DJ. Henry. TJ.
Kilkenny have had such a smooth transition of superstar sharpshooters that they are instantly recognisable from first name alone.
On Sunday, TJ Reid will lead the line for the Cats against Limerick in pursuit of an eighth Celtic cross.
His man-of-the-match display in the All-Ireland semi-final makes stopping the three-in-a-row chasers seem more than a fanciful notion.
"He's one of the greatest hurlers that has ever hurled," said Clare talisman Tony Kelly in the wake of his side's mauling. "I think he's still operating at an extremely high level.
"In terms of his skill level, his ability to score, his ability to make space for other lads to lay off ball, he’s still at the top of his game in all those attributes. He’s an incredible player.
"It’s mad that he’s 34. He doesn’t show real signs of actually slowing down, which is a credit to himself and how he keeps himself in that incredible shape. With the way that the game is gone in terms of conditioning and keeping yourself at that level, he’s a phenomenal player."
As befits a farming boy from Ballyhale - the village hurling hotbed that gave us Fennellys and Aylwards galore - the son of Shamrocks hurler Seán and nephew of 1979 All-Ireland winner Richie Reid was hooked, so to speak, from an early age.
"I remember going down the road to TJ's house, to his brother Paddy, and TJ was three or four," Shefflin recalled a couple of years ago.
"He was (already) relentless at that stage, he just wanted to play hurling. He’s no different now. He loves playing."
The game's most decorated player gave his younger neighbour lifts to and from training and in 2004, TJ made his senior debut in goal for Ballyhale, six weeks shy of his 17th birthday. A year later he was starting at midfield and scoring 1-02 in a Kilkenny championship final defeat.
He was a county champion the next season and on St Patrick's Day 2007, he hit 2-02 in Shamrocks' fourth club All-Ireland final victory.
By the summer he had made his championship debut for Kilkenny and, along with older brother Eoin, was a non-playing substitute for the triumph over Limerick. But forcing his way into a team on their way to four in a row was never going to be easy.
After losing his mother Mary to cancer that March, Reid, still 20, came off the bench to score four points in the 2008 demolition of Waterford, following that up with the U21 title as part of a Kilkenny clean sweep.
He added another point off the bench in the hard-fought win over Tipperary in '09 and was captain when making his first start in a senior decider as the drive for five came unstuck the following year - his only other final as captain, a decade later, also ended in defeat to the Premier, so he might be grateful that younger brother Richie is the skipper this week.
In 2011, TJ was back on the bench, and got just 10 minutes (and a point) as Tipp were vanquished and Liam MacCarthy reclaimed. When he was taken off in the 2012 Leinster final loss to Galway and subsequently dropped he gave serious thought to walking away from inter-county hurling. Encouragement from Shefflin and manager Brian Cody helped to change his mind.
"I was competing against lads at the peak of their powers - Henry Shefflin, Martin Comerford, Eddie Brennan, Richie Power was there before me, Eoin Larkin was there before me, Derek Lyng and so on. So it was hard to break into it," said TJ three years later.
"I was being taken off and getting dropped here and there. As a player, as a young hurler, you just want to be hurling. I was getting annoyed about it. For that game against Limerick (AI quarter-final) I was dropped, and I was annoyed over it. I was thinking about retiring.
"I would be very good friends with Henry. He sat me down and spoke to me. So it was my choice then. I suppose what turned it was that I loved it so much and it would have been hard to walk away from it. I think it was a stepping stone for myself.
"I suppose some players are maybe afraid to open up to Brian about how you feel about the set-up. I opened up and I think after that I'm after becoming a different player."
Reid ended up fighting for his place, playing all but five minutes of the drawn final and replay win against the Tribesmen, and securing the first of his five All-Star awards.
A broken kneecap sustained in the closing stages made his, and Kilkenny's 2013 campaign forgettable but the next year he was back to full fitness and had now taken over the free-taking duties.
TJ racked up 4-53 and a second All-Star as the Cats beat Tipperary in another replay.
