I hate hearing about how muh better their culture is blah blah.Longmire has made the finals 12 out of 14 years, topped the ladder on three occasions, made 5 grand finals and won one premiership. That's a phenomenal record.
Sydney have their academy rort, COLA, a potential player base of 5+ million people etc etc. It helps when you can have the best players added for free.
A bit like Geelong- they have the upper hand over the rest of the comp with proper home ground advantage, players looking to move clubs out of the bubble, and travel is an hour or two for 95% of the year.
The proof is that both teams make finals often but can't win it all. If we transplant the same players to WCE/Freo then it goes from a top 4 finish -> Elimination final and so on.