At the commencement of the 2022 AFL season, one of the residents of the Last Chance Hotel had his football life on the line.
Thrown a lifeline by the Geelong Cats, Tyson Stengle knew he was lucky to get another opportunity at AFL level. His past few years had been littered with poor decisions and after being let go by the Adelaide Crows, it was viewed as a pretty big risk by the Cats to pick him up.
Geelong, however, backed their culture and their system to both work with Stengle and support him as he attempted to make amends and give his AFL career one last shot. It proved to be a wise decision, with Stengle moving from the Last Chance Hotel to a permanent residency inside the Geelong forward fifty.
And he earned himself a nice new blazer to go along with it. From AFL discard to All-Australian in 12 months… luck had little to do with it. Stengle lived the dream in 2022, but as we hit 2023, we have a new crop of players hitting the Last Chance Hotel, hoping to once again ignite their dreams of a long career in the league. Some are just trying t hold on until they can prove themselves. Others are looking for redemption.
The sad fact is that for every Tyson Stengle, there is a Cam Ellis-Yolmen, Jarrod Brander, or Oleg Markov where things just didn’t work out.
Let’s take a look at who is checking in this season, and their chances of making out of the LCH to go on to resume their AFL career.
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