In 2000, the Saints won only  two-and-a-half games, and were compensated with both Nick Riewoldt and Justin Koschitzke, key-position pillars who were drafted at picks 1 and 2 in the national draft.

This year, they will receive only one early choice, and will consider ''all options'' – presumably, trading down for two picks, or a pick and a player, with that solitary selection, likely to be No.1. It all depends on who or what’s available.

Not only did the 2000 Saints gain the double dip of a priority draft choice – the same generous rule that would see Hawthorn land Jarryd Roughead and Buddy Franklin together four years later – but the system for uncontracted players was highly favourable to the bottom team.

Today, free agency is seen to have tilted the playing field towards teams higher up the ladder. James Frawley won’t flee the Demons to join the club his uncle captained; he is eyeing teams that can play finals soon.

The Saints, who used their incoming, ill-fated messiah, Malcolm Blight, to woo recruits, utilised pole position in the pre-season draft (for uncontracted/delisted players) to snatch Fraser Gehrig, a century goalkicker and dual Coleman medallist, and Aaron Hamill, the forward who would bring hardness and professionalism to their impressionable kids.

In 2000-2001 alone, the Saints used the threat of the pre-season draft to acquire a raft of uncontracted players: in addition to the critical Gehrig and Hamill (obtained in trades on St Kilda’s terms), they recruited foot soldiers such as Steven Lawrence, Matty Capuano and Craig Callaghan. They then took Brett Voss – who played 135 games for the Saints – for nothing in that pre-season draft.

The following year, as the Saints started an initially incremental climb –  and sacked Blight, replacing him with Grant Thomas – the club received another priority pick (Luke Ball). It mattered little that the second choice, No.5, was misspent on injury-prone Xavier Clarke, because the trading of Barry Hall enabled them to select the smooth operator, Nick Dal Santo, in the same draft that delivered Joe Montagna and Matt Maguire in later rounds.

By 2002, the Saints were blessed that Carlton was pinged for salary-cap cheating – delivering No.1 pick Brendon Goddard to Moorabbin (not Seaford). Luke Penny was recruited, again, as an uncontracted player (traded for pick 17), while the Saints offloaded Peter Everitt to Hawthorn.

Today, priority picks are banished – and can be given only at the ''discretion'' of the AFL, whatever that means. Free agency has taken root, and while the AFL doesn’t believe it favours the top sides, many clubs think otherwise; regardless, the Saints won’t be in the market for free agents – reckoning that they are too far away for quick fixes.

In 2014, there are 18 teams and free-agency compensation means even the bottom side often gets only one selection inside the first 20; the recent drafts have been heavily compromised.

''Certainly, the system today appears to make it more difficult for clubs at the foot of the ladder to improve,'' said Brian Waldron, who was Saints chief executive from 2000-2004. Waldron said in 2000-2001, the club had used ''the leverage'' of the pre-season draft to land all those out-of-contract players. ''Free agency took that away.'' That clubs exploited the system by what became known as ''tanking'' – stage managing a low finish – which eventually brought the end of the priority-pick largesse.

The challenges faced by bottom clubs such as the Saints was a topic of conversation at the dinner hosted by AFL bosses Gillon McLachlan and Mike Fitzpatrick with 11 senior coaches, who, by and large, expressed negative views on free agency.

No club has a harder road than the Saints, who had the competition’s oldest list in 2011 and will soon be the youngest. Several years of poor recruiting and then expansion have placed the club in a jam. Under the direction of football chief Chris Pelchen, the Saints have chosen to accelerate the pain by letting Goddard, Dal Santo and Ben McEvoy go for younger players; the hope is that these aggressive moves will also accelerate the recovery. The club is confident about the prospects from its 2013 draft, with its three selections inside 20.

''This is the most confronting list transition that many of us have been involved with,'' said Pelchen, who was list manager at Hawthorn when the club embarked on its rebuild after 2004, and at Port in its infancy. ''But we are determined to rebuild our talent base in a considered and deliberate way.'' Pelchen acknowledged that the ''current system makes it more difficult than ever before''.

By 2004, the Saints – who had started their rebuild with Robert Harvey, Austinn Jones, Max Hudghton, Andrew Thompson and others from the 1990s teams – were within a kick of a grand final. They were close again in 2005, before the near misses of 2009-10. This time, the club’s mission statement suggests a premiership by 2020 – which is viewed as optimistic by many within the industry, given the system and its list profile. This column’s view is that the Saints will need at least six years before they can contend.

But St Kilda reeks of realism about its position, the club board having recently seen a 40-page document on its list management strategy. ''Our current situation has developed for a number of reasons over a period of time,'' said Pelchen. ''I guess it could be said we have flown into the perfect storm. We appreciate that this is a very difficult period, but the club is committed to strategically working through the challenges in front of us.''

The factors that created the storm were both club-made and a result of a changing AFL climate. In 2000, the spoon they took was truly ''golden''. In the likely event that they’re last in 2014, the prize will be as wooden as any of their other 25.