Legendary centreman Geoff Raines has described his departure from Collingwood in 1986, calling to mind the Pies’ messy off-season just past.
Raines won three best and fairest awards and a premiership with Richmond before signing with the Magpies for the 1983 season, amid a poaching war between the two titans.
He made just eight appearances in his first season, plagued by persistent injuries.
“It took me two years to get the body right,” Raines recalled on SEN Breakfast.
“I could see all the supporters frowning, like ‘this guy has come to Collingwood on big dough and is not performing’.
“Then I had one reasonably good year there, and unfortunately ran into a pay dispute.”
Raines’ story is reminiscent of the Magpies’ decision to move Adam Treloar, Tom Phillips and Jaidyn Stephenson on at the end of 2020 with an eye to salary cap constraints.
“They said you can either take a 20 per cent pay cut or don’t bother turning up, basically,” Raines explained.
“The thing that riled me was I’d actually signed a new contract with them only a couple of weeks before.”
Former club Richmond had expressed an interest in bringing Raines back to Punt Road, but he wanted to repay the Magpies’ faith after a rocky start.
“Unfortunately, after two or three weeks (Collingwood) came to me and said ‘we can’t honour that contract’,” he recalled.
“I thought it was pretty low at the time, and being reasonably principled I decided I’m not going to accept that.”
Raines was cleared to move to Essendon early in the 1986 season, after 47 matches in the black and white stripes.
He concedes the move to Windy Hill was a “mistake,” however.
“I was living over in the eastern suburbs, travelling across in peak hour traffic,” he said further.
“I just didn’t enjoy it, I didn’t have my head right and was going to retire after 1986.
“Then I got a knock on the door from Peter Knights and Shane O’Sullivan asking ‘would you like to pioneer footy in Brisbane,’ which was wonderful on reflection.”
Raines retired in 1989 after 59 games with the Bears. His son Andrew would later follow in his footsteps, representing Richmond, the Brisbane Lions and Gold Coast Suns.
His overall career tally was 254 games for four clubs including 134 for the Tigers.