Best thing Caro's written!
http://www.realfooty.com.au/news/news/doing-the-don-thing/2007/05/18/1178995414154.html
JASON Winderlich cannot recall the moment he finally fell in love with the Essendon Football Club, but he can remember how many times he tried to reject it. And the tragedy that became the turning point for both his life and his football will stay with him always.
Winderlich, now 22, came to Windy Hill as a first-round draft pick at the end of 2002. He left behind the tiny Gippsland town of Thorpdale, which boasted a pub, a post office, a milk bar and a footy ground. Not to mention a group of mates, some of whom had chosen the wrong path.
His first season at the club was punctuated by injury, loneliness and regular visits home. But, in the words of the club's fitness chief, John Quinn: "I'll take a hamstring every day rather than depression and all those other injuries you can't see."
In fact, at one stage, Winderlich was heading home so regularly and with such desperation that he would barely hang around to warm down after training or playing. Young teammates, who would call him to catch a film or a meal on weekends after matches, soon gave up because he was rarely there.
"I didn't really embrace the Essendon Football Club," Winderlich recalled this week. "I was pretty homesick and any chance I had to go home, I would go home to spend time with my mates. I always had an excuse. I wasn't exactly an angel growing up and I hadn't changed."
Then came the week in 2003 when Quinn diagnosed Winderlich with a stress fracture of the tibia and ordered him to remain in Melbourne for rehabilitation. Winderlich refused, saying he was desperate to get home. Quinn insisted he needed to be part of the club.
Winderlich's response? "I don't give a stuff about what's going on here." Quinn replied that that attitude was part of the problem and the fitness coach won the argument that time.
The following week, Winderlich wandered up to Quinn. A group of his friends had been involved in a car accident. One was dead and the young footballer's best mate had been badly injured. To this day, he remains in a wheelchair. "If you hadn't made me stay, I might have been in that car and I might have been dead," Winderlich said.
He told The Age: "When that happened, I was even more homesick, but John made me realise I wasn't going to be able to change what happened. He said: 'You're not going to make it until you become part of this club'." Since then, Winderlich's girlfriend of four years has lost her older brother to a road accident and — more recently — close family friends have lost a daughter, also in a car fatality.
Much has happened off the field to Winderlich since those early dark days. He has added a bigger engine to the explosive speed and superb kicking style that first led former Bomber Darren Bewick to endorse him passionately as a junior in the Gippsland under 18s. But equally significantly, he was at the end of last season announced the inaugural winner of the Bill Hutchison Award at Essendon's Crichton Medal presentation.
The Hutchison award is the ultimate achievement for players' services to the community — an area the club has thrown itself into in recent years. Last year, the fund-raising raffle at the Essendon Women's Network lunch raised $25,000 and all that money went to Mercy Care — a safe house in Maribyrnong. But more significantly, the club's chief executive Peter Jackson announced that by the end of this decade, the Bombers will have contributed $15 million to the Windy Hill precinct.
Winderlich's work has led him to excel, according to the club, as convener of Essendon's "On The Ball" program. Essendon organises once-a-week or twice-weekly sessions where between 35 to 60 year 8 students from Maribyrnong region or Bendigo attend five-hour in-depth sessions at Windy Hill. Essendon spends $4000 on each session.
Those sessions are the first of a three-stage program which then has follow-up visits by Winderlich and teammates, including Angus Monfries, Henry Slattery, Ricky Dyson, Kepler Bradley and Nathan Lovett-Murray.
"I remember as a kid doing Auskick. Ben Allan came up to see us for a session," said Winderlich. "I never forgot about him coming up like that and what he said to us when I was seven years old.
"I just hope they get one thing out of these sessions. I've had mates who've (chosen) the wrong path in life, done drugs and things like that and I've seen what it's done to their lives. The kids I'm talking to now are year 8 students about to make some big decisions about how they live their lives. I must say I find it easy talking to kids and I think it's helped me mature."
