It was far from the ideal way for Jayden Short to celebrate reaching his AFL 150-game milestone against Western Bulldogs at Marvel Stadium last night, with Richmond suffering a 55-point loss, but the star rebounding defender could hold his head high as one of the team’s best players.
He finished the match with an equal team-high 25 disposals, seven marks, five rebound-50s, three inside-50s, three clearances, three score involvements and a team-high 569 metres gained.
Short is a big success story of the AFL’s rookie draft system.
Taken by the Tigers with their first pick (No. 11 overall) in the 2015 rookie draft, Short is a dual premiership player with the Club (2019, 2020) and a Jack Dyer Medallist (2020).
The 27-year-old is one of only three rookie-list players in the competition to have gone on and become a Best and Fairest winner at their club in a premiership year (Sydney’s Brett Kirk and Hawthorn’s Josh Gibson are the other two).
After making his senior debut for Richmond in Round 2, 2016 v Collingwood at the MCG, and kicking three goals playing as a small forward, Short developed into a top-class rebounding defender.
His capacity to cover the ground with hard, quick running, and then turn defence into attack through penetrating, long, accurate kicks, makes him such a valuable asset for the Tigers.
Metres gained is one of the most vital statistical categories in AFL football these days, and Short is elite in this regard.
And, as he’s highlighted again several times this season, he can hit the scoreboard from a long way out, having kicked half a dozen goals from beyond Richmond’s forward-50 area with his booming right boot.
Across his 150-game AFL career, Short is averaging 20.0 disposals, 4.9 marks, 4.3 rebound-50s, 2.9 inside-50s, 3.9 intercepts, 3.7 score involvements and 485.0 metres gained per match.
He is currently ranked sixth in the competition for metres gained per game.
