The first step was Paddy Ryder's wish to escape from the airport. Then Dayne Beams, too, wanted out. But the weirdness only really escalated when Ryan Griffen quit the Dogs, went bush and turned his phone off as the carnage ensued.

The Bulldogs moved on their coach, and then retaliated with an offer that was as difficult to comprehend as the infinite universe – $6 million-$7 million over seven years for a kid who's played nine games. We assume he isn't being paid in Hong Kong dollars.

But Greater Western Sydney wasn't finished. The Giants were still stalking the nightclub floor in the wee hours of the trading period, touting their AFL drink cards, hoping to pick up someone else who would complement Griffen and Joel Patfull.

They were eyeing Ryder, who had been betrothed to Port Adelaide by his manager Paul Connors. The manager wouldn't let the Giants so much as buy Paddy a drink, or have a phone call.

But, if we extend the nightclub analogy further, the Giants – emboldened by scoring Griffen – made a 3am lunge for another glamorous "untouchable": Stevie Johnson.

The Giants expressed serious interest in Stevie J  the day before the trading period expired. Geelong was made aware of their interest, as were Johnson and his management.

GWS chief executive David Matthews was the driver of the Johnson pursuit, which, doubtless, would have seen the Giants hand the Cats a first-round draft pick – GWS had three of them inside the top seven (or it could have swapped picks). Presumably, Johnson would have received a significant contract – otherwise, why would he even consider it?

Johnson, as it happens, was playing golf in the United States. His wife is expecting their second child and his expectation had been that he would finish his career as a one-club, triple premiership player, icon and Norm Smith medallist.

If you remove emotion, sentiment and club identity from the picture, there were sound reasons for Geelong off-loading the sublime Stevie, who, after all, is 30 and has had physical and attitudinal issues this year. He isn't really worth a high draft pick, despite his outstanding record and entertainment value.

Thankfully, Johnson and the Cats politely knocked back the approach, and probably saved the Giants a pile of money and a talented kid.

The attempted pick-up of Stevie was a measure of how out of hand and strange the trading marketplace became. The notion of Johnson becoming a Giant on the last day is jarring, and would have shaken football's foundations further; GWS, it seems, is prepared to live and die by the recruiting raid.

If Stevie J could be traded, who couldn't?

Happily, there are still "core" players at each club who will finish their careers as one club players. Nick Riewoldt's decision to stick has been important to the game's fabric, which was always going to be eroded by free agency – the AFL's version of no-fault divorce. One can only imagine what the late, great Robbie Flower – the apotheosis of a one-club stickler – would have made of this past fortnight.

While Griffen, Boyd, Beams, Ryder, Cooney, Lumumba, Varcoe et al should all benefit from new environments, we cannot safely predict which clubs will win and lose from the various transactions.  But the clear-cut winners from these two weeks of mayhem are abundantly clear – Boyd's manager, Liam Pickering, and Connors, who successfully landed Beams and Ryder at their preferred destinations, with an honourable mention and joint place on the podium for the Brisbane Lions and ESP's Justin Reid, who shepherded Griffen to GWS.

These past two weeks have been manna from heaven for the managers, and not too shabby for the footy media, either. Whether it works for the fans  will hinge, as ever, on how their new favourites fare. For the game's sake, though, it's nice that Stevie stayed.