Aug 19, 2026 · 8 min · 6 segments
Episode 201 Joc discusses why it takes many seasons to be play your best footy . Areas of discussion include: \- The pressure to be good now \- Development timeline is longer than you think…
does not happen in one year.
In fact, it takes many.
And this is something I've been thinking about for a while with a lot of players.
There's a lot of pressure to be good right now, pressure to be better than teammates, parents wanting and worrying that they're not up to where they need to be at a younger age.
They might have been cut from a pathway program.
There's pressure making rep teams, a whole range of things.
But the reality is to get better, to become a really good player takes many years and it's a never ending game of development.
The reality is a lot of players development timeline is a lot different.
Everybody's on their own journey and no two journeys are the same.
12 year olds don't need to compare themselves to 16 year olds and just like 15, 16 year olds don't need to compare themselves to AFL players.
Sometimes being the best player at 13 or 14 does not necessarily make you the best player at 20.
And as I mentioned, players develop a different rate, whether it be physically, whether it be mentally, whether it be tactically, footy IQ, or skills-wise, all different rates.
We need to really focus on stop comparing players who are just maybe starting out.
Maybe if you think about it in chapter two, compared to players who might be up to chapter 10 and thinking that they know as much as those players and going to be as good as those players.
Everybody comes from different backgrounds.
Some people have family who are right into football.
Some people don't have those things.
Some people have been exposed to different football camps and private coaching.
Other kids haven't.
A whole range of things go into every development, every kid's development, every player's development for that fact, and it's an individual journey.
does not happen in one year.
In fact, it takes many.
And this is something I've been thinking about for a while with a lot of players.
There's a lot of pressure to be good right now, pressure to be better than teammates, parents wanting and worrying that they're not up to where they need to be at a younger age.
They might have been cut from a pathway program.
There's pressure making rep teams, a whole range of things.
But the reality is to get better, to become a really good player takes many years and it's a never ending game of development.
The reality is a lot of players development timeline is a lot different.
Everybody's on their own journey and no two journeys are the same.
12 year olds don't need to compare themselves to 16 year olds and just like 15, 16 year olds don't need to compare themselves to AFL players.
Sometimes being the best player at 13 or 14 does not necessarily make you the best player at 20.
And as I mentioned, players develop a different rate, whether it be physically, whether it be mentally, whether it be tactically, footy IQ, or skills-wise, all different rates.
We need to really focus on stop comparing players who are just maybe starting out.
Maybe if you think about it in chapter two, compared to players who might be up to chapter 10 and thinking that they know as much as those players and going to be as good as those players.
Everybody comes from different backgrounds.
Some people have family who are right into football.
Some people don't have those things.
Some people have been exposed to different football camps and private coaching.
Other kids haven't.
A whole range of things go into every development, every kid's development, every player's development for that fact, and it's an individual journey.
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