Healy: History is Fremantle's for the making

For me, the highlight of this weekend of footy was simply the confirmation of just how good the Fremantle Dockers are.

You could easily make the case that the purple patches, as Daniel Hoyne calls them, are the best side in the competition. They might have the best list.

This isn’t something I’m telling you after the fact of their big win against Hawthorn, it’s a repeat of an editorial I did about this time last year, when I said they should win – and probably should – win the flag.

It was met by a fair bit of derision both here and over in the West, and history says I was too early. But the talent is basically the same.

In fact, the only difference is the addition of big Mason Cox, and medium-sized Judd McVee, who are both only just holding on to their spots.

This is a list that is premiership ready. The Fremantle Dockers, in 20 minutes in the last quarter, told us exactly how powerful and how talented this young team is, and it is young.

They want for nothing and have spares in everything. It’s now an incredibly premiership-ready combination.

When in the first quarter, they took off the handbrake and handball chained out of defence, straight into the forward line to kick goals… twice, I thought, something has changed in the coaching department.

Excited, after the game I rang the smartest man in footy (Hoyne), who responded by giving me a nice-old dressing down. I was excited, he was abusive!

'Don’t get blinded by the highlights reel, how many times have I got to tell you! It was only four successful transitions from D50 from 31 attempts!'

I was flattened, because I’d let the eyeball dictate my thinking, and was quickly shoved back in my box by the meatball with a computer.

I recovered… at least I thought I had and settled on the potential that if they can do it twice in the first quarter, they can do it again and again, enough times to win a flag.

They get a bit more adventurous in the box with the best part of half a season to go to continue to tinker, and I’ve since found out that they actually kicked five goals from just behind the centre. The transition game is slowly emerging.

Yes, it’s still very early in the season, but if injury is kind to the Dockers, history is theirs for the making.