We're feeling for you Mitch 😢
What Mitch Lewis' sickening injury means for the present, and future
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Another wretched season for Mitch Lewis. And this time with a capital ‘W’.
A tangle with Geelong’s Jake Kolodjashnij in the final quarter that initially looked bad because it cut his head open, turned out to be much worse.
The seemingly innocuous knee buckle that followed the head clash, turned out to be a serious injury, with Monday’s news that he has ruptured his ACL and that a knee reconstruction is in his immediate future.
They’ll be shattered right now at the Hawks. Lewis is a highly popular and influential figure around the club. At a club with such a young playing cohort, 25-year-olds with talent and wisdom are much-needed and much-loved.
How soon he returns to the field is the first and most obvious question. You will recall that James Sicily injured his knee with six games remaining in 2020 and he didn’t play at all until 2022. It was probably the right call; he has taken his game to a new level since he returned.
But then there’s Collingwood’s Dan McStay, injured last December but set to resume in the VFL on the weekend. His is the template for a quick return.
The difference between Sicily and Lewis is that high performance boss Peter Burge and by extension, Sam Mitchell, are now in charge of the rehabilitation and therefore the timeframes. We have no real guidebook as to how willing they are to push the envelope in this respect because there haven’t been many ACLs in their time back at the club.
But even by a conservative assessment, Hawthorn is now 12 months away from having a forward line with all its weapons fit and firing.
We didn’t learn a whole lot on Saturday. Lewis was feeling his way back in what his first game for three months after his previous knee injury. The narrow ground, dewy conditions and dirty delivery from the midfield made it a difficult evening and tough to assess how he and Mabior Chol were going to work together.
This week in Tassie and next week at the MCG would have been more illustrative, rather than a pokey ground the Hawks might play at perhaps once every two years.
But while the Lewis news was and should be treated with dismay by Hawthorn people, there also needs to be a reality check of sorts.
The Hawks won eight of 10 without him the lead-up. They moved from the depths of the ladder to knocking on the door of the eight without him. They were scoring freely without him.
Where to from here?
How they move on without him is the discussion point. The Hawks are a game (although with percentage effectively two games) out of the eight. With seven games remaining, you would think that Mitchell is still in ‘win’ now’ mode and that selection will reflect that. That means Chol will likely go back to anchoring the forward line with any and all of Jack Gunston, Calsher Dear, Luke Breust, Nick Watson, Jack Ginnivan, Connor Macdonald, Blake Hardwick and Dylan Moore playing alongside and at his feet.
All have played their part in reviving the season although the commentary after last Saturday that Breust and Gunston can no longer play full games together in the same forward line, started to grow.
But what happens if they lose this again week? Freo, even in Tassie, will be a huge ask. Hawthorn is on the wrong end of a six-game losing streak against the men in purple. 8-9 and with the finals moving only to the mathematical possibility stage this might mean a different slant on selection.
Does Max Ramsden get a decent run at it as a ruck/forward? Jasper Scaife has a few people excited. Does he get a look over the final few weeks?
It’s a question the Hawks hoped to kick down the road. The numbers rarely lie, however, and Lewis has never played more than 15 games in a season.
Can the Hawks be absolutely certain that Lewis is their next premiership full-forward? Who can really say.
They probably had a Plan B etched on a whiteboard in a hidden corner at Waverley. Now we all get to see it.
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Using cricket and fast bowlers as a comparison, it is estimated that somewhere between 5-9 times the body weight of a fast bowler goes through their front leg when they land. Mitch at 199cm & around 100kgs, it is little wonder that his knee gave way, given that he was in a totally vulnerable position following the marking clash.
If HIs can remember back to when Impey did his knee in a marking contest (again against the Cats from memory) that was even more innocuous, it is an unfortunate outcome for Mitch. History shows that there are some players who do just have a run of bad luck.
Mitch will be 26 in October, he has time on his side. Wishing him a successful recovery in order to be back as the Hawks hit their sweet spot for a Premiership tilt over the next few years.