...ership-contender/story-fnp04d70-1227055607821

But it wasn’t till he arrived at Geelong for the start of the 2004 season that I quickly understood why the wraps on him were so big. Ken just made sense when he talked about the game. Apart from being an important support for individual players along the way, Ken developed some on-field strategies, mainly with our forwards, that became a key factor in our success later on. He spent a couple of seasons doing the opposition breakdown and his analysis on every team was first class. You were never left wondering what type of style that team played or the tricks they might try to produce on the day.
​

Hmm... sounds... handy.

I actually have a soft spot for Port now. Hinkley has stamped his style all over the way they play - hard, uncompromising, but fast and skilful. You never get the feeling Port will get beaten because they didn't try hard enough. It's the game played the way it should be played.

One day, when Chris Scott's time is over, I hope we look over the border to Alberton to see if Ken's ready to come home.

 

[Catastic82]

Already said as much in another thread, Geelong made a serious mistake and Ken won't be leaving Port now . Strikes me as a loyal guy and Port offered him a job when no one else would.

Very dissapointed we let him go

 

[catempire]

Already said as much in another thread, Geelong made a serious mistake and Ken won't be leaving Port now . Strikes me as a loyal guy and Port offered him a job when no one else would.

Very dissapointed we let him go

I'm not sure we 'let him go'. Do you mean gave the job to Chris Scott instead? That decision was vindicated when Scott won the flag.

In any event, I'm not measuring them against each other. I am daydreaming that we might one day get to see Hinkley back though. He seems like a sentimental guy so the pull to return to Geelong one day might be there.

 

[Beth]

Yes I suffer from this greatly. I always felt he could be a gem of a coach. I loved Kenny as a player, one of my all time favourites.

I don't mind Chris, but I don't "love" Chris. I'm setting myself up a bit here but I don't really consider 2011 to be a flag the coach won. Standing on the shoulders of giants is a term that comes to mind.

 

[Catastic82]

Yes I meant as in giving the job to Chris, I think the group was that dedicated abyone could had coached them to a flag that year .

I do not rate Chris at all

 

[Jeff76]

He has walked into a side thats full of first round draft picks and also he wasn't who Port wanted to start with, Hinkley was pretty much last resort for Port. Leon Cameron and Eade both declined.

 

[JUBJUB]

Yes I meant as in giving the job to Chris, I think the group was that dedicated abyone could had coached them to a flag that year .

I do not rate Chris at all

Kenny got one of these as senior AFL coach ?




NOPE !!!

Geelong made the correct decision in going for an outsider,just like they did when they appointed Thompson.

 

[Catastic82]

Kenny got one of these as senior AFL coach ?

View attachment 79466


NOPE !!!

Geelong made the correct decision in going for an outsider,just like they did when they appointed Thompson.

Keeny didn't have our list, have developed port nicely .

Again I haven't seen Chris do anything similar besides relying on a few champions to keep carrying the team.

 

[catempire]

I really didn't intend for this to be a d**k measuring contest between Scott and Hinkley...

 

[Rainfall]

I really didn't intend for this to be a d**k measuring contest between Scott and Hinkley...

but I'm sure your enjoying the outcome

 

[SleazySimon]

Already said as much in another thread, Geelong made a serious mistake and Ken won't be leaving Port now . Strikes me as a loyal guy and Port offered him a job when no one else would.

Very dissapointed we let him go

I thought we should have got him at the end of 2010. Look at all the other clubs who passed on him and took Scott Watters, Mark Neeld, Brendan McCartney and Brendan Sanderson instead, they had a lot of good publicity just because they worked under Mick Malthouse. The media even talked about Scott Burns being the best candidate for the Port job. That just shows how football 'journalists' know SFA.
Ken was a top assistant coach and a big part of the clubs success.

 

[goyoucatters]

Kenny's doing a fantastic job over there.

And it's fair enough to wonder how he'd be going if he was running the show at the Cattery right now.

However, the suggestion that CS was gifted a flag with the team he inherited is breathtaking revisionism.

Anyone who watched the 2010 PF can't tell me the team we put out that night was 'destined' to do anything apart from potentially make up the numbers in the bottom half of the 2011 top eight. We were slaughtered and the team looked spent as a real force in the competition.

We went on to win the flag convincingly the next year (over the team that had poleaxed us in the finals in 2010) and took out all the other serious contenders (several times) along the way.

For those who want to have a shot at Scotty, you would think they should be looking elsewhere for ammunition rather than the evidence of what is acknowledged by footy followers everywhere as a seriously significant achievement.

When a person's best moments are brought up as further evidence of their unsuitability, you have to wonder how long ago objectivity left the discussion.

 

[CatTricks]

I think most of us wanted Kenny as our coach. Can't see him leaving Port, maybe one day he will come home.

 

[GFrost]

Scarlett said the transition from Bomber to Hinkley would have been "very comfortable" for the players. When they heard Chris Scott was appointed, he and other senior guys upped their off season training, everyone was on their toes, and no one was certain they were "safe". Scott then managed to help the younger guys feel they would have more opportunity and kept the senior guys completely on side, with the whole club feeling a sense of freshness and unity.
I think an outsider with a fresh voice was what we needed and I'm not sure we would have won that flag if Sando or Hinkley had have taken over.

Ken was that fresh voice, outside influence, and excellent coach for Port. He's been fantastic for them but I don't wish he was coach of Geelong over Scott.

 

[THE CAT WRANGLER]

Kenny is the man

 

[Sttew]

Already said as much in another thread, Geelong made a serious mistake and Ken won't be leaving Port now . Strikes me as a loyal guy and Port offered him a job when no one else would.

