ANOTHER week, another dominant performance from Lance "Buddy" Franklin. It's par for the course these days. And with each brilliant game by the Hawthorn superstar, so are the comparisons with one of the greatest players football has seen becoming increasingly apt.

When Wayne Carey retired in 2004, we pondered whether we would ever see another power forward of the same stature, presence and all-round brilliance. We might just have one. And it's taken only four years.

Longevity, obviously, is going to be the factor which determines whether Buddy can be as good as the King. Carey played 16 seasons and 272 games worth of AFL football, won innumerable individual honours, and captained two premiership teams.

But Franklin, still just 21, is right on track. In fact, their records are starting to look eerily similar, and in some instances, Franklin's is superior.

Saturday night's superb nine-goal haul against a hapless Essendon defence was Franklin's 67th game of AFL football in his fourth season at senior level. He's averaging 13 disposals, five marks, and a couple of tackles per game.

Carey played his 67th game midway through his fifth season, in round seven, 1993. He was 21, too, though by then captain of North Melbourne. At that stage, he averaged 15 disposals, six marks and one tackle a game.

Like Franklin, even at that relatively tender age, Carey exuded ridiculous amounts of self-confidence and swagger. But where Buddy leaves even a certified AFL great in his wake is when it comes to scoring power.

Granted, Carey generally played a little further from goal, and North Melbourne had a very good full-forward in John Longmire kicking the bulk of its score. But Franklin isn't averse to venturing a fair way from goal, either. And why not? He can slot them home just as easily from 60 metres as 25.

After 67 games, Carey had a goalkicking aggregate of 139.91. Buddy is already up to 184.122, and is re-writing modern football theory as we speak.

The days of the 100-plus goalkicker are supposed to be over. Tony Lockett was the last player to top the ton in the season proper, in 1998. But Franklin is taking us back to the era of Lockett, Jason Dunstall and Gary Ablett senior, a time when booting the ton was de rigueur for a Coleman medallist, 13 of the 16 winners of that honour doing so from 1983-98.

With 59 goals after 11 rounds this season, barring injury, something will have to go spectacularly wrong for Franklin not to end 2008 with well over 100 and a Coleman Medal draped around his neck. Quite possibly a premiership medallion as well.

If it does go pear-shaped for Franklin, it seems far more likely to occur via events off the ground than anything that happens on it. And that's one area in which Carey had a considerable advantage over his latter-day heir apparent.

As big as AFL football was in the mid-1990s, the superstars of the game didn't face anything like the sort of scrutiny they do now. And that could be the biggest challenge Hawthorn faces in keeping this footballing skyrocket soaring.

I was in the Hawthorn rooms post-game for 3AW on Saturday night when Franklin and the Hawks came in after their efficient dismissal of Essendon's brief challenge. Of course, we all wanted to speak to the nine-goal hero. But it wasn't going to happen.

"F--- the media" was the essence of his response when club media personnel asked him whether he was up for a chat. It was pretty understandable.

Franklin had just been put through the ringer of public tut-tutting for the best part of a week for a nightclub incident the seriousness of which is still the subject of conjecture, and which, cast even in its worst possible light, was hardly a hanging offence.

Two women, a proposition, some expletives, and maybe the tossing of a drink. Stop the presses.

There was even a controversy about some mobile phone camera footage from a couple of years back. Yes, Franklin is a young bloke who fancies himself, particularly with the ladies. Well, you don't say.

What can be said after Saturday night is that Franklin clearly has a remarkable capacity to shrug off the distractions that have turned less resilient types into a quivering heap, and just go on producing one spectacular performance after the next.

Wayne Carey isn't a bloke easily impressed, but surely even he would be watching Franklin with not just a little admiration.

Sure, Buddy still has a long way to go to end up with the sort of footballing innings the King managed to compile over the journey.

But the early part of Franklin's career knock has been negotiated with aplomb. And as good as Carey always was to watch, would anyone seriously argue that this hand isn't proving every bit as entertaining?