The No-Look News (Schuster Chronicles)

[LeonardCohen]

IMO Schu should have been groomed and coached to be our ball playing lock. He would have been able to play both sides of the field and used as a 2nd 5/8th.

You see how valuable Yeo is to Penrith with his ball playing ,as was Glen Stewart back in the days.

Des and Seibold really missed an opportunity there, sticking to Jake - who is not a ball playing lock whatsoever.

Yeah I agree it should have been his position; I said he wasn’t a 5/8 all along. Just because you do some good things with a number on your back, doesn’t mean you are now suited to that position. He still had highlight reels at 6 because he was a freakish talent but he was never going to play with the consistency and control required to manage an edge in first grade; too flighty.

Which brings me to lock. He was a handful when he ran and had the silky ball skills to provide an attacking threat. He’d be a perfect fit if not for one problem - fitness.

His fitness was a big reason why he never played such a gruelling physical position; you have forwards running at you as nauseam and he just wasn’t fit enough for that. He whacked on weight and lost a ton of speed and that’s what really cost him his first grade career; he was no longer physical capable of playing in the top grade. Sad.

 

[manly al]

Yeah I agree it should have been his position; I said he wasn’t a 5/8 all along. Just because you do some good things with a number on your back, doesn’t mean you are now suited to that position. He still had highlight reels at 6 because he was a freakish talent but he was never going to play with the consistency and control required to manage an edge in first grade; too flighty.

Which brings me to lock. He was a handful when he ran and had the silky ball skills to provide an attacking threat. He’d be a perfect fit if not for one problem - fitness.

His fitness was a big reason why he never played such a gruelling physical position; you have forwards running at you as nauseam and he just wasn’t fit enough for that. He whacked on weight and lost a ton of speed and that’s what really cost him his first grade career; he was no longer physical capable of playing in the top grade. Sad.

Still think only on an edge that he would have managed or been capable of best effectiveness
Even there and when he was doing quite well or mainly in 21 , still was showing signs of not being fully committed in defence
No doubt had the skills to do occasionally well as a 6 but badly exposed there when the going got tough but no question also , when the fitness , injury and weight issues really came into the equation , just a continuous struggle then to be competitive
Great if he could have transitioned to a 13 role but never even got close to that outcome and playing on an edge seemed the closest he got to showing even moderately good and reasonably consistent form as an N R L player