Very dissapointed we let him go

Disagree. It was between Scott & Hinkley, wasn't it? And Scott got the nod. Who's to say Scott might not have ended up at Port if Hinkley got the Geelong job? And who's to say that in 3 years or so Hinkley does not return to Geelong?

 

[Scottland2007]

They played his pre final speach on 360 Wednesday night. Mentioned "paying the price". I haven't heard many coaches speeches, it may have come from somewhere else, but it was great. Even Gerard Healey said he would put on the boots and follow Ken.

 

[ATSAM]

Thank Ken Hinkley for the development of our premiership(s) team. he had the strategy and tactics- watch the way that Port play just like us in those early years-, he had the players front and centre, their welfare well being and learnings, he was the one that they went to when they had problems. Forget Thompson he got the benefits. If it can't be us this year I would love to see the old number 29 hold that cup up.

 

[Footy Smarts]

Yes Ken Hinkley's great but this board has reached peak crazy. Apparently a guy who came in when everybody thought we'd plummet down the ladder and has won a premiership and finished top 4 in three out of four seasons is an ordinary coach. This year despite significant injury issues and older players dropping off we finished 3rd when most people were predicting us to finish lower. Yet Scott's still apparently had a poor season as coach.

Just to remind everyone how the board was feeling just before Scott was appointed have a read through this.

http://www.bigfooty.com/forum/threads/another-crack-or-transition.757631/

Practically nobody thought we were a chance of competing for the flag in 2011. When Chris Scott said that our supporters should expect to push for the flag the media literally laughed at him.

Yet what has happened? He came in and galvanised the squad to win us another premiership. Since then he's transitioned the team in a remarkable way so that if everything had gone right around finals time we might have pinched a premiership at some point. Unfortunately injuries have hit at the wrong time but nobody predicted that we'd be going this well.

So not only has he brought in success that nobody imagined but he's also given us a much, much brighter future than anybody expected. Perhaps rather than looking over at greener grass elsewhere we should look at our own club and realise we're currently in a position we have absolutely no right to be in. Everything says we should be down near the bottom of the ladder but instead we're competing in finals and there's no sign of that ending soon. Chris Scott is the one who's overseen this transition and he deserves immense accolades because of it. He certainly deserves better than the sly cracks and disdainful sarcasm that he's received from some quarters this week.

 

[barmy44]

people on here were saying exactly the same thing about taking chris scott over brenton sanderson after 2012.

 

[geelong_boy]

They played his pre final speach on 360 Wednesday night. Mentioned "paying the price". I haven't heard many coaches speeches, it may have come from somewhere else, but it was great. Even Gerard Healey said he would put on the boots and follow Ken.

The "paying the price" line what Allan Jeans said to the Hawthorn players at half time of the '89 GF.

 

[Pollywaffle]

Hindsight is 20/20 vision...........
I suspect that our 2011 flag was more 'player driven' than coach related and CS still has a little more to prove now we are 'rebuilding'.
Talks the talk but yet to convincingly walk the walk.
With reference to the OP. Maybe Ken could have offered something, but the club moved away from home grown coaches in the last 20 years or so after a long, long list of ,favourite sons' returning and giving us NOTHING.
I reckon that ethos still drives the coach selection process to this day.
Probably militated against us getting back one of our own, especially an 'unproven coach' such as Sanderson and/or Hinkley circa 2010
Sadly this may affect our chances at a Ling or Johnson in the future

 

[SkittleCats]

Taking CS was the right call and the 2011 premiership vindicates that. Reading the biography on the 2011 premiership side by Scott Gullan spell's it out pretty clearly. The players where enjoying there off-season's abroad, suddenly the news comes through about Bomber and a month later Scotty is appointed coach. The players through this time felt positive either Sando or Hinkley would get the job, given how well they knew these two they felt very comfortable about where they would sit in the team should one of those two get the job. Then the news breaks that CS is the new Geelong coach and suddenly these players, even 200 game veterans, have to prove themselves to a whole new person. CS's appointments provoked everyone to put there heads down, we had players in New York running laps of central park (atleast according to Gullan in the book) because they wanted to impress CS at the start of pre-season. His appointment is in my opinion the reason we went all the way in 2011.

Obviously, since then CS has made some decisions we question regarding team selection and gameplan. I, like a lot here in BigFooty, have wondered if we have put our best foot forward in finals since 2011. But we have to remember CS isn't just here to win us games but to rebuild the team. To do what he has done by blooding so much youth, and keep us inside the top 4, is just a massive effort. We can look at PA all we like and marvel at the resurgence lead by Hinkley but ultimately, if we become a force again in a couple of years because of the steps CS has taken over the last few years to play the kids then it'll be worth it. And there's no reason why that isn't achievable as far as i can see.

 

[barmy44]

if we had hired hinkley in 2010, i can just imagine what would be said in 3 weeks time should sydney or hawthorn win the flag as is likely the case:

• 'did we make a mistake not making a play for clarkson at the end of 2010? clarkson was out of favour with the hawthorn board, and would have jumped ship cheap'; or
• 'did we make a mistake not making a play for longmire at the end of 2010? the succession plan was always shaky, and he would have jumped ship cheap'.

could we get any more reactionary on here?

its moot anyway, as if we had hired hinkley and he had given us a return of 4 wins, 7 losses since rd 11 this year like port returned, he would have been lynched. strung up on some tree with mitch brown for company.

hinkleys last half of the year just isnt good enough for a club that is owed the flag every single year

 

[MajorPayne]

Scott did inherit a great side, I think the thing in his favour is despite a heap of champs retiring etc, we have maintained our standing as a finals contender every year. Look at Buckley at the pies for what a s**t coach looks like. He potentially had a better side with younger stars in 2012 and they have continually gone backwards. I don't particularly like Scott as a bloke, but he obviously can coach and has managed to introduce young kids while maintaining a top 4 spot. And he can also improve...