Considering we were 3 goals shy of a Grand Final last year could be a factor of players pushing themselves super hard over pre-season (competition for spots) to get back to prelim and make up for it.
Clearly Voss sees we're in the window and has been building us up to be like the Lions were in his 4GF in a row dynasty, hard running, physical and honest. Problem was back in Voss' day no interchange limits existed so certain susceptible players could be rested more frequently in shorter bursts when required. I'd imagine we'd see McGov, Martin, Saad, Cunners, Cerra and Marchbank being rotated more often particularly after numerous sprints to get a rub down and such.
I've said previously I'd be factoring footy IQ and physical resilience/genetics as priority factors for the bulk of future recruiting. For todays game is a grind and players like Diesel who were resilient physically with a huge IQ didn't need speed or size to dominate.
Back in Voss’s day interchange rotations were below 40 a game when they played those GFs. The interchange explosion didn’t happen until 2007/08.
There were no interchange limits back then but it was Malthouse and the pies who begun the interchange explosion later.