With all the wheeling and dealing of the AFL exchange period, draft picks were shuffled between clubs across the board.
While North traded its first-round selection to Hawthorn in a deal for Jed Anderson, it was able to gain pick 17 in an exchange involving Ryan Bastinac.
Also part of the Bastinac deal was the 26th selection at the 2015 National Draft.
The Roos boast three picks in the top 30, the second of which will be vitally important come November 23.
Like selection 17, featured in last week’s NMFC.com.au flashback, pick 26 has come with mixed fortunes for the teams that held it over the 29 years of the National Draft.
RELATED: NMFC Draft Hub
North has held the pick just twice.
In 1995, Robert Pyman was traded to Collingwood in return for selection 26, Chris Groom.
Groom played just five games at the Kangaroos.
In 2004, North traded pick 26, along with pick 10 to Hawthorn for Nathan Thompson, who went on to become a star in his own right at Arden Street.
Given the lottery of the very early drafts, it comes as a huge surprise that arguably the greatest ever 26th pick came in 1986, recognised as the first National Draft.
Darrin Pritchard was selected by Hawthorn from Tasmanian League team Sandy Bay and went on to play 211 games as a three-time premiership player.
Perhaps Tim Notting can lay claim to being up there with the best too. Drafted in 1996, he lined up for Brisbane on 208 occasions, twice claiming a premiership medallion.
In between, there were some speculative selections. In fact, between 1988 and 1991, the four players selected at pick 26 combined for a grand total of four senior games.
And many would remember big forward Stephen Jurica kicking five goals for Richmond on a Friday night against Essendon in 1995, as Matthew Richardson sat on the sidelines injured.
Just as quickly as Jurica arrived with a bang, his career was over. He played just 13 more games and was delisted following the 1997 season.
But there were more success stories. Brodie Holland, taken by Fremantle in ‘97, played 155 games for the Dockers, then the Magpies, while Jared Rivers won a Rising Star Award at Melbourne in 2004 before transitioning to Geelong in the twilight of his career.
Garrick Ibbotson has been a regular in the Dockers’ lineup over the past decade, while Shane Edwards continues to grow in stature at the Tigers after arriving in 2006.
Of the new crop, Jack Darling is one of the emerging key-forwards of the game, while his namesake Jack Viney, son of Todd, looks a future star at the Demons.
* Still playing. Totals current as at end of 2015 season.
F/S = Father/Son selection
Prior. = Priority selection
