List management is a balance. You may argue we've neglected the spine but the answer is not to go in the complete opposite direction and not look to bolstering our stocks elsewhere on the park.
I totally agree with you that it is a balancing act and our club has not done it that well over the past 6-8 seasons.
An example of that was the year we went tall crazy and snaffled Watson, Mitchell & McCarthy in attempt to address the list deficiencies. Problem there was Mitchell & McCarthy didn't make it and there is strong evidence to suggest Watson isn't going to either making that draft a complete wipe-out.
Clearly we do not have the necessary key position players at the club and need to draft some in, bearing in mind that they do take longer in the development phase. If we accept that Jamison is going to retire at the end this new contract, then we should be grooming his replacement now, not the year leading into his exit interview.
I cannot see us being successful until we address the spine as it has been our Achilles heel for way too long.
This does not mean we draft & trade only for key position players either, we need to be constantly reviewing our list and looking for where the next hotspot is going to occur. Judd, Carrazzo & Simpson are about to retire so we certainly need to be picking up one solid midfielder every year at the draft regardless of the other player types acquired as the midfield is where the game is at in this modern era.
Get as close to an ideal spread of player types on the list and then have some sort of succession planning after that.