You're wrong. Against the likes of Cronulla, Melbourne, Cowboys and Broncos, we wouldn't have gone near the grand final.
Yes but not because they have superstars and we don't. It's because they're spending a lot more on players than us (due to TPAs) and so can afford some superstars
as well as putting good first graders around them.
You need a couple of superstars to win a comp these days.
Says who? Manly made the finals for ten straight years and won two comps without any genuine superstars. Their highest paid players in that time would have been Lyon (an outside back), Stewart (only eight Origins in his career) and Orford. All three players looked like stars playing in a team with no weaknesses, but managed little (or nothing) at rep level. Foran and DCE had their premiership success while young and on relatively modest contracts.
None of these guys would have been on Hayne/Inglis/Smith money, because they weren't as good. They just looked great because the quality around them picked everybody up.
Winning a premiership with a good, solid, honest team of 'genuine first-graders' went out in the nine-teen seventies. Besides - we cheated to get the team we've got this year.
Don't focus too much on 'solid, honest' players. I think you're ignoring the grey area between Michael Gordon and Jarryd Hayne. I advocate spending the entire cap. With players 18-25 averaging $120k each that leaves a salary cap of over $5.8M for the other 17 players. You really believe you can't win a comp with 17 players worth $300k+ each? Jack up the highest paid half dozen to $500k and the rest are still worth over $250k each. That's probably more than Semi Radradra is costing under the cap.
The more you're spending on your best players the less you have to spend on your weakest players. IMO it is constantly proven that your worst handful of players are at least as influential as your best, especially in defence.
As for our team this year, if you removed Foran and Jennings, and replaced them with Townsend and Ryan f**king Morgan, plus kept Peats and Paulo, then it would have won as many games, plus been under the cap from round one.