"2014 was a real turning point for TJ," suggests then team-mate and current All-Ireland junior football champion Paul Murphy. "We started seeing these performances that made him step out from the crowd as an exceptional player.
"He scored a goal in the first game that looked like he was playing in the back yard. Got a ball on the 21, a quick look around, didn't see any passes around so just turned and snapped it straight into the net past Darren Gleeson.
"In the two All-Ireland finals we really saw him set himself apart and since then he has been so consistent."
Three-time Tipperary All-Ireland winner Brendan Maher marked TJ in those two games, conceding 1-02 in the draw but holding him scoreless from play in the replay.
Maher, who was given the same task in the 2016 and 2019 finals, highlights Reid's ability to win possession as the best he has ever faced.
"He was the always the first name that we talked about. We always had a plan for him," he tells RTÉ Sport. "There was always somebody who you had to be very aware of where he was and what he was doing because if you let him off, and he was on form, he would punish you all day.
"I felt that I broke even with him over the few times in big games that I had to mark him. He didn't catch ball over me but purely because I sacrificed trying to catch it myself.
"I backed myself against anyone under a high ball but if you try to catch the ball against him, he'll punish you. Get the ball to ground and hopefully the boys will be there to pick it up.
"It was a bit like Mikey Butler marking Tony Kelly, you have to resist the temptation of going for a ball because if it doesn't work out they could get free. You have to sacrifice a lot of your own game."
"He can catch it from any angle. He makes you think he's going to do a certain thing and then last-second he'll change and go around the back of you or come around the side.
"Some of the balls he catches, his arm is lateral rather than under it. It's an unbelievable skill and ability to catch it when he’s not under the ball, which is what most half-forwards will try to do.
"Even if he doesn't catch it, he’s still right there to try and tackle you. It’s unbelievable how strong he is under the high ball and the second ball as well.
"If he's not under a high ball, two other players are going up for it, his timing is impeccable to get the break off it. If the ball spills, he just seems to be there.
"That comes with patience, it's not always about busting yourself to get to a breaking ball, he just knows what his strengths are and he plays to those strengths all the time."
Fantastic finish in the back of the net from @KilkennyCLG's TJ Reid! pic.twitter.com/kCJ3ka9ADs
— The GAA (@officialgaa) November 28, 2020
2015 turned out to be peak TJ, at least in terms of titles. The 28-year-old was named Hurler of the Year and an All-Star for the third time after scoring 4-32 in just four games, a goal in each, including the seven-point final win against Galway.
Given how his career began, it seems almost surreal that Kilkenny haven't won the All-Ireland title since. But it hasn't been for a lack of effort from TJ. His championship scoring averages over the next six seasons were: 10 points, 13, 10, 12 (championship top-scorer, All-Star), 14 and 14 (All-Star); and 15 goals in 29 games.
The average is down to around nine so far this year but TJ, "the most consistent free-taker in the game" according to Maher, continues to convert placed balls remorselessly and in the semi-final against Clare consistently turned the ball over and set up scores for his younger forward colleagues, including clubmates Eoin Cody and Adrian Mullen.
"TJ's role over the years would have changed," says Murphy. "When he was getting into the team as a younger player, he would have been playing with a bit of abandon and just enjoying the game.
"As you become a focal point of the team, you're bringing on the younger sharpshooters coming through as well and showing them. Henry would have done that to TJ, and DJ would have done that to Henry. It’s almost a right of passage and the mantle is passed to you.
"TJ’s role now is very much bringing on these lads around him as much as it is being the free-taker. His ability to provide scores and not just score them is sometimes overlooked. He’s aware that when he gets the ball in his hand players are heading towards him to close him down, and he has the vision to know who is around him and he’s able to pop off the ball.
"It helps that he has the likes of Eoin Cody and Adrian Mullen, Ballyhale players that he has hurled with for years, he understands their movement."
