Draflicks and Cover Drives
The one-time hockey star is now a Proteas cricketer
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Jason Smith was so elegant he was a cliche. He didn’t run, he floated. He didn’t hold the hockey stick, it was an extension of his arms. And the ball? Well, eight-year-old Smith had it on a string.
The ball rolled on the stick as the youngster stepped forward and flicked it against the garage door. Smith’s drag flick technique was still rough around the edges, however, it was better than most adults and mesmerizing. There is no telling how long he had been working on the skill.
Some people wear holes into the carpet pacing up and down. Given enough time, Jason Smith would have dug a hole to China. Day after day he retreated to the same pavement spot in front of their house to work on his hockey skills. Instead, he wore out the heel of the hockey stick until all that was left was a piece of the toe and head.
This is where Franswyn Smith found his six-year-old every day. Even at that early age, Smith moved elegantly in the confines of the small space to which he had decided to limit his dribbling. Watching him was like watching a Brazilian soccer prodigy learn new skills. It was as if he was born with a hockey stick in hand.
“He was one of the most talented hockey players I have had at Wynberg Boys,” Keith Richardson shared. It’s high praise, given that the institution has produced outstanding hockey players including Wayne Denne, Rhett Halkett, Lloyd Norris-Jones, and Ian Haley.
According to Richardson, unlike players like Norris-Jones who instilled fear into opposition players because of their energy and ability to bulldoze through defences, Smith was more grace. His finest skill was his ability to shoot from any angle and on any foot without effort.
“Had he pursued hockey, he would have been one of South Africa’s best players,” Richardson added.
Franswyn has no idea where the love or aptitude for hockey came from. He didn’t play the sport. Neither did his wife. He could take credit for the athleticism. The older Smith played rugby in his younger years. Franswyn even earned provincial colours in soccer and athletics.
During the week, Jason Smith’s grandmother would sit on a chair on one end of the passage and throw balls to him for hours. The youngster would swing with all his might, safe in the knowledge that the passage walls contained his sixes from causing damage to windows or disappearing into the neighbours’ yard.
When it wasn’t his grandmother, it was Franswyn or Smith’s mother throwing tennis balls for him. There was also an army of friends and cousins against whom he played tennis ball cricket.
When the KFC mini cricket party rolled into town, father and son attended all days of the cricket showpiece. One time, Herschelle Gibbs was part of the crew that made rounds at schools that included Smith’s primary school. Meeting the Proteas star is all the youngster talked about for days.
While meeting Gibbs and being part of the mini cricket crowd was a highlight of his childhood, an enduring memory for Smith was the first time he faced a hard ball. The week leading up to that moment was his birthday and his parents had bought him a proper bat as a present.
“My dad was like, ‘OK, let's go test it out.’ At the time, I was obviously quite scared because I only played Bakers’ mini cricket before, which was with a soft tennis ball. And for me, it was quite scary because I think I was a skinny little boy at the time. And at that age, you're always going to be scared of getting hurt,” Smith recalled.
Franswyn did his best to reassure Smith that no harm would befall him and provided words of encouragement between deliveries. The positive messaging worked wonders so much so that it wasn’t long after that session that father and son were spending weekends in the nets at St Augustine or Constantia Cricket Club.
Shortly afterwards, Smith played his first hard-ball game for his school and scored a carefree 94.
he saying goes: everyone loves a good busker because their music creates a wonderful ambience. However, for the busker to keep busking, someone needs to put some money into the hat.
I am a busker and this is my hat:
Everyone at Wynberg Boys High called it the Bedingham and Smith. The bat’s real name was Bellingham and Smith, B & S for short. However, because Smith and David Bedingham played for the Wynberg first team during the same period, their teammates felt it was only right to name the bat after their middle-order batters.
The first time he arrived at school with it, Smith’s B & S had red cherry markings on it, on and around the area, most batters considered it the sweet spot. He sanded off any markings on the edges, they did not help in his adolescent quest to be regarded as a top batter.
Beyond the cosmetics on the bat, Smith walked the walk in the middle by executing the straight drive, one of the most glorious shots in the game. He enjoyed playing it so much that it cost him a place in the U15 side.
