FREMANTLE has gone from fourth-quarter pushovers to final-term bulldozers.

There's a lot to like about the Dockers' 4-1 start to the season, especially the way they're steamrolling teams late in matches.

Sunday's win over Essendon was just the latest example.

Although most of the game-shaping damage occurred in the third quarter, Fremantle kicked 4.3 to 3.1 in the fourth to round out the easy victory.

It was the fifth time in five matches they'd won the final term, a feat no other team in the competition has achieved.

What's even more remarkable from Justin Longmuir's men is that in 2021 they were the worst-performed team in final quarters across 22 rounds.

Fremantle won the fourth quarter just six times last year, ranked 18th. They were rarely blown away, losing the quarter by an average of six points, but the wins were few and far between.

This season is totally different to date.

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In round one, the Dockers executed a come-from-behind victory on the road in Adelaide, punctuated by Heath Chapman's remarkable spoil on the goal-line to cling to a one-point win.

In round four they had six individual goalkickers in the last to blow Greater Western Sydney away and turn a two-point lead into a 34-point shellacking.

On average, Fremantle is 16 points better than its opponents in final terms this season.

Sydney and Adelaide have both won that quarter four out of five times, as has Hawthorn on its way to a surprise 3-2 start to the campaign.

On the other side of the ledger, North Melbourne and Greater Western Sydney are both yet to win a fourth quarter.

That's not the end of the good news for Fremantle either, as it's the only team, alongside undefeated premier Melbourne, to have not lost a first quarter.