As Richmond's triple premiership-winning and longest-serving skipper Trent Cotchin steps down from his captaincy role, Jack Riewoldt says the "sad moment" is also an important one for the club's next step forward.

Speaking on Fox Footy's AFL 360 on Tuesday night, the star forward lauded Cotchin as "arguably the greatest captain of Richmond of all time".

"It’s a long time as captain and he can be credited with the shift of the whole football club, along with the coach Damien Hardwick," Riewoldt said.

"He just did everything right and we don’t lose him as a player, he’s going to play on next year obviously which is super exciting, but the door opens for someone else to come in and fill really big shoes.

"The timing I think is great for the fact that there’s a few of the older crew who are going to be around for maybe one, two or three more years that can help the next person through, so it’s not going to be sort of thrown to the wolves a little bit.

Riewoldt was confident the team will be in good hands with their next leader, with a number of Tigers on the list capable of stepping into the role. 

"We’ve got a litany of blokes that could come in and pick up that role and we're just excited to see who the boys think the next captain is going to be," he said.

Riewoldt said Cotchin, who has played 188 of his 268 career games at the helm after being appointed the captaincy role at 23 years old, would continue to inspire both on and off the field.

"Whilst he’ll lose the captain logo next to his name, he’ll still lead from the front," Riewoldt said.

"It may free him up to become a bit of a different leader in different areas of the football club which we’re excited about."