“It was the last day of the trials and the coaches were deciding on the team that would play the first game in the first week of school. I remember in that session I was just trying to hit everything straight over the bowler’s head because I was obsessed with seeing the guys walk back to fetch the ball,” Smith shared.
The coach, noticing Smith’s propensity for the straight shot asked the teen to shelve the stroke. The youngster employed a few shots before the bowler sent one in Smith’s arc. His instincts took over and he executed the forbidden shot.
“It was, in my mind, a good shot. But that didn’t matter to the coach, he told me after the session that I, unfortunately, hadn't made it and would be starting in the B team,” he recalled.
Smith’s run in the B team did not last long. He scored a 70 and a century in his first two games and bagged a hat trick with the ball. They were performances that the coaches couldn’t ignore.
There are two pictures of Jason Smith aged around 15. One sits on top of the other. In the first one, Smith is waiting for the delivery. The second one has him addressing it with a pull shot. Another page has pictures of Smith at the U19 World Cup, which he won with Aiden Markram and Kagiso Rabada, among others. One other page is a cutout article of Shukri Conrad praising Smith's skill.
Every page is a treasure and every treasure has a story. This is Jason Smith's sporting career compressed into images. Smith's grandfather curated the scrapbooks. There wasn't a lot for him to add to the books between 2012 and 2015. Smith was still finding his feet at Western Province. He scored 73 runs for an average of 7.7 in First-Class cricket in the 2012-13 and 2014-15 seasons.
There was no report of the first match Smith played a starring role in, therefore, there is no scrapbook entry of it. However, Smith remembers it as if it was yesterday.
“We played on a dodgy wicket in Kimberley, and myself and Zubayr Hamza fought back quite nicely for the Province team and I think that's where the team sat up and took notice,” Smith narrated.
His match-winning 81 against Griqualand West was enough to show the suits at Western Province that, despite his slow start, Smith was a classy batter. That innings bought him enough time to prove himself as worthy a contract, and he paid them back with two centuries and three half-centuries in 18 First-Class innings
Smith's time with Western Province Union overlapped with Ashwell Prince's tenure. Prince saw what Eric Lefson and Shukri Conrad saw in the youngster. At Wynberg, Lefson had watched an elegant batter with an impeccable technique. Conrad saw the same and called him the genuine article.
However, all three also agreed on something else, half the time when they watched Smith bat, they felt as if they were not getting the full Jason Smith package. Their feelings can be summed up with this statement from Lefson, “He played one of the best innings by a schoolboy when he scored 127 against Affies. He had a few other good ones, but he also had several cameos.”
During his four years with the Cape Cobras, Prince felt that Smith had more to give, and yet, the coach was unable to get the all-rounder to perform consistently. Things turned around for the Proteas star when he moved to the KZN.
“The Dolphins have always wanted him to move to KZN,. Lance Klusener watched as Jason hit boundaries off Imran Tahir in one match and from that moment, his mind was made up,” Franswyn shared.
However, Smith needed a little convincing. He was a Cape Town boy, desperate to hold on to the fulfilment of his childhood ambition of playing professional cricket with Newlands as his home ground. But when he released his grip on that dream and flew to the KZN coast, his career changed. He hit the ground running, ending his five-season long drought for centuries in his first year with the Dolphins.
“It took me out of my comfort zone and I think that was good for me. The environment was also great for me,” Smith explained.
Quinton Friend, his head coach at the Dolphins, agrees with Smith’s sentiment, adding, “I think he came with the right mindset. He was prepared to roll his sleeves and put in the work. He is also at a stage where he understands his game in and out. His ambition to play for South Africa was crucial, the drive was always there to get higher honours.”
After three years of constantly providing scrapbook fodder to his family with his headline-making match-winning performances with the bat, on the 7th of October 2024, Smith created a moment worth a double spread in the scrapbook. He scored an outstanding maiden international half-century in his second ODI.
Everyone who has been a part of Smith's scenic-route journey agrees on one thing: it was a coming-of-age innings and will live on beyond the scrapbooks his family keeps.