You return to coaching next year and you get the choice of taking the Carlton or Richmond job on a five-year deal at $1 million per year.

That was the hypothetical put to Ken Hinkley.

The former Port Adelaide coach had zero hesitation with his answer.

“You nearly don’t have to pay me to take Richmond,” said Hinkley swiftly on SEN’s Sportsday.

But don’t worry Adem Yze, Kenny is not after your job. He was merely professing his love for what your club has done.

The Tigers did narrowly lose their Round 1 clash with the Blues but that did not dampen Hinkley’s enthusiasm for Yze’s emerging outfit.

He is a fan of the rebuild after a successful three-flag era. They allowed established contracted players to leave in exchange for a suite of draft picks which they’ve used over the past few years

“If you want a model to rebuild (on), and how to do it…,” Hinkley said on SEN’s Whateley when expanding on his Tigers comments.

“They’d won three flags so when these players came up that other clubs had interest in - whether it be Daniel Rioli, Liam Baker and Shai Bolton - they just cashed in at the right time.

“But they also knew when the good draft was coming. Everyone knew that was a great draft and I was really passionate about that draft, I watched them all really closely.”

The draft Hinkley speaks of is of course the 2024 edition in which the Tigers had eight picks in total, six being inside the top 25.

Names like Sam Lalor, Josh Smillie, Taj Hotton, Jonty Faull, Luke Trainor and Harry Armstrong are the ones with the responsibility of taking the club forward and that is a compelling and exciting situation in the mind of Hinkley.

“The talent was there, you just had to be brave enough to go there. Now, if you’re not that club who hadn’t won three flags in a row, it’s a really hard sell,” he continued.

“But of course Richmond had won three flags. So they kept the amount of senior experience they needed to keep it ok and to help coach young players which is really important.

“Their rebuild is fast-tracking, I can guarantee you. They are going to be powerful pretty quickly, again, with the talent that I’ve seen. Last Thursday I thought, ‘Wow, this is pretty promising, this group already’.

“But the courage to make it happen and more importantly to have all the information about what’s on the landscape, ‘This is a great draft, we’ve got to be big and we’ve got to be into it’.

“You’ve got to know the draft and you’ve got to hit it at the right time.

“Richmond: tick, tick and (for) courage, tick.”

The Tigers have a major test this Saturday when they host their premiership coach Damien Hardwick and the slick Gold Coast Suns at the MCG.

Nobody outside of Punt Road Oval expects them to win, as long as the Tiger cubs keep building momentum so the rebuild can continue moving forward.