When Teague took over halfway through 2019, Cripps averaged 117.44 for the rest of the year - on par with his average for the whole year. That included some monster scores of 194, 152, 148 and 134, so the Teague factor seemed to have negligible effect.
Last year it is really hard to know what was going on - hubs, partner unwell, lost weight to supposedly run better. This year we now know about the back issue.
The factor that I think is overlooked here is the ruckmen. Kreuzer was very predictable to Cripps - he would either win the tap, or become an extra mid on the ground, bustling the ball forward at worst. Kreuzer as we know, was injured in round 1 last year and never played again
De Koning played most of the latter half of last year, either sharing with Pittonet, or being the preferred option. Cripps averaged 108.33 with De Koning as the main ruckman (small sample of 3 games with Pittonet out of the side).
I suspect Cripps and the other Carlton mids have struggled to adapt to life without Kreuzer, particularly with TDK injured this year. Pittonet is a battler who will randomly win his share of taps, but offers no predictability. We should find out this week if my theory has any validity.