On Friday afternoon, Phil “Buzz” Rothfield was about to do the one thing he would never have dreamt of doing in 50 years.

He was about to turn his phone off.

Particularly odd being a Friday, where for as long as he’s known, the weekend deadline was fast approaching for his must-read ‘What’s The Buzz’’ column for The Sunday Telegraph.

There’s still a chance for another exclusive. A funny spotted. A juicy shoosh. One more Saint. Another Sinner.

Not anymore.

So Buzz thought bugger it, I’ll turn the phone off.

That was, until we called.

Buzz had been scrolling through the hundreds of text messages that had been pinging ever since he announced his shock retirement from News Corp Australia, his home since 1976, and so too, the farewell from his weekly appearances with Fox League’s NRL 360, Triple M and The Big Sports Breakfast, last Thursday afternoon.

“Your kidding aren’t ya? Not another story about me, surely?’’ Buzz said down the line.

The journalist with the best contact book in Australian sports media loved nothing more than breaking the biggest stories.

But tell him we’re writing one more story about his illustrious career in journalism and he does what so many CEOs, sporting stars and celebrities tried, before eventually succumbing to the relentless and dogged pursuit of the master with his pad and pen.

However, if there’s one moment in time that Buzz is willing to explain, a career-defining story that he is prepared to share, if for no other reason but to honour one of his greatest mentors, it’s the days following the passing of NRL Hall of Fame inductee, former colleague and chief rugby league writer Peter “Chippy” Frilingos.

It was the moment that changed Buzz Rothfield.

A pallbearer at Frilingos’ funeral following his devastating heart attack in 2004, Rothfield spent the next few weeks pondering how The Daily Telegraph were going to replace the most revered rugby league reporter in Sydney.

He made a choice that would alter the landscape of how the game was covered forever.

“I don’t want to say this disrespectfully to any of my past and present colleagues. But I thought we needed new leaders,’’ Buzz said.

“No one will ever replace Chippy. But I saw that as my role to become the leader of the team and to try and do it as well as he did.

“I learned a lot from Chippy about longstanding relationships and more importantly, looking after the fans. We’re not here for the clubs, we’re here for the fans.

“The only thing that ever mattered for me was keeping them informed and anything I heard, I wanted them to hear.

“That was one of the things Chippy taught me.

“We’re just a pipeline from the game to the readers.

“I was writing league long before that (Chippy’s passing), but I’d never had that burden of being the main man, until then.’’

A pioneer for the way rugby league reporters are now widely used beyond newspapers on TV panel shows and radio for their inside knowledge of stories, Buzz said it was imperative he cultivated Chippy’s hard work.

“Back then, there were very few journos on television,” Buzz said.

“We were just hard-nosed rugby league reporters and Chippy became huge on radio, on TV on Fox with The Back Page and so I did everything that Chippy did.

“I wrote back pages, I wrote columns, I followed him into radio in the end and then followed him into the TV.

“It was a huge thing.

“It was special because of Bozo (Bob Fulton) and (Ray) Hadley, having worked with Chippy with the (2GB) Continuous Call Team and it was important in maintaining their relationship with the paper.

“It was always going to be impossible to replace Chippy, but in a way I tried to keep up his worth ethic. He was seven-days-a-week rugby league.’’

Buzz said in the hours leading up to his decision to retire from the media landscape, he had caught himself reflecting on Frilingos’ impact.

“I have thought about him and Ian Heads, who was my first mentor and a wonderful help to me,’’ Buzz said.

“But it would be embarrassing to put me in the same league as Chippy.

“He was something else.

“The thing is, when I think about these wonderful mentors, I also think how at the end of the day, I was a kid who was a school dropout who couldn’t spell, who found something that he really loved and worked hard.

“Every kid that finishes school I say to them, ‘Don’t worry about what a piece of paper says, if you go and work hard and show initiative, you can do anything with your life’.’’

As for the text messages, who has reached out, Buzz?

“Mate, I’ve been blown away by messages from good people in the game like Mal (Meninga) and Benji (Marshall).

“People like that, who I wasn’t expecting.

“I told Benji to go and have a week in Fiji without some old bloke calling you out.

“I honestly have no idea how many there have been, there’s hundreds.

“Even people like (Former Wallaby captain) John Eales and Richard Colless (former Swans chairman), who didn’t talk to me for three years.

“Roosters coach Trent Robinson, Dessie Hasler, Ricky Stuart and Kenny Callandar, too.

“There’s been former rugby boss John O’Neill, all the CEOs in the NRL, Nicho Hynes, Josh Addo-Carr. It’s been unbelievable.

“Everyone except Gus (Phil Gould).’’

Originally published as Buzz Rothfield reflects on mentor Chippy Frilingos as he calls time on his own legendary career