Hawthorn captain Sam Mitchell says the doomsayers who predict his club's premiership will usher in a dull, defensive AFL era need to take a closer look at the sport's history.

The Hawks' success with their rolling zone has led to expectations every other club will adopt the tactic this year, which in turn is tipped to lead to high-possession, low-scoring matches.

That prospect has led to calls in some quarters for rule changes to combat the zone.

Even AFL chairman Mike Fitzpatrick admitted this week there were aspects of the modern game he did not like, particularly the increasing use of handball.

But Mitchell said that if the critics looked at other sports and the AFL's own tactical history, they would note constant ebbs and flows between the dominance of defensive and attacking tactics.

"You look at any sport, I think you're probably a little bit insular if you're just looking at footy and thinking it's going to be all defensive," Mitchell said.

"I think any game, defence overtakes offence and then they find a new tactic that they think is going to beat the zone, then they find some defensive tactic that is going to beat whatever that was."

Mitchell pointed to then-Fitzroy coach Robert Walls' introduction of the "huddle" tactic at kick-ins in the early 1980s.

"That was too hard to stop so they started zoning, so they stopped doing that and started kicking it to outriders," Mitchell said.

"The game's going to continue to evolve."

Mitchell also defended the spectacle provided by his own side.

"Everyone thinks Hawthorn play an ugly zoning game of footy, I think the grand final was a pretty good game of footy," he said.

"Anyone who wants to try to stop the evolution of the game, if you're happy watching a 1970s game every weekend you can keep playing that way, but that's probably not the way AFL's going to go, it's an elite sport."

But Mitchell predicted the issue would soon die a natural death.

"Don't worry about it, the media's got to talk about something, they want to talk about that," he said.

"But the game's going to continue to evolve, it's going to get better and better the way it has for the last 150 years."

Meanwhile, he was unfussed that 14 of the 16 captains tipped Geelong as this year's team to beat.

"If you watched the NAB Cup that's who I would have tipped too," he said.

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