Each year AFL clubs decide their list strategies and assess whether a strong draft hand is likely to yield benefits comparable to the trade assets the picks are worth.
As clubs push higher up the draft board they gain the security that they can draft the players they rate the highest before other clubs and, consequently, increase their chance of securing successful long-term recruits.
Nonetheless, this strategy is not foolproof and hindsight exposes the difficult reality of ranking the ability and potential of players before they have been introduced to an AFL environment.
In this list, the first round of the 2016 National Draft will be reassessed with the benefit of six years of AFL data.
Below is the original 2016 first round:
- Andrew McGrath
- Tim Taranto
- Hugh McCluggage
- Ben Ainsworth
- Will Setterfield
- Sam Petrevski-Seton
- Jack Scrimshaw
- Griffin Logue
- Will Brodie
- Jack Bowes
- Oliver Florent
- Jy Simpkin
- Daniel Venables
- Harry Perryman
- Jordan Gallucci
- Todd Marshall
- Jarrod Berry
- Sam Powell-Pepper
- Tim English
- Isaac Cumming
- Will Hayward
In this draft year, a number of players were taken as father-son and academy selections (eg. Will Setterfield, Jack Bowes, Harry Perryman). The nominal draft order will be adjusted to reflect what clubs would have actually taken into this hypothetical draft.
Where these players are selected it will be assumed that the clubs that matched their bids in the original 2016 draft will continue to do so regardless of where they land in this order.
14. Pick 14: Brennan Cox - Adelaide (Original position - Pick 41)ย
The Fremantle Dockers have been the beneficiary of one of the most underrated defenders in the competition in Brennan Cox since drafting him at pick 41.
In this re-draft it is Adelaide that benefit from the services of Cox, who was originally drafted as a versatile forward/defender out of South Australia.
Cox was the runner-up in Fremantle's best-and-fairest in 2022 in a season where the purple outfit exceeded expectations, and at 195cm and 100kg he is a sizeable figure that would be beneficial to an Adelaide side that leaked goals last year.
A pairing between Cox and Jordon Butts would also put less pressure on Tom Doedee and allow him to roam more freely within the defensive 50.
