They will have set out guidelines for him, what he should and shouldn't do, what he should and shouldn't eat, railway tracks for him to follow if he wanted his train to pull in at the terminus of fulfilment. That he is now an All Black suggests he rode those tracks.
His adolescence, then, was an obedient affair. But adolescence should not be an obedient affair. Adolescence is kicking off the harness. It's leaving the rails to explore the dark forbidden places.
It is moody, uncooperative, experimental. It's striking out on your own, however misguidedly. Your poor All Black will have done little of that. He was guided. He followed a path that others had laid down for him.
His first reward, of course, was money, a lot of money for one so young. Even if he managed to remain uncorrupted by it, consider what he missed out on.
Think of your own early adult years, the years of rented rooms and lousy food and cheap booze and lugging your clothes to the laundrette in a torn bin bag.
They may not have been golden years, but they will have been bright ones, memorable ones, formative of a sort of gutter resilience. Years against which to measure any later wealth or comfort.
His second reward was fame, with people wanting his autograph, his photograph, his touch to add a lustre to their lives. Did he go along with it, acting, performing, playing the role, while retaining a sense of his own fallible humanity? Or did he start to half-believe the flattery?
He was only young, remember. If he turned on the television he would see advertisements in which he was portrayed as an idealised being, someone to be envied and emulated, when he had barely had the chance as yet to find out who he was himself.
Worse still, expectations will have been placed on him. The country attaches vast importance to its national rugby team, as if a rugby victory vindicates our collective existence on these windy rocks.
It is the All Black's responsibility, then, to maintain other people's sense of wellbeing. That's quite a burden for young shoulders.
If he is part of a successful team, well, he will be taken for granted. Success is expected. It's seen as his job. But if, as now, he is part of a losing team, the criticism will be fierce, unfair and unrelenting.
All Blacks are often called rugby royalty. There's some truth to that. Like royalty they live under constant scrutiny. But royalty is for life. Once a prince, always a prince. No work required, only to be a totem in perpetuity.
The All Black deal is different. Everything comes up front with a rush at 22: the money, the fame, the worship, the column inches, being unable to walk down a street without people nudging each other, pointing.
Then just as suddenly it's over. Few last even five years. A loss of form. A broken leg. A new young stud on the prairie. And that's that.
Not even 30 years old and the money stops, the attention with it. The future stretches for ever. What to do with it all?
A few remain in the club. They coach teams or become pundits on the television. But most have to find a way to rub along somehow in a world that you and I have never left and are perhaps better fitted to.
They became public property before they were able to become themselves. That's tough to cope with, to recover from.
So if, as I say, you come across one today, reflect on what's been done to him, what we indeed have done to him, and be kind. He'll be grateful.
