Ahh yes 'its the vibe'
My entire argument is that the club being purchased is what made them successful. Your argument was that Souths being booted out for 2 years turned them into the club they are today. When they came back into the comp they were the same shit show that they were prior to being booted. Less than 12 months after readmission the excitement had gone and their fans were back to having bumper stickers and reminiscing about Scott Sattler and Bob McCarthy.
They started to get a bit of cred and media exposure once Maximus got on board, prior to that it was borderline embarrassing to say you were a Souths fan. After the players started rocking up to games in Armarni suits and getting celebrities in the box the jerseys started going up and suddenly being a souths 'fan' was seen as the cool thing.
George did a great job in getting them back in, then went straight back to running them like clubs were run in the 80s, the board implored him to change but he wouldn't, he was running them into the ground. Luckily for them they ousted him, got Crowe and the Trust Fund baby in which made them what they are, or were. If Rusty didn't come along Souths wouldn't have survived past the 00s.