With all the wheeling and dealing of the AFL exchange period, draft picks were shuffled between clubs across the board.
The final order for the National Draft was released on Friday, with North moving up the ranks in the third round from pick 47 to 46.
When it comes to lottery picks, selection 46 certainly fits in the mix.
Across 29 drafts, players taken with pick 29 have combined for just 1,221 games, with an average of 42 career matches.
As was somewhat of a common theme with picks outside of the first couple of rounds in early drafts, pick 46 experienced a run of outs between 1986 and 1991. The first six players taken with selection 46 never played at VFL/AFL level.
The Saints’ Matthew Jackson broke the drought, albeit for four career games only, before a young man by the name of David King joined North Melbourne in 1993.
A mature-age recruit at 21, King arrived from VFL team Port Melbourne. He was fast, skillful and aggressive, making an immediate impact with 19 games in his first season.
A two-time All-Australian, he retired with 241 games to his name and two premiership medallions as perhaps the most memorable pick 46 of all-time.
There were some lean years to follow for the pick after ’93, with the super-talented Justin Charles who was drafted in ’94 perhaps the most memorable for reasons both good and bad.
Charles’ work ethic helped him to become one of the competition’s best ruckmen, so much so he finished sixth in the 1996 Brownlow Medal.
But his career ended in controversy, as he copped a 16-week ban for using an anabolic steroid as tried to return from a lengthy stint on the sidelines due to injury. He returned the following year, but his body let him down again and he retired at 27.
In 2001, Jarrad Waite, son of Vin, landed at Carlton as a pick 46 father-son selection.
The tall-forward played 184 games for the Blues before switching to North at the end of 2013.
Among the more significant recruits in recent years, Colin Garland (135 games), Dennis Armfield (125 games) and Ben Stratton (117 games) have all enjoyed handy careers, with the latter's three flags with the Hawks a shining light.
But history shows there are no guarantees and that is evidenced with this selection. Of the 29 players picked at 46, just nine have played over 50 games while 11 never played a game.
North has held the selection four times, with Gary Brooker (1986), Simon McCarthy (1988) and Josh Robertson (1997) never pulling on the royal blue and white.
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* Still playing. Totals current as at end of 2015 season.
F/S = Father/Son selection
Prior. = Priority selection
