Key forwards win you flags. Carlton have no proven key forwards on the list. Waite is 29 and past his best. Mitchell is young and will take at least another 2 years to develop. Ruckman never make good key forwards. So that counts out Kreuzer & Hampson. Carlton will be lucky to stay in the 8 in 2012.
Since when?
Travis Cloke and Buddy Franklin were the dominant key forwards for the year and both their teams failed in finals despite their impact.
Geelong had Hawkins stand up on the day (much aided by an injured Reid), but he was hardly consistent for the year, and Podsiadly had been there main target for the year.
Before these two the Cats flags of 07' and 09' were hardly blessed with dominant forwards. Ablett, Mooney and Hawkins were never superstars.
Hawks won with an awesome double set-up, which hardly fired in the GF.
In recent times key forwards haven't been essential to winning premierships, but important to getting you in a position to. If you can get a player to fill that role, and have stars around them to feed them premium ball and make them look good then you can win