Most players his age have not played for their country, like he did – astonishingly – in just his first year of senior football. Most players his age have not been named to represent their state, like he could do later this year after being named in the 40 man Victorian squad for the Hall of Fame tribute match.
On the flip side, most players of his age have had nearly a decade in the AFL system. Some will play their 150th games this year. It could take Morris another four years or more to reach that mark.
However, after being rookie-listed at the age of 22, he’s crammed an awful lot into just three-and-half years of football.
“I never give up and I just hate getting beaten,” he says with a sense of genuine feeling. “I’ll fight, I’ll keep fighting and then I’ll fight until I can’t fight any more.”
They are words he is using to describe what it’s like to play on the giant forwards of the game, but they could easily form an apt description of his own career to this point.
Yet as he stands in the newly completed Elite Learning Centre (ELC), an impressive facility recently completed as part of the ongoing redevelopments at the Whitten Oval, Morris looks right at home. Teammates poke and prod him like he’s been here forever.
The atmosphere is relaxed, even jovial, but also confident. These are good times to be a Bulldog.
“As a team we’ve won four games to start the year and then we had the draw last week, which was a bit disappointing. But we’re moving from that, the starts have been pretty good and all the players have been playing some pretty good footy,” he says.
“Personally, I think it’s been an OK start for me but I can always do better and there’s always room for improvement … If there wasn’t, there’d be no other place to go.
“I think all our players can improve and they’ll be looking to show that in the coming weeks.”
Although the multi-million dollar redevelopment is far from the complete, Morris confesses it’s given the playing group a real lift in 2008 to see the high-performance hub finally established.
“We’re definitely playing better football than last year. With the ELC coming up that’s been a big morale boost in itself, and with the redevelopment that’s going on at the Whitten Oval there’s a real buzz about the club.”
“That’s also turned into a confidence thing, and we’re going out there playing on the field with confidence, too.
“At the end last year we faded away for reasons I’m not too sure [of], but we always knew we had it in us to play good footy. Now we know what we need to do, and we’ve got that confidence".
Morris speaks like a model professional but could easily have trodden a different career path. As a junior, he repeatedly tried to impress the talent scouts at TAC Cup side the Calder Cannons but they weren’t interested.
“I tried out a few times but never made it and they gave me some reasons at the time. I think it was like ‘your skills aren’t good enough’ or ‘you’re not quick enough ’,” Morris says.
“So I went away and worked on those things, I wasn’t going to let it deter me, and also played at my local club, where Simon Minton-Connell played.”
At the peak of his powers in the early 1990s, Minton-Connell was a talented forward who would end up kicking more than 300 goals in a career that spanned 12 years across four different clubs. His last was the Western Bulldogs, where he kept close ties.
“He suggested that I try out for a rookie spot in about 1999-2000. So I went down and tried out but I missed out, and they said I should try out with Werribee", Morris says.
“I spent four years there, and tried out a couple more times over the years for a rookie spot and missed out.
“In late 2004, I thought I’d give it another crack and yeah, got very lucky and was picked up, and it was largely thanks to the then-coaching staff that pushed my case forward. The likes of Chris Bond, Leon Cameron and Alan Richardson really helped me to get where I am.
“It’s been a tough long journey, there’s been a few obstacles along the way, but I think if I had of made it another way I wouldn’t be the player I am today.”
Since he joined the Bulldogs, there’s been some confusion over what role suits Morris best; is he a key position defender, back-pocket, midfielder, tagger or ruck-rover?
“I’m a backman,” Morris says, assuredly. “But I play on talls, smalls and anyone and everyone in between.
“Sometimes, yes, I may fight out of my weight division on Nick Riewoldt and Brendan Fevola and those types that are a bit bigger, stronger and may think they’ve got the wood on me. It’s tough but I enjoy the challenges I get in my game .
“And if you want to be the best, you’ve got to beat the best. That’s the way I look at it.”
