Teams constantly evolve in terms of personnel from year to year.
Players retire, get injured, come in as young draftees and get recruited from other clubs.
The Hawthorn premiership side of 2008 had an average age of 24y 219 days.
The Collingwood side of 2010 an average of 24y 57 days.
But that isn't even the important point.
The Hawthorn grand final side of 2012 only had 10 individuals who played in 08.
In there premiership year of 2013 that figure was one less at 9.
That's more than half a team different in the time frame that we've gone from premiership contender to finals pretender while the hawks have just completed the three peat.
For me the succession plan has proven to be both a short term brilliant success and a medium term complete failure.
I'll maintain to the day I die that the succession plan was the catalyst for our premiership in 2010, that it drove the very best out of Mick as coach at a time the list was primed and hungry for success with a sound mix of youth and experience.
However in hindsight I believe cooler heads should have prevailed during our dominant 2011 home and away season with Buckley asked to put aside his ambitions for at least another 12 months with Malthouse retained as senior coach for 2012.
Now whether either man would have accepted this is unclear but if it had come to be then you feel Malthouse would have felt less bitter about the succession plan, that he wasn't robbed of another serious tilt at a flag in 2012 and may have been willing to undertake the director of coaching position.
Arguably even more importantly the players themselves many of which naturally felt strong loyalty to there long time and premiership coach would have been more accomodating of the goal of the succession plan and as competitive individuals not left with the feeling of a reduced opportunity to win another flag with a rookie coach.
Alas it didn't turn out like that and in the years since the dynasty Ed had envisaged has all but evaporated.
Probably the biggest direct consequence of the coaching handover has been the continual loss of the players who with those who remain from 2010 could have been the back bone of continued success like Hawthorn
While I don't put all the blame squarely on the shoulders of Buckley it's clear that personality issues arose with some players under his reign that were once loyal servants of Malthouse.
Again this isn't entirely the fault of the coach but it would be interesting to know if Shaw, O'Brien, Thomas, Wellingham and Beams would all still be at the club if Malthouse was still coach.
That loss of experience has hurt us in the short to medium term and we've cut to deep in trying to bring about "culture" change which some would argue wasn't required to begin with and has been a failure anyway it would seem.
While there loss is still being felt we did get something back in terms of top 20 draft selections and players so it's not sole reason for our current position nor an excuse and as Hawthorn has shown with smart targeted recruiting you can lose many members of a premiership side and still remain highly competitive 5 to 7years later.
Unfortunately since securing Ball and Jolly we haven't had any real success in this area until Varcoe last season have we?
That's a 6 year gap and plainly not a good enough performance from our recruitment staff and coaches and yet another reason why we've fallen off the pace as a team.
So here we are it's 2016 and our first 3 weeks have mostly been a putrid display of football.
There might be many excuses given or reasons for our current position and Buckley isn't responsible for all but he is for the game plan and it's been plainly awful this year and had major flaws in the past which have only been magnified to all and sundry of late and not simply appeared from nowhere.
If we don't improve markedly over the next 3 months he'll rightfully face the sack.
For a coach in his 5th season that appears highly reasonable to me.