Jackson Barrett: Port Adelaide coach-in-waiting Josh Carr is as prepared as anyone to take over Ken Hinkley

He might not have given off this impression when he was running around as Fremantle’s physical midfield enforcer, but Josh Carr is as ready to be a senior coach as anyone ever has been. The West Australian and former Docker was unveiled on Wednesday as the next coach of Port Adelaide — the club he played in a premiership with — and will take over from Ken Hinkley at the end of this season. Very few coaches — perhaps none since Hinkley — have done the type of long and winding apprenticeship Carr has undertaken to land a job. There are questions in the merits of succession plans, questions over why Hinkley hasn’t just quit now and questions over the sort of dynamic it creates between assist coach and the big boss. But there are few questions over whether Carr is the right man for the job. “He’s done it the right way. I had coached for 15 years, coached my own team, coached other teams, seen other programs and you need to do it the right way. For me, that’s why I was really confident that Josh needed an opportunity, because he has done it absolutely the right way,” Hinkley said of Carr on Wednesday. “He has coached premiership teams, he has been to other clubs ... he’s perfect.” Carr was at the top of the shopping list for Richmond, before he pulled out of the running, and was a name floated for the West Coast gig, before also withdrawing early. Port Adelaide had clearly given him the assurance he was their next man, as Hinkley spent recent years living on the edge. Coaching your own team has become so highly-valued by club executives in the past decade. He spent four years as an assistant at the Power, then coached North Adelaide to a SANFL premiership. When he returned to Fremantle to work with their developing midfield, he became one of the most highly-regarded line coaches in the entire league. All-Australians Caleb Serong and Zak Butters both praised Carr in their acceptance speeches after being named All-Australians in 2023. Andrew Brayshaw and Connor Rozee have both won blazers under his watch. The gold standard for coaching succession is those masterminded by Paul Roos. He gave John Longmire a push off the mark in 2011 before letting him run in 2012. Longmire won a flag in his first season at the helm. He then did the same with Simon Goodwin, pulling Melbourne off the depths of the ladder for his successor to them steer them to a premiership in 2021. But Collingwood fell off a cliff when Nathan Buckley took over from Mick Malthouse after the 2010 grand final replay. Buckley ended up a coach who took the Magpies to a grand final, but he had next-to-no experience outside of Collingwood before he took the keys. The same can’t be said for perennial contenders Port Adelaide and Carr.