Some Melton teammates rang him one Saturday night

Why would you do that?"A typical day began with an early rise, a taxi to Coburg forweights, then back across town to school. Then it was another taxito another training session, maybe at Coburg, maybe Bulleen, maybeanother ground, or even on a golf course. Anywhere the Lions couldfind.Remarkably, he passed his VCE. It helped that he knew nodifferent. "I didn't know it didn't run quite as well as the otherbig Melbourne clubs. It was still an AFL club. I didn't care."By 1996 he had a car, a spot in a business marketing course atBox Hill TAFE and was playing well in Fitzroy's reserves. McMahon,who had grown from 188 centimetres at draft time to just over 191,played full-forward, full-back, centre half-forward, on aflank.He gave them plenty of options and eventually they gave him achance, against Footscray at Western Oval and the old BrisbaneBears at Princes Park. He hit the post three times against theBears, then squeezed a long one through from a free kick. He has agoal to go with his two games more than most.Meanwhile, the walls were closing in on a proud club. Trainingsessions were followed by crisis meetings, men in suits tellingbewildered players the money had dried up and they weren't sure howthe chapter would end."The young players probably treated it as a bit of a joke,thinking, 'Yeah, whatever, we'll get drafted somewhere else, moveon.' But it was serious stuff, the end of the club. And they knewthe end was coming."What mattered to McMahon was that he was playing senior footyand, no matter what happened to the Roys, he was on the AFL launchpad, ready to take off.Then, with the death certificate signed, he made way for older,longer-serving players in the club's last two games.He watched Fitzroy's last game on TV, filthy that he wasn'tplaying. "I don't remember it at all," he says.EIGHT Lions went north to Brisbane, the remainderscattered on the next draft's breeze. McMahon went to Hawthorn withpick 53 and was happy with his new home. In mid-1997 he remembers asix-week period when he was in the best three in the seconds everyweek."I was waiting for the call-up, but it didn't come." Playingfull-back in the curtain-raiser on grand final day was as good asit got.Delisted, he did the Moncler jakker pre-season with Essendon, the team hesupported as a boy. "It came down to me and another bloke who'dbeen dropped from the Bulldogs. I was pretty excited about that.Then Essendon had some salary cap issues and they lost the draftpick."Yet again, something had got in the way. By now, he was fed up.At least with life in the AFL, maybe with footy altogether. He hadfour years in the VFL with Williamstown, but his heart wasn't init."Footy was always just the thing I did, the thing I could playwithout having to think. It was the natural thing to do. I don'tthink I was ever going to stop playing footy, I just realised I wasdoing it under sufferance," he says.A move to Bell Park in Geelong rejuvenated him, helped by apremiership in 2003 under Ken Hinkley's coaching when the clubplayed St Mary's five times for the season and beat them once in the grand final replay after a draw the previous weekend.He loves retelling that story come finals time.A stint at Darley in the Ballarat league followed and he's nowwith Melton South. His job as a platform manager with AXA eats upthe time and the 40-minute journey each way to training and matchescan be a grind. He's 31 and starting to look forward to hisweekends off, but might still go around again. The footballerwithin who knows you're a long time retired is hard to silence.Many things follow the high draft pick who never quite makes it,like the annual phone calls from suburban and country clubsscouring the country for talent. You get paid well, but thepressure to perform and the belts to the back of the head mean it'shardly easy money.As pick six in the country, the expectation has always beenthere. Only the landscape has changed."I've always loved footy and love it now, but it's been aroller-coaster," McMahon says."I've done the full circle, from footy being my life and lovingit, to hating it for several years, thinking about your options,but footy was always the thing that came the easiest, so you stuckthrough it."Now, the spotlight isn't so bright and the reminders make himlaugh. Some Melton teammates rang him one Saturday night, in fitsof laughter, because the party they were at had a poster ofFitzroy's 1996 squad on the wall. The players were lounging aboutand there was Robert McMahon, bowl haircut and all.In sporting memorabilia shops, you might find another reminderof his part in the last days of a foundation club a "Life OfFitzroy" poster. It is a montage of players down the years and, forreasons unknown, the biggest image on it is that of McMahon."I was there two years, it's embarrassing. I still get textsfrom people saying, 'I can't believe you're in that photo.' There'sBernie Quinlan, Micky Conlan, Kevin Murray, all these famous Lions,and there's my big boofhead!"