I know many hold this view but is it actually true? Look at how many of the '01 Premiership players were coached by Walls vs those who were coached by Lethal and very briefly by the other two:Robert Walls says hi
Matthews probably didn't even have the decency to offer him a reach around
Coached by Walls: Marcus Ashcroft (1991-95), Shaun Hart (1991-95), Michael Voss (1992-95), Daryl White (1992-95), Justin Leppitsch (1993-95), Nigel Lappin (1994-95), Alastair Lynch (1994-95), Chris Scott (1994-95) Jason Akermanis (1995), Craig McRae (1995)
Total: 10
Not coached by Walls: Daniel Bradshaw (1996-01), Clark Keating (1996-01), Chris Johnson (1997-01), Simon Black (1998-01), Beau McDonald (1998-01), Tim Notting (1998-01), Luke Power (1998-01), Brad Scott (1998-01), Jonathan Brown (2000-01), Robert Copeland (2001), Mal Michael (2001), Martin Pike (2001)
Total: 12
Over half of the Premiership team never played for Walls and 5/10 that did play for Walls were only coached by him for two or less seasons. So did Walls really have as big an impact as some say or was he just given a whole heap of talent from the Queensland/NT zone and the team just accumulated talented players through high end draft picks because they were mostly languishing at the bottom end of the ladder while he was coach?
If Clarko takes over in 2023 and happens to take us to the finals for the first time then of course this topic will come up again but I think the real sign of a good coach is that he finds a way to get the best out of his players. Are we seeing the best out of our players under Dew? Probably not to date but we may see it emerge in 2022. If not, Clarko can come in and should be able to get things going pretty quickly. You only have to look at some of Hawthorn's results this year with the lack of talent on their list (currently) to realise Clarko is a master at extracting the absolute best out of players, even when the ability isn't necessary there.