ALTHOUGH he didn't realise it at the time, the seed for the idea that has formed the bedrock for Chris Fagan's lifelong coaching obsession was planted as a young boy.

Fagan's father Austin was a coach on the west coast of Tasmania and his eager son would follow him around, sit in changerooms, and inadvertently take in nuggets of wisdom that would serve him throughout his life.

Players would come to the Fagan household for dinner. It was how Austin liked to operate, getting to know the man behind the footballer.

"Maybe he was a bit before his time, I'm not sure," Fagan told AFL.com.au as he sipped a flat white in an Oxford St café on Brisbane's southside.

"The best coaches I had were the ones that built relationships with me. I felt like I would want to do more for them and sacrifice more for them than the coaches that just saw you as a player that could help them win a game of football."

Fagan is a teacher by trade and somewhat fell into coaching, but those traits his father exhibited were passed on and have been the foundation for a career that has taken him from Queenstown to Melbourne and now to Brisbane, where he hopes to guide the Lions to their first premiership since the three-peat team of 2001-2003. On Thursday, he will steer them in an elimination final against Richmond.

There's so much that makes the 61-year-old tick.

He's empathetic. He's nurturing. He's positive. He's self-aware. He's feisty. He's emotional. And he's fiercely protective of those he cares about.

It's a complex tapestry of traits.

Fagan's own playing days were prolific. Learning to play on the gravel oval in Queenstown, he had to be tough. He was a 15-year-old shredding skin off knees and elbows playing senior football against the town's hardened miners.

It's little wonder one former Lions staff member described him as "old school", someone that didn't like to show pain. Fagan would illustrate that again many years later after ripping his hamstring off the bone at Neale Daniher's Big Freeze event at the MCG.

Barely wincing when he exited the ice pool, he refused to use a walking stick to help get around during recovery, so determined was he to plough on without causing a fuss. 

The Fagan family moved to Hobart late in his late teenage years, and Chris began his distinguished career in the Tasmanian State League, where he won two premierships, played 263 games, kicked 430 goals and would be inducted into the state's Hall of Fame.

It would showcase his desire for constant improvement.

"In my first year we won a premiership in Hobart, but I was 19th man and I hated that," he said.

"I'd been in the team all year, and this wasn't the era of interchange. If you were the 19th man you only got on because of an injury or if the coach had the shits with someone. I got on after half-time and played well, but it just burnt in me."

Paul Sproule was his coach, a man who had a big impact on Fagan with his personal approach – they'd often fish together – and he had some advice. Fagan had to become a better runner.

So off Fagan went, finding a running coach and attending sessions six days a week for four months to improve his speed.

The next year he won the club best and fairest, played for Tasmania and was runner-up in the State League medal.

David Noble, who would become such an integral part of Fagan's story, remembers playing against him.

"He was towards the end of his career, and I was near the beginning. We were both midfielders. He used to run so hard, he was hard to play on. He just wouldn't stop. He was on the go all the time," Noble said.

"He was always thinking about the game, he was so smart.

"It was good to play on those older guys back then, even just for the odd game, just patterns to run, where they went, the connections with their midfield and ruckman."

Long before Fagan finished his playing days, he dabbled in coaching.

At first it was his primary school team. He was just 21 and loved it. Having to educate a class of 30 children every day of the school year, figuring out ways to keep each of them engaged and finding which buttons to press to get the best out of each would be a useful tool as a football coach.

When he stopped playing, the bug to coach was well and truly there.  Mark Yeates had headed south after his career finished with Geelong in 1990 and would captain/coach North Hobart. Fagan was his "bench coach" as the Demons won back-to-back premierships.

He would then lead Sandy Bay from the bottom of the TSL into the finals in three seasons and was then given the role as inaugural Tassie Mariners coach in the TAC Cup.

"I'd always loved the teaching bit, I'd always loved footy, I thought I've got a chance here to do the two things I love the most full-time," he said.

"It wasn't the smartest move at the time financially … it was a fair pay cut at a time when we had a young family. My wife (Ursula) was very understanding.

"It was (a gamble). You do crazy things when you're young.

"I didn't do the Tassie Mariners job as a stepping stone to the AFL, I just wanted to do it. I probably thought I'd do this a while and go back to teaching."

Twenty-eight years later, he hasn't returned to teaching. Fagan admitted he struggled to find his identity as a coach with his under-18 team. He made mistakes.