Quinn said Winderlich had found his niche. According to the Bombers' hierarchy, the young utility sets a series of tasks for the teenagers and then returns to their schools at a later stage, with the third stage of the program being a forum at Windy Hill involving footballers, parents, coaches and child psychologists.
Winderlich said he expects his "kids" to have taken up a team sport, extra exercise or even simply given an example of when they may have stopped a friend from getting into trouble. "They come into the Essendon inner-sanctum and they get the chance to talk to AFL footballers and netballers. If they have fun, they'll come back.
"The On The Ball program is nothing to do with our required voluntary appearances as AFL footballers. It is the fourth year the club has done it and I think it has been as good for me as it has been for them."
Winderlich now lives with his sister in Strathmore. He goes home far less frequently these days and according to both Jackson and Quinn has become a young leader. He is also, says Quinn, one of the few Bombers who can put a smile on Jackson's face on a bad day.
Winderlich is now a regular member of Essendon's best team. In the past, injuries, including a broken leg, and occasional indifferent form have slowed him down but the end of 2007 should leave him close to being a 50-gamer.
Jackson told The Age: "As a board, we recently had a new look at where we were at and what we were really here for. We put down four key objectives: success, tradition and heritage, community and professionalism.
"You've got to be prosperous in order to pay for all the things we are attempting to do here, but that should not be a means to an end.
"Two years ago, the statistics told us that four out of 400 kids sentenced in the Maribyrnong Children's Court participated in organised sport. We can play a role in changing that.
"Let's not be completely altruistic. Obviously, we are hoping that many of these kids become Essendon supporters … But I have been so impressed with the way some of our players have responded."
Jackson pointed to Mark McVeigh, who several times last year singled out and took aside disengaged teenagers attending the program, one of whom had attempted suicide and who since has begun playing sport again.
And Winderlich, who now runs one or two sessions a week of the Bombers' three-stage youth community program. "Jason has had a pretty tough time," Jackson said. "He has lost friends in car accidents and somehow he seems brilliant at using his own experiences to talk to other kids.
"If we could only ask for one player to truly break through and make it this year, I hope it's him."
http://www.realfooty.com.au/news/news/doing-the-don-thing/2007/05/18/1178995414154.html
JASON Winderlich cannot recall the moment he finally fell in love with the Essendon Football Club, but he can remember how many times he tried to reject it. And the tragedy that became the turning point for both his life and his football will stay with him always.
Winderlich, now 22, came to Windy Hill as a first-round draft pick at the end of 2002. He left behind the tiny Gippsland town of Thorpdale, which boasted a pub, a post office, a milk bar and a footy ground. Not to mention a group of mates, some of whom had chosen the wrong path.
His first season at the club was punctuated by injury, loneliness and regular visits home. But, in the words of the club's fitness chief, John Quinn: "I'll take a hamstring every day rather than depression and all those other injuries you can't see."
In fact, at one stage, Winderlich was heading home so regularly and with such desperation that he would barely hang around to warm down after training or playing. Young teammates, who would call him to catch a film or a meal on weekends after matches, soon gave up because he was rarely there.
"I didn't really embrace the Essendon Football Club," Winderlich recalled this week. "I was pretty homesick and any chance I had to go home, I would go home to spend time with my mates. I always had an excuse. I wasn't exactly an angel growing up and I hadn't changed."
Then came the week in 2003 when Quinn diagnosed Winderlich with a stress fracture of the tibia and ordered him to remain in Melbourne for rehabilitation. Winderlich refused, saying he was desperate to get home. Quinn insisted he needed to be part of the club.
Winderlich's response? "I don't give a stuff about what's going on here." Quinn replied that that attitude was part of the problem and the fitness coach won the argument that time.
The following week, Winderlich wandered up to Quinn. A group of his friends had been involved in a car accident. One was dead and the young footballer's best mate had been badly injured. To this day, he remains in a wheelchair. "If you hadn't made me stay, I might have been in that car and I might have been dead," Winderlich said.
He told The Age: "When that happened, I was even more homesick, but John made me realise I wasn't going to be able to change what happened. He said: 'You're not going to make it until you become part of this club'." Since then, Winderlich's girlfriend of four years has lost her older brother to a road accident and — more recently — close family friends have lost a daughter, also in a car fatality.
