The truth is, he didn't want to be. At the time, Ward didn't view himself as leadership material and was focused only on improving as an up-and-coming AFL footballer.
So you can imagine his surprise when Greater Western Sydney came calling with not only a lucrative, long-term deal, but also offering a share of the inaugural club's captaincy.
"It was something (GWS football manager) Graeme Allan asked me if I wanted to do," Ward recalls.
"I remember saying to him 'I'm not even in the Bulldogs' leadership group. I never had been and never really aspired to be in it.
"In my mind, I never really thought I could be a leader."
Yet he was still intrigued by the possibility and, at the tender age of 21, decided in late 2011 to leave the Bulldogs and sign on with the fledgling club.
Soon after making the move to Sydney to begin training with his new teammates, it suddenly dawned on him just how young and inexperienced those around him were.
As a comparative veteran of 60 AFL games, Ward was quickly looked up to by the eager young GIANTS who sought his guidance.
Having started his career as a year 12 student at a club boasting leaders the calibre of Brad Johnson, Matthew Boyd, Daniel Giansiracusa and Robert Murphy, being looked up to and admired was something totally foreign.
It had an impact and he started giving some serious thought to the captaincy proposal, sounding out his family and friends and eventually deciding it was an offer he couldn't refuse.
"I thought I may as well try it and if I didn't like it, that's fine, at least I could say I've tried to be a captain of the Greater Western Sydney Football Club," he said.
"To this day I feel like I'm doing an OK job and I'm improving every day.
"But I've given it a red-hot crack and haven't looked back."
To say Ward is "doing an OK job" is to grossly understate the role he has played since he joined Luke Power and Phil Davis as the first three co-captains in GWS' history.
Yet he did take a little while to warm to the position.
On February 14, 2012, the day he was introduced alongside Power and Davis, he appeared to be still getting his head around the idea and what it all meant.
Struggling a little with the cotton mouth and knotted up tongue that can come addressing a room full of microphones, TV cameras and flashing lights, Ward managed to express his gratitude and excitement about the opportunity.
From that point on, he quickly started to shine.
Appearing in all bar one game in the club's debut season, Ward produced the type of fierce attack on the ball and absolute dedication it had hoped for when he came on board.
He became more comfortable addressing the media, his teammates, fans, sponsors - anyone who took an interest in the GIANTS.
And when GWS' first seasons was done and dusted, Ward was a clear winner of the inaugural Kevin Sheedy Medal as its best and fairest player.
Ward may have taken some convincing, but Sheedy was certain of his leadership material the moment he met him.
"I thought he had great leadership potential and that was the area I wanted him to move into," Sheedy said.
"He wasn't necessarily the type of person that wanted to be captain, but we had Phil Davis and we just felt like we needed another one, particularly with a young group of kids.
"So he went home and thought about it. Other people might grab it straight away and say yes, but might not really want it.
"He gave it a great deal of thought and came back and said, 'I'll try it, but I don't know what being a captain or a leader really is yet'.
"And he's been excellent. We need to have that stable person that can blend in with the young kids that we bring to the club and the experienced players that have played in premierships.
"When the team is settled and we've done our base five years, I think we'll be very happy with the leaders we've got."
If there had been some initial reluctance, Ward now wears the captaincy as a badge of honour.
He takes establishing the GIANTS' culture and practices as a personal responsibility.
Ward, who turned 24 on April 10, has a simple philosophy when it comes to his leadership style.
"Different things come up where younger boys haven't done the right thing," he says.
"And if you're not doing the right thing, you can't really be the one to tell then off or set different guidelines of punishments once they do stuff up. It's a bit of practising what you preach."
Ward's leadership has faced its greatest tests this season.
It all started so well when the GIANTS stunned the competition with their morale-boosting victory over the Sydney Swans in Round 1.
After just three wins in the previous two years, it was just the start they needed, and was quickly followed by a narrow away loss to St Kilda and a home trump over Melbourne that had them in the eight.
But as Ward sees it, some cracks then started to appear on the field.
The GIANTS remained competitive against the Bulldogs and Port Adelaide, but their co-captain began to notice they weren't finishing off quarters properly.
Previously confident they were a chance of winning any game, Ward began to get a sinking feeling, well before the heavy defeats started to flow, such as against West Coast and Richmond.
Then came another significant stumbling block - Toby Greene's incident in Melbourne that result in an arrest and a string of assault charges for the young midfielder.
For a club fighting to establish its identity, it was a critical moment and the AFL world watched keenly to see how it would respond.
The entire playing group came together and, with the leaders making the strongest stand, Greene was suspended for five games and fined in a club-imposed penalty.
During this stretch of poor on-field results and difficulties off it, GWS coach Leon Cameron regularly fronted the media and did his best to explain the situation and implore supporters to keep the faith. And alongside him would be the club's young co-captain.
"That's the part of being a captain that, before I accepted it, I really wanted to avoid," Ward said.
"I never wanted to be the one after a big loss having to speak or try to make excuses or whatever. I wanted to leave that up to other experienced players. That's been a part of my development I've had to get better at and realise it's me that has to step up.
"As hard as it gets. that's when it tests you the most as a player, as a person and as a leader. That's when you have to be the one to stay positive and try to keep the boys up and face the consequences."
Ward fronted the media again earlier this week, but this time it was the day after the GIANTS nearly pulled off a monumental upset against reigning premier Hawthorn last Sunday.
"I think it's great for our confidence playing against a great football club in Hawthorn," he said. "We had plenty of focus ares for the game and I think we nailed almost all of them. I think as a football club we can take plenty out of it."
Ward said the GIANTS have now set a standard for the rest of their season. "I think this week our training standards were great, the intensity at training was fantastic, the best it's been all year, so to take that into the game was important."
Ward's acceptance of taking the good with the bad in the GIANTS' relatively short AFL lifespan hasn't gone unnoticed by those around him.
He is still in regular contact with Brad Johnson, who used to pick him up from school and drive him to training in that first year with the Bulldogs.
Johnson is another who sits in the camp of not necessarily pegging Ward initially as leadership material.
While he was gutted Ward left, he can at least admit the move has worked out superbly, and he admired his position on the Greene issue.
"The way he's grown as a player and a person with the extra responsibilities, I think it's been the best thing for his football and him as a person.
"We'd certainly love to still see him in Bulldogs colours, no doubt, but he made the move and it's definitely been the right decision.
"More recently he's been challenged to make some big decisions with teammates that don't align to the standards you're trying to set as a club and as a leader.
"I think he's handled his first big situation like that really well."
Along with more team success, the next step for Ward could be All-Australian honours, something Johnson feels is more than capable of.
Upon reflection, Ward conceded the captaincy has forced him to grow up and mature in the public eye.
Not unlike many other young guys his age, he likes to enjoy a drink at times, but knows the right and wrong time to do it.
In light of some recent speculation about players wanting to leave, Ward doesn't get involved in those discussions, but is confident the vast majority will stay and help the GIANTS continue to build. And he has total faith in the club's direction.
"I do," he said. "I think as a co-captain of the footy club, you have to have complete faith in the people above you and also the players in your team.
"The hardest thing about footy is when you do get smashed, stayingpositive and having that belief, because ultimately it comes back tobelief all the time. You have to stay strong as a group."
