Shaun Grigg has revealed that he was on the winning side of a cheeky wager with former Richmond teammate Dustin Martin during the 2017 season.
Grigg, now an assistant coach at Geelong, was challenged by Martin to win a centre bounce ruck contest against current Cat Josh Jenkins who was with Adelaide at the time.
Tigers forward Jack Riewoldt recalled the moment on SEN’s Tiger Time when Grigg was a special guest.
“There’s a funny story about you versus him in the ruck,” Riewoldt said to Grigg of Jenkins who debuted for the Cats against Essendon on Sunday.
“Dustin Martin bet you $50 when you were in a centre bounce, that you couldn’t jump over the top of him and get a hit-out, which you proceeded to do.
“Dustin has paid you for the bet, hasn’t he?”
Grigg said that Martin was indeed a man of his word but admitted he hadn’t yet informed Jenkins that the wager had taken place at his (and Dusty’s) expense.
“He (Martin) paid me straight after we sung the song later that day,” he said.
“I haven’t mentioned (to Jenkins) that there was a wager but I have brought it up about our tussle in the ruck and me actually getting a couple of hit-outs.
“But I didn’t mention there was a bit of a wager.
“The big fella was back in the ruck on the weekend, big Joshy Jenkins. He did a good job against Sammy Draper as well.”
Ahead of Friday night’s clash between Richmond and Geelong, Riewoldt jokingly added: “Alright, that’s my number one sledge (for Jenkins) for the weekend. All sorted.”
Grigg, who retired last year, also touched on the “premiership ruckman” term which came to prominence after his pinch-hitting exploits in the ruck in Richmond’s drought-breaking 2017 flag.
He admits it gets thrown around whenever his name is mentioned stemming from a season he remembers with plenty of fondness for obvious reasons.
“The premiership ruckman (term) does get carried on a little bit,” he added.
“I had a bit of fun with it. It was just to help out Toby (Nankervis) in little spurts in quarters.
“I used to joke around with the opposition ruckman and have a bit of fun with them. It was just something so different that those guys had never come up against.
“To create something special and be involved in that year was unbelievable. We were up against it all year. Our forward line, you (Riewoldt) were our only tall forward and everybody said we were too young, or we’re too small, or we had those close losses in the year and it was the, ‘that’s the old Richmond’, and ‘Richmond-y’ to lose those games.
“Everything going against us and for us to galvanise and come together and do something special … sometimes now I catch myself and have a think about and have a smile.”
The fourth-placed Tigers and second-placed Cats clash in a crunch encounter at Metricon Stadium on Friday night.