During the 2017/18 off-season Graham received life membership to Richmond for his premiership-winning appearance the previous year , despite having played just five AFL matches . He also signed a new two-year contract extension , seeing him secured to the club until the end of the 2020 season . When the new season began Graham found himself right back into the Richmond best-22 , making his season debut in round 1 's opening match against . Graham repeated the negating role he had been used in during the grand final the previous year , this time being switched onto Patrick Cripps in an attempt to quell the young star 's influence after half-time . He laid a game-high 13 tackles in Richmond 's 26-point win and recorded 106 pressure points , the sixth most by any player in the history of the statistic . In round 4 Graham set a then season-best mark with 17 disposals but attracted a report for rough conduct against the 's Dayne Zorko when he attempted to push Zorko out of a kick and hit him with a forearm to the head . The incident was graded by the AFL 's match review officer as intentional conduct with low impact to the head and Graham was subsequently offered a one match ban . Graham and the club elected to challenge that decision however , taking the case to the AFL 's Tribunal on the grounds that the hit was careless and not intentional . The appeal was unsuccessful and Graham 's one-match suspension was upheld . To that point he was oddsmakers ' sixth favourite to take the league 's Rising Star award despite not having been nominated and was ruled ineligible to win the award as result of the suspension incurred . At the end of round 4 he was ranked number one at the club and third in the league for pressure acts applied per game . Graham returned immediately to senior football after serving that suspension and recorded a career high 24 disposals the following week in a 77-point victory over . He received one vote in the Coaches Association Player of the Year tally for that performance in which he also laid seven tackles and kicked his first goal of the season . To the end of round 8 Graham was ranked fifth in the competition for average pressure points applied per game ( 62.4 ) . Despite that form Graham was omitted from the club 's round 12 side to take on . He did not play at VFL level that weekend either , in what would effectively serve as a one-week rest before he was recalled to AFL football in round 13 . There he would equal his season-best tally of 13 tackles , this time recorded in a win over in wet conditions at the MCG . Graham recorded 17 disposals in the first three quarters of his side 's win over in round 16 before suffering a match-ending dislocated shoulder while tackling opposition midfielder Myles Poholke . Scans would reveal he had sustained some anterior labral damage in the dislocation and club officials confirmed he was set to miss up to a month of football despite avoiding the need for immediate surgery to repair the joint . Graham made his return from injury in round 21 's win over , recording 19 disposals and a match-high 60 pressure acts in the 74-point victory . He earned praise from Damien Hardwick for that performance with the coach saying Graham was " such an important player to us . His pressure points are high and he makes other players around him better " . In the club 's final match of the regular season , Graham recorded 20 disposals and kicked an equal career-high three goals , all of which came in the first quarter of that win over the . He also received a two thousand dollar fine from the AFL 's Match Review Officer for striking opposition defender Dale Morris during the match . Graham finished the regular season averaging 62 pressure points per game , good for third best in the league behind only Dayne Zorko and league-leader Devon Smith . He had a relatively quiet final series , kicking a goal and laying seven tackles in the club 's qualifying final win over but recording only 15 disposals in total across that match and the club 's shock preliminary final loss to . Graham finished the year having played 18 matches and kicking six goals . Graham spent the early part of the 2018/19 off-season rehabbing from shoulder surgery required to fully repair the joint he had dislocated in the later part of the 2018 season
Rising Star
2018 AFL Rising Star
Jack Graham (Australian footballer, born 1998)