25 in 25: Best rookies of NRL era - Folau, Slater, DCE, Hayne, Haas, Smith, Anasta, Reynolds, SBW?

The 25th season of the NRL is done and dusted so to commemorate the first quarter-century of this instalment of the premiership, The Roar is looking back at the 25 best players and moments in 25 categories.

We have already gone through the best fullbacks,
wingers,
locks,
second-rowers,
players to never make Origin,
coaches,
captains,
halfbacks,
front-rowers,
goal-kickers,
recruits,
heaviest hitters
and Grand Final moments of the era.

Now we’re casting our minds back to the best rookie seasons on record, which players burst onto the scene with a bumper debut year.

Some went on to become legends of the game, some had solid first-grade careers and a few didn’t quite live up to the hype.

When assessing each player, all that was taken into consideration was how well they went in year one, not whether they became a long-term gun or not.

Israel Folau in 2007. (Photo by Quinn Rooney/Getty Images)

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The top 10 – the best of the best

1 Israel Folau (2007)
2 Jarryd Hayne (2006)
3 Tim Smith (2005)
4 Daly Cherry-Evans (2011)
5 Billy Slater (2003)
6 Payne Haas (2019)
7 Braith Anasta (2001)
8 Adam Reynolds (2012)
9 Sonny Bill Williams (2004)
10 Harry Grant (2020)

Everyone knew as soon as Folau was thrown into the first-grade furnace that we were witnessing something special. He scored 21 tries in 27 games for the Storm as an 18-year-old and was fast-tracked into the Australian team at the World Cup at the end of the season.

Hayne had been kept in reserve grade by coach Brian Smith but when he departed mid-season and caretaker Jason Taylor took over, Hayne was immediately elevated to first grade on the win and the Plane took off straight away. The 18-year-old touched down 17 times in just 16 games.

Smith’s rookie season in 2005 looked like the beginning of a superstar career but unfortunately form and off-field problems derailed his progress. He started the year at halfback and played the entire season as the Eels won the minor premiership before falling in the Preliminary Final. He conjured up a whopping 40 try assists, one of the best individual seasons by a playmaker, let alone a rookie.

Cherry-Evans was another half thrown into the fire in Round 1 in 2011 after Trent Hodkinson switched to Canterbury and he not only played all 27 matches, he had the rare honour of winning a premiership in his first season and then making his Test debut for Australia at the end-of-season Four Nations tournament.

Slater did not receive the Dally M Rookie of the Year award in 2003 due to the players’ union taking industrial action by boycotting the event but he was the standout newbie that year, scoring the match-winning try on debut for Melbourne and tallying 19 all up.

There had been plenty of hype about Haas after three appearances off the bench the previous year before injury struck. In his first full season of 2019, the teenaged Bronco showed why he was the prototype for the modern prop with an imposing mix of strength, speed and stamina, getting a NSW call-up mid-season and making his Test debut before the year was out.

(Photo by Matt King/Getty Images)

Anasta switched to the Bulldogs when his junior team Souths had been expelled from the NRL and when he was given a crack at five-eighth in 2001, he starred as the Dogs surged into the finals and was handed his Test debut for the end-of-season Tests against PNG and Great Britain.

Reynolds started 2012 at halfback, taking over after Chris Sandow had joined Parramatta, and Rabbitohs fans instantly took a shine to their new No.7 who looked as calm and composed as a veteran as he helped guide the team to their first top-four finish since 1989.

SBW was another Round 1 reveal – he starred in his debut at centre in the season opener against Parramatta and despite a knee injury sidelining him for two months mid-season, he became a bench weapon for a star-studded Bulldogs team as they marched all the way to premiership glory. 

Grant is a unique case in that he won Dally M Rookie of the Year while not playing for the club where he had signed to play. Sent to the Wests Tigers by the Storm for a season-long loan during Cameron Smith’s final season, the young hooker did more than just get some game time, he wowed the NRL with impressive attacking prowess and a willingness to do plenty of work in defence.

Best of the rest – elite performers

11 Karmichael Hunt (2004)
12 Jack Bird (2015)
13 Alex Johnston (2014)
14 Daniel Mortimer (2009)
15 Jeremiah Nanai (2022)
16 Shaun Johnson (2011)
17 Nathan Hindmarsh (1998)
18 Mark McLinden (1998)
19 Sam Walker (2021)
20 Nathan Cleary (2016)

Hunt’s booming first-up season at the Broncos led to Darren Lockyer switching to five-eighth and Wayne Bennett’s gamble paid off with the young fullback scoring 15 tries in 26 matches to pip Sonny Bill Williams for the Dally M Rookie of the Year award.

