I think people need to chill on Simpkin. For me, he's shown enough at this point in his development. He can handle himself in the middle in defence. He just doesn't have enough gas in the tank to maintain his skillset with the ball in hand on top of making 30-40 tackles.
Remember, he missed 2 years of development in NSW cup, and he is still only 20 years old.
Let's look at the ages of the younger hookers going around the NRL:
- Wayde Egan - 25
- Jake Turpin - 25
- Jacob Liddle - 25
- Jayden Brailey - 25
- Harry Grant - 24
- Erin Clark - 24
- Mitch Kenney - 24
- Reed Mahoney - 23
- Blayke Brailey - 23
- Sam Verrills - 23
- Tom Starling - 23
- Reece Robson - 23
- Reuben Cotter - 23
- Tyran Wishart - 22
As you can see, he is 2-3 years behind the other hookers in the comp. He has improved since last year and we can expect that he'll continue to. Give him time.