“TRAVIS BOAK is a walking, talking AI for human behaviour, on how to respect people, how to treat others well and, more than anything, how to be a good bloke.”

Mark Williams loves dropping a good line. He’s especially proud of this one. Because it’s about one of the greatest footballers he’s coached. And more importantly, about one of the legendary AFL coach’s favourite draft picks ever. Along with it also being a bloody good line to describe Travis Boak as he approaches the finish line of an extraordinary career on Friday. 

So, I decide to use it on a couple of his longstanding teammates to see if they agree with Williams’ summation. The answer is an overwhelming yes, of course. But both Charlie Dixon and Sam Powell-Pepper go a step further in describing the impact that the retiring Boak has had on their lives. Just like he has on dozens of those who’ve been fortunate enough to be in his presence at Port Adelaide. 

“Trav is what young blokes coming into football should strive to be like,” says Dixon, who formed the core of the Port team for nearly a decade alongside his great mate before hanging up his boots last year. 

“There’s no drama around Trav. There’s never been that drama around Trav. He was purely in football to be the best he can be. He’s just a beautiful man on and off the field. It’s so difficult to put into words what he means to me. He’s helped me through so much.”

Charlie Dixon and Travis Boak celebrate a goal during Port Adelaide’s clash with Essendon in round three, 2016. Picture: AFL Photos

For Powell-Pepper, the 37-year-old Boak, has been much more than a senior teammate. He’s been a mentor in life, the man he’s looked up to the most. 

“‘Boaky’ means the world to me. He’s always been there for me. I can talk to him about anything, whether it’s life or family trouble or even a day when I’m not happy with the way I performed. And that (AI) is 100 per cent him. For, he always has some wise words ready for me, like stuff straight out of a motivational book that he’ll spurt out from the top of his head,” the midfielder says. 

Travis Boak and Sam Powell-Pepper celebrate a goal during Port Adelaide’s clash with Collingwood in round 19, 2023. Picture: AFL Photos

It’s something you hear a lot about the man who will finish with the most appearances ever in a Power guernsey. Right across the board, from those who played with him and those against him. And what you gather is that Boak was, if anything, a phenomenal human being who happened to be terrific at the sport he played. A highly talented footballer who gave his all and some more for his team but forever remained true to his core, a family man whose ultimate focus was to elevate the lives of those around him. The talisman who became the conscience for Port Adelaide for nearly 20 years. 

Another common theme you pick up from those who moved to Port from interstate is that Boak was the first person from the team to welcome them in. Dixon and Powell-Pepper shifted base at different stages of their careers. The towering key forward had already appeared in 65 matches for Gold Coast when he was traded and remembers receiving a call from his new captain. 

“He rang me while I was driving on the Gold Coast, and I remember the first chat and we hit it off really well straight away. He helped me transition so easily as even though we are different in many ways, we bonded over our common interests, whether it was surfing or extreme sport, and I learnt so much by just watching him on and off the field,” Dixon says. 

Charlie Dixon and Travis Boak before Port Adelaide’s clash with Richmond in round two, 2024. Picture: AFL Photos

Powell-Pepper still gushes about his first meeting with Boak, who he’d watched on TV as a teenager. He talks about how he formed a “brotherhood” with the man, 10 years his senior, straightaway but still reminisces about the first message he received from his Port captain. 

“The night I was drafted, a bunch of the boys messaged me welcoming me to the club. But Boaky’s name was the first one that popped up on my phone. I couldn’t believe it and I showed it to all the fellows that were in my house in Perth, saying, ‘Travis Boak just messaged me’,” Powell-Pepper recalls.

“He was also the first person to walk up to me at my first training session, and we were mates from day one. He’s pretty intimidating if you haven’t met him, but you soon realise that he’s a big softie who loves a laugh.” 

Sam Powell-Pepper and Travis Boak celebrate a goal during Port Adelaide’s clash with Essendon in round eight, 2023. Picture: AFL Photos

None of this surprises ‘Choco’ Williams though. He’d been impressed with both Boak the footballer and Boak the person from the day they’d met. Williams concedes the young draftee’s move to Adelaide in 2006 from his home in Torquay wasn’t easy in the wake of him losing his father to cancer. 

