I know what you and the other posters on here mean, but I view our spine to be elite already and here is why.
We have had 2 back to back seasons where we have out performed more celebrated and experienced spines and finished above them. And even though Moses had a very patchy season last year, we still managed to dominate most sides and that is with a spine that 2 of the 4 are relatively very inexperienced.
With more games now including finals, we will boost this season a very elite spine that baring injuries should be in the top 3 or 4 spines in the comp again. I mean when you are comparing all four players from each club as a whole, ours is right up there. We are better then almost all spines in the NRL.
Look for example the Roosters, Tedesco and Keary may edge out our two in those positions, but our hooker and 5/8th in my opinion are better, especially if Mahoney can recapture his running game, and we could even out point Keary or at least be evens with him if Moses recaptures his best form this year. (NOTE: Keary is their half playing in 6)
Then there is Penrith, I rate Cleary on last years form better then Moses and Api Koroisau also better then Mahoney, but then I rate our fullback better the theirs and the 5/8ths at this point at about even. But the thing here is Moses is not that far behind Cleary. So if he can start playing the way he can before his calf injury, then our spine is at least as good as theirs. But either way we aren't that far behind the Grand Finalists of last year.
Melbourne have Munster and Harry, who are obviously streets ahead of our 2 in these positions. But we have Moses who is at least as good as their 7. Then I know most would rate Papenhuyzen a better fullback the Guth, but I wouldn't trade Guth for him. He brings so much to our team that Pap doesn't, but I won't go into it here other then to say he is invaluable to our team. But yes the storm do on paper have an edge on our spine overall, but not by much at all, which means we are still in the elite class.
Then there is the Raiders. Other then fullback, their other 3 spine players are better or equal to our spine players on last years form overall, but Moses has the ability to exceed anything that George Williams can produce if he bounces back to his best this year. But either way we are up there and very close to them also.
Souths are a very good package of 4, that is overall in every position better then ours, but their problem, some could say like ours is consistency. But the 2 young blokes in our spine are a major reason for that inconsistency, needing more experience and maturity, whereas the Bunnies don't have that excuse. Also if Moses plays his best game this season, he has a better running game then Reynolds and has a kicking game almost as good.
Manly's 1 and 7 are obviously better and equal to ours in that order, but then we blow them away in the other to positions.
As for the rest of the NRL, we piss all over them.
The major takeaway from this though isn't if we have an elite spine, which to me is bleeding obvious, but just how elite it manages to get hinges on Moses regaining his running game and not losing his "team playmaker game" in the process. If this happens, not only have we got an elite spine, but we will catapult probably all the other spines in the NRL to being overall the best.
Also a major improvement will materialize if Mahoney starts to run. That alone will improve our attack by at least 20%. But even without much of a running game he is still high quality if not a little predictable in attack much like Jake Friend at the Roosters. Also at least this year we have backups for him, which may assist in his overall game too.
Note: I know that the abilities of one great superstar spine player like a Trbojevic or Mitchell can blow away any opposition team on their own and that is why they earn the big bucks. But I am analyzing the overall qualities of each spine as a whole. And remember, when playing a quality opponent like these guys if you have an overall high quality team who are all focused you can and we have minimised their contribution against us. The trick is for our spine players to step up and dominate over the rest of theirs.
