His 28-possession performance in the 2008 grand final was one of the best of his career, and a key reason behind his side’s surprise win over Geelong that day.
But an interrupted 2009 pre-season with hip surgery as well as foot problems throughout the season meant Ellis played just 11 games last year, sitting in the stands for half the season as his team unsuccessfully battled for a spot in the eight.
If the correlation between Ellis and the team continues into 2010 then the early signs are good for the Hawks.
Ellis has remained healthy over summer and is in top shape, completing 86 per cent of the pre-season training.
“I’m injury free, (head fitness coach) Andrew Russell has an 80 per cent mark for pre-season and if you do that you’ve completed a pretty good pre-season,” Ellis told hawthornfc.com.au.
“I saw my mark and it was 86 per cent. It was my goal at the start of pre-season to get 80 per cent so it’s the highest it’s ever been.”
Ellis’ solid summer campaign has been partly due to his interrupted 2009.
The 21-year-old missed the last four games of the season with an ankle injury, giving him the advantage of an early start.
“It gave me a good six week lead into the pre-season," he said. "Then we had the six weeks off so I had 12 weeks to get my body into some sort of order and that has worked really well for me.
“It was extremely frustrating though. It would have been nice to have a clean run at it but unfortunately it didn’t go my way last year.
"With the pre-season that everyone has had this time around we shouldn’t have the injury problems we had last year.”
It is in many ways a new-look Hawthorn team for 2010 and Ellis says plenty of players will go into this season with the benefit of an uninterrupted summer.
“You look at blokes like Luke Hodge and Jordan Lewis who have the bigger frames, they are in the best nick of their lives and Brad Sewell is also looking trim," he said.
"Even the younger fellas like Ryan Schoenmakers and Liam Shiels are in pretty good nick."
Ellis has spent much of his career across half-back but with a few extra kilos to his slight frame, he is eyeing off a spot in the Hawks’ highly-rated engine room, after working closely with new midfield coach Adam Simpson.
“He’s settled in well and having a coach who is so fresh out of the game, he knows the modern game plan as well as anyone. He’s been fantastic,” Ellis said.
“Each pre-season I’ve been doing work with the midfield but then unfortunately injuries happen and at my size as an outside player who can go inside a bit, you get moved around a fair bit. It’s good to be a little versatile but hopefully I can lock down a position somewhere this year.”
Ellis stopped short of saying the Hawks had a point to prove this season but admitted there was a renewed hunger about the side after failing to make the finals last year.
“I suppose after winning the flag in ’08 and being the younger side everyone thought it was only natural that we were going to keep on improving,” he said.
“Last year there were some players who underperformed through injuries, this year there is a group that are trying to achieve and reach the top like we did in ’08.”
