In 2022, the first year of Sam Mitchell’s tenure as coach, Hawthorn have been adventurous in both game style and in willingness to jettison experience from their playing ranks.
As of Tuesday evening, it was quite feasible that both Jaeger O’Meara and Tom Mitchell would be following Jack Gunston out the door before the close of trading business. O’Meara was said to be sleeping on his choice of club – Fremantle, Greater Western Sydney, or the less-probable option of staying at Hawthorn.
Tom Mitchell and Jaeger O’Meara.Credit:Getty Images
Mitchell would be Collingwood-bound, provided the Hawks could reach terms with their old list manager and football boss Graham Wright. Usually, when clubs are quibbling about picks between the low 40s and mid or late 20s, an accommodation will be reached.
Usually, when a player is entertaining two clubs at once, like O’Meara, the result is that he leaves.
Gunston has landed in Brisbane, walking from a team that is only midway through what has become a near-total list reconstruction to play with a contending team that also hopes to snare Josh Dunkley.
Gunston’s exit, and the retirement of Ben McEvoy, means that the Hawks will begin 2023 with only one player left from their 2015 premiership team: Luke Breust.
If this seems the natural order, given the turnover of all teams, bear in mind that Hawthorn’s grand final opponents for the three-peat premiership, West Coast, will have eight players remaining from that grand final side next year: Jeremy McGovern, Nic Naitanui, Elliott Yeo, Luke Shuey, Shannon Hurn, Dom Sheed, Jack Darling and Andrew Gaff.
So, the Hawks are clearing the decks. But this is not a firesale, in the style of Collingwood two years ago, since there is no imperative to get under the salary cap.
Rather, Mitchell and the Hawks are taking a hard-headed and long-term view, willing to offload virtually anyone who’s around 30, assuming they carry decent draft currency (Gunston is 30, Mitchell 30 in May, and O’Meara turns 29 in February).
Mitchell had long been on the block, with O’Meara only entertained if the deal is right. The Hawks would almost certainly prefer that he goes to GWS, who have a prospective top-20 pick on offer.
Isaac Smith poses with his 2022 Norm Smith and AFL premiership medals.Credit:AFL Photos
Fremantle’s logical play would be to parlay the likely return from Rory Lobb – assuming he gets traded to the Bulldogs – and hand that pick over to the Hawks.
To lose O’Meara, Mitchell, Gunston and McEvoy in one hit would leave Hawthorn light-on for seniority and mature leaders. Should the trades happen, there will be Hawk fans wondering if the cuts are too deep – as they proved for Carlton circa 2014-15 – and that their period out of contention will be prolonged, rather than fast-tracked.
But Mitchell appears to have a converse view, believing that the extra draft hand will accelerate the rebuild; hastening, rather than postponing the renaissance.
He has seen Hawthorn at both ends of the rebuild spectrum, having been a young gun when Alastair Clarkson offloaded Jonathan Hay and Nathan Thompson for picks that turned into Grant Birchall and Jordan Lewis, but also for the unsuccessful mature trading that followed the glory years.
After the 2015 flag, Clarkson attempted to top up, giving up draft picks over two years to recruit Mitchell and O’Meara. Richmond, as it happens, are trying to do similar this year by acquiring Jacob Hopper and Tim Taranto from GWS.
The Hawks failed in their bid to stay in the premiership window and have subsequently paid a price for those trades; Richmond may well fare better in their Taranto-Hopper double play, since the Tigers have a stronger youth contingent than Hawthorn did in 2016 when Sam Mitchell and Lewis were shuffled off to West Coast and Melbourne respectively.
One would imagine that James Sicily will succeed McEvoy as captain. Once, O’Meara shaped as a prospective skipper and it is his leadership that the Hawks would miss most; the same can already be said of Isaac Smith.
Tom Mitchell isn’t as renowned for leadership, despite his more consistent output as a ball-getter. The Hawks had been reducing the centre-bounce appearances of both O’Meara and Mitchell, promoting Josh Ward and Dylan Moore. Jai Newcombe, in effect, has superseded Mitchell in the pecking order for inside midfielders.
Sam Mitchell’s audacity is underpinned by his deep understanding of midfielders and the knowledge – evident from the moment Hawthorn shoved Clarkson for his old skipper – that the club hierarchy is willing to be patient.
The Hawks have bet the farm on Mitchell bringing them back, handing him the licence to put the Clarkson era in the rearview mirror.
Keep up to date with the best AFL coverage in the country. Sign up for the Real Footy newsletter.
