Inside the AFL's infamous 2020 'COVID draft' as teams and players battled impacts of lockdowns

As clubs gear up for this week's AFL draft, the class from five years ago looms as a cautionary tale.  

The 2020 draft — known in some parts of the AFL world as the COVID draft — has gone down in infamy for the struggles of the players taken with first-round picks.

Just three players from the class — Riley Thilthorpe (drafted second overall), Errol Gulden (32nd overall) and Max Holmes (20th overall) — have made an All-Australian squad of 40 or the actual final team. 

For reference, the 2019 draft already has a total of 11 players who have achieved the same honour, while the 2021 class has five players to have made the All-Australian squad or more.

Thilthorpe is the only player drafted inside the top 10 of the 2020 draft to make an All-Australian team so far, while two players — Will Phillips (drafted third overall) and Denver Grainger-Barras (sixth overall) — have already been delisted by their respective clubs.

The top 10 picks from the 2020 draft are already considered to be one of the worst-performing top 10s of a draft class in league history when measured purely from individual accomplishments such as All-Australian appearances, club best and fairest wins and other honours.

Here is the story of the infamous 'COVID draft' from those who were involved.

Lockdown hits and grinds play to a standstill

Teams will prepare meticulously years out from a draft year, watching kids develop through the under-16 level all the way through to the under-18s before they are eligible to be selected. 

However, it is in a player's 18th year where true development starts to happen and teams are able to truly extrapolate what a talented youngster might project out to be at the AFL level. 

Game vision from the draft year will allow teams to witness a player's athleticism in pressure situations, the efficiency of their movement, their decision-making and their ball use. 

As COVID-19 lockdowns started to appear around the country, players and teams were stopped in their tracks, much like most of the world at the time. 

Grainger-Barras — touted by many experts as one of the best players in the 2020 draft coming into the year — was training with Swan Districts teammate Zane Trew when the harsh reality hit.

"We were running and it came out then that they were actually thinking about cutting the draft altogether," he told ABC Sport.

"We were really nervous, obviously being in our draft year and COVID had just started to take off so there was a lot of nervousness around what that landscape looked like. 

"At one point it was like, 'Hey, there might not be a draft at all', but I was sort of on the optimistic side thinking it will work itself out, but there was definitely some underlying nervousness. 

Months passed before heightened restrictions in Victoria meant the AFL was forced to cancel the NAB league, depriving players of invaluable development opportunities, and depriving teams of film they could scout. Other under-18s competitions from around the country were also forced to shut down.

"You're relying on what you see from them in their draft year and so many players just didn't even play," GWS Giants list manager Adrian Caruso told ABC Sport.

"There was maybe one or two practice matches for some players before it got shut down in mid-March, so that's all you had to go off. 

"There was no updated information about how a player had developed or how they'd performed in their draft year or anything. All you had was whatever they'd done prior to that year."

Kevin Sheehan has established himself as one of the leading talent scouts and draft analysts, having watched decades' worth of players come through the junior ranks before forging AFL careers.

Sheehan used the example of Fremantle star Josh Treacy — who had to wait until that year's rookie draft to get picked up — as a player whose draft stock likely suffered without a year of development as an 18-year-old.

"You never collectively got the best against the best to try and weigh up how they'd developed over the last six to 12 months," he told ABC Sport.

"You've got some unusual selections when you see Josh Treacy taken as a rookie. Being a big key position player, you probably need to see in his 18th year how he progressed, and we didn't get to see that, so he ends up as a great pick as a rookie."

Vital home visits turn into Zoom interviews

With no live action to help guide teams, more of an emphasis was placed on the interview process. 

Home visits are a key part of the interview process in a normal draft year, but with lockdowns in place, teams and players were confined to Zoom interviews.

"For us, it's a really important part of the process, meeting face to face with the player, sitting down, having a chat, building rapport, you can't do anything like that on Zoom," Caruso said.

Grainger-Barras — who eventually ended up being selected by Hawthorn — said Sydney was the only club he managed to meet in person, adding that virtual meetings were tough on not only the teams, but the players being interviewed as well.

"I didn't have to clean the whole house when clubs would come over, so that was a little added benefit, I just had to clean the desk I was sitting at," he recalled.