“It was an emotional move, and it was very clear how close he was to his mother and his sisters, and how much he loved his late father,” Williams says.

“But even back then, I could see the natural leadership qualities in him, and also how he could bring people together. We did everything to try and make him feel comfortable, including trying to get his family over, and he just adjusted brilliantly to being a player at the highest level.”

The impact his later father Roger had on his life has been well-documented over Boak’s illustrious career. He still glances towards the heavens before and during every game. While Williams and his coaching staff played father-figure roles during their star recruit’s early days, what was evident to them was Boak’s understanding of his own game. 

Travis Boak looks towards the sky as he leads Port Adelaide out for the 2014 preliminary final against Hawthorn. Picture: AFL Photos

“I remember showing him some technical videos during our draft camp, and he could grasp all of it immediately. He was a great student of the game and just got it. He had it in him and was ready to work harder than anyone else I’ve met. He also received every piece of advice you gave him with that classic smile of his, which he’s never lost,” Williams adds. 

The way people gravitated towards him off the field was very similar in the way he gravitated towards the footy on the field. And that was Boak’s biggest strength as a footballer, according to the premiership-winning coach, along with the tough-as-nuts attitude he carried into every contest. 

“If you wanted to compare him to a cricketer, Boaky was like Steve Waugh. He was always hard to beat on the field,” Williams says.

It’s a comparison that Boak, a lifetime cricket fan who still pads up socially for his team during summer, would surely love. 

Dixon, who often paired up with Boak in and around the opposition’s 50-metre arc, is still in awe of his former teammate’s work rate at both ends of the field. 

“Firstly, he led from the front and also had that ‘never-let-up’ mentality, whether we were 10 goals up or 10 goals down. He would be getting the ball in the back 50 but then working and then getting the ball back in the forward 50. That was Trav. One of those blokes who’d throw you on his shoulders and drag you through,” Dixon says.

“He still had the capability of that flash and flair, but he’d just grind his opponents into the ground and outwork them constantly.”

Travis Boak celebrates a goal during Port Adelaide’s win over Carlton in round 16, 2025. Picture: AFL Photos

There was also the work Boak put into his fitness during every off-season that Dixon believes has resulted in his impressive longevity as a footballer. He witnessed it first-hand in 2020 after accompanying the champion on a US trip to Santa Cruz, California to train at the Red Bull training camp. It was at a time when Dixon was dealing with injuries and “relationship stuff” and Boak was there, as always, to provide a shoulder to lean on.

“It was totally different. We trained at the Red Bull facility a couple of days. I did a program that Trav was doing. It was around body movements, and I returned home at my fittest and both of us had a great season and ended up as All-Australians, the only time I managed that. In hindsight, maybe I should have bloody kept going with him. But it tells you why he’s able to play at that level in his 19th year,” he says. 

That was also the year when Boak finished runner-up in the Brownlow Medal, an achievement that Powell-Pepper insists is a sign of his bloody-mindedness to remain competitive. 

“There were a few doubters who said he was kind of done but then out of nowhere he’s our best and fairest and nearly wins the Brownlow,” Powell-Pepper says.

“That to me is his greatness, the way he was able to turn his career around towards the end and get more out of his body and never stop adding to his footy knowledge. What an inspiration.” 

Travis Boak in action during Port Adelaide’s clash with Gold Coast in round four, 2020. Picture: AFL Photos

Powell-Pepper has often cited moving in with Boak in 2018 as being the biggest turning point in his life, at a time when his off-field issues had threatened to get the better of the talented footballer. He reveals that it was Boak who’d suggested the move. 

“He walked up to me after my first year at the club and anyone who’s seen Boaky’s house wouldn’t say no either. I lived there for four years, and it changed my life. It brought us closer together. I became like the little brother he never had, and he became my big brother,” he says. 

