BY season's end, as many as 15 players could reach and possibly pass milestones with the Port Adelaide Football Club - none more significant than Travis Boak with his 350th AFL game this weekend on the big stage of the MCG.
Four - vice-captain Zak Butters, key forward Todd Marshall, defender Ryan Burton and midfielder Willem Drew - will have their names marked on their lockers at Alberton forever on reaching the 100-game milestone at Port Adelaide.
"It is extremely humbling," says Paul Stewart, one of 53 players to have their names honoured to eternity for playing 100 AFL games with Port Adelaide.
Stewart seemingly waited - by his memory - an eternity for that 100th senior game in 2016, his final year as a player for Port Adelaide.
"It was the one milestone - one achievement - I never thought I would get to," says Stewart, now the club's SANFL team manager who continues to work on the welfare of players with Justin Westhoff.
"Even when I was at 96 games and then 97, 98 and 99," adds Stewart with the tone of a Test cricketer approaching the ton through the nervous 90s, "I did not think I would make it to 100."
Stewart finished Season 2015 with the round 16 Showdown marking his 87th AFL game after arriving at Port Adelaide as the No.23 call in the 2006 AFL national draft in which Boak was taken at pick No.5.
"I was a fair way off 100," says Stewart, who etched his name in Port Adelaide folklore with the match-winning goal against North Melbourne at Football Park in round 8, 2012 after the deficit had blown out to 32 points nine minutes into the last term.
"I never even thought I would get close (to the 100-game milestone)."
On July 30, 2016 - with a 94-point belting of Brisbane at the Gabba - Stewart earned his name on the No.14 locker at Alberton for eternity alongside the names of John Cahill, Peter Obst, Harold Oliver and Stephen Paxman.
"It is something I am super proud of," says Stewart, who finished his AFL career at 101 matches. "It is cliche, but you do reflect on it more after you stop playing.
"And it is not seeing your name on the locker that leaves the biggest impression. It is the names that came before you. And then you look at the other names on other lockers ... that tells you the story, the long story, of the Port Adelaide Football Club."
Darren Mead was the first to reach the 100-game milestone at AFL level at Port Adelaide - in the No.33 jumper with a win against Fremantle at the lost Subiaco Oval in Perth in early July 2001.
The John Cahill Medallist defender also is the only player to have reached the 100-game milestone in both the SANFL and AFL for Port Adelaide. He contends he should have his name on the No.33 locker twice, once in teal for the AFL achievement and once in white for his milestone moment in the State league.
Like Stewart, the history that is permanently marked on the Port Adelaide lockers leave the greatest impression on Mead.
"You see who came before you," said Mead. "I had Russell Ebert take me to meet (Allan) "Bull" Revel who played 100 games in No.33 (187 SANFL league games from 1932-1945). You remember those moments ...
"It is an important tradition at Port Adelaide. I can't speak for others, but it meant a lot to me as someone who grew up with Port Adelaide through and through. It means so much to me to be a one-club player ... and at a club such as Port Adelaide."
Since Port Adelaide's promotion from the SANFL to the AFL in 1997, 53 players have reached and passed the 100-game milestone earning their names permanently on a locker at Alberton.
"It is a special moment," says Mead. "At the time you don't want to look back, but now - and I am not one to dwell on the past - it is a memory that sparks so many other good memories."
Season 2024 will bring many significant milestone moments to follow Boak's celebration this weekend when the former club captain will close the gap on Russell Ebert's club record of 392 senior games.
Brownlow Medallist and former captain Ollie Wines could reach his 250th AFL milestone late in the season. An extremely long run in September - and no setbacks during the home-and-away season - would get Darcy Byrne-Jones to 200.
The 150th game milestone awaits Dan Houston and Sam Powell-Pepper, whilst Charlie Dixon is set to play 150 club games at Port Adelaide.
And that first milestone marker - at 50 AFL games at Port Adelaide - is before Mitch Georgiades, Jeremy Finlayson, Lachie Jones and Jed McEntee.
