Everything in this crazy ol' life involves risks- they might succeed or not. The real question is whether you're getting value for money, i.e. whether you're backing a nag at 10-1 that will only win once every 20 outings.
Unless we got an absolute freakin' bargain on the deal, it's hard to see the value in trying Crawford as a short-term fix.
The evidence is here on this very website.
Here's the history of players drafted/traded who had achieved at least a little something at their old club, but were (known to be) over the hump in their careers, put into 3 categories:
Successes: Tony Lockett (1994 obviously, not 2002!), Paul Roos, Schwatta, Jason Ball, Paul Williams.
Failures: Rudi Mandemaker*, Paul Hawke (in 1991), Phil Krakouer, Richard Osborne, John Hutton, Brad Hardie (!), Dermie, Shannon Corcoran, Scott Russell, Brett Allison, Stephen Tingay, Nick Daffy.
Call it square: Darren Kappler, Dean McRae, Derek Kickett, Kevin Dyson.
I might have missed more obscure players, especially in the early years. Where it's not obvious, I've called a player 'over the hump' if they were over 25 yoa at the time of first playing for us.
I've only tracked whether the player was a success for us, as it's impossible to determine whether players who played very little for us and were then traded away (and played some decent footy after that) got us value with their replacements. For example, Richard Osborne.
It's true that Crawfod is a more talented player than most of the above. Nonetheless, in 17 years of trying (and trying, and trying), bringing in older players from other clubs has worked on very few, select occasions. The difference between successes and failures are those who are prepared to work hard and start afresh, rather than expecting to just drift through on natural talent and reputation- but that's a question-begging criterion, 'cos you only really know if they are going to buckle down once they arrive at the club. Well, except for Brad Hardie! Whose brain exploded that day?
If he comes here, Crawfie might be one of the successes. I hope so. I just don't like our chances so much.
* There's a slight typo on RWO where they call him 'Mandemacher'; and sure, he wasn't that old in 1988, but big Rudi was over the hump after about the 2nd season he played footy. I cacked myself when I found out that Sydney recruited him!
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