#19 Dave Taylor
Dave Taylor copped a fair bit of criticism around the 2012 Origin period and found himself out of the team come game 3 of the series and I'm sure a few people will disagree with me having him here. This year he joins a Titans team to create an absolutely loaded back row situation, joining Origin regulars Ashley Harrison, Greg Bird, Nate Myles and supplemented by the likes of Mark Minichiello, Luke Douglas, Luke Bailey. Much is being made of the Sharks forward pack this season and with good reason, but this Titans group may well be in the mix for the strongest forward pack in the competition. For all of the detractors that were chiming in about Dave and his place in the Queensland team, let's take a look at what he did for the Bunnies in 2012...
- 19th in the NRL in line breaks with 14
- 15th in the NRL in runs with 335
- 14th in the NRL in metres with 3104 (giving him an average of 9.2 metres per carry)
- 17th in the NRL in tackle busts with 85
- 6th in the NRL in offloads with 41
and Dave isn't exactly the type of bloke to log huge minutes to pad his stats, what he does is make impact, and those are impact stats. Metres, line breaks, offloads, tackle busts, that's how the big man stamps his print on the game.
While that appears to be a young child, it's actually a full grown woman
At only 24, Taylor is preparing to enter what will be his 8th year in the NRL, yet another one of these young players who feel like they have been around forever, but that's because in this instance, Taylor really has been around a long time already. But even when the man known as Coal Train first appeared in the NRL, he didn't look the least bit out of place, that's because he's an absolute mountain of a human being. In a competition full of plenty of big blokes, Taylor still stands out as one of the true big boys, standing at 185 and a hulking 123kg. But he's not just big, he's strong as an ox, which is why he's putting up the type of stats I presented earlier, the metres, the tackle busts, the strength to free up his arms for the offload, that's his calling card. I'd wage there's very few in the competition who could take on Big Dave in an arm wrestle, he's one of the few in the competition who makes a habit of manhandling opponents, tossing legit professional athletes around like he got lost and wound up at schoolboys game.
Big Dave says no
As if his imposing figure and tremendous strength wasn't worrying enough for opponents, the most freakish thing about Dave Taylor is that he's one of the biggest men in the competition, yet is loaded with skill. Sure, he can just run straight at your defense all game, and he'll break through it too or sap the life out of your defense trying, but trapped inside the frame of the big man is a guy who fancies himself as halfback or five-eight material. For his size, his ball skills are fantastic, Dave could get by as a rampaging front rower who just lugs the ball up, but he's so much more than that. He's got the offload, but he's also just a really good passer in general, the defense can't just simply brace themselves for the bus that is about to run them over because Dave may well be part of a play designed to exploit just that. Now there's several good ball playing backrowers in the comp, though at quite the size of Taylor is a rarity, but to cap it off he's got some skill in his feet as well. He's surprisingly agile for a man his size, though he isn't stepping around like he's Matty Bowen, he moves pretty well, about as graceful as a 123 kilos is ever going to move and he's got a bit of a kicking game. He's not going to chew off big raking kicks for you, but he isn't shy about putting a grubber in, and he's good at it too. If you wanted to make an overpowered player on Rugby League Live 2, Taylor would serve as a pretty good prototype.
How would you approach this situation?
For Taylor now it's all about finding consistency, maintaining his fitness, maintaining his health. 2012 saw him earn his first international cap with Australia, and was the third year in a row he was part of Queensland's Origin campaign, seeing him now up to 6 Origins. Earlier in his career there was questions about his work ethic and his weight, but he seems to have put those to rest. Of course he's still a heavy bloke, but he always will be, you could feed him lettuce sandwich's and water and that wouldn't change. In recent times he's looked in very good shape and seems to be fully committed to his training. So from here it's just about cutting down the errors to fully capitalize on his potential, remembering again that he's only 24, so he's still a young bloke who can work out the kinks. If he can do that, the world will be at his feet.
If there was ever a bloke who looked like he'd chop a good tree
Check back in tomorrow for number 18, hopefully everyone enjoyed the first week of Super Rugby, right? if you have any comments or criticisms direct them to me at @WellsNorthShore
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