Bird’s arrival was the boost the Sharks needed as they tried to rebuild after the peptide sanctions propelled them to the wooden spoon the previous year. The young five-eighth announced his arrival with two tries in his starting debut in a boilover win over the Roosters as Cronulla rebuilt their team to make the second week of the finals.

Johnston, just five years after playing a young Greg Inglis in the NRL advertising campaign, became his teammate at Souths and went on to score 21 tries in 18 games on the wing, collect a premiership ring as part of the historic 2014 triumph and was selected in the Australian squad at the end of the season although didn’t make his Test debut until the following year.

Mortimer bobbed up mid-season in an underperforming Eels side in 2009 and was a key part of the fairytale side which barely qualified for the playoffs before storming all the way through to the Grand Final. The five-eighth with the legendary Bulldogs surname rejected a big offer from Canterbury to stay at Parramatta and then won a premiership at the Roosters in 2013.

Nanai blitzed everything in his path for the Cowboys last season, scoring 17 tries to finish just three shy of Steven Menzies’ all-time record for most by a forward. He was rewarded with call-ups by Queensland at Origin level and the Kangaroos at the World Cup.

Johnson was thrown into first grade midway through 2011 by Warriors coach Ivan Cleary and the decision was a masterstroke with the 20-year-old halfback combining brilliantly with more-experienced halves partner James Maloney to take the team all the way to the Grand Final.

Hindmarsh in 1998 came into Parramatta’s side mid-season and cemented a spot straight away with his massive work rate in the second row but also with surging runs on the edge of the ruck to breathe life into their experienced pack alongside fellow rookie Nathan Cayless.

The meteoric rise of the Super-Macs of Mark McLinden and halves partner Andrew McFadden was an unexpected bonus for Canberra in 1998 with Laurie Daley and Rickey Stuart injured for much of the season. McLinden showed plenty of pace which he still retains, as evidenced by his unauthorised sprint onto the field during the Grand Final this year.

(Photo by Jason McCawley/Getty Images)

Walker stepped up for the Roosters to play out the entire season when Luke Keary was struck down by an ACL and displayed a strong playmaking sense well beyond his years.

Cleary was just 18 when Anthony Griffin handed the teenage prodigy his debut midway through 2016 in the toughest of circumstances, away to the Storm. But he not only survived that initiation but swiftly settled into the groove of the NRL as the young Panthers advanced to the semis.

The final five

21 Darius Boyd (2006)
22 Chris Sandow (2008)
23 Luke Brooks (2014)
24 Ash Taylor (2016)
25 Petero Civoniceva (1988)

Boyd understandably missed out on the official award to Hayne in ‘06 but the young Bronco got his own piece of silverware on Grand Final night, capping off a superb first year in which he scored 11 tries in 27 matches.

Sandow, Brooks and Taylor were three young halfbacks who earned plenty of headlines for their opening efforts at beleaguered clubs desperate for success in the Rabbitohs of 2008, Tigers of ‘14 and Titans two years later. The burden of those early expectations weighed each of them down in later years.

Civoniceva, in a sign of things to come, stood out in his rookie year (it’s hard for someone of his size not to) for what would become his trademark – relentless efficiency carting the ball up and getting through huge amounts of defence while leaving opponents battered and bruised, all the way to the Grand Final win over the Bulldogs. 

Just missed the cut

Broncos winger Jharal Yow Yeh (2009) and second-rower Matt Gillett (2010) both made storming introductions to the NRL but unfortunately for Yow Yeh, his career was cut short a few years later by a serious leg injury.

Mark Gasnier made an eye-catching start mid-season at St George Illawarra in 2000, the same year that young prop Luke Bailey played the entire season, unlucky to miss out on Dally M honours to Storm five-eighth Tasesa Lavea.

Greg Inglis also turned plenty of heads in 2005 as an 18-year-old at Melbourne but only played 13 games before the following year really making his mark, rushed into the rep teams for Australia and NSW Queensland.

Sione Mata’utia had a historic 2014 at the Knights, only playing seven games but then getting a run in the Australian team on the wing.

Jamal Idris was another prodigious teenager who looked like a potential world-beater when he scored seven tries in 20 games at Canterbury in 2009 but he never quite lived up to his potential in later years.

Among the other players who won the Dally M rookie gong were Eels prop Michael Vella (1999), Bulldogs pocket rocket Matt Utai (2002), Souths front-rower George Burgess (2013), Raiders speedster Nick Cotric (2017) and Brisbane winger Jamayne Isaako (2018).