Hype and Hope

I just need to get my confidence back.

– Mike Tyson during his comeback after being released from prison in 1996

 

Nothing fuels hype quite like winning does.  Hype is infectious, delirious and addictive.  Essendon, having endured seven miserable seasons, currently has more hype than any other club.  On the basis of a 55-point win over the Western Bulldogs, thousands of disaffected Bomber fans without memberships are suddenly afflicted by wobbly head syndrome as they talk up the win.  Talking themselves into a membership wobbles the wallet, but hype and hope make the hands work. 

Essendon is on top for the first time in nine years.  Bulldogs coach Rodney Eade, embarrassed by the loss, took the easy way out and lauded the opposition.  According to Eade, the Bombers will make the finals and challenge for the top four.  In deflecting criticism from the insipid performance, Eade found a neat excuse, look how good Essendon is.

The media doesn’t need a neat excuse to focus on Essendon.  Eade handed them a gift anyway.  No one is surprised that the media is playing along.  Journalists are drawn to glamorous clubs.  Essendon, despite recent dysfunction, is certainly glamorous. 

Former premiership player James Hird must think coaching is easy.  Having guided the Bombers to the pre-season final, he went on and won his debut match.  Hysterical fans held up banners at Docklands, Congratulations Hirdy, and gave the rookie coach rousing applause at the end of the game. 

Collingwood, the reigning premier, drew fewer accolades for their 75-point dismantling of Port Adelaide than Essendon did.  Collingwood was expected to win.  Nothing is as dull as success.  The Bombers were underdogs, hence the difference in media attention.

Given journalists and editors know underdogs are usually more interesting than champs, pictures of Hird adorned websites.  A poll on Real Footy attracted 6305 votes, with 70 percent of respondents predicting the Bombers will make the finals.

On Tuesday 29 March, eight of 29 photos on the Real Footy website featured Essendon’s players, coaches or supporters.  Four of the nine featured stories were about the Bombers, including a positive piece by Caroline Wilson highlighting Essendon’s ambitions to replace Collingwood as the biggest club in the AFL.

The story, which relied heavily on quotes, was largely fluff.  Wilson could’ve elicited the same story out of every club in the AFL.  It proves, simply, that the majority of the industry is drawn to Essendon by virtue of potential might. 

Six months ago Hird was a reluctant wannabe.  Now he’s the saviour, coming home to rescue his former club.  The transition in coach and team is remarkable.  The Bulldogs are highly regarded, nominated by many pundits to either win the premiership or play in the grand final.  One loss doesn’t cruel a campaign but it can be the catalyst for a future of failure.    

Hird was calm in the days following the match.  ‘We’re very conscious that the Essendon footy club hasn’t handled good wins that well,’ he said of the past.  ‘It’s one win, our first win for the year and we’ve got a very tough football team next week in the Swans in Sydney.’

Sydney will be tough to beat, most AFL clubs are.  The Swans drew with Melbourne in round one, a close, hard fought game.  Sydney emerged with two points and a little bit of pride.  Aside from individuals, as a club there was a vital element they missed out on at the weekend, an emotional element the Bombers are high on.

Essendon will have more confidence, and it is based on hype and hope. 

James Hird provides the hype, his deputy, former premiership player and coach, Mark Thompson is the hope.  Without any shred of originality, they have been dubbed the dream team by sections of the media.  Imagine the inspiration and time needed to come up with that hip cliché.  They’re better known, right now, as Hope and Hype.

Essendon fans hope like hell that Thompson can transfer his discipline, ethos and game plan from Kardinia Park to Windy Hill.  Essendon fans hope the hype surrounding Hird will prove to be reality.

Nothing fuels hope like hype, or is it vice-versa???  Mark Thompson and James Hird might just be interchangeable…

Define confident, or confidence.  It’s just a fancy word that usurps hope and aligns itself with belief.  Yet they’re just words, part of a sentence, we’re confident we can, we believe we can, we hope we can.  Confidence, though, is far more powerful than belief or hope.  Confidence is evocative.  It is illusive.  It can’t be bargained with or reasoned with.  Often it seems unobtainable, an emotion long spent at various moments throughout the season.  

