Hawthorn trading Sam Mitchell and Jordan Lewis is a succession plan towards club’s next premiership

THE moves to send Sam Mitchell to West Coast and now Jordan Lewis to Melbourne has shocked the football world. But for Hawthorn, these moves are made out of necessity and part of a plan.

THEY are hard calls Hawthorn had been considering all season.

The moves to send Sam Mitchell to West Coast and now Jordan Lewis to Melbourne has shocked sections of the football world.

But for Hawthorn, these moves are made out of necessity, and part of a highly-orchestrated plan that includes even more movement at the end of next season.

Hawthorn has long been wanting to stagger the retirements of Mitchell and Lewis, Luke Hodge, Shaun Burgoyne, Josh Gibson, Jarryd Roughead and Ben McEvoy.

And the reality is they couldn’t all go in one hit, at the end of next season.

Clearing Mitchell and Lewis now gives the Hawks crucial salary cap space to land Tom Mitchell, Tyrone Vickery, and Jaeger O’Meara, helping reload and refresh their ageing team for another shot at a premiership in coming years.

And at the end of next season, bigger moves are afoot as the Hawks prepare to clear more than $1 million in their salary cap when Hodge, Burgoyne and Gibson most likely retire.

Sam Mitchell is no longer a Hawthorn player after being traded to West Coast. Picture: Sarah Reed

Just like this year, more big names will be targeted.

We sheet a lot of the responsibility about Lewis and Mitchell to coach Alastair Clarkson, but list manager Graham Wright, chief executive Stuart Fox and football director Andrew Gowers have been focusing on their next premiership tilt for some time.

And it was known to them, with seven debutants and no Roughead this season, that a flag was unlikely to be this year. Success in 2016 was always a bonus.

Really, it was the start of a transition period and Clarkson kept telling us as much.

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While the Mitchell and Lewis news has filled up the bulletins over the past four days, and we’ve all wondered whether it will tear at the team fabric that has taken Hawthorn on one of the greatest magic carpet rides we have seen, there has been almost no backlash at Waverley.

There’s been no protests out the front gates, no streams of heated phone calls or emails.

Hawthorn’s playing group is backing the club on this one, as hard as these calls are.

And fans trust Hawthorn’s decision-making, after making similarly tough decisions in 2004 when Clarkson first arrived and helped turn over the list.

Jordan Lewis is expected to depart the Hawks. Picture: Wayne Ludbey

Remember, the is the club which plucked struggling big man Jack Fitzpatrick from Melbourne, who, to everyone’s surprise, kicked the blinding goal that saved them against Collingwood on the eve of this year’s finals. They have good form.

But overall, Hawthorn won six games this year by less than 10 points. The Hawks’ ladder position flattered them.

They were bundled out of the finals in straight sets and might have been thankful to make it at all.

Change was always coming. It had to.

The Hawks know they need more speed in the midfield and Lewis and Mitchell weren’t getting any quicker, despite finishing top-two in the club’s best and fairest this season.

Their brains move faster and they will play more quality football next season because they are proud and competitive, in the same way Steve Johnson was headed towards an All-Australian guernsey midway through last season.

But these moves were about walking away from the cliff edge before Hawthorn’s playing list tumbled over it. They don’t want to fall into oblivion, as other ageing teams have.

Unless the player leadership group dramatically rejects the Hawks’ handling of the situation, which it hasn’t, these moves should be seen as bold and calculated rather than overtly dangerous or crazy.

Josh Gibson and captain Luke Hodge may join the list of departing players at the end of next year as Hawthorn set up its next premiership tilt. Picture: Alex Coppel

The Hawks have been in close contact with Lewis about his future and even though he indicated to them about Thursday he wanted to stay, things changed on Friday when Liam Pickering met with the Demons and now Lewis is expected to go.

Lewis and the Hawks are still on good terms.

The confusing part was when Wright said on Friday Hawthorn would hold Lewis at the club against his will, but the reality is the club will be happy to rubber stamp a deal, albeit with some argy-bargy about what he is worth.

Maybe pick No.66 or No.84 or a player-swap, but it will happen.

Lewis is a great pick-up for Melbourne because he will deliver a much-needed injection of leadership to a young team on the rise under Simon Goodwin.

He will add to their culture and challenge it as well, helping the burgeoning Demons cope with the increasing expectations they will face next season.

A three-year deal is a juicy opportunity, and one that can refresh a player in the twilight of his career, as the Dees look to play finals for the first time in 11 years.

Tom Mitchell will serve as an immediate and long-term replacement for Sam Mitchell in the Hawthorn midfield. Picture: Mark Evans

The Hawks are happy with Mitchell, Vickery and O’Meara, given Vickery, in particular, has cost them nothing as a free agent.

West Coast is looking for something similar in a ruck-forward and is weighing up between veterans Will Minson and Drew Petrie and a stack of state-league players.

Vickery is part of a plan to help ease the burden on Jack Gunston, and regain some of the scoring potency that Hawthorn lost last year.

As Geelong has experienced, moving on champions Johnson, Paul Chapman and potentially Jimmy Bartel, there are some tricky seas to navigate in these transition periods.

Especially when you have been at the top for so long and some of the premiership heroes command gold-plated statues in all our minds.

But they will all go, at some stage. And Hawthorn it could not lose them all in one go.

This is Hawthorn’s succession plan. We just never saw it coming.

Originally published as Hawthorn trading Sam Mitchell and Jordan Lewis is a succession plan towards club’s next premiership