'Takes a village': Draftee's dad thankful as Saints give superboot a chance

However, St Kilda were able to do that with the penultimate pick of Tuesday night's draft, selecting Launceston's Arie Schoenmaker with pick 62.

"With his height at 194cm, he's got good run and fairly good speed for his size, so we were happy to get him," St Kilda list manager Stephen Silvagni said.

"He's had some adversity early on in the year and had to go back and find some form and prove himself again, so that's a good sign.

"With kids, you want to see how they handle adversity a little bit and it's not all smooth for a lot of kids. He's 18 years of age, we've given him a chance and hopefully he takes that chance, because he's got some talent."

Schoenmaker's adversity came in the form of a 10-week ban for an alcohol-related indiscretion during a Tasmania Devils training camp, taking him out of Talent League matches.

That sent him back to Tasmanian State League club Launceston, where coach Mitch Thorp was waiting.

"We were quite firm initially with him and then wrapped our arms around him," Thorp said.

"Certainly being someone that's made a few mistakes myself, I wanted to make sure that he had all of the support he needed to get his footy and some of his behavioural habits on track.

"To his credit, under our watch, he was fantastic, he was super popular among his teammates and was a pleasure to coach.

"I was certainly sweating last night myself watching it with the family but when his name got read out, my young son jumped off the coach, he was pretty excited for him."

Schoenmaker has often credited Thorp for getting him back on track throughout the season and the Blues coach said he "couldn't be happier" for him as well as drafted clubmates Colby McKercher and James Leake.

In being drafted to the Saints, the left-footer farewelled a club he had been playing at since the age of seven.

Arie's father, Danny, thanked the club - in particular Thorp, director of football Scott Stephens and the core of senior teammates - for issuing him with "tough love, accountability and support at a key time".

"It genuinely takes a village to raise these kids at times and Arie's experience has brought that home to me very clearly," Schoenmaker said.

"There was a month-long period shortly after the event where I was genuinely concerned for Arie's emotional wellbeing - he was stressed, pretty flat and also caught a heavy flu.

"It wasn't a good time at all in what was shaping to be an exciting and important draft season.

"Both the Devils and Launceston FC provided professional pastoral care over the period of suspension but I strongly believe it was the Launnie boys that closed ranks around Arie that helped him the most."