Doubt has been cast over Melbourne on the back of their loss to the Western Bulldogs on Saturday night.
The Demons have lost five of their last eight, going down to Fremantle, Sydney, Collingwood, Geelong and the Bulldogs.
The reigning premiers remain second on the ladder, but is that position in doubt given their recent shortcomings?
Aside from their 64-point thumping of the Brisbane Lions in Round 15, David King says the Dees have played well within themselves this year.
He has major reservations for them for the remainder of 2022, suggesting they may just struggle at the business end of the season.
“They’ve played one game for the year with severe anger against Brisbane and that was brutal,” King said on SEN’s Whateley.
“That was as good as we’ve seen for some time.
“Outside of that game, their whole profile just reads of a nice, ordinary team. A good AFL team that can threaten at centre bounce clearance, the odd clearance and the odd boundary throw-in or ball-up.
“Outside of that, they are just an average team right now.
“We are on the premiership runway. You don’t magically hit form come September 1.
“You need to build into it, it’s like a plane taking off. You’ve got to build into the premiership runway.”
King believes teams have worked out how to play the Demons and counteract their strong defensive template.
He is suggesting that doesn’t bode well for Simon Goodwin who has to either tinker and change or stay strong with his current plan.
“I talk about templates. You’re a unique product for a period of time,” King added.
“So when you’re doing something different you’ve got to win the flag that year. Everyone is going to have an off-season to look at what you’ve done, steal parts and work out how to defeat it.
“When you’re the best, you get picked apart more than anyone else. There’s now different templates on how to beat Melbourne.
“The number one template that has been adopted is to not kick the ball to Max Gawn or Luke Jackson down the line, to go around them.
“The good teams have gone around Melbourne, tried to use angles, go short then over.
“I think that they’ve been picked apart so heavily now that they’ve been forced into change.
“It’s a bad time to be forced into change.
“You could mount a case that their advantage has lasted the full season of last year and 12 weeks of this year. So it’s had a 35-game lifespan.
“Do they have to tinker? Or do they just have to get better?”
Melbourne’s obvious advantage is their dominance at the centre bounce, but if that can be curtailed, where do they seek refuge?
One of King’s favourite indicators is ‘Preliminary Final Integrity’. He believes, at the moment, the Dees don’t have much of it.
It is why King has little faith in them succeeding in September.
“We know what they’re trying to do. They’re brutal at centre bounce clearance,” King continued.
“They kicked six goals from centre bounce clearance (against the Dogs) when the average is about 1.5. That’s a massive advantage.
“They can still win a game by dominating scores from clearance, but I don’t know right now if they can win a game defensively.
“And if you can’t win games defensively, you can’t win Preliminary Finals. It’s all we track.
“Can you win a Preliminary Final playing like this? Right now, I have no faith in Melbourne winning a Preliminary Final.”
Looking at the Demons from a pessimist’s view, King ran the rule over the potential for them to slip out of the top four with games against fifth-placed Fremantle in Perth, fourth-placed Collingwood, seventh-placed Carlton and third-placed Lions in Brisbane.
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It has them in a precarious position and a fifth-placed finish would see them up against the Bulldogs in an Elimination Final.
“Paint the darkest picture, there’s a high likelihood they can finish out of the four now,” King said.
“If they finish fifth, who is going to finish eighth? The team that has just rolled them.”
King added: “It would be unfathomable for Melbourne not to be part of the finals in the second week.
“But right now, it’s a discussion. Their game is so far away from where it was defensively that it’s not the same team.
“If they’ve been worked out, it’s a bad space to live in.”
While the Demons are the current occupiers of second position, there is a harsh reality that could see them slip out, unless Goodwin finds a new way, starting with the Dockers away in a huge Friday night clash.