The two-time premiership coach respected the back pocket's knowledge of the game enough that he thought he might make a good coach one day.
So he was slightly surprised and amused when Hocking wondered aloud how Blight stayed in the job for so long after coaching Newtown-Chilwell in the Geelong Football League for just two years.
Hocking didn't think coaching was for him so he began establishing a successful picture-framing business in Geelong.
That could have been it for Hocking but Brian Cook came knocking on his door soon after being appointed CEO at the Cats in 1999.
"A few people were telling me when I first arrived that Geelong needed to get a few ex-players back of good character and a lot of people said[Steve] Hocking was a beauty,"Cook toldThe Sunday Age.
Hocking kept the Cats at arm's length before joining them part-time as chairman of selectors in 2003,about three years after Cook initially tried to entice him back to the fold.
In the next 14 years,Hocking,the administrator,found his niche in football and earned a reputation as a change agent.
In fact,Cook said this week that the 53-year-old is a rare beast who loves dealing with change.
Such an attitude can unsettle people initially but most of those who worked with him at Geelong eventually found him to be a man who engendered loyalty and trust.
Collaboration is the word Cook comes up with when asked for Hocking's defining ethos.
"He turns the difficult into the simple,"Cook said.
Hocking sees such collaboration as the essential component of his new role,believing strongly that the only way to succeed is to use the expertise that surrounds him.
Cameron Ling,who led the Cats to a flag and played in three premierships with Hocking in the football department,saw such characteristics in action.
At leadership meetings Hocking's only contribution might be a well-placed question that made the players think about a problem differently. At times during the season,he would sidle up to a player and suggest it might be a good idea to sleep in the next morning and perhaps have breakfast with his partner rather than train.
Such little things added up for the players who began to respect Hocking's intuitive sense of what they needed.
That style helped the club balance itself and then negotiate the tumult in 2006,when Hocking was the man everyone trusted,to win three flags between 2007-2011.
Neil Balme,who joined the Cats as football manager in 2007,said he and Hocking complemented each other when they worked together.
"He is a forward thinker who is prepared to think outside the square[but] his first thought is for the players and the organisation rather than himself,"Balme said.
"It's a loss for the Geelong footy club in some ways[but] it's a gain for footy. He's a terrific footy guy."
Hocking is a footy guy but not the stereotypical one,celebrating the drought-breaking flag without the need for a drink in his hand.
"You wouldn't have known but he was as happy and excited as everyone else,"Balme said."He just wasn't quite as stupid in the end."
Stupid is never an adjective applied to Hocking,with clubs unanimous in their praise of his approach to matters that concern them,even those who questioned the wisdom of the memo to AFLW clubs that created controversy this week.
Loading
Despite the title and the scrutiny that comes with it,not much about what Hocking holds true will change (and those who underestimate his commitment to upholding the spirit of the game do so at their peril). He sees himself as a role player rather than someone with all the answers.
"It's not that he always initiates change. He does that sometimes but it's more when the world is changing around him really quickly,how do you accommodate that and shape your own strategies and your own people around that,"Cook said.