Harry Cunningham will go into his 11th AFL season as the unknowing poster boy for an elite and previously unidentified group of AFL players.
It is a group that comprises players who, since the introduction of the AFL draft in 1986, have made their AFL debut in Round 1 of their first season in the AFL. Or, in the event if a Round 1 bye, the club’s first game.
It is the ‘Draftee’s Dream Debut Club’ for players who make the enormous jump straight from junior football or State League football into the elite ranks in one summer.
In 35 years since the first AFL draft in 1986 and the expansion of the competition via the addition of Brisbane and West Coast in 1987 a total of 451 players have qualified for the ‘Triple D Club’.
These numbers have been inflated recently by the addition of Gold Coast and Greater Western Sydney, and earlier by the expansion teams of Adelaide, Port Adelaide and Fremantle.
But they only make the Cunningham dream debut even more special.
It came on March 24, 2012, when the then 18-year-old debuted for the Sydney Swans against the Giants in the first AFL game at the old Olympic Stadium.
Indeed, it was the most remarkable ‘Triple D Club’ entry in League history after the boy from Wagga had been claimed by the Swans on December 13, 2011 with selection #93 in the Rookie Draft.
And 10 years on it still is. Indeed, no player further down the pecking order in his draft year has debuted in Round 1 of his first season.
Only five other players drafted beyond #40 in the AFL rookie draft, introduced in 1997, have debuted in Round 1. They have been Carlton’s Sam Jacobs (rookie #76), Hawthorn’s Cameron Stokes (rookie #54), Port Adelaide’s Jarrad Irons (rookie #50), Fremantle’s Michael Barlow (rookie #48), Melbourne’s James Magner (rookie #42) and Collingwood’s Jack Frost (rookie #41).
Cunningham’s meteoric climb came after he had been shunned by the Giants, who had first call on his services because Wagga is in the GWS recruiting zone.
Ironically, 12 months earlier Cunningham had trained under Sydney Swans legend and Wagga favourite son Paul Kelly, who at the time had a part-time role with the Giants Academy.
Elevated the to the senior list in the week of the game, Cunningham wore jumper #44 on debut. He was the starting substitute as the Swans beat GWS by 63 points and played 20 per cent game time for four possessions after replacing Luke Parker.
Josh Kennedy, with 27 possessions and two goals, picked up three Brownlow Medal votes, while Kieren Jack’s 30 possessions and one goal earned him two votes and Shane Mumford, now on the Giants coaching staff, received one vote for 11 possessions, one goal and 35 hit-outs.
It was the only game Cunningham would play in his first season and his only game in #44 as a string of senior players returned from injury the following week, but it was enough for him to claim a place in history and kick start what has been an outstanding career.
With Sydney set to open the 2022 season back at the Olympic Stadium against GWS on Saturday afternoon March 19, supporters are wondering who, if anyone, will join the ‘Triple D Club’ this year.
Eligible are Angus Sheldrick, Matthew Roberts, Corey Warner and Lachlan Rankin, who joined the club via picks #18, #34, #40 and #59 in the 2021 National Draft.
Twelve months ago, Logan McDonald, Braeden Campbell and Errol Gulden, drafted at #4, #5 and #32 in the 2020 AFL Draft, gave the Swans their biggest Triple D Club intake in history. They took to 16 the Sydney Swans membership – smaller than every club in the League except the Western Bulldogs (16).
Andrew McGovern, father of West Coast’s Jeremy McGovern and Carlton’s Mitch McGovern and drafted by the Swans with pick #4 in the 1991 National Draft, was Sydney’s first.
After the club opened the 1992 season with a bye, he debuted in Round 2 when Sydney beat West Coast by three points at the SCG in Gary Buckenara’s first game as coach.
Joining the Eagles’ division of the Triple D Club the same Sunday afternoon was Jason Ball, a pre-draft selection by West Coast in 1991 who later to became a premiership player with West Coast and Sydney, a Sydney Swans Director and a long-serving AFL Commissioner.
In chronological order, the others have been:
1995 – Shannon Grant – pick #3 in the 1994 National Draft
1998 – Jason Saddington – pick #11 in the 1997 National Draft
2002 – Ricky Mott – pick #74 in the 2001 National Draft
2008 – Craig Bird – pick #59 in the 2008 National Draft
2010 – Lewis Jetta – pick #14 in the 2009 National Draft
2012 – Dane Rampe – pick #37 in the 2012 Rookie Draft
2015 – Isaac Heeney – pick #18 in the 2014 National Draft
2016 – Callum Mills – pick #3 in the 2015 National Draft
2016 – Tom Papley – pick #14 in the 2016 Rookie Draft
2017 – Ollie Florent – pick #11 2016 National Draft
2019 – Nick Blakey – pick #10 2018 National Draft
Grant, 17 days short of his 18th birthday on debut, is the Swans’ young Triple D Club member, and McGovern, eight days short of his 24th birthday, is the oldest.
Among current Swans, Lance Franklin, originally drafted by Hawthorn with pick #5 in the 2004 National Draft, and Lewis Taylor, drafted by Brisbane at #28 in the 2013 National Draft, are also members of the ‘Triple D Club’.
