In Part 1 of kangaroos.com.au's interview with North Melbourne recruiting manager Bryce Lewis, the workload and first half of the season was discussed. Topics included the amount of football covered in a week, the large recruiting team hard at work all over the country and more.

To read Part 1 click here.

While watching copious amounts of football during the early parts of the season, Lewis and co are able to identify many names to look out for throughout the rest of the year. North Melbourne's first pick in the 2011 National Draft, Brad McKenzie, was one of those.

“Brad would have been on every club’s radar ahead of last season,” Lewis said. “He first came to our attention in 2009 when he represented South Australia at the National Under-16 Championships, which were held in western Sydney.

In a testament to the work ethic of the recruiting team, the constant travelling to Adelaide to watch McKenzie play in the SANFL left them with no doubt that he was their man.

"There's no substitute for watching a player live. It would have been upwards of a dozen times live amongst us, adding to all of his games in our vision, when we watched Brad in person."

By contrast, emerging tall forward Aaron Black was a complete unknown to North’s recruiters when he stepped out for Peel Thunder Colts in Round 1 of the 2009 WAFL season.

“There are players who you might not be aware of at the start of the year. They might be late developers or be players who haven’t previously been in an elite pathway program.

“Aaron falls into this category. As a teenager he’d played a lot of basketball and was living in Eaton, which is near Bunbury, about two hours south of Perth. He didn’t join Peel until he was 18, but by the end of the year he had debuted in the league side and was probably his side’s best player in the Colts grand final."

With McKenzie arriving via the SANFL and Black the WAFL, state leagues can be a gold mine if scouted correctly. Clearly Lewis and his team are believers in this theory with three of the four selections in last year's Rookie Draft coming via the VFL.

Mature-age rookies via state leagues are players who have come to be regarded as ready-made AFL players. Despite the fact that Lewis believes the amount of players recruited under this banner will not increase further, they're still a valuable commodity.

“The establishment of the two expansion teams necessitated the need to find 80 to 100 new players and this has resulted in mature-age types being afforded greater opportunities.

“There are numerous examples of mature-age players coming in and having an impact in the AFL, so you’d be negligent to not pay the state leagues due respect in an attempt to identify players who can help your club moving forward.”

North's recruiting team has all the state leagues well and truly covered with the plethora of full and part-time staff. The Under 18's TAC Cup is also an area that demands attention due to the quality of players it produces.

"The TAC Cup produces more than half of the AFL draft pool so we've got to put a lot of resources and effort into that competition. The philosophy behind it being a development competition and showcasing the best players and the coaching they receive is great."

Max Warren was North Melbourne's most recent pick via the TAC Cup and the Eastern Ranges. It's not only players that work their way through the competition who are rated highly.

"Not only is it a great pathway for players but it's also great for staff when you look at those that have progressed through the competition and up to AFL ranks."

Kangaroos welfare manager Neil Connell coached the Northern Knights, assistant coach Shane Watson was in charge at Eastern Ranges while development coach John Lamont was in the TAC Cup for 10-years.

"So the competition produces outstanding players and also quality staff as well."

Part 3: Preparing for the draft