BUDDY Franklin. Even the name's different. Buddy's an American name from the 1940s and 1950s. Buddy Rich was a great jazz drummer. I've never heard of an Australian being called Buddy, but then I haven't seen anything quite like Lance "Buddy" Franklin, either.

If sport is theatre, this boy's the star attraction. Only I shouldn't call him a boy. Buddy's a young man — tall, slender, brown-skinned, dark-haired, a smile that's a crease of light. And then there's the way he walks. To call it a strut is too strong a word for me because there's an easiness in the style that tells you Buddy's only doing what comes naturally.

He's like a jazzman, cool and unafraid, and, let's be frank, Buddy knows he's good. He's at ease out there with all those people watching because he's got the measure of the game. For me, last Saturday was one of those, "I knew he was good, but I didn't know he was that good" moments. Watching Hawthorn's electric responses to Buddy's every move, I was reminded of Peter Hudson, Hawthorn's great full-forward of the 1970s. Coach John Kennedy unashamedly set up the forward line around Hudson. They'd leave him one-out on the full-back in a way you can't do nowadays because players are so much more athletic and can get back and cover.

Back then, they looked like two sentries facing one another at a lonely border crossing. Their war was entirely personal. Periodically, the ball would break into their space and the contest would be on, naked and unadorned.

If Buddy looks good in every way, "Huddo", as he was known, didn't. Huddo looked like a tractor, with heavy thighs and long arms and a waddle in his walk. He wore long sleeves — taken, in those days, as a sure sign of being a lesser male. But he was quick and artful and marks stuck to his hands and he kicked ugly flat punts that went dead straight and he got belted every week just as surely as he scored lots of goals.

What do Buddy and Huddo have in common? In football, the play mostly transfers from line to line. Not when Buddy and Huddo are involved. Everyone — players and crowd — knew in Huddo's day like they know now that when Buddy goes for the ball that he is the game. Coaches can say what they like to diminish the status of individuals within their teams but I go to the football, unashamedly, to see the ones whose performances are greater than themselves.

Last Saturday's match between Hawthorn and North Melbourne at Telstra Dome was a beauty. North was terrific. It had a plan that worked. All it required was everything the Roos had and that's precisely what they gave it. They also have a champion, Brent "Boomer" Harvey.

Boomer's not like Buddy, not at all. For a start, he is, or was, the smallest man in the competition. He's white-skinned, not real pretty, but he's a mighty player, large of heart and possessed of classic skills. Check out, if you can, a moment in the third quarter on the wing when Boomer gets the ball and has three to beat.

We lament the loss of skills to the game — for example, the dummy and the baulk. We haven't been watching closely enough. Boomer did them all, but he did them at speed and what, in a slower game, was done extravagantly as a signal to the crowd to laugh and cheer is now little more than a hint, enough to send your opponent the wrong way for a second because that's all you need, you're past him.

North won for most of the day but lost convincingly in the end. The Roos were spent in body and mind and the Hawks were humming.

Other Hawthorn players who caught my eye? Cyril "Junior Boy" Rioli. His mother is Michael Long's sister. Through his father's side, he's related to another great football product of the Tiwi Islands, Maurice Rioli. Junior has Norm Smith medallists on both sides of his family. He plays like a Rioli with a hint of that hyper-energy Long brought to his great performances. Junior had four intersections with Saturday's game that were brief but thrilling. Check out the possibilities that suddenly appear when a player from the Tiwi Islands has the ball.

This article would be less than complete if I didn't also mention the phenomenon of Jarryd Roughead. Imagine you were talking to a television producer. You've got a show starring a tall, slim, extremely good-looking young man of colour (as we say nowadays) and we want the program to have general appeal. We need another character to act as a contrast for our hero, sort of like Richie was to the Fonz in Happy Days. Wouldn't you come up with Jarryd Roughead?

It's not enough that he's white-skinned and shaped like a doorway. What name would you give him if you were trying to slyly suggest the star of your show is extremely good-looking. You'd give him a name like Roughead. The Hawthorn forward line is like a cartoon, The Buddy and Roughead Show, but it works. In the sort of defensive panic Buddy engenders, opportunities are created that Roughead is more than capable of taking.

Finally, I have to mention Brad Sewell. I have to mention him because he's the sort of player you can easily miss. He's a Volkswagen among sports cars. Last Saturday, when North looked like it could tear Hawthorn apart, it was Sewell who kept getting the ball and bringing it forward, running at the North defenders and making them turn and run back to cover him. Obviously, Hawthorn knows how good Sewell is. He won its 2007 best and fairest. The Hawks, unlike me, have always been sober in their judgement of a footballer.