"It is hard to get a feel on the type of person you've got when you're speaking through a computer screen. It would've been nice to get my family involved, to be at mum's house with a crew, but it was a lot more of a one-on-one. 

"I had a few clubs that would have multiple Zoom meetings and just tried to get a gauge on different times and things like that. I was pretty lucky in that I was working full-time hours, so I had a busy life that was the crux of conversations when they were asking what I was doing outside of football."

Caruso recalled a range of emotions from the players the Giants interviewed in the draft lead-up.

"Some of them saw the positives in that they could do training on their own and prepared themselves that way," he said.

"The majority of kids saw challenges in terms of not being able to put their best foot forward and what they were missing out on going through the draft year, that whole experience of being in Year 12 and going through the draft process was taken away from them."

Preparation continues, even with no play

As the reality of no football set in, Grainger-Barras said his life turned into lots of workouts with Trew and lots of shifts at Bunnings as draft preparation.

"I tried to lean as much as I could on my good friends, whether it was people living in the neighbourhood, mainly Zane Trew, he was one that I just leaned on heaps," he said.

"We'd say, 'Hey, let's go and train, let's just try and do something', whether it was just running or kicking the footy, keeping that two-minute time that we had to keep, just trying to keep active. 

"In a way it was easier because you just had nothing else to do. I had just finished school and was working at Bunnings, but I was quite bored of that. 

"We'd kick the footy to keep the mind pretty active. Obviously it was a year of turmoil with no clue with the way it was going to go. So we just tried to do everything we could to stay prepared for if the situation came the way we wanted it to."

Despite the cancelled season, the AFL opted to move forward with a national draft — albeit a little later in the year to allow for mini draft combines to allow teams to gain the most up-to-date measurements on the prospects.

"We did have combines at the end of the year, we had them all over the place. I remember being in Bendigo and we had one in Melbourne as well," Sheehan said.

"So we had different spots where, depending on restrictions, we were able to get kids together and to give clubs a look at them athletically and to check them out medically as well. 

"It's nothing compared to watching them play in four national games and then two national academy games. 

"You'd have six chances to have a real good look and consolidate your views, whether you're a club or a recruiter."

A consensus top 10 slowly takes shape

As the year developed, Jamarra Ugle-Hagan — who was a part of the Western Bulldogs' Next Generation Academy — became the consensus top prospect after earning comparisons to a young Lance Franklin.

South Australia's Thilthorpe was the other name in contention for the top pick, particularly with Adelaide sitting at the top of the draft after finishing on the bottom of the ladder.

Outside of Ugle-Hagan and Thilthorpe likely being the first two players selected, the remainder of the top 10 was considered to be fairly fluid at the time. 

With Fremantle's top pick not coming until the teens and West Coast not having a pick at all due to the previous year's Tim Kelly trade, Grainger-Barras had come to terms with moving interstate.

"I'd planned on moving out in the year of my draft year, so I came to terms pretty quickly with moving interstate," he said.

"I was aware of all the draft talk. I knew within that first round, Fremantle had the highest pick [of a WA team] and they were later on, so I had a gauge on the fact that I'd have to move interstate. Again, I was super lucky and I relished the idea of moving."

However, Grainger-Barras believes other players might not have had the same security, particularly those who weren't expected to have their names called out early on.

"I was lucky enough to have the privilege of speaking to every club," he said.

"There was a lot of talk in the media about me going to Sydney with Aliir Aliir just leaving to go to Port Adelaide, so I sort of had it in my mind that was where I was going to go. 

"I maintain the opinion that I was super lucky on draft night because I knew I was going to be picked up. 

"I had a club call me and say, 'If you're [undrafted] at our pick, we'll pick you no matter who's on the table', so I knew my AFL dream was going to be lived, which was amazing. 

"It was a tough time for anyone outside of that first round. There was a lot of ambiguity about who was going to be picked and where and whether clubs were even going to use all their picks. It was just a massive guessing game."

As the trade and free agency period closed up, the draft order was confirmed, with Essendon looming as the major wildcard team having amassed three top-10 picks stemming from the departure of Joe Daniher and a free agent and the trade of Adam Saad to Carlton.

