Carlton has won two games in a row and now sits six points outside of the top eight.
David King believes Blues coach David Teague deserves some credit for the defensive adjustments the club has made since the bye.
Despite Fremantle dominating the clearances, Carlton held them to just 64 points, thanks in part to goal kicking inaccuracy.
“Leigh Montagna did the prep work for Fremantle and he went through how Carlton has shifted their defence,” King said on SEN Breakfast.
“There’s now more assistance coming back. There’s a roll-off effect. The half-back flanker rolling back to assist the key position players and the wingers rolling back to assist the half-backs, that sort of thing.
“It may only be 10 metres off your man, but it’s really important. That 10 metres can cover so much. They haven’t done that for the first dozen rounds.
“Since they’ve hit the bye, they’ve been working on some things and I think that makes for really good coaching.
“David Teague needs to get some endorsement for what he’s done defensively over the last few weeks.
“It doesn’t all work straight away and he is only second year in and I think the timing of this is brilliant for David Teague.
“He can now comfortably go into the review and say this is what we had as an issue and we’ve fixed it and we need other pre-season to grow this and become more defensively rigid and have greater defensive integrity.”
Carlton faces Geelong at the MCG in Round 17 in what will be a true test of whether they have what it takes to play finals.