Much of the rugby league world is waiting for the Roosters to destroy them.
In the pre-season, they were warm premiership favourites and they weren't far off that last season either. In fact, it feels like they've been in the premiership conversation before every season since man discovered fire.
Even when they've stumbled in the years since their back-to-back premierships in 2018-19, nobody has ever panicked too much. For the most part, we've sat there patiently waiting for them to once again turn into the kind of team that dominates the competition like it's their birthright.
That's the luxury that comes with being one of the dominant clubs of this century: You earn the benefit of the doubt, even when things don't quite work out. A lacklustre beginning to the year is hand-waved away as a classic slow Tricolours start.
They time their run. They get hot when it matters. They always have the expectation they will come good when it matters and bury the rest of the competition alive.
One day, they'll become a monster, we just have to wait for that day to arrive.
Their 27-26 win over the Dragons on Anzac Day was, in it's own way, a classic Roosters win.
It was an ominous warning of what this team might one day be and a frustrating example of what they still are.
The good signs came thick and fast early. For the first 50 minutes or so, this was Victor Radley's best game, not just this season but for a couple of seasons.
Yet the club's stuttering attack in recent weeks is not down to a single player. Everything looks a whole lot more dangerous when Radley gets his passes right, as he did when he connected with Egan Butcher in the lead-up to the opening try of the day.
Radley and Brandon Smith — who had his busiest game for the club after tough outings against Melbourne and Cronulla — both played with far more width, allowing the Roosters to attack both edges of the field in rapid succession, as well as pulling open holes in the middle of the field.
Such a dynamic attacking approach led to Radley's score in the first half and to Joseph Manu's just after the break.
Manu looked dangerous at five-eighth and straightened-up the attack while Luke Keary looked as sharp as he has all year.
There were glimpses of a great football side out there, of true connection between all the disparate and brilliant parts that exist within this team.
After Manu's try, it felt possible that we were witnessing the birth of a monster but the Roosters have made a habit of taking one step forward and two steps back in recent times.
The shaky edge defence, a problem for several weeks now, reared is head up again as the Dragons scored three straight tries that all originated down the Tricolours left side.
Tautau Moga, a Roosters prodigy in another time, found plenty of joy in scoring a hat trick as Joseph Sua'ali'i struggled defensively in the centres.
There were other bad habits that returned as the Roosters got stuck into the patterns they are finding so hard to change.
Radley was sin-binned, for the third week in a row — although this did seem to be more on reputation and far closer to a head clash than a high shot — and the offence stalled in the attacking half without him.
The disconnect between what this side can be and what they are was summed up in Luke Keary's match-winning field goal.
It was the last tackle and Manu took off from dummy half before throwing a long pass back to Keary, who duly nailed the kick from the 30-metre line.
The winning moment was a triumph of talent, not execution nor connection nor any of the things Trent Robinson praises when his team is running at full capacity.
The Dragons are not a team that lacks for talent or ticker — young fullback Tyrell Sloan was superb and instrumental in the fightback — but they miss the details.
This was the third game in a row they've scored as many or more tries than their opposition and failed to close it out.
They were loose around the middle throughout and looked ripe for the plucking at half-time but — instead of the crushing, breakout win that seemed in the offing — it was more of the same from the Roosters, the same mix that has become common for them this season.
They still won, of course, and the sky is far from falling. The side's ability to steady the ship once the Dragons scored their three quick tries and when Radley was in the bin was no small thing.
Those positive signs and that ability to close out the match is part of the reason nobody is panicking. This is the Roosters and so many of us are so sure they will eventually turn into what so many dread they can become.
They are not running out time for this to happen, but it has to happen sooner rather than later.
The season is not beginning anymore. It's in it's adolescence and Origin is looming and it will hit the Roosters like a tonne of bricks like it always does.
Whatever this is, it's not a slow start because we aren't really at the start anymore.
Championship rivals such as South Sydney are looking more fully-formed and the day when it will be time to hit the gas, lest they risk being left behind, is on the horizon.
The Roosters like to say they play for premierships. They know what it takes and they have all the pieces. There are few doubters, but before long the faith must be justified.
