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Merrin has been playing less as a prop who is attempting to provide momentum, bending the line and softening the defence early in the set, and more as a smaller forward building on the props work by trying to find the gap in the opposition defensive line, using his larger frame (relative to a half) to hit the line, offload ball and extend the attacking play. just because a back rower is playing in the middle of the field doesn't mean he is instantly a prop. they do defend in the middle of the field with the two props and the acting half, so do get through a lot of work in defence, but their use in attack is different and builds on the more physical work of props. that's why props play less time and smaller middle forwards play more.
that was Stuart's major blunder. He consistently selected a forward unit of smaller and mobile players than Queensland, and what you would even find at most clubs. he got extremely poor use out of his interchange because of it, and also, failed to realise that it doesn't matter if a player is generally a smaller forward who is used to playing more minutes (like Gallen & Bird who he selected at prop and the smaller middle forward respectively in game 1 2012), these guys need to be interchanged when playing in the middle with the amount of work required in both attack, and particularly defence if the team is losing the set count. this was another problem for NSW last season. the only way a mobile forward unit may get on top of a bigger pack is if they dominate the set count and NSW didn't. this meant that these smaller forwards were absorbing more defensive pressure in the middle against QLD's bigger bodies and fresher prop rotation. QLD's fair dinkum props and Meninga's/Henry's effective rotation of them eventually wore down the NSW smaller fill-ins like Gallen, Watmough and Creagh, and the disproportionate game time they got from Stuart too.
three props on the field is overkill and 6 in the unit is rare. you'd never see it. it'd end up making the team cumbersome and one dimensional, particularly if there isn't one or two that can hit the line hard and then offload. and as you say, it's a poor way of building a the squad. there has to be a balance of speed and size and strength. having that one smaller mobile body in the middle that can build on the momentum the props can generate provides more of an attacking threat. this is what Gallen and Merrin can do after their props have provided the platform for them earlier in the set.
I haven't been informed by anybody, I make up my own mind. It's interesting that Merritt's try scoring feats have been downplayed as just being lucky to be on the end of the final pass, yet you want to use Ferguson's try scoring as being in great form which is not necessarily the case overall.