"I decided I was going to be a real hard arse and I lost some boys. I was ridiculously hard on them," he said.

"It didn't work. I'd walk in the locker room and they'd all look away and put their heads down and not want to talk to me. That didn't work. I thought, 'How can you coach them if they don't want to listen and don't want to engage with you?'"

The fire and passion is part of the Fagan package.

Anyone that watches him coach from the boundary line for Brisbane will realise he rides the emotional rollercoaster with his players.

Now when he criticises players, he wants to do so after having built an iron-clad relationship where they know he's upset with their actions and not them as a person.

It was something former Lion Nick Robertson saw first-hand after he called Gold Coast "soft" during a radio interview in the build-up to a late-season clash in 2018.

Noble, who had been Fagan's football manager for two years, takes up the story.

"I saw Nick's comments pop up on AFL.com.au and I was thinking 'Uh oh, I better go see 'Fages''," Noble recalled.

"I go down the hallway trying to find Fages and he'd already got Robbo. I don't know how long ago he'd seen them (comments) … but I could hear him with Robbo. I didn't have to look too far.

"For me it was his passion. His passion of not giving the opposition an opportunity.

"[Be] respectful, but passionate about it. You're giving them something they can potentially use, and we probably don't need to do that."

Robertson, who now works full-time in car sales in Perth while playing in the WAFL for East Perth, said it was the biggest spray he had copped in his life, but one that was ultimately fair.

"He can show emotion like anyone can. I'm quick to anger as well, like him," Robertson said.

"In his view I was being disrespectful to the opposition. You listen to the interview and that's what I did, he was absolutely right.

"Was that what I was trying to do? Not at all. The boys were around, revving me up, it was a radio interview so a little less formal and I wasn't thinking about what I was saying.

"He definitely gave me a good spray. We had the CEO in there and everything. I'm one that can handle a spray and criticism, I've copped it my whole life, but some guys can't cop that."

Fagan called the tough-nut midfielder shortly after to say he'd "probably gone over the top a bit". Following up is one of Fagan's great strengths, Noble said.

It's something this reporter can attest to after a post-match disagreement with the Lions coach earlier this season. Any difference of opinion can be resolved and moved on from quickly.

After three years with the Mariners, Fagan's next big gamble came along.

With AFL clubs beginning to hire development coaches, Fagan went on a "fishing expedition" to get his resume out and see if he could snag an interview.

One club got back to him – Melbourne.

He went to the mainland, admitting it was the most nervous he'd been in his life, and into a room with Neale Daniher and the Demons' hierarchy to get grilled.

Fagan was asked to write his development philosophy on one piece of paper. Two years later – when he had the courage to ask Daniher why he was chosen for the job – he realised that heartfelt piece of work won the day.

Mark Evans, who was Melbourne's welfare manager at the time and would go on to have a long association with him at Hawthorn, remembers vividly what the strong-willed Tasmanian brought to his new environment.

"He started by coaching our reserves, and that was a weird time for the reserves comp because you'd have so many top-up players. He was forever welcoming in a new player or two when we required it," Evans said.

"You could see he developed a great way of giving advice but giving loyalty at the same time.

"One of the best things about Fages is he's developed strong relationships, so that when he's giving you advice, you know it's coming from a good place."

He'd be Melbourne's backline coach – despite never having played there – and become Daniher's trusted right-hand man.

He was so loyal to his coach that when Evans approached him to join Hawthorn at the end of 2006, he just couldn't do it, out of respect to Daniher. The move would happen 12 months later when the Demons parted ways with their coach of 10 seasons.

Fagan's move to the Hawks to be the head of coaching and development was his "sweet spot" at the time, he said.

Luke Hodge, who took over the captaincy from Sam Mitchell in 2010, said Fagan was the perfect conduit between Hawthorn's leaders and coach Alastair Clarkson.

"Loyalty was the one thing that stood out," Hodge said.

"You knew he always had your back, even at stages where other coaches disagreed, we always knew he would be standing there and give our point of view. And that hasn't changed even though he's gone on to get a head coaching role."

What has evolved, but never changed, are the principles that Fagan builds his leadership on.

Every single person spoken to for this story came back to the same word – relationships.

"You need to get to know them as a person, what makes them tick, what motivates them, that's a key pillar," Fagan said.

