AFL 2022 Radar: 'Fremantle are known for utter mediocrity'

Fremantle are coming off an 11th placed finished in 2021. A club cloaked in failure, they’ve only finished higher than that nine times in their 27 AFL seasons.

It’s been seven years since the Dockers bothered the contenders at the pointy end of the season, and their players have been well-accustomed to holidays in September.

Their achilles heel has been an inability to score freely, something that hasn’t changed under coach Justin Longmuir. They have been a bottom-four attack in each of his two seasons, as well as the four years before that. Even in 2015, when they finished on top of the ladder, they were 11th in points for.

There was some speculation last season that Freo may have played some finals football and they were somehow sitting in seventh after Round 17 despite never looking a likely candidate. But in the last six rounds they lost four games by an average margin of ten goals, which gave them the reality check they required.

Ending the season with a percentage of 86.5 suggests the Dockers still have plenty of work to do, but there are enough positives to think they can turn it around quickly, particularly if they can get a good run with injury.

Is this the year Fremantle is ready to re-emerge as a finals player?

What’s new?
The Dockers will have a new look midfield given Adam Cerra won’t be a part of it since his move to Carlton. They took two top-ten picks to the draft as a result, which they parlayed into two young, local products, claiming young key forward Jye Amiss at pick eight, and a midfielder with goal sense in Neil Erasmus with pick ten.

Freo also picked around the fringes to claim a couple of offcuts from other clubs – Will Brodie from Gold Coast and Jordan Clark from Geelong. Brodie is an inside mid who could never hold down a position at the sadness factory the Suns call home, while Clark does have something about him but turned the ball over too often for Chris Scott’s liking.

If the Dockers are going to rise, it’s going to have to come from within.

Star on the rise
Sean Darcy may well end this season as the best ruckman in the competition. He’s already not far off that mark in all truth, but you have to think that he’s got even more to come.

While Darcy has looked at home from day one, having 40 hit-outs on debut against Geelong not two weeks after his 19th birthday, he has continued to improve from that point on. His main problem has been the mechanics and soundness of that huge frame keeping up with his athletic gifts.

Sean Darcy (Photo by Daniel Carson/AFL Photos via Getty Images)

In some ways he is tracking a similar path to Max Gawn, who battled injury while showing obvious talent. In the season he turned 24, which Darcy will be this year, Gawn finally played 22 games, polled 16 Brownlow votes, and earned his first All Australian guernsey.

Darcy is arguably coming off a better base than Gawn and showed at various stages last year that he can take a big contested mark, kick goals and even be an enforcer at ground level. It’s exciting to think how much further he can rise.

Who’s under the pump?
There’s no other way to cut it, but Michael Walters had a poor season in 2021, and has actually performed moderately since Justin Longmuir became coach.

He only kicked multiple goals once last year, and that was only two in his first game of the season. And this despite spending more time forward and less in the midfield than previous years, in what was supposed to help fix Freo’s forward woes. There were none of the consistent moments of magic that we’ve been used to, and rather than setting quarters ablaze he went missing far too often.

Walters is 31 the next time he kicks a footy, and the Dockers have sneakily accumulated quite a bit of depth over the last couple of years. If his desire isn’t there, or he isn’t gelling with Longmuir, and he can’t find ways to impact games, he might see his spot taken. It will be fascinating to see if he can bounce back.

Michael Walters of the Dockers (Photo by Jono Searle/AFL Photos/via Getty Images )

Best-case scenario
Fremantle have been beset by injuries in recent times, particularly to their backline. And while this must have had an impact on their short-term gains, it should hold them in good stead.

While only four players played every game last year, they had 27 play ten or more. And that doesn’t include a premiership defender like Joel Hamling, a best-22 player like Ethan Hughes, or highly rated talent like Hayden Young, Michael Frederick and Heath Chapman.

The Dockers best 22 is easily the hardest to pick, because they have 30 players that belong at AFL level and have genuine claims to be in there. If that depth stays fit and the hunger for spots spurs individuals onto greater heights and selfless team play, and they can find a way to kick winning scores, then they can be finals bound.

Worst-case scenario
The problem with always complaining about injuries all the time, as Collingwood did for many years, is that it means the list management team has crafted together a squad of crocks. If a club carries too many of these injury-prone players over too many years, then at some point you have to say they’ve done it to themselves.

The worst-case scenario for Fremantle is actually just more of what they are known for as a club – utter mediocrity. Another tenth-15th placed finish of being competitive at home and hopeless away, another wasted season.

Is it time for the Dockers to take destiny into their own hands and rewrite history? We’ll all be watching.

Best 22
B Griffin Logue Joel Hamling Hayden Young
HB Luke Ryan Alex Pearce Nathan Wilson
C Darcy Tucker Andrew Brayshaw James Aish
HF Travis Colyer Matt Taberner Michael Walters
F Lachie Schultz Rory Lobb Sam Switkowski
Foll Sean Darcy Nat Fyfe Caleb Serong
Int Brennan Cox David Mundy Ethan Hughes Michael Frederick