6 March 2020, Crown Palladium, Melbourne, Australia
I might keep these, I think, Dennis. Thank you. Dennis, thank you.
As we saw tonight at the beginning, there's a lot happens with that clip. And we've got a World Cup match that might get 90,000 people at the MCG, on Sunday.
We've got Russia, FINA, Sheikh Mohammed, Casa Semenya, coronavirus, Tokyo 2020, understanding mental health problems, animal welfare.
But I thought tonight I'll talk from the heart and not from the head.
Because those issues are — some of them common sense, and many of them are complex. And they are difficult to work out, even as a sports broadcaster.
I do feel like number 24 in that great race, the lowest saddle cloth possible. Particularly sitting next to Laurie tonight, and the people that have been honoured and the way that I am this evening.
I said to Annie, my wife, about three days ago, what would be appropriate tonight? And she said, "Well, Barrie Cassidy announced his retirement when he got it last year."
Dennis and I have talked a lot about the exit. How do you? And Dennis has done the soft landing — still working in Perth. But as he said to me, "You don't retire the ego." And that's the trick, I guess for all of us.
So a bit from the heart hey? I've got a lot of people that have helped me, from Gordon Bennett and Gary Fenton, through to Lewis Martin and Col Southee. And in between people like David Barham and certainly Josh Kay, who's done so much for all the broadcasters. And he is here tonight. So thank you Josh.
All of those people have made an enormous difference.
In this room I've had some the greatest anxiety that I've ever had in my life. Because this is the Brownlow Medal room. And many years ago things were going a little hairy, about a half an hour before the Brownlow. Our producer at the time, Tracy Damon looked at me and she said, "We're going to be all right. You're hosting."
If only she knew. If only she knew how I was feeling at that moment. But she did. She empowered me. I felt a responsibility. I felt for one minute that I was captain of the Channel 7 team. God, it made me lift and get my act together. So all those Channel 7 people that have helped me over the years, and those broadcasters from Sandy Roberts to Brian Taylor, and in particular, Dennis.
One of the great thrills of my life, and sad in a way, was to be with Dennis with his final AFL call. Remarkable match. When Picken did run into that open goal and the drought did finally end. An amazing day, an incredible experience for both of us to realise that our partnership was ending, and that arguably the greatest voice in football was going to be heard for the last time on an AFL grand final.
Les Carlyon, Harry Gordon, if you're a writer.
Ron Casey, Bill Collins, if you wanted to be a broadcaster. That's the way I grew up living in Adelaide. It was Bill that I wanted to be. I didn't want to call like him. I wanted to be him, to be honest. His clarity, the colour at the same time. Fact and fiction, maybe. His rhythm. His ability not to call a race, but to describe it and to read it and then to bring it home and make the hair on the back of your head stand up.
I was hooked from a very, very young age.
I've worked alongside of lot of ex champions like Robert Otie and Raelene Boyle and Jim Courier, Leigh Matthews, and they've all held my hand and helped me through. I've been fortunate. Opportunities, Seven have provided them and so did Ten. How lucky I've been to be able to speak publicly on those occasions that Dennis talked about. To talk when that ball bounces away from Stevie Milne. To be there when Glenn Boss brings Makybe Diva back, and they just stand there in front of the stand.
To be there when Winx, in the blue and white, walks through the tunnel onto the track for the final time. To be there when Carl Lewis in 1984 put the baton from his left hand to his right hand, and ran alongside Jesse Owens in the same lane, and broke the world record in the 4x100. And then Carl and Ben four years later. And then Michael Johnson's masterpiece in Atlanta. And then El Guerruj who looked like being never and then became the best ever. And then the bloke that was probably the best of them all who morphed into Muhammad Ali in the last 10 metres of the hundred metres. How dare he do that? Usain Bolt.
And then there was Cathy. And that's the one that if I ever had to look over the cliff, that was the one. And she did get away, and she did run well on the back straight. And she did explode like she did in Atlanta. And she did lift when she hit the front and she looked a winner.
And Raylene summed it up beautifully. Relief, she carried us on. How lucky am I? Opportunity. So, so fortunate. Dennis described it perfectly.
If I've got a talent... Just because I feel more comfortable talking to you right now than I did ten minutes ago, that I'm better with the headphones on, than without them on. And if I've left anything, it's, I hope I've helped someone along the way.
I'll finish by quoting something that meant a lot to me and still does us. We're all inspired by words. And when I was young, probably fifty years ago, I read this, that Gatsby believed in the green light. “The orgastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that's no matter. Tomorrow we’ll run faster, stretch out our arms further. And one fine morning... And so we beat on boats against the current. Born back ceaselessly into the past.”
I don't know exactly what it means. But I know what it makes me feel. Thanks everyone.