Draft day arrives and a couple of future superstars slide

As the draft began, the first two selections went as expected.

Adelaide's bid with Ugle-Hagan was immediately matched by the Bulldogs, and the Crows took Thilthorpe. 

The first surprise came with the third selection —when North Melbourne took Phillips — who was mocked by several experts to go later in the top 10.

"From what we were led to believe, North didn't change from picking [Elijah] Hollands to Phillips until late in the piece. Before that, there was a sense that they were going to pick Elijah Hollands," Caruso recalled.

With very little game film to go off, both Caruso and Sheehan believe impressive interviews may have tipped the Kangaroos towards Phillips at pick three ahead of other prospects. 

"He was certainly a player that won plenty of the footy at the underage level, and probably an early-maturing player," Sheehan said.

"It was no surprise to see him be an early choice because he looked a safe pick to play at least. 

"He's certainly a terrific young leader and he would've interviewed very, very well and been totally professional in all of that."

After the Swans took Logan McDonald at four and matched a bid on academy prospect Braeden Campbell, the Hawks read out Grainger-Barras's name with the sixth pick.

Gold Coast selected Hollands at seven before the Bombers rounded out the top 10 by picking Nik Cox, Archie Perkins and Zach Reid. 

Two of the consensus best players to come out of that draft — Geelong's Max Holmes and Sydney's Errol Gulden — were not selected until picks 20 and 32, respectively. 

Geelong ironically bid on Gulden before it was matched by Sydney — and then took Shannon Neale with the very next pick — a selection that has proved to be inspired in the past 18 months. 

"Holmes [was ranked so low] purely because he had no exposed form," Caruso recalled.

"He'd only played one game as a bottom-ager and he was very underdeveloped before his 18th year, so he was very much a punt. 

"There was school footy vision that we were able to watch, but in the end, it was pure projection in terms of what he was going to become. 

"That last trial he played in before COVID he had a strong game so I suppose the most recent information was that he was developing and progressing, but it was still considered pretty speculative to take him with a first-round pick.

Sheehan said Holmes was initially tipped to slide even further than he did before his stock skyrocketed in the lead-up to the draft.

"They [Geelong] watched him very closely at the school level and they, like everyone at the finish, had a really good look at him athletically but then were prepared to say, 'Well, the others like him at 50, if we're going to get him, we've got to go at 20', so they backed their judgement," he said.

Gulden's position in the second round was complicated by the fact that he was tied to Sydney's academy, with his slide indicative of the wrinkle when it comes to players who are already tied to other clubs — whether that be via academies or father-son selections.

Caruso suggested the fact that rivals knew Sydney would automatically match a bid for Gulden meant his eventual draft position wasn't a true indication of where he ranked among his peers.

"Every club will say, 'We just rank them where we rank them', but I think some clubs will also have the theory of, 'If we're out there bidding on other clubs' players, well then when we've got a player who is tied to us, are other clubs going to want to get us back?'" he said.

"So there's a lot of games involved and you might have a good relationship with someone at another club who has got a player and so you might think, 'I don't want to do it to them and make them pay up'.

"There's all these different elements to the bidding system which make it really challenging. 

"You're also not doing all the [scouting] work on that player, so how can you have them in your order without having done all the same level of interviews and vision on that player. 

"It's a very challenging process trying to place those players. Sometimes they get bid on way too early compared to what they would if they were in the open draft, and sometimes they slide a little further than they should because clubs just choose not to bid."

The draftees settle into their new homes

Grainger-Barras was one of four players drafted by Hawthorn in 2020, alongside Seamus Mitchell (pick 29), NGA prospect Connor Downie (pick 35) and Tyler Brockman (pick 46). Jack Saunders was later added through the rookie draft.

All five players are no longer at the club. Grainger-Barras, Mitchell, Downie and Saunders are no longer in the AFL system, while Brockman was traded to West Coast at the end of the 2023 season.

Grainger-Barras recalled having his living plans altered at Hawthorn's request upon making the move to Victoria following the draft. 

"I was pretty adamant on moving interstate and living on my own with a few boys, and Hawthorn were heavy on living with a host family," he said.