"You have to create a supportive environment where people have the opportunity to grow and develop and thrive. To do that you've got to make it safe. Safety means they feel respected, can have an opinion, they know what the rules are, what the parameters are. I think that's really important.

"If they don't feel supported, they'll feel fear and trepidation and uncertainty and that can get in the way of progress.

"That doesn't mean we create a warm, fuzzy environment where we all hug each other and sing Kumbaya. It's about honesty. If you have criticism, it's about a behaviour, not the person. It's not them you don't like, it's just that thing they've done.

"I'd rather be a transformational coach – somebody who can coach the all-round athlete and help them develop as a person – as opposed to a transactional coach, who just is interested in what you can do in what you play on the weekend. It's a very one-dimensional relationship."

When Fagan arrived as Brisbane's coach in late 2016, he took two to three weeks to interview everyone at the club, getting to know what they liked, what they didn't, what they'd change if they were coach.

It was also noticeable how much trust he put in the assistant coaches – all of whom remained following Justin Leppitsch's tenure – allowing them to run most sessions in his first pre-season.

Former Lions captain Tom Rockliff was coming up to the final year of his contract and was at the centre of much rumour and speculation about his relationship with teammates and his role in Leppitsch's dismissal.

"When he first signed as coach, I had a meeting with him," Rockliff said of Fagan.

"My manager Tom Petroro and 'Nobes' and him and I met in Melbourne.

"He just allowed me to be me. There was stuff flying around left, right and centre, but I know 95 per cent wasn't real and he was big enough to have that conversation with me … I respected that.

"Once we walked out of that meeting, we'd addressed it, had a good discussion for an hour or two and from then on it was a clean slate and he treated me how he treated everyone else.

"We had a great relationship. I saw him more as a father figure. For me it's what I needed at the time. He made me fall back in love with footy again."

Robertson said the change Fagan brought to the club was instant. He concentrated on players' strengths – or weapons – rather than their weaknesses.

"It was the first time I had a coach that had pulled in everyone and knew everything about every person. He knew about my partner (now wife) and always asked me about her," Robertson said.

"Something he did really well was communicate with players and know them on a personal level and not just a football basis.

"I loved 'Leppa' as well, but I just think Fagan had a more personal approach."

Fagan said part of building that trust was being vulnerable and admitting mistakes.

His go-to phrase as a coach is having a "growth mindset", something he says you can't have if you don't admit mistakes or take losses and failure and as an opportunity to learn.

"If anything, you fail your way to the top," he said.

"Often the wound is the place where the light enters. The biggest mistakes are the biggest learnings."

Fagan messages former staff members and players about significant milestones in their life. His mind never stops ticking, whether it's how to get the best out of his team, how to improve, or how to foster a relationship.

Danny Daly, who was Fagan's strategy coach when he first came to Brisbane and now his football manager, was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2018.

He received the news immediately following a round three loss to Port Adelaide, just before the Lions' coaching staff boarded a plane to Melbourne for some scouting.

"He was first person I told apart from my wife," Daly said.

"I'm an emotional beast at the best of times and he was cool and calm because he'd been through it with Jarryd Roughead and others.

"He was a great person to speak to … he put things in perspective because he didn't get emotional with me. When you're told you've got cancer, it's a shock. I was all over the shop.

"I let Fages know and we spent the next two hours talking. He was a great avenue for me to use, that caring side."

Hodge says Fagan works as hard as any coach he's seen.

It's a trait Brisbane CEO Greg Swann says Fagan has to balance out. Swann was one of the men responsible for hiring Fagan at the end of 2016, despite him not coaching his own team for 16 years.

He clearly remembers his pitch to the then Hawthorn general manager of football. The Lions were young and wanted a teacher, someone that could educate their group.

"I said: 'Hi Chris, Greg Swann here' and before I could say anything else he said: 'I'm a coach, you know'," Swann recalled.

"To me that was the start of this guy being invested and wanting to do it."

Fagan's ensuing six seasons have taken Brisbane from a club floundering at the bottom of the ladder with a low membership base and trouble holding sponsors, to one that has now made finals for four straight seasons, a record membership with regular sellouts at the Gabba and a corporate list longer than Eric Hipwood's arms.

Brisbane became a destination club. Charlie Cameron came at the end of 2017, as did Hodge. It was Lachie Neale 12 months later and Joe Daniher at the end of 2020.

Fagan is a huge reason for that.

