Harry McKay will run out for his 150th AFL game in Navy Blue on Saturday night, a milestone that lands more than a decade after he first walked through the doors at IKON Park as a first-round draftee. Carlton’s key forward reaches the mark with teammates describing not just the player, but the person who has grown around him.

Jacob Weitering, Mitch McGovern, Ben Ainsworth and Jagga Smith spoke this week about McKay before his 150th game, and the theme was consistency as much as talent. Weitering said they had spent their top-age year together at Vic Country and remembered McKay as “a really nice, really kind guy and a great teammate to be around,” adding that he has become “the ultimate professional who knows what he is doing every minute of every day.”

McGovern said he had long expected McKay to have already played more than 150 games and pointed to his Coleman Medallist teammate’s standing in the game. “To be honest, I really thought he’d play more than 150 already,” he said, adding that he was “absolutely rapt for him.” For Carlton, the number is a tidy round figure. For those around McKay, it is a sign of how much he has already packed into a career that has often looked bigger than the stat sheet.

The milestone also says something about the club McKay has built himself inside. He arrived at IKON Park over a decade ago as a first-round pick and has stayed long enough to become a reference point for new faces. A player can take years to earn that kind of trust, but McKay appears to have done it by the same methods his teammates keep returning to: reliability, work, and a manner that makes the people around him comfortable.

Ainsworth’s perspective sharpened that picture. He said McKay had a “fantastic career,” recalling that they played together for Gippsland Power in 2015 and again at the state carnival for Vic Country that same year. “It was a long time between drinks: I was at the Suns for nine years and he’s been here the whole time, but it’s been so good to reconnect with him here at the Blues and so fun playing with him over the first 10 or so weeks,” Ainsworth said. He also said McKay had been exceptional at welcoming him through the doors at Carlton.

For McKay and Weitering, the connection goes back to junior football, and the old memories still come with a grin. Weitering said McKay would still remind him that he kicked four on him in Dandenong against Gippsland in Round 1 of 2015. It is the sort of line teammates keep alive because it turns a career milestone into a story about a shared beginning, not just a number on a team sheet.

Smith’s comments showed the influence reaches beyond the veterans. He said he and McKay did a little rehab together last year and that the relationship has carried over into the details of football, including inside-50 work. “He’s been really good for me and my development, on and off the field,” Smith said. He also said McKay had been trying to help him with cooking, calling him “a very good cook.”

That is the tension in McKay’s 150th game: the public sees the tally, the Coleman Medal and the key-forward presence, while teammates see a calmer, more dependable layer underneath. Carlton has another milestone on Saturday night, but the more interesting measure may be how many of the club’s players speak about McKay the same way — as someone they trust, learn from and still want around.