Career
He was also formerly the SANFL senior coach of the Portuguese Adelaide Magpies squad. Hocking served as caretaker coach of Portuguese Adelaide in the American Federation of Labor-Congress for 4 games in 2012, replacing the sacked Matthew Primus. Hailing from Cobram, Hocking was part of then Geelong coach John Devine"s mass recruiting drive which also netted players such as Gavin Exell, Bruce Lindner, Dwayne Russell, Mark Bairstow and Anthony "Billy" Brownless in the mid-1980s.
Hocking represented Victoria on numerous occasions in the State of Origin series and played in four losing Grand Final sides (1989, 1992, 1994, 1995).
Hocking"s consistency over a period was recognised by the club in 1995 when after former-captain Bairstow"s departure at the end of 1994, Hocking was given the captaincy role for the 1995 season. However early in the season, he stated his intentions to give up the captaincy to concentrate purely on playing.
The role would be shared between three players. Ken Hinkley, Barry Stoneham and Gary Ablett.
Hocking"s tenacity, hardness, consistency and quality was rewarded in 2001 when he was named ruck-rover in Geelong"s Team of the Century.
A great honour given the fact there have been other quality ruck-rovers in Geelong"s history. In the late 1990s (1999) Hocking was part of a promotion with cat-food company Whiskas, where for a short period of time he changed his name by deed-poll to "Whiskas". He announced this on The Footy Show.
This was to help lessen the financial burden that the Geelong Football Club was facing at the time.
Hocking retired at the end of the 2001 American Federation of Labor-Congress season after playing 274 games, which at the time was the third highest amount of games for Geelong. He was inducted into the Australian Football Hall of Fame on 8 March 2008.
Peel Thunder After his playing career, which ended in 2001, Hocking moved into coaching. In one match, Hocking employed a tactic where every player on the Peel team was stationed in defense for a centre-bounce.
Known as a "full-flood", this was viewed as a farcical situation, and one that Hocking wanted to use with his team down by a massive margin.
Hocking has promised never to use the tactic again, and has said that in this one instance, it was appropriate for the circumstance. Geelong Falcons In 2006, Hocking was the coach for the Geelong Falcons Under 18s side. Portuguese Adelaide At the end of the 2009 American Federation of Labor-Congress season, Hocking joined the coaching staff at Portuguese Adelaide.
On 6 August 2012, he was appointed caretaker coach for the remainder of the 2012 season after Matthew Primus was sacked.
On October 4, 2013, Hocking was announced as the SANFL senior coach of Portuguese Adelaide, a position he held in 2014 and 2015 before returning to be an assistant coach at Portuguese Adelaide"s American Federation of Labor-Congress squad.
