Purple beer is flowing in Alex Pearce’s home town. But this question made him emotional

Fremantle skipper Alex Pearce speaks with clarity and purpose about a range of topics, everything from his love of music, to the pre-grand final hype that has enveloped Perth.

But he stops in his tracks when asked to imagine what his dad, Scott, the president of Ulverstone Football Club on Tassie’s northwest coast, might feel when he gets to see his son run onto the MCG to play in an AFL grand final on Saturday.

“Ah … yeah, uh… I might get emotional if I start thinking about that too much,” the Dockers’ leader said.

“My parents have been with me every step of the way and my life has revolved around the Ulverstone football and cricket clubs, and it means a lot to be able to share it with my mum [Karen], and dad and my sister [Georgia].”

Pearce left Ulverstone at 18 when Fremantle drafted him in November 2013 with pick No.37 in “the Tom Boyd draft”, alongside lifelong friend Brady Grey (No.58) – who grew up 25 minutes away from Pearce in Burnie. The pair would manage just seven games together for the Dockers, with Grey’s breakout year, 2017, when Pearce missed the whole season.

This week, the Ulverstone Football Club has run a competition pitting local shops against each other to see which one could create the best Fremantle-themed shopfront. The local brewery, Buttons Brewing, has a purple beer flowing and the lights on Leven Bridge will be purple on Friday, too. Pearce’s old school, Ulverstone Secondary College, is holding a “Purple for Pearce” day on what they have dubbed Fremantle Friday.

Pearce’s lifelong mate, Jordan Quaile, who captained Ulverstone into the NWFL grand final a fortnight ago, said the town is buzzing. “There is a lot of love for him,” he said. Pearce was never going to miss tuning in, and watched the match against arch-rivals Devonport on a live stream. He will be hoping for a different result on Saturday – Devonport claimed their sixth-straight premiership, winning by 14 points.

A bag of bones as a teenager, the life of the man nicknamed “Moose” revolved around sport, his mates and family.

“If ‘Moose’ wasn’t at the footy club, he was at the cricket club,” Grey said.

Pearce made his footy debut for Ulverstone seniors in May 2012, aged 16, and played in a B-grade cricket premiership alongside his dad, and Quaile.

Scott Pearce, a respected sporting figure in the northwest, was the son of Wayne – one of 10 brothers – who kicked bags of goals for Ulverstone when footy was thriving in the ’60s. It’s no surprise that the Pearce name appears on a few honour boards in clubrooms around town.

Quaile said Alex and his mates spent their time “hanging around and learning and watching” from the older people at the club, the local crew’s bonds growing like compound interest.

Meanwhile, Pearce’s mum, Karen, and sister, Georgia, became doyennes of Tasmania’s equestrian world, with Karen coaching Pony Club Australia to victory in the 2026 Pony Club International Alliance (PCIA) International Mounted Games Exchange in Kentucky in the United States. Karen is a Pony Club Tasmania board member, while Georgia represented Pony Club Australia at the Generali World Club Showjumping Tournament in France’s Loire Valley in 2018. Karen will be Pearce’s guest at the Dockers’ best-and-fairest count this year.

Pearce shot up suddenly in his late teenage years like a mountain ash, towering over his peers on the footy field, yet retaining enough endurance to play in the midfield. Local scouts began to notice him and the Tassie Mariners came knocking. So, too, did Devonport – the only state league team in the northwest.

Such was his connection to his hometown, Pearce was not breaking his neck to play for Ulverstone’s local league rivals, which still makes Grey laugh. “It was hard for him to actually play for Devonport,” Grey recalled. “People told him, ‘Mate, if you don’t do it, you probably aren’t going to get drafted’.”

His talent shone in the state league and recruiters leaned forward even more when the then-199-centimetre Pearce recorded a 15.5 beep test and then ran three kilometres in 10.06 minutes the next day at the 2013 AFL draft combine. He played well with Devonport as he split his time between pulling on the boots for them and the Mariners.

The idyllic upbringing was broadening into the world beyond sport, too – Quaile recalling trips with Pearce and others near the end of their schooldays to the Falls Festival in Marion Bay, on Tasmania’s southeast coast, as signalling the start of Pearce’s lifelong love of music and gigs.

By then he had a manager, Tim Hazell, from Vivid Sport, a former Hawk who was just starting out, himself, and is still managing Pearce.

“Alex’s loyalty is a defining trait. He has never forgotten where he has come from, and who helped him get to where he has – even though he is the one who has made it happen,” Hazell said.

Grey recalls the excitement that filled Ulverstone on the night the Dockers drafted the local duo. People descended on Pearce’s house, with cars pulling up left, right and centre to celebrate the unexpected turn of events. “We were both crapping ourselves about ‘the 3ker’ [time trial] on Tuesday after the draft, and our dads were having 10 beers,” Grey said.

