NOW, Andrew Mackie is an accomplished AFL footballer with 71 games to his name, one of them a premiership.

The team whose attacks he springboards off half-back is widely tipped to win more silverware before its window of opportunity begins to close.

He is growing before our eyes, into a better fit for his 192-centimetre frame, and in the assurance and adventure with which he plays.

He is, in the words of Geelong's wry football manager Neil Balme, "a beautiful mover, beautiful skills … he's a lovely player".

Six years ago, Mackie was the most speculative stock on football's crowded teenage market floor. His 2002 performance amounted to a handful of games with Glenelg's under 19s, one in the reserves, and school footy for Adelaide's Sacred Heart College; he did not make the South Australian team for the national under-18 carnival.

It's fair to say his selection at No. 7 in that year's national draft was not widely expected. Rather than hang agape, Kevin Sheedy's famously jutted jaw flapped: "One of the players didn't turn up (to the annual draft camp) and he is a pretty exciting player … It would be interesting to question why he wasn't in the state side."

Geelong's Stephen Wells, who in 11 years as recruiting manager has never had a higher pick at his disposal than that with which he took Mackie, is at pains to gelignite Sheedy's conspiracy theory, which amounts to a veteran prospector finding a precious nugget, stowing it under a rock, telling no one and slipping back later to collect his bounty.

"I'd like it to be this big, romantic story, but it's probably not," Wells said.

"Try not to make us out to be some sort of clever dick that found this player no one else could find, and don't put the other clubs down too much for 'missing' him. It's not the way it was."

Balme concurs. He was at Collingwood at the time, and swears the Magpies were nearly as convinced of Mackie's promise as the Cats. Anthony Goodrich, who coached him at Sacred Heart, remembers the Pies' recruiter, Noel Judkins, seeing Mackie in a game the previous year.

"He came up and said g'day at quarter-time and said: 'Gee, I like the look of that No. 21'."

The whiff of espionage was clearly fanned by Mackie going so high in a draft headed by Brendon Goddard, but there were contributing pieces to the puzzle of mystique.

Clubs nominate 50 players each for the October draft camp, with the most popular 65 or 70 invited; Mackie's name was not on Geelong's list.

Even at the Cattery, he was somewhat anonymous. Each tape in coach Mark Thompson's video collection of prospective recruits was clearly marked — except one. The explanation given at the time was that the "A. Mackie" label had fallen off.

As for missing the national championships, Goodrich says there were certainly those who thought he should have been picked. Wells doesn't know why he wasn't, "and to be honest, I didn't make too many inquiries". "You didn't necessarily want to attract too much attention to the fact that we were interested in him by asking why he wasn't doing this or wasn't doing that. I assume he just didn't get a game."

There is no shortage of AFL footballers who call Sacred Heart their alma mater. Goodrich says it has little to do with him; his beginnings as coach 11 years ago coincided with Matthew Pavlich's HSC year.

"I learnt nothing about coaching — kick with the breeze, he's up forward; kick into it, he's up back; can't get it out of the middle, put him in the guts."

The Marist Brothers might wish their school's strong curricular achievements gained similar attention, but are long used to the sight of AFL club scouts at their 14 matches each year and, says Goodrich, often at training, too. He has watched stories like Mackie's become virtual self-fulfilling prophecies.

"I remember after a game one day, a West Coast scout was saying hello to Andrew, and a Freo bloke came up to me asking: 'Who's that bloke, what's his story?' "

Wells saw Mackie play off a wing in a couple of school games that year, and a little up forward. He remembers him taking a spectacular mark one day, and kicking a couple of special goals. "(I was) just thinking, this lightly-framed but really talented young fella might one day be able to develop into an AFL player."

Balme says this "predictive nature" of his drafting has contributed to the romance, and while Wells thinks it's still possible to snare a draft "smoky" — someone who travels a less-conventional pathway to the modern norm — Balme reckons you either see them or you don't. "The only way you can hide a player is if he doesn't play — and then you don't see them, either."

Goodrich says Mackie was "struggling for selection" in Glenelg's under 19s when a reserves coach "pushed him up to the twos to see how he'd go". "He slayed them." Darren Chandler, Glenelg's chief executive, well remembers that night at Norwood. "He was just outstanding.

"He came in and played on a wing, and it was like he'd been playing at that level for two years. If anyone was going to get picked up without dominating for a period of time at a certain level, he was going to be a chance. He just moved so well." In a flash, the Brisbane Lions and Fremantle joined the hunt.

Ultimately, Sacred Heart delivered another four boys on to AFL lists in 2002 — Mackie, Jason Porplyzia to the Crows, Nick Smith to Melbourne and David King to Collingwood. The latter proves Mackie's story is not unique; he didn't make the state under-18 squad either. He also played only nine games in three seasons with the Pies.

Mackie's progression wasn't exactly greased lightning, either, but his and Geelong's patience are being rewarded. At the end of 2006, he was courted by Port Adelaide, offered a lucrative three-year deal and, for a player who had largely underachieved in 37 games, the call of home must have been strong.

In an interview with Adelaide's Sunday Mail last year, he described Port's offer as "a lot more than I deserved", and said the decision to stay came down to a sense of debt towards those who had put their faith in him.

A gradual move into defence via the wing has emboldened him; he is taller, but plays with the intuition and daring of another Cat who played at both ends, found his feet in defence, and now does his bit from the coach's box.

"He's a bit similar in the way that he plays, the lightness of his body," says Ken Hinkley, who has joined Mackie in 6am weight sessions that have added nearly 10 kilograms to his frame since he weighed in at 79 kilograms on arrival. "The biggest thing with him is he's such a good decision-maker when he gets the ball. We get such good benefit from his work coming off half-back.

"You become confident when you have a run in a certain area and you think, 'That's you, that's where you should be'. It takes a while to get that."

It took a while to get why Geelong went for Mackie, too. But the picture has become much clearer.