The only way to create confidence is hard work and luck, often as a simultaneous equation but neither is mutually exclusive, they’re not always interchangeable.  Essendon has confidence, based on hype and hope.  The new coach (hype) and the aged, wizened mentor (hope) seem intent on moulding a ramshackle bunch of man-boys to exact revenge on the competition.  Hype and Hope played in a premiership together in 1993.  Hope retired the captaincy two years later and accepted an assistant role under Kevin Sheedy.

Together, Hype and Hope have created confidence at Windy Hill.  So far, one round into the season, the players have responded well, as have the fans and the media.  Essendon, by virtue of one victory, are back, and the whole industry is shouting wow, let’s get carried away.  Hype, though, offered a sobering view.

‘We can’t afford to get carried away,’ he said.  ‘Yes, we’ve won a game of football, the boys have played well, but that doesn’t make our season.’

That single victory over the Western Bulldogs mightn’t make Essendon’s decade.  It mightn’t make Hype’s coaching career.  It might mean nothing.  In 2008, Hype’s predecessor, Matthew Knights, also won his debut match as coach by the same margin, 55-points against North Melbourne, a preliminary finalist from 2007.  Knights, as everyone knows, couldn’t coach.  No one knows if Hype can coach yet.

What is clear following round one is dominance.  Essendon is number one in the competition for effective long kicks, kicking efficiency and inside 50.  Hype mightn’t be unconvinced of his ability, but he’s measured in his warning.

‘There’s a long way to go for us to improve,’ he said.  ‘We finished 14th last year, we’ve won a game.  If we want to keep improving, going up the ladder, you’ve got to win back-to-back games.  We’re hunting Sydney from today.’

There is no doubting Essendon’s value to the competition.  Their fans, like those of many clubs, are fickle, abandoning the team when times are tough.  When the hype is guaranteed by wins, those same fans will invest time and money in football again. 

Essendon has a lot of fans.  When the club is in contention for the finals, their fans can inflate crowd figures.  A strong Essendon can inflate crowd figures by up to 10,000.  AFL boss Andrew Demetriou would be wiping wet palms in anticipation of huge crowds.  He could be forgiven for privately hoping the hype is real.

The guff, though, is getting too much.  Hird (Hype, whatever) has been labelled the messiah, part of the dream team, the future.  He’s been praised for playing Michael Hurley in attack and letting ruckman Paddy Ryder rest up forward.  Journalists making those claims need to do simple research.  Ryder has kicked 43 goals from 94 matches, Hurley 22 from 29 games.  Both played up forward under Knights, who was trying to reset the Bombers’ forward line.

Amazing how moves tried under duress are forgotten and one win proves genius.  Essendon, along with Carlton, Collingwood, Richmond and Hawthorn, are the Victorian heavyweights, but it doesn’t mean football is better when they’re on top.

All it proves is the glamorous clubs get more media.  What everyone must understand is this; it makes no difference to a journalist or editor if Essendon is winning or not.  They will command space purely on glamour, their weight of numbers and the little alcove north or Melbourne they’ve occupied for decades.

Hype and Hope have to prove the glamour, because if the Bombers start losing, they’ll still dominate websites and newspapers, but the stories won’t be fuelled by hyperbole and speculation.

Reality can ruin hope and destroy the hype.  Tangentially, it can offer affirmation.

Better to have Hype and Hope, than be without.

St Kilda 1.25 v Richmond 3.90

North Melbourne 7.25 v Collingwood 1.09

Port Adelaide 1.42 v West Coast 2.85

Gold Coast 3.65 v Carlton 1.28

Fremantle 1.77 v Geelong 2.05

Western Bulldogs 1.10 v Brisbane 6.85

Sydney 1.75 v Essendon 2.07

Hawthorn 1.42 v Melbourne 2.85

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