After making his championship debut against Dublin in 2019, Mullen hailed Reid, who hit hit 2-12 in a stirring comeback: "TJ is magical and I see that magic every week in training. It's nothing new to me. He's an unbelievable player."
Though Limerick rarely man-mark, Maher thinks they need a plan to stop him wreaking havoc between the lines.
"Kilkenny get fierce energy off TJ," he says. "He's their main man. If you can put him off and stop him you’re a long way to negating their threat.
"He's going to move around and Limerick don’t tend to have a man that will follow him so he has the ability to punish them.
"He’ll stand on the top of D and you’ll see him calling Eoin Murphy 'Let it down on top of me’. It’ll be interesting to see whether Limerick get Declan Hannon to go back under it with him, because the Limerick half-back line hold their position, he’ll be thinking that if he moves across the line into pockets of space that they won’t follow him.
"If him and Adrian Mullen can move around, not settle in any position, and get on the ball they’ll punish you.
"I don’t think he was ever selfish. He was always great at making the right call, whether it was to take on the man and win a free himself or that popped pass. Despite being the main man for many years, he’s the ultimate team player.
"I’d say you could count on one hand the amount of times he has been blocked down or hooked. He knows when to take the shot and when to pop it off. His ability and awareness of people around him is top-drawer."
In 2018, Brian Cody suggested that "TJ couldn't give up hurling. Training doesn't stop for TJ, but it's not just the training, it's the hurling, out there pucking around - all that sort of stuff, he loves it. That's what has turned him into the player he is. I'd say TJ will want to be hurling in ten years' time".
What level that will be at we'll have to wait and see but the fact is that in a sport where most now retire by 32, he is holding his own physically, four months ahead of his 35th birthday.
"It's exceptional in this day and age, how physical the sport is, that TJ is still right up there with the best in terms of physicality," says Murphy.
"His physical conditioning is unbelievable. I think people over the last few years have been looking at his age and expecting him to slow down but he hasn't.
"The semi-final was an example of that. A real all-round performance, not just on the frees but catching balls, setting up scores. Right up to the 70th minute, he was still motoring around the pitch comfortably."
TJ got married last year and wife Niamh is expecting their first child. He owns a gym in Kilkenny, which probably helps with the fitness to balance the attention it demands, but how long can he keep going?
"It was more of a commitment thing for me," says Maher of his own inter-county departure last year. "Physically, I feel good and I could have stayed going if I was in the position to make the commitment.
"TJ won't retire because he’s not up to it physically. It will be whether he has the capacity to keep making the commitment. The hours you have to put in are unbelievable.
"He's obviously still in the position where he is able to make the commitment and he’s still enjoying his hurling. The physical shape he is in, I can’t see how he wouldn’t stay going on. But when you get to that age the other part of your life starts coming and you need to prioritise it."
One thing Limerick can count on is TJ fighting to the last seconds, as St Thomas' discovered when he lashed a game-winning free to the net deep into injury-time in January's All-Ireland club semi-final.
Shefflin, who managed him to two club All-Irelands, also admiringly recalled the 2020 Kilkenny county final, when TJ "got injured near the end of the match. He went down on his ankle. They had used their five subs so it was 'TJ, just stand near the end line’.
"The next ball that came, his hunger and desire to win it back, he dropped his hurl and everything, Cillian Buckley got it and he went after him half-limping, chasing him down. That’s what he has and what he has developed over the years."
In return, Reid once said that he had been inspired by the only three-time Hurler of the Year's "phenomenal work ethic, on and off the field".
"I'll never be Henry Shefflin. He's the king of hurling. I’m looking to do my best out on the hurling field and looking to be the best out there."
He doesn't have to be Henry II. TJ the first might be enough for Kilkenny to reclaim the throne.
Follow the All-Ireland Hurling Championship final on Sunday, Limerick v Kilkenny, from 2pm via our live blogs on rte.ie/sport or on the RTÉ News app. Watch live coverage on RTÉ One and RTÉ Player with live radio commentary on RTÉ Radio 1
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