NFL and ARU can both come throwing their money around, and it’ll hardly make a jot of difference - there’s simply not enough spots in their game available for it to be a massive risk.
The ARU only have 15 positions to fill, but let’s pretend they’ve got squillions to spend double that number, so they need a squad of 30. How many of a 30 man squad are they really going to want ex-NRL players in? They’re not going to put NRL players in the front row, so there’s 3 positions gone, leaving 12 to fill. They’re highly unlikely to want NRL players in the 2nd row, so down to 10. Of those 10 positions, even if we said it was 50/50 between born and bred RU players and ex-NRL, you’re talking 5 to 10 ex-NRL players at any 1 time. They can’t afford that anyway, and even if they could, we can easily replace 5 to 10, even if they took the very top line.
NFL again, they’ve got the whole of the USA to get their athletes from, yes they might pick up a few that might make it to NRL, but it’s hardly going to be dozens of players, they don’t need that talent pool, they’ve got enough home grown who grow up with the game, who play elite level junior and college football - kids from anywhere else in the world ain’t getting the initiation to the sport.
I think we might just be alright….