Much has happened off the field to Winderlich since those early dark days. He has added a bigger engine to the explosive speed and superb kicking style that first led former Bomber Darren Bewick to endorse him passionately as a junior in the Gippsland under 18s. But equally significantly, he was at the end of last season announced the inaugural winner of the Bill Hutchison Award at Essendon's Crichton Medal presentation.
The Hutchison award is the ultimate achievement for players' services to the community — an area the club has thrown itself into in recent years. Last year, the fund-raising raffle at the Essendon Women's Network lunch raised $25,000 and all that money went to Mercy Care — a safe house in Maribyrnong. But more significantly, the club's chief executive Peter Jackson announced that by the end of this decade, the Bombers will have contributed $15 million to the Windy Hill precinct.
Winderlich's work has led him to excel, according to the club, as convener of Essendon's "On The Ball" program. Essendon organises once-a-week or twice-weekly sessions where between 35 to 60 year 8 students from Maribyrnong region or Bendigo attend five-hour in-depth sessions at Windy Hill. Essendon spends $4000 on each session.
Those sessions are the first of a three-stage program which then has follow-up visits by Winderlich and teammates, including Angus Monfries, Henry Slattery, Ricky Dyson, Kepler Bradley and Nathan Lovett-Murray.
"I remember as a kid doing Auskick. Ben Allan came up to see us for a session," said Winderlich. "I never forgot about him coming up like that and what he said to us when I was seven years old.
"I just hope they get one thing out of these sessions. I've had mates who've (chosen) the wrong path in life, done drugs and things like that and I've seen what it's done to their lives. The kids I'm talking to now are year 8 students about to make some big decisions about how they live their lives. I must say I find it easy talking to kids and I think it's helped me mature."
Quinn said Winderlich had found his niche. According to the Bombers' hierarchy, the young utility sets a series of tasks for the teenagers and then returns to their schools at a later stage, with the third stage of the program being a forum at Windy Hill involving footballers, parents, coaches and child psychologists.
Winderlich said he expects his "kids" to have taken up a team sport, extra exercise or even simply given an example of when they may have stopped a friend from getting into trouble. "They come into the Essendon inner-sanctum and they get the chance to talk to AFL footballers and netballers. If they have fun, they'll come back.
"The On The Ball program is nothing to do with our required voluntary appearances as AFL footballers. It is the fourth year the club has done it and I think it has been as good for me as it has been for them."
Winderlich now lives with his sister in Strathmore. He goes home far less frequently these days and according to both Jackson and Quinn has become a young leader. He is also, says Quinn, one of the few Bombers who can put a smile on Jackson's face on a bad day.
Winderlich is now a regular member of Essendon's best team. In the past, injuries, including a broken leg, and occasional indifferent form have slowed him down but the end of 2007 should leave him close to being a 50-gamer.
Jackson told The Age: "As a board, we recently had a new look at where we were at and what we were really here for. We put down four key objectives: success, tradition and heritage, community and professionalism.
"You've got to be prosperous in order to pay for all the things we are attempting to do here, but that should not be a means to an end.
"Two years ago, the statistics told us that four out of 400 kids sentenced in the Maribyrnong Children's Court participated in organised sport. We can play a role in changing that.
"Let's not be completely altruistic. Obviously, we are hoping that many of these kids become Essendon supporters … But I have been so impressed with the way some of our players have responded."
Jackson pointed to Mark McVeigh, who several times last year singled out and took aside disengaged teenagers attending the program, one of whom had attempted suicide and who since has begun playing sport again.
And Winderlich, who now runs one or two sessions a week of the Bombers' three-stage youth community program. "Jason has had a pretty tough time," Jackson said. "He has lost friends in car accidents and somehow he seems brilliant at using his own experiences to talk to other kids.
"If we could only ask for one player to truly break through and make it this year, I hope it's him."
now we need Dyson to improve and we will have 2 gun wingers...