Carlton list was the terrible when SOS arrived and its profile suggested it was only going to get worse in the coming years. SOS has cleared out heaps of players quickly that might have got a game but aren't going to improve enough to play in a potential finals side. By clearing them out he helps them bottom out to get trade picks and to a lesser extent saves some salary cap money. They have rarely traded top end draft picks away only the bottom end ones if I recall correctly - although there was one mega deal were they traded in heaps of GWS players. So he traded in heaps of young cheap GWS talent and brought in the occasional players in place of late trades that go nowhere anyway.
Whether the GWS imports work or not - that is a bonus. What's more important is what they do with the top end talent they recruit while they bottom out. They would want to get it right like Todd and Jason have. The GWS list he moulded looks alright so I think he knows what he is doing but starting from a long way back - time will tell