Sintiger said:
In hindsight we would have to suspect that he was taking drugs when he was at Richmond. It's stretching the imagination to think he was suddenly clean for 2 years.
TigerMasochist said:
Pretty sure there was a get out clause in the AFL doping code where a player with drug issues who was receiving ongoing treatment wouldn't cop any doping strikes if he had a relapse n tested positive, or perhaps they just stopped bothering to test Ben. Heaps of noise at the time about him needing the support of a footy environment if he was to have any chance of sorting himself out.
I was staggered when I read his book to learn Wallet and co. recruited him when he was still on the gear. The whole shaving his head thing should have sent alarm bells ringing.
I bet if most members had known that at the time they would have changed their tune of wanting him at the club. :-\
He might have been off hard drugs for a while but there was just so much smoke that he hadn't managed to stay clean for long.
Rumours over off season behaviour in the 2009/10 off season, reports of 'warning to curb his drinking', 'hospitalisation for stomach pains', 'induced coma from sleeping tablet reaction' and who knows what
wasn't reported....lots of speculation.
Clearly he wasnt in the same shape physically as his first season with us. His performances early in his second year were poor and his build was a shadow of what it was the previous year.
At a meeting after he left the building I asked a club official if he was any chance to be an assistant coach and he basically scoffed at the idea.
Clearly no way he was going to be offered a role after he 'retired'.
Have never wavered in the belief that we should not have brought him to our football club. That said I was proud of the way we dealt with it and the club earned a lot of respect because of it . We may have prolonged the inevitable for a short time.
That said as others have noted we're now permanently attached to him with every move he makes.
