Port Adelaide vice captain Zak Butters is emerging as a key domino in the upcoming trade period, with several Victorian clubs recently becoming aware of his potential availability, despite being contracted until the end of next year.
Multiple club sources have confirmed Hawthorn, Richmond, Essendon and Collingwood are all preparing to make serious plays for the 24-year-old, who grew up in Bacchus Marsh and played under-18 football for the Western Jets.
Tight-knit duo Zak Butters and Ken Hinkley at Port Adelaide training a few weeks ago.Credit: Getty Images
Knowledgeable sources at Port Adelaide, who were not able to speak publicly about the matter, said the club was confident of retaining him. While Port is adamant it has ample salary cap space to afford to offer him a significantly increased pay packet, Butters – a two time All Australian – is open to exploring a trade at the end of this season, 12 months before he will become a restricted free agent.
Port Adelaide would like to extend Butters’ contract beyond 2026 now, but neither the player nor his management group have indicated they would be open to that conversation yet.
Butters is managed by Kapital Sports. He has recently changed managers within the company from Mark Kleiman to Peter Lenton.
Butters, a loved and respected teammate and person at Port Adelaide, has an extremely close relationship with outgoing coach Ken Hinkley, who will officially hand over the reins to Josh Carr at the end of the season.
Insiders at Port Adelaide said Butters had other strong relationships at the club, but conceded that he and Hinkley had a special bond, and that rival clubs may attempt to use the coach’s pending departure as leverage to lure him back to Victoria.
Butters is yet to play this year after having surgery for a minor knee injury in February, but the Power are hopeful he will return this week against St Kilda. He watched from the stands as his Port Adelaide teammates suffered a shock loss to Essendon last Thursday night at Marvel Stadium.
He completed a strong running session in Melbourne on Friday morning with Port Adelaide staff and stayed in Victoria to see family before flying back to Adelaide on Sunday.
Port believe that, at the very least, Butters will remain at the club until the end of 2026.
“I imagine at that point he is going to be a restricted free agent, so we’ve got control of that situation anyway. But there’s no doubt that Zak is going to get paid,” football boss Chris Davies told SEN when asked about the situation recently.
“If there are clubs who are providing inflationary pressures to others, that gets well known pretty quick. For the teams desperate to land players, sometimes if they don’t, it’s not overly helpful because it does create some inflationary pressure across the competition we’ve all got to deal with.”
Hawthorn, who have Carlton’s first-round pick in the upcoming draft, have made it no secret that they want to add to their midfield depth. The Hawks also have a war chest of money, given how even their playing list is and how many players are performing above their contract.
Richmond and Essendon both have two first-round picks this year. The Tigers have their own and North Melbourne’s, while the Bombers have theirs and Melbourne’s. It’s conceivable they could both end up with two top-10 picks.
Zak Butters will be a restricted free agent in 2026.Credit: Getty Images
Richmond’s No.1 pick from last year’s draft, emerging star Sam Lalor, also hails from Bacchus Marsh.
“We have got no restriction around keeping the players that we are wanting to keep,” Davies added in his radio interview.
“Our salary cap has been well managed over the time. We certainly have the money if we want to keep the players who are out of contract.
“Kane Farrell is out of contract at this end of the year, Miles Bergman … there are some players that we have a more immediate need to get re-signed.
“Zak will be certainly a player that we will want to keep when the time comes. With where the dollars are going in the AFL, all of those guys are going to get paid, and fair play to them because they have all performed pretty well.”
Kapital Sports declined to comment.
