‘He could score from all angles’: Why magic TJ Reid will always be one of hurling’s giants

The timing of TJ Reid’s retirement suggests that he may have lost control of the ending. After Ballyhale Shamrocks won the Kilkenny county final last week Reid was asked about his intercounty future, and his gentle prevarication didn’t conceal his determination to continue: he was waiting to be asked; hoping.

“At the moment I’m still a Kilkenny player,” the 38-year-old said. “So that’s still there. We’ll see ... Obviously you want to play forever. I’ll try my best to do that. If there’s a panel picked and I’m called for it, I’ll be there. And if not, so be it.”

For Henry Shefflin and his new management team, they needed to reach a conclusion about Reid, just as Ben O’Connor had a decision to make about Patrick Horgan a year ago. The observed protocol in these situations is that the player is given space to announce their retirement, even if that decision was not entirely their own. That has been honoured.

Reid’s status as one of the greatest forwards of all time was established in the second half of his 19-year Kilkenny career. He won Hurler of the Year in 2015, the year in which Kilkenny won their last All-Ireland under Brian Cody, and still their most recent title.

But around that time his role on the team changed significantly. Over a three- or four-year period Kilkenny’s greatest ever forward line was lost to natural decay: Shefflin, Richie Power, Eoin Larkin, Eddie Brennan, Martin Comerford and Aidan Fogarty all went and injuries meant that Richie Hogan wasn’t always available. The difference for Reid was the proportional needs of those around him. He became the load-bearing forward. Every day.

“For me, when Henry [Shefflin] left, and TJ took over the free-taking, that really elevated his game to another level,” Richie Hogan said a couple of years ago. “But TJ is a far better forward than I was. A far better shooter. A far better finisher. I was somebody who was going to be a creator. I was going to be on the ball constantly and using it really, really, well.”

It seems unimaginable now, but Reid spent years trying to disentangle himself from Cody’s doubts. When he joined the 2011 final as a sub, he became the first player in the history of the game to win three All-Irelands off the bench. For that match he had been dropped. A year earlier, as captain, he was replaced by John Mulhall in the All-Ireland final, even though Reid had scored three points from play and another from a sideline cut.

[ Kilkenny great TJ Reid announces his retirement from intercounty hurling ]

[ All Stars ceremony live updates: Hurling team and players of year to be named ]

The consensus in those years was that Reid didn’t work hard enough without the ball and in Cody’s eyes that was a capital offence. In a sense, Reid’s outlandish talent was a complicating factor. For too long he seemed to believe that Kilkenny would settle for his brilliance.

It came to a head at a video review meeting after Kilkenny had lost the 2012 Leinster final and Reid was highlighted for giving up on a chase. He was dropped for the All-Ireland quarter and considered quitting the panel.

That summer, though, was the turning point. When Reid came on against Limerick he changed the game; Kilkenny recovered their mojo in time to win the All-Ireland and Reid finished that season with the first of his seven All Stars.

“No one doubted that he could make the ball talk and score from all angles,” said Brian Hogan, the former Kilkenny centre back a few years ago, “but that’s only part of the game.”

Once Reid came to that realisation, nothing was the same again. In the second half of his career, he acquired bullish strength. When a players’ gym was installed in Nowlan Park he didn’t grasp the value of moderation at first and even on the day before matches his car would be seen parked outside. Once he settled into a sustainable routine, though, he turned into an imposing specimen. It was the final piece of the jigsaw.

During his long peak, Reid was the best forward in the game under a dropping ball, the deadliest free-taker, the hardest player to hook or block. Like all the great players, the speed of thought and touch and eye were in orchestral sequence. If he were a golfer, Reid would be gaining shots against the field under every metric: long game, short game, around the green, putting.

For years he carried the Kilkenny forward line on his back and the numbers kept racking up. Against Wexford last summer he passed Horgan at the summit of the all-time scorers’ list; he finished his championship career with 43 goals, 672 points.

But even those towering numbers couldn’t tell the whole story. The magic is everlasting.