You must not be watching the same player as me. He is one of the best defensive fullbacks in the NRL he pulls off more try saving plays than anybody not named Barba, Bowen or Slater. He puts his body on the line time and time again when he tries to stop tries. He DOES run the ball back hard now, and has done basically all season, his bad hands are only really his issues under the high ball, other than that it's fine. As a ballplaying fullback he has a great passing game and since when is it a pre-requisite of fullbacks to kick the ball?
Lay the boot in all you want but please stick to facts. I said as a fullback he has a few key problems and most of the things you said are blatantly untrue. His issues are not offering support around the ruck, not attacking the ball fiercely enough and a lack of confidence under the high ball. That is it in 2012\. In years past there were others but he solved them imo.
I have to further explain myself. Credit where credit is due,I totally agree with one aspect of your praise. He has pulled off some fantastic try saving plays on the line. At least 3 or 4 times he has swept through on the line and knocked a ball free etc and I genuinely think he is fantastic at that. He has also surprised be a few times with great one on one tackles with a player who has made a break. His general defence in any other position of the field is poor.
Lets address your other points since you would like to debate based on correct information and stick to facts. you say that he DOES run the ball back hard and has done all season? He averages 78m per game over 18 games (pretty much all at fullback). Lets compare this with other fullbacks, Mini 140m, Slater 140m, Stewart 100m, Barba 122m, in fact he probably has the worst ave metres of any fullback in the game. This is due to the high number of times that he offloads a kick return to his wingers or jogs tentatively to the defence.
I am yet to see ANY evidence of a great passing game from him as a "ballplaying fullback" unless you call passing it to a winger for a kick retuen a passing game.
I bring up his kicking game because you have said he will realise his potential as a 5/8, in fact in another thread you said we will _"finally see the talent that we all know he has. Moving him from fullback will remove every weakness has has. At five-eighth we will see Moltzen's career best game this weekend imo_". Well playing 5/8 doesnt remove his weakness with a poor kicking game. Today in a game when he was going to "step up" and when we were missing one of our kickers, and when playing 5/8, he kicked once…and it went straight down the defenders throat on the full.
You state that his weaknesses are ..."_His issues are not offering support around the ruck, not attacking the ball fiercely enough and a lack of confidence under the high ball."_. Well that pretty much sums up 80% of a fullbacks role. How many other fullbacks would be picked who are poor in the areas you identified? Add to that his lack of kicking game, poor passing game and timidity and he deserves all the criticism he gets. He should probably NOT be under this much scrutiny though as he should NOT be in first grade.
It is obvious that he was very poor again today but also just as obvious that he wasnt on his own in that regard. I am simply sick of watching him week in and week out playing poorly. It is a given that every week he will make a poor error such as a dropped bomb that puts his team under great pressure and usually cost us points. Today I was grateful that we wouldnt see a dropped bomb from him but he didnt disappoint and put it dead on the full from a kick off for his obligatory weekly screw up to put us under the pump again.
