In the 2000 trade period, Carlton traded Aaron Hamill to St Kilda for Sam Cranage and the fourth pick in the draft – Luke Livingstone.
Comments made by then Blues president John Elliott at the club’s best and fairest suggesting that Hamill was expendable catalysed the trade request, ultimately leading to the key forward’s storied career at Moorabbin.
However, the trade nearly went in an entirely different direction.
A lucrative offer from St Kilda reportedly sealed Hamill’s desire to head there but going into the final day of the trade period, Carlton recruiting manager Shane O’Sullivan had other ideas.
“We thought we had a deal with the Sydney Swans,” O’Sullivan told the Carlton website.
“We were going to get Leo Barry and a couple of other things, in terms of picks.
“On the morning of the final day, we got a phone call from St Kilda to say that Aaron was going down there.
“We said, ‘No, he’s going to Sydney’, and rang Ricky Barham at the Swans, who thought he was going to Sydney as well. But his manager David Allison had obviously done a deal with St Kilda: that’s just the way it goes.”
Had Hamill ended up a Swan, the early 2000s may have looked quite different.
The clearest example is Sydney premiership hero Leo Barry ending up at Carlton, five years before his signature performance in the 2005 Grand Final.
Hamill ends up at the Swans, giving them a weapon inside 50 as they built the bones of a dominant side.
Sydney's first round pick in 2000, which may have gone to the Blues in the deal, ultimately passed through the hands of Collingwood, Fremantle and North Melbourne in trades that included James Clement, Brodie Holland, Paul Williams and Peter Bell. The Roos drafted Daniel Motlop with it.
One fluctuation in the trade period potentially could have affected multiple clubs and changed the flow of the early 2000s.
It was an era shaping off-season for St Kilda, trading for Hamill and Fraser Gehrig before drafting Nick Riewoldt and Justin Koschitzke.
They also brought in Craig Callaghan, Matthew Capuano and Steven Lawrence, offloading Cranage, David Sierakowski, Darryl Wakelin, Joe McLaren and Matthew Carr
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