Noble says two the coach's greatest traits are his humility and that he's understated.

After a loss to St Kilda in round one, 2018 – Fagan's 23rd game at the helm – he said he wasn't sure how good the Lions could become, he just wanted to leave the club in a better place than he arrived. Even if he was moved on at the end of his first three-year deal.

It showed a vulnerability, a slight insecurity and uncertainty about the future.

The trajectory has generally headed north, although he's hit some turbulence this season as the up-and-down Lions finish the home and away season in sixth and not playing their absolute best football.

Fagan is someone who stresses. One former staff member summed it up perfectly by saying sometimes he can be talking to you, but be looking straight through you as his mind is off somewhere else.

A switch flicks in the lead-up to round one. It's like clockwork. The jovial, grandfather figure the public sees at press conferences is switched to a laser-focused coach who will immerse himself in untold hours of work over the next seven months.

Walking is his medicine – and he takes it by the litre. Some weeks Fagan covers more than 100km, making phone calls and giving himself an 'out' from the hustle and bustle of coaching.

"I do it to try and relax, mate," he said.

"It's bloody stressful, coaching, to be honest with you.

"There are days I say to myself: 'how long do you keep doing this to yourself?'

"I knew what I was getting myself into being a head coach. You're the man, you're in the seat, people fire the bullets at you, you've got to explain, you're the accountable one."

Fagan says he goes into the "cave" after a loss. Daly says there's almost no point speaking to him in the immediate aftermath of a match, so immersed is he in his own thoughts.

He usually surfaces the following day, full of ideas on how to improve things for the following week's opponent.

The way forward is easy after a win, but it's not after a loss.

"I have an impatience after we have a poor performance to find the answers and get ready for the next performance," Fagan said.

"The world we live in now will always tell you why you're no good.

"My job as a coach is to neutralise the environment and see the truth in whatever happens."

He loves to deal in facts, not the outside "crap". If you don't have numbers or evidence to support your argument, don't bother. It's one of Fagan's great lessons for journalists at a press conference – don't challenge him unless you can support your question.

Particularly if you're challenging his team.

"As a coach it's not about me, ultimately…" he says before trailing off and taking a second to compose himself.

"I got a bit emotional there. It's not about me, it's about helping those boys…" – he pauses again, almost choking up and half turning his head away – "… get, get where they want to get.

"I know their story.

"I would love for guys like (Dayne) Zorko and (Daniel) Rich who have been through the bad times to feel the good times because I know what it feels like. That's what drives me. I'm not in it for me.

"I'm a bit combative because I want to stick up for my boys. That's who I am. I get a bit passionate about my coaching."

It's that passion that has players wanting to fight for him. Why Rich had a mid-career revival. Why Brisbane has won more home-and-away games than any team bar Geelong in the past four seasons.

There's another step though – perhaps the biggest. Fagan is well aware of the 1-5 finals record as Brisbane approach September again, starting with the bout against the Tigers this week.

"I look at it as us doing our apprenticeship. That's the growth mindset way of looking at it," he said.

"I know people who report the game look at wins and losses and you can't argue with that, but I look at it a bit deeper than that.

"I'm disappointed in our finals record, that it's not a little better because it could easily be, and a little frustrated by it.

"Federer and Nadal don't always win. Two of our finals have got to a fifth-set tiebreaker and we lost.

"I don't know how long this apprenticeship goes for, but all I know is you keep knocking on the door.

"I don't see it as failure, I see it as an opportunity to learn. All the great people in the world and all the wise people I've ever read about, that's how they view failure."

Whether Brisbane are bundled out by the Tigers, go on to win the premiership, or fall somewhere in between, Fagan will keep searching for answers and keep looking for ways to improve – it's all he knows.

From that same conversation in early 2018 where he talked about wanting to leave Brisbane in a better state than he found the club, Fagan also said he never wanted to outstay his welcome. The minute he thinks he can't get the best from his players, he'll walk.

"I've been with this group for six years and I've got to work out which ones to keep going forward with and which ones to not. That's hard because I'm loyal to my players," he said.

"You try and build a place on that, you have to.

"I could be accused of sticking with some blokes for too long, but you look at how many games we've won. You can't say it doesn't work.

"Finding the line, that's my challenge.

"The love is still to see blokes grow and develop and improve and become better people. That's the love for me."

Just like his dad, all those years ago.