Andrew Roy Leslie has done it all for Wellington - player, captain, management committee, coach of Colts, coach of the A team, and union president (2003).
He took over after Alan Muir's disappointing 1989 season. Leslie said he put his name forward for any position the union wanted to put him in. It decided to put Muir aside and give Leslie his chance.
Leslie talked hard and long with Muir about his (Muir's) problems and about the future, decided to start again from scratch, and set out to establish (in time), a base of players with 40-50-60 games or Wellington.
"Wellington was only going to be good again if we aimed at getting that level of experience. So that's how we went about it."
On that basis, Leslie says he was "pretty stoked" with the 1990 fifth placing in the NPC. And it was done under the difficulty of having his backline general Steve Pokere retire about a third of the way through the season.
"That put an awful lot of pressure on Simon Mannix because I had gone for two young halfbacks in John Bradbrook and Junior Tonu'u, and Pokere was meant to be the stabilizing influence in that area," Leslie says.
"So that was a great loss the way we had been planning things."
Come 1991 and go 1991 without any great remembrances - except that Ranfurly Shield game.
A lot of planning went into that September 14 match. Wellington played men in different positions against North Auckland three days earlier - and a completely different game plan.
And Auckland was confused. Wellington, with a mediocre record, was like a dog with a bone - it kept shaking the Aucks, and they were starting to squawk.
With 10 minutes to go the Aucklanders were 10 points in front but out of energy and penned in their own 22. They committed professional foul after professional foul - and were only penalised instead of heavier punishment.
Somehow they held Wellington out. It was the one that got away. Remember Auckland had 15 starting All Blacks - and the World Cup was just a couple of months away. No way were we going to win that cup. Leslie comments on the fouls.
"There's no way it would be allowed to happen these days. There would have been players in the bin left, right and centre. They were shot."
But the match was lost and Wellington had to settle for sixth in the NPC that year.
And it improved just one place in 1992, a year in which Wellington beat the depleted Auckland side, King Country, North Auckland and Canterbury. Big wing Lani Koko starred with 11 tries, but generally the side did not kick on.
So Leslie was out - and David Kirk was in.
Leslie was disappointed with the clean-out of players in 1993. He felt the time was due when the build-up of experience was about to offer rewards.
Instead unwanted players had to leave to find spots, like Tonu'u to Auckland, Bradbrook to South Africa, and Simon Tremain to an early retirement.