Grainger-Barras moved in with the Brendish family, who had made their home available for Hawthorn draftees after selling a car to then-Hawthorn player development manager, Cam Matthews.

"I wasn't very keen on it, but it ended up being an absolute blessing," Grainger-Barras said.

"I don't think I'd enjoy my time in Melbourne as much as I did without moving into that family. I moved to Melbourne and I was with Tim O'Brien for about two weeks and then had a little meeting with the host family. 

"I went to their house and it was a beautiful house and they were beautiful people. They are such a loving, caring family and I'm still really good friends with them today."

What was really behind the struggles of the class?

The theories are many as to why the players selected in 2020 struggled so mightily, particularly since the 2021 class has thrived despite having its season also impacted by lockdowns, especially in Victoria. 

Caruso said the signs of a weaker draft class were evident years out from the actual draft taking place.

"The 2020 crop, when they were under-16s in 2018 there was a strong sense that it was a weak draft class," he said.

"While we might look at them and say it was a COVID thing, I think the signs were there beyond that.

"If you can come away from that under-16s competition with 10-12 names that you're confident are going to be good, that's a good sign [of a strong class]. 

"With that 2020 crop, when they were under-16s there might've only been three or four guys, and I guess that's already an indication that it's going to be hard to find a strong and deep draft, if that's the trend."

Could some players have had different careers had they landed at different clubs? 

"The recruiting of the right type of player and the right type of person is only part of the equation," Sheehan said. "It's then the next step on how they're coached and managed at this level. 

"Some go into great programs with great mentors around them straight away within the playing group and great development coaches. 

"It's always the great unknown. You can only judge it years later when you see a young fella who might be managed well at a particular club and have a great career and it was all to do with what happened in his first couple of years. He was able to grow and develop and wasn't rushed into the senior team. 

"It's always a part of the way any fan should analyse a club's draft performance — did he go into the right environment at the time or was he a bit of a victim of where the club was sitting?"

Ugle-Hagan — after looking every bit like a top pick in the early stages of his career — has seen his progress dragged to a halt due to a raft of off-field issues. He was traded this summer by the Western Bulldogs for pick 74, a return that would've seemed unthinkable in his first few years. 

Sheehan said Ugle-Hagan was an example of a player who struggled to adjust as he went from a situation of playing no football prior to the draft to one which is as structured and as regimented as an AFL system is.

"Like all of the boys from that year, he suffered from not being able to play in those six big matches," he said. 

"He was a part of the national academy that never came together. A boy from the country could've gotten the chance to play for Vic Country, but he never got the chance to be coached and trained by the very best. 

"On natural talent he'd played some great games for Oakleigh in 2019, so he'd been exposed as a pretty promising 17-year-old, but missed a whole year of development. Who knows the impact that might have on different individuals. 

"It's a big miss for any young fella's development to not be able to play nor train at a high level, so all of the habits, even rehab, if you're in a club you're surrounded by people who are going to help you if you're injured or there are parts of your game that need development. He missed out on all of that."

Sheehan believes the lack of football in 2020 may have meant some players were lost to the AFL altogether.

"Many [players] just come in their 18th year. Kids develop at different rates and there just might've been a cohort out there that didn't get the chance in their 18th year and didn't pursue the elite level in footy," he said.

"They might be playing at the community level or they might even bob up in their 22nd or 23rd year, something down the track. There might've been a hidden gem or two that were missed. 

"It's a critical year, the 18th year, to assess themselves on where they rate amongst the other kids around Australia. They missed that development chance that often inspires them to be as good as they can be, and gives them the belief that they might well be an AFL player, and then they take off from there and shine."

For Grainger-Barras the answer to why his AFL career lasted just four seasons is quite simple.

"I think if I played a full season of footy maybe I wouldn't have gotten drafted where I'd gotten drafted. The eight games were maybe a bit of a blessing for me," he said.

"I just think I managed the stresses of AFL footy incorrectly. Maybe I didn't see things going the way I liked at Hawthorn and didn't have the maturity to understand how to change that, or the awareness. 

"Had I been back there in hindsight, I'd probably do a bunch of things differently. 

"As with any job, I wish I handled things differently, but at the same time it's sliding doors. If you were at another club maybe the whole situation would've panned out completely differently, you just don't know."