Port Adelaide and How to Succeed in Succession Planning

Port Adelaide and How to Succeed in Succession Planning

GuyWhoLikesSport

On February 13th – a month before Port Adelaide’s season opener – the Power announced that 2025 would be their final year with Ken Hinkley at the helm, and Josh Carr would take over thereafter.

With that announcement, Port Adelaide successfully did what Logan Roy never could – they worked out who was next with more clarity than a piece of paper of dubious legal value around which comic speculation could result.

The recent history of coaching succession plans that led to incumbent coaches heading into their final years as lame ducks is astonishingly positive.

The first one from the last 20 years was the Mick Malthouse to Nathan Buckley succession at Collingwood after the 2010 season. The human element of that was complicated, but to call it a failure is dumb.

Buckley won 55% of his games as a coach, made a prelim in his first year and lost a Grand Final over 10 years.

The next one was Paul Roos handing the reins to John Longmire also after the 2010 season at Sydney. Like with Buckley and Malthouse, this was announced before the incumbent coached his final year at the club.

Longmire was also a success. He won 64% of his games, made finals in his first year made five Grand Finals and won one in 14 years.

After that is the Paul Roos to Simon Goodwin succession plan after the 2016 season for Melbourne. This one was agreed years before it actually happened, with Goodwin tabbed to take over from 2017 after the 2014 season.

Again, Goodwin has been a success. He has won 57% of his games to this point, narrowly missed finals in his first year as coach, and then won a drought breaking premiership at Melbourne in 2021 as he heads into year nine.

The most recent one was John Worsfold handing Essendon over to Ben Rutten after the 2020 season.

This is the exception.

Rutten is the only one who made it less than eight years (Goodwin is still coaching and is contracted until the end of 2026) and won fewer than half of his games.

If you go back through each of those succession plans and look at the teams the incoming coaches took over, you’ll notice something about the list profiles. They’re all good.

Collingwood in 2011 had Pendlebury, Didak, Ball, Thomas, Sidebottom, Cloke and Swan all in their primes.

Sydney in 2011 had Shaw, Hannebery, Kennedy, Bolton, Malceski, Bolton and Goodes again in their primes.

Melbourne in 2017 had Petracca, Viney, Brayshaw, Gawn and Oliver all under 26 and heading into their primes.

You compare those lists to Essendon in 2020 and it’s chalk and cheese.

Rutten did not inherit a single A grader, and the only player that has become one from that 2020 list is Zach Merrett.

Now let’s look at Port’s list.

They have one genuine A-grader, Zac Butters, but he has been susceptible to getting tagged out of games.

Jason Horne-Francis has huge potential, but he’s not an every week A-grader just yet. That should come this year, though.

The only other guy that’s nearly at an A level is Connor Rozee but his goal output has dramatically diminished over the last two years, as he’s become more workmanlike than explosive.

Maybe we could have an argument about Aliir Aliir but we’re stretching.

Who does that list look more like? The bursting at the seams with young talent Melbourne team? Or is it like those ready-made Sydney or Collingwood teams?

Or is it more like the Essendon team that destroyed Ben Rutten?

Despite Port somehow finishing third last year with 17 wins and winning a famous final, I would say it’s comfortably between the two poles laid out. It probably edges closer to Essendon than Collingwood in 2011.

That’s the message that I would give to the Port brass that has been trying to find a reason to sack Hinkley since at least 2016.

With lists of varying talent, Hinkley has won at least 10 games every year of his career at Port and has won 16 or more in three of the last four years.

I’m aware that he hasn’t won a premiership, but his direct and territorially dominant style is perfect for a team that has all its best players concentrated in the middle of the ground.

If nothing else, he has shown himself to be a floor raiser for average lists.

I don’t know if it will work with Josh Carr taking the reins at Port after this season. I do know that Ken has done a lot with relatively little recently. If you look around the league, there’s more coaches doing the inverse.

I know what who I’d rather have.

 

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