Then, when Collingwood read the young Western Australian's name out at selection No. 38, his mates appeared and celebrations broke out.
Ramsay, 17, had been briefed by his manager regarding his draft chances, and he watched it unfold with a list of selections he could potentially be taken at.
As a number of players older than him got snapped up early, the defender remained unsure of his chances and started to wonder if the two injury-hit seasons he had recently endured had really hurt him.
"I wasn't really confident. It was a little bit shady because of the games I'd played," Ramsay told collingwoodfc.com.au this week.
"But then my pick came up and happy days. It was the best feeling ever."
Last season, in his final year of school, he broke his collarbone - twice.
He first split the bone at training and then cracked it further in his second game back about two months later, which ended his season.
This year, his luck didn't improve. He broke the bipartite sesamoid bone in his foot in the second game of the NAB AFL Under-18 Championships, and then managed just one more game for Western Australia before his season ended.
"It's a weight bearing bone in your foot and if that splits, you're in quite a bit of strife," he said.
"[West Coast's] Beau Waters has just had his cut out and I went the non-surgical route and it's just starting to come good now.
"It's about 95 per cent now and I'm doing most of the running and it's hanging in there, which is good."
Ramsay tried to return for East Perth late in the season but his toe grumbled along and he instead started to focus on the October NAB AFL Combine.
As it stood, the last time he played in front of recruiters was against Vic Country in round three of the champs - and personally against No.1 draftee and new Greater Western Sydney forward Lachie Whitfield.
Having sustained the toe injury the game before when his foot "had a big stub and hyper-flexed, and someone landed on the back of it", Ramsay had relied on painkillers to finish the match.
He needed them again against Vic Country, but they wore off by half-time and he wasn't able to go with Whitfield much after that.
Still, recruiters - and particularly Collingwood's Derek Hine - saw enough in the first two quarters and the previous two games to be impressed.
"At half-time I was pretty happy with how I was going. He (Whitfield) got a couple of outside balls, which I didn't like, but I think he was on about seven touches and I was on about six," Ramsay said.
"So it was all right but then after that, the floodgates opened when no one was running with him.
"He's a very good player and I learned quite a bit from him, with the way he runs and loses the contest.
"I learned truckloads from that game."
Something else that separated Ramsay from the rest was his diligent approach to improving his fitness.
He worked with a trainer in this year's pre-season to make himself stronger, and used the time when he was injured to put on muscle.
He even had a weights session scheduled for the day after the draft.
"I think it was just the way I went about my business with extra training and mental skills and physical skills, I might have stood out from other players," Ramsay said.
"I think that's why maybe I might have got picked but on the other hand they might have just liked the way I play, even in the short period of time I was playing.
"When we were training for the pre-season, I was with my trainer for about a year this year and he set me up for a good year and got rid of little nicks.
"I got as much extra work into me as possible."
Ramsay has only been at Collingwood for a week but has already identified Scott Pendlebury as a natural mentor.
Pendlebury, who takes preparation and recovery incredibly seriously - and had a profound effect on second-year player Paul Seedsman's approach this year - sets the bar at the Pies high.
"He's an ultimate professional so I'd like to look up to him and I just want to soak as much information from him as I can," Ramsay said.
Jennifer Witham is a reporter for AFL Media. Follow her on Twitter @AFL_JenWitham
