In 14 seasons, from 1974-87, he played in five Grand Finals (including the 1977 draw and replay) with Collingwood without a win. He won the 1979 Brownlow Medal with the Magpies, was twice the club’s leading goalkicker and captained the club in 1981-82.

He controversially left Victoria Park to join Melbourne in 1983, winning his second Brownlow Medal in his second season with the Demons, to become—at the time—just the second player to win a Brownlow at two different clubs.

When he retired after 249 games, he left behind a football career that even he admitted never lacked headlines.

“Plenty happened,” he said.

Much of what happened muddied the waters when it came to outsiders’ perceptions of Moore. But, confident in himself, his decisions and the strong friendships he made through football, Moore did not let perceptions worry him too much.

For a start, he was too busy when his career ended. A qualified lawyer with a pilot’s licence, Moore, 55 in January, became involved in the resources sector and companies exploring for gold after a period practising law.

The father of four—with two teenagers and two children from his first marriage now in their 20s—continues to work at the edges of business opportunity, and plays golf, does some cycling and, when he can, enjoys skiing in Aspen in the United States.

He is still flying, working in a consulting job that takes him to the skies to do remote sensing for resource companies.

Moore is a successful man with an outstanding football legacy. As his friend, lawyer and former Melbourne teammate Steven Smith said with a laugh: “I want to come back as ‘Moorey’.”

Plenty wanted to be Moore the footballer, a high-flying blond who thrilled crowds with his athleticism, high marking and penetrating kicking, despite an idiosyncratic style. But Moore avoided the limelight when he could.

“At the club, he was very committed and contributed, but the adulation, he did not really embrace that,” Smith said.

That unwillingness led some supporters to perceive Moore as aloof.

Noel Spoor, who met Moore at Eltham when he started coaching him in junior football and has remained friends, said the opposite is true: “He never wanted the fame.”

Unfortunately, fame was something Moore was never going to avoid.

Read the full story in this week’s edition of the AFL Record, available at both preliminary finals.