Doesn’t even matter.
What he did covering for Hynes the beginning of this year would have him signed pretty quickly at a few clubs
Realistically any teams recruitment staff worth their pay should have been able to see that level of play would be possible.
Was anyone in here blown away by how he went? Was pretty much what I would have expected, probably a little bit better but not significantly.
There was a pretty big sample size a recruit officer has had to make a judgement on potential on.
Before this season he has started 7 games at FE and 11 at HB and we have been generally happy with his performance for a fill-in player. Plus more than 30 games for Newtown.
If you want to sign him now it could be double what you could have had him for just 6 months ago and all he has done is play 3 NRL games for 1 win. PLUS you will need to give us one of your juniors in return.
While he was good to start this year he hardly came out of nowhere. We definitely don't know if there was other interest or not, but seems like a safe bet to say it wasn't with a high likelihood of a starting jersey. But I don't think we have seen a substantial increase in play quality from him vs what could have been expected.
My guess the NRL in general currently view him as a very strong backup so he didn't have any
better offers, as teams either had reliable back-ups (your Maddens, Pezets, Salmon/Cogger etc) or had an eye on younger guys they see as being higher upside.
It's probably likely he is more similar to Fogarty than just nobody at Sharks or anywhere else has realised he is the next Jonathan Thurston, regardless of playing decent to start the year (for just 1 win).