Kind of surprised the lack of commentary in this thread about the [edit] Faatape sin bin. I accept it was a borderline penalty but I reject the use of the sin bin, which is becoming a new epidemic in the game.
Generally speaking, a professional foul (PF) is a deliberate breach of the rules in order to prevent a scoring opportunity. NRL does not provide an official interpretation (that I can find). Historically in the NRL/ARL/NSWRL a PF has included an element of cynicism, i.e. not just an intentional foul but a cynical abuse of the accepted norms of play. This would include holding down in the tackle when you have conceded a significant line break, grabbing a player who takes a quick tap etc. Note how the concept of a "scoring opportunity" is very nebulous and is easily applied anywhere on the field where the play is far from being an imminent opportunity.
Faatape runs a silly block, but he also clearly turns away at the last moment. He does not pull or push the opponent, but he does place himself into the path where the opponent is leaping/landing. It's mildly dangerous.
This is where I differentiate between a cynical intervention of a player in possession (like a jersey-pull or a hold-down) versus an illegal challenge of a speculative nature. In the first instance like a jersey-grab the opponent definitely has the ball and you definitely prevent them advancing with it. In the Faatape incident, the opponent has not even touched the ball (Warbrick does not in fact lay a hand of the ball) and it's still speculative whether or not he would have ended up with the ball. Many many bomb attempts are dropped and you cannot get further from a possession guarantee than a bomb (as opposed to a pass, a loose ball or a grubber). This is why aerial contests are so rarely penalty tries.
There is no guarantee Warbrick catches the ball and he's short of the line, so what Faatape has done is infringe the ball contest, not a genuine scoring opportunity.
More than this however, I also fail to see how Faatape's block is any worse or more cynical than any other disingenuous kick contest, including the hundreds and hundreds of escort plays that are penalised every year. The ref in fact says to Api "they've ruled it an escort".
So if Faataape's one is the standard, so be it, but it's clearly not the standard. We should therefore expect to see a raft of sin bins for kick defence infringements, almost all of which involve an attacker being in some form of try-scoring or attacking attempt, with a defender deliberately interfering with their run. Doubly-so because kick defence is, almost by definition, typically a 1-1 (or at least "just a few on one") contest.
I was at the ground, but on the replay the commentators didn't seem that fussed. Maybe I am alone on this one. It certainly flipped the game on its head and removed the genuine contest - because Tigers and Storm were fairly evenly-matched for the other 70 minutes of the match.
Of course I don't watch all minutes of all NRL games, but Tigers so often seem to be on the negative end of these new or newly-tested interpretations, just like when Bryce Gibbs got 3 weeks for sliding into a try scorer (and almost never suspended since) or when Cowboys were permitted to challenge "the end of the match" call by the ref.
And like last week when we had 2 binned against Roosters and Annesley comes out to apologise that they were not the appropriate use of the bin, as if an apology makes a lick of bloody difference in the wash-up, or as if the apology comes with any kind of implied "get square" in coming matches.