The former North Melbourne and Adelaide champion told Triple M on Saturday that Sylvia looked like "he fell asleep and swallowed his pillow".

After a poor showing in the Dockers' three-kilometre time trial on Thursday, Sylvia was banished to Freo's WAFL feeder side Peel Thunder for an indefinite period.

"I saw a little bit of vision on TV, and I know that TV puts weight on ... He has put on a little bit of beef," Carey said.

"[If you're a] current footballer in today's footy, you don't come back looking like a pork chop, you know. You're paid good money."

Carey lashed the former Demon for failing to put his best foot forward this pre-season after an underwhelming first year with the Dockers in which he played only six games.

"He went over there, he had an ordinary year last year, I would have thought that [after] an ordinary year last year that Colin Syliva would have turned up this year super fit and rippling and he hasn't done that," Carey said.

The seven-time All-Australian intimated that Sylvia should have embraced fully the gruelling pre-season training program that coach Ross Lyon had set his players.

"I love Ross Lyon," Carey said. "To hear that they've trained every Saturday, and I tell you what, as a footballer pre-season, and they would have been told beforehand we're training Saturdays, you just look at the coach and you go, 'Gee, I hate you. I absolutely hate you, how can we get rid of this bloke?'.

"But then five or six weeks in when you're super fit and you're going into a season where you just go, 'I feel as good as I've ever felt in my career', no matter what your age, you look at him [the coach] and go, 'I now want to go to battle with you', and that's why Ross Lyon is one of the best coaches in the comp."

Sylvia is into the second year of a three-year contract with Fremantle reportedly worth more than $1 million.

The 29-year-old joined the Dockers at the end of 2013 after a 10-year stint with Melbourne that yielded 157 games and 129 goals.