Anyone else had enough of the code wars yet?
Certainly the back and forth between league and union types over Roosters young gun Joseph Suaalii is getting tiresome already; probably because neither side has come with any new insults.
It's predictable. The codes being 'at war' is pretty much a perpetual state of being. Rugby league's very existence sprung from a dispute with rugby union - a game that long trumpeted amateurism (for those who could afford it).
Ever since William Webb Ellis allegedly picked up a football and ran with it at big lunch at Rugby School back in the olden days, the two variations of rugby football have been like two feuding brothers, irrevocably linked by blood but perpetually antagonistic.
Like most brotherly feuds, it predominantly lies dormant, each taking only a passing interest in the exploits of the other. Every now and then, something comes along to pour fuel on the slow-burning coals and we get a full blaze.
Rugby Australia's bid to make teenaged Suaalii the highest paid player in either code has done that.
From the jump, it's not hard to figure out which side of the fence KICKOFF sits on. Your columnist doesn't believe in heaven and, as such, isn't all that fussed with what game is allegedly played there.
Still, given some of the cheesy jibes being traded, neutrality is becoming ever-more appealing.
The barney has exposed a lot of things about both codes.
For one, It's shown up rugby league's insatiable appetite for a stink, be it with Rugby, the AFL, state governments or the bloke in the corner looking at it funny.
Nothing keeps rugby league's wheels spinning more than the wolf at the door, its buttons all too easy to push as rugby types have managed with little effort of late.
The chip on the game's shoulder is most often attributed to its working class roots, despite the fact that, today, it's a very middle class game - not that any in its halls of power would admit as much.
It's also exposed rugby union as Australian sport's emperor in new clothes, parading itself through the streets projecting a royal bearing blind to what the rest of us can clearly see from the street.
The pitch, one we've heard before, is that rugby players can "see the world" (NRL players on a million-plus a year apparently have to surrender their passports as part of their contracts).
Of course, the 15-man code dwarfs league on the global stage - and that'll never change. It also doesn't change the fact the viability of Super Rugby is currently being called into question given how poorly the Australian franchises - with the exception of the Brumbies - are performing.
It was only last year RA chairman Hamish McLennan was talking about Aussie franchises exiting Super Rugby to form a purely domestic competition to more closely mirror the NRL and AFL because it would "rate better."
That the RA chairman is an accountant named Hamish seems like something pulled out of a Betoota Advocate yarn, but we digress.
For all union's global supremacy, the only Wallabies non-hardcore fans in Australia could pick out of a police line-up are either retiring, or are ex-NRL players. One of them, Marika Koroibete, went to rugby for more money than he could never hope to earn as a winger in the NRL.
He's since won a John Eales Medal as the Wallabies best player. The highest award he could hope to claim in league would be Dally M Winger of the Year.
At the same time, as a World Rugby Dream Team member last year, his global reach dwarfs that of Nicho Hynes, Latrell Mitchell or just about any leaguie that comes to mind.
It's the simple reality of both games. It's why they sell different visions. What shouldn't be difficult to fathom, though it is for some, is that modern players want to experience both if they're able.
That's the most striking feature of the current debate. The ongoing feud has exposed a lot about the codes and the men who run them but, more than anything else, it's exposed a generation gap.
While the usual suspects have been ready to take up arms, what's now shaping as the majority couldn't really give a toss. It's a demonstrable fact that rugby league's never lost a player it couldn't afford to lose.
Bigger stars than Suaalii have left and rugby league's done just fine.
Sonny Bill Williams departed in infamous circumstances, headline-grabbing and all the rest, but rugby league carried on unabated; even welcomed him back down the line.
The other great dual-International of our time, Brad Thorn, came and went multiple times with few people taking much notice other than to marvel at his unmatched list of cross-code honours.
Wendell Sailor, Lote Tuqiri, Mat Rogers and Andrew Walker all came back to league after initially departing the code. For a generation of younger fans who've watched it all without the world caving in, Suaalii leaving is hardly an earth-shattering, development.
The broader reality could be that just about everyone wins. Rugby gets its cut-through domestic exposure, Suaalii gets his significant coin, the Roosters retain first dibs on his return and rugby league carries on with at least 10 or more fullback/centres far better than him at this point in time.
Perhaps that's why the Roosters seem the least fazed by it all. Clubs are far more concerned with losing players to NRL rivals than rugby.
The only party with anything to gain from a 'war' between the codes is player managers lurking in background sniffing out an earn. For the rank-and-file fan, it's of only passing interest.
If there's still a 'code war' raging on, it's being fought by Dad's Army.
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Mitch Jennings
Sports writer. Sport is my passion, rugby league my first love.
Sports writer. Sport is my passion, rugby league my first love.