It took Pearce two years to break into the Dockers’ line-up – in round six, 2015, the year of the club’s most recent preliminary final appearance before this year – and, despite his talent and growth as a player, it wasn’t until 2022 that his career gathered momentum as he battled injuries that caused him to miss the 2017 and 2020 seasons, a devastating broken leg taking a year to heal.

He did not waste the time sidelined. By 2022, despite having played only 63 matches in his first eight years in Fremantle, he entered the club’s leadership group. By this time, he was a key defender but he was also a significant influence on his peers, his desire to win motivating him to develop ways in which to win – soaking up the model set by club greats Matthew Pavlich, Nat Fyfe, David Mundy, Michael Barlow and former coach Ross Lyon. He also looked internally to discover how best to get the most out of himself in a sporting sense, while also satiating his curiosity for life outside footy.

Family, friends, working in programs to help others, study, an exploration of his Indigenous heritage (he is a proud Palawa man who has spoken about the confidence he felt at the Dockers to explore his heritage), music and travel became his simple antidotes to football’s ups and downs.

“The lesson through the really hard times was about finding a balance for myself, which is not to have a life just centred around football and performance,” he said.

“I understand clearly that football performance takes up a big part of my life, and it is super important, but the relationships I have outside with friends and family, and the person I want to be, also plays a big part in allowing me to play games and train with a mindset where I am free, and I can go out and do my thing with less pressure.”

Coach Justin Longmuir, perhaps an even deeper thinker, became a perfect match for Pearce as the pair created an environment that allowed everyone to flourish. They understand the importance the mind in high performance, but they also carry intrinsic qualities learnt through community sport that have grounded them.

Studying psychology helped develop Pearce as a leader.

“There is an awareness that your mind controls a lot of what you do,” Pearce said, “And your mindset is so important, and that is something that ‘JL’ [Longmuir] really shares, and we do a lot of work on that as a team and I continue to as a player and a leader.

“I am better at being conscious of my emotions and the way I am acting, trying to make sure I am giving my teammates what they need and giving myself what I need [to perform].

“I also like to have a real lens on the group and where are we at, and how are we feeling – what is our best mindset when we perform, what are the challenges that come up, [and] how do we get ahead of that?”

For all that, Pearce’s quirks remain. He couldn’t resist nominating Canadian rock duo Angine de Poitrine as the artists he would like to see perform at the AFL grand final in the annual captain’s poll. Other rival skippers nominated American country singer Luke Combs, Robbie Williams to go around again, and Oasis.

“I don’t take those things too seriously. It would cause quite a stir if they [Angine de Poitrine] did appear on grand final day. I’d like to see how the crowd would react,” Pearce said.

“When my life is at its best, and I have got the right balance, often I am listening to music.”

Pearce is wary of using his profile to make a difference in an environment which is increasingly hostile when it comes to debating social issues. “I find it challenging. I am not going to give you more there, but yeah, it’s challenging at times,” he said.

Quaile says you only have to see Pearce’s interactions with Ulverstone’s locals on his regular visits home to understand that the connections he still holds there are as strong and authentic now as they were when he left.

“When you move away, you probably appreciate a bit more what you had growing up, and Alex is definitely like that,” Quaile said.

“I am, in particular, really proud of him for the way he has gone about his career and the things he has stood up for. He has ensured he has got an identity away from being a footballer. When people look up to him, he is more than just a footballer – he is a strong man who is proud of his heritage, and he stands up for the right things.”

Grey says it’s a family trait, saying Scott Pearce is the bloke who never forgets someone’s name, always asks how the family is, and will stop for 10 minutes if he bumps into someone he knows – which is most of Tasmania’s northwest.

“They are a bloody good family,” Grey said.

It’s obvious why the Tasmania Devils have Pearce on their radar to join the club in 2028. He has not allowed that to enter his thinking this season.

“[I’ve] done a really good job of not thinking about that, and particularly at this time of the year I have much bigger things to worry about,” Pearce said.

When he leads the Dockers onto the MCG, he will be representing not just the footy club, but also the town of Fremantle (a section of Australia with a thriving arts and music scene), and the Tassie town he came from.

“It is really special for me because I grew up as that footy-mad kid. There were AFL players from the northwest (a list that includes Alastair Lynch [Burnie], Matthew Richardson [Devonport] and Grant Birchall [Devonport]) but there isn’t one who played for the Robins [Ulverstone],” Pearce said.

“I hope I have been able to set a good example and give them something to care about and cheer about. It is another thing that will be special about the weekend, because I will have a lot of people following me.”

Grey has “no doubt the whole town will stop and watch” Pearce play.

Quaile agrees.“He is one of our own.”

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