One of the great exercises when talking footy is to debate your club's best draft steals. Sure, high draft picks are great, but everyone knows it's much easier to hit a winner with a top 10 selection than it is with a pick in the 50's. Or in the Rookie Draft for that matter.
So we've decided to put together something for you to refer to next time the debate springs up over a couple of beers.
For the purposes of this exercise, anyone drafted before pick 40 is ineligible and we've decided to keep it in the AFL era. This is by no means a complete list, every year tosses up several gems and sadly, we can't include them all.
So without further distraction, here are our biggest draft steals for every club in the competition.
Sydney
Adam Goodes (pick 43)
One thing becomes clear when looking at the Swans' draft history, they have an incredible success rate. While it was tempting to pick Kirk here, solely because of that viral clip of his work for the Channel 7 Saturday football coverage, it could only be Goodes.
Not just one of the greatest draft steals ever, Goodes is also one of the best to have ever played AFL football. A dominant player all over the ground, Goodes' incredible athleticism allowed gave the Swans incredible flexibility during his career.
A dual Brownlow medalist and premiership player, Goodes was also a triple B&F winner and leading goalkicker for the swans, four time All-Australian and the 1999 Rising Star. Throw in the 372 games and nearly 500 goals and the value for a pick 43 is clear for all to see.
Honourable mentions: Andrew Dunkley (pick 56), Michael O'Loughlin (pick 40), Brett Kirk (Rookie selection), Ryan O'Keefe (pick 56), Luke Parker (pick 40)