Being housemates also gave Powell-Pepper an insight into the lighter side of Boak, the one that not everyone gets to see, and he talks very fondly of how they were like “two big kids” living together. 

“All we did was just watch movies or go to the movies and eat donuts and ice cream on the weekend. Then just laugh about everything and invent our own little games in the hallway and in the pool. Then in 2020 his sister and brother-in-law moved in too, and we’d cook these rib-eye steaks, and it felt like a big holiday.”

Dixon got to see the goofy side of Boak as well when they were together in LA, and cruising around in a G-Wagon on the sidelines of their training trip. 

“We drove to San Diego to watch a preseason basketball game and were sitting courtside. It was pretty wild. We were cruising around in that G-Wagon thinking we’re really cool,” he says with a guffaw while adding how the two of them would joke about not being able to find a partner in Australia and how their best chance for getting one potentially lay overseas. 

Along with Boak’s playful side, Powell-Pepper also learnt a lot about his mentor’s background and family connections during their time living with each other, in addition to travelling to his hometown and meeting his mother and sisters. He talks about how Boak was among the happiest people around him when Powell-Pepper started his own family. 

“All my three kids love their uncle Trav. They talk about him a lot and when it’s summer, we all go and crash his house and use his pool,” he says.

Over the last 15 years, the champion footballer has supported over 300 families and visited over 150 hospitals as part of his role as an ambassador with the Childhood Cancer Association. He’s also been actively involved in countless young survivors’ fight against cancer. And more than his stupendous numbers on the field, it’s this contribution that will remain his biggest legacy, in the opinion of almost everyone who’s close to him. 

“He is the hardest working footballer in the country. The incredible work he’s done off the field is more impressive than what he’s done on it. Just how generous he is with his time. If anyone who comes into the AFL is looking for someone to mould themselves off, then Trav is that guy,” Dixon says. 

Travis Boak trains in his garage during the COVID isolation period in May, 2020. Picture: AFL Photos

Powell-Pepper echoes the sentiment and can’t talk enough about the way Boak has been able to influence, impact and change lives in his time as a Port Adelaide legend. 

“It’s just who he is. He cares about everyone. He’s got a lot of empathy for a lot of people and everyone he meets,” he says.  

Williams was captivated by the “genuineness” of the boy whose career he ended up playing a big role in shaping, and is chuffed to see the plaudits flooding in. 

He’s not the only one who is confident that Boak will not particularly enjoy the attention that’s already coming his way, and will only get accentuated on Friday evening at the Adelaide Oval. 

Travis Boak and Mark Williams embrace after Port Adelaide’s clash with Melbourne in round three, 2024. Picture: AFL Photos

And what about the thousands of Port supporters, then, who have spent the last two decades cheering for Boak? They’ll be there in their hordes one final time to see off their beloved Boaky. 

“When we look back on Travis Boak, we won’t just remember the games, the goals, or the accolades, says Mark Koncewicz, super fan and Port member since the late 1990s. 

“We will not forget the man who held Port Adelaide together, who lifted others when they stumbled, and who showed us all what it truly means to wear the prison bars with pride. Travis Boak isn’t just part of Port Adelaide’s history — he is Port Adelaide.”

What next for Boak then? Dixon has had a chat with his fellow retiree about the future and believes that there’ll be time spent in Queensland surfing with Mick Fanning and a trip overseas to holiday with his partner. 

In the couple of chats, I’ve had with Boak this season, he’s expressed his great desire to go watch Test cricket in India and in England. He’ll have plenty of time to do that. Whatever it is that he chooses for his next chapter, Williams is convinced that he’ll fit the bill. 

“That’s just how genuine he is. He is the same Travis Boak whether he’s meeting a senior government official, if he’s at a surfing club, at the footy oval or when he’s supporting the hundreds of cancer survivors around the country,” he says.  

And as his remarkable AFL journey comes to an end, we can also be rest assured that who he is will never change, which is to quote Travis Boak’s own Instagram Profile: “Human being first, athlete second”.