On the eve of another highly-anticipated, nerve-wracking AFL season, it’s only fitting that everyone’s favourite podcast - Freedom in a Cage - is back on the airwaves.

The famous Footscray Caravan Park has reopened, the thin supermarket barbecue sausages are sizzling away, and conversation abounds about footy (and sometimes not footy!).

It’s free-flowing, unscripted and fun, there’s a ‘swear jar’ for clichés, and nothing is off limits.

And this year, it has a new co-host, and Twitter page!

After a year of podcast excellence, Adrian Brown has hung up the headphones, and in steps seven-foot NBL and NBA basketball legend (and unabashed Doggies fan) Chris Anstey.

Freedom fans will be familiar with Anstey’s work, as he featured as a guest in an episode in 2018 and was a host-for-a-day in another.

In the first episode for the 2019 season, the lads discuss the excitement of the new season, new rules, Dale Morris and the Dogs’ gun young players.

And speaking of guns, Jason Johannisen drops in to talk all things from LeBron James to killing his hair, and his salmon corduroy jacket.

If you want a podcast with a difference, look no further than Freedom in a Cage.

You can find the podcast and subscribe to it on iTunes, TuneIn Radio, and AudioBoom, or simply by searching "Freedom in a Cage" in the search section of any of these podcast platforms.

2019 episode 1: show notes

0.25 – Introducing Freedom in a Cage’s new co-host (and farewelling another).
3.00 – What to expect from the podcast in 2019.
6.20 – Moving with the times and the creation of a brand new Freedom in a Cage Twitter page
8.30 – Expectations of the new season, the JLT Community Series, optimism about the Bulldogs’ prospects, the talent in the
forward line.
16.10 – Top-end talent vs an even spread, big forwards, the prospect of a fit Tom Boyd.
19.45 – Dale Morris’ knee injury, strength from adversity, what comes next.
24.10 - The upside of Tim English.
26.05 – The impact of the new AFL rules.
28.00 - What we want to see from the opening rounds.
29.50 - Jason Johannisen enters the Footscray Caravan Park.
30-25 - JJ’s salmon corduroy jacket, killing his hair.
31.40 - Allergies to the cliché, the new rules from a player’s perspective, runner restrictions, the Bulldogs’ chief on-ground organisers.
38.30 – JJ’s love for NBA basketball and LeBron James, LeBron vs Michael Jordan.
42.40 – The excitement of Bailey Smith.
43.55 – Rating the best Bulldog debuts of all time.

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