He is the late bloomer, a skim-boarding electrical apprentice from Frankston who made his way to the GIANTS as a 19-year-old after playing as a forward, winger and midfielder in his draft year.
He is the creative mind - a budding filmmaker who has spent the last year piecing together a documentary charting the GIANTS’ journey from start-up club to the 2019 Grand Final.
He is the low-key, no-fuss defender who quarter after quarter and week after week breaks opposition hearts while saving the day for his side with his anticipation, courage and smarts.
And now, Nick Haynes is an All Australian.
Haynes was the only GIANT in the side announced tonight, named alongside West Coast's Brad Sheppard, Fremantle's Luke Ryan, Collingwood's Darcy Moore, Port Adelaide's Darcy Byrne-Jones and Brisbane's Harris Andrews.
He becomes the seventh GIANT to be selected as an All Australian after Jeremy Cameron, Heath Shaw, Toby Greene, Josh Kelly and Lachie Whitfield, as well as former teammate Dylan Shiel.
Cameron was the first GIANT to make the team, at the end of his second season in 2013, before making it back there last year. Shaw became a back-to-back All-Australian in 2015-16.
The club has had players recognised in all but two of its nine seasons in the AFL.
Haynes was selected after a season that saw him grab more intercept marks than any other player in the competition, with an average of 3.4 per game.
Statistically he ranked elite for possession gains (6.8 per game), uncontested marks (6.2) and spoils (4.5), and above average for disposals (16) and metres gained (312).
The numbers say that Haynes was at his best in games against Carlton, Hawthorn, Gold Coast, Port Adelaide and Essendon this year, his ninth season in the AFL.
He snaffled eight intercept arks and had eight rebound 50s in the game against the Blues, and had seven rebound 50s to go with his five intercept marks against the Hawks.
He had his highest number of disposals – 23 – against Port Adelaide in round six. He took five intercept grabs against Gold Coast in round nine, and again against Essendon the following week.
Harder to measure was the number of times Haynes was just there when he was needed: when the opposition was coming hard, when the backline was under the pump, when someone needed to do something.
Together he, Phil Davis, Lachie Keeffe, Shaw and others found a way to survive some serious onslaughts, and make sure the team kept hanging in there.
He went for his marks and got the ball moving while also matching up on all sorts of opposition forwards as required: against Brisbane he had time on Charlie Cameron as well as the much taller Oscar McInerney.
Haynes is not an attention seeker, and not the sort of person who chases acknowledgement for his own individual efforts. There has been a humility about him ever since he stepped through the door as the seventh draft pick nine years ago.
But the people who work and play alongside him each week will be rapt to see his skill, courage and reliability rewarded with some much-deserved time in the spotlight.
“Backlines are always called the working class part of the team and Haynesy has that real attitude of 'Let's get the job done' each week," said coach Leon Cameron of him a few years back, in an interview with the Sydney Morning Herald.
"The boys love him because they know he's so brave. He's courageous in the air but he's equally competitive on the ground. He's got that competitive streak that we love at our footy club.
“He's really quiet, but his attitude to beat his opponent is first class. He wants to knock off the tall, the small or the medium.
“He's so flexible he can play on a number of players. When he does that he wants to chop out and help his mates. That sort of defender is like gold."
