Superlatives absolutely fail when you are talking about Sam Docherty.
Everyone knows the key aspects of his incredible story.
As the first player from Phillip Island to be drafted into the AFL his career was eagerly followed by local fans.
Between 2012-2013 he played 13 games for the Brisbane Lions before being recruited to Carlton around the same time as Dale Thomas. But it has been a bumpy ride from the sudden death of his father Eddie from a heart attack at age 53 just as he was starting his journey at Carlton in 2013, to his first John Nicholls Medal in 2016, All-Australian honours in 2017, anterior cruciate ligament injury late in 2017, and being named co-captain with Patrick Cripps in 2018 before doing his knee again at the end of 2018.
And in between two diagnoses for cancer, in November 2020 and August 2021, ‘Doc’ came back and continued on to complete a total of 166 games, to the point now where he's on the cusp of something really special at one of the huge clubs in the AFL.
And as they say, “cometh the hour, cometh the man” and in Friday night’s semi-final against Melbourne, with less than a minute on the clock, that man was Sam Docherty, winning a one-on-one contest on the flank, getting clear, taking a bounce and kicking superbly to the advantage of Blake Acres, who had been up and down the ground all night.
With the massive 95,000 crowd pulsating with life, Acres kicked a low shot through, squeaking past the goal post, to put Carlton up by a point.
They won it out of the centre again, and scored a point with only seconds to go to ice the game and set up a preliminary final meeting with Brisbane, Docherty’s first club, next week.
And all that after dislocating his shoulder in the second quarter, and coming back on after half time to play a crucial role in the win.
As coach Michael Voss said after the game you come to expect that from Docherty.
“Yeah, pretty amazing but it doesn’t surprise me with him,” said Voss.
“We spoke at half time and I said to him what have you got for me and he said he would give it his all.
“We strapped it up and he hasn’t come up too bad.
“It certainly won’t feel right if we’ve got to go forward without him.”
Speaking on Sunday, Docherty said he expected to play on Saturday night.
"I've had the scan this morning but it feels really good. I've got really good range of movement and I'm really confident I'll be able to get there," said Docherty on ABC Radio.
"To be perfectly honest, I don't think the scan will be saying whether I play or not."
Former team mate now ABC commentator, Marc Murphy, attested to Doc's great mental strength, the fact that he had been getting back to form after a calf niggle and also his immense value on the ground, not only as a player but also as an on-ground coach.
He said he firmly expected him to pursue coaching after his playing career was over.