Shameful to admit, but for months I've been reading about this 'Jibasaki' player you guys keep mentioning and I legitimately thought it was a player with the surname Jibasaki and thought it was a funny coincidence that it rhymed with Shibasaki.
I feel pretty stupid right now. Piakura levels of empty-headedness.
He was with the broncos on scholarships, etc. but he's from Townsville, so decided to join cows to stay close to home... which is understandable.
He's been identified as a serious talent coming through the grades where I think he played across prop and second row, but appears to be dropping down the pecking order at cows.
Also noteworthy that cows have a plethora of forwards that have been up there or still coming through, so his pathway up there is pretty congested.
Off the top of my head I can think of the following guys that have been at the cows whilst he's been up there Nanai, Luki, Luciano, Lemuelu, Finefuaki, Neame (if we're going into props as well)... and even this year it seems like he's dropped behind Bateman, O'Donnell and now Lahrs.
If Scanlon is not across his situation then I'd have questions given we have no depth at second row and a guy who was in our junior development program (probably one that Scanlon was overseeing before he moved up under Ikin) appears to be blocked from first grade at the only club that is within proximity of his family.
We've got his brother on the books, and likely to extend him for a few years, and probably some guys he was around during his junior development. So it won't be a foreign environment to come into.
Even the other clubs in SEQ are pretty well sorted for edges... phins have Lemuelu, Finefuaki, Keeley, Gilbert, etc. and titans have Fermor, Fifita, Haas, and probably other guys coming through, but have spent a ton on their forward pack already.
It's really a no brainer that broncos appear to be the best location for him at this point.
Cows could retain him, but he appears to be dropping down the depth chart up there, so him extending is likely going to be on a modest contract and Todd is potentially not seeing him in the future plans so he's just sitting there as depth and delaying his own development.
At the broncos he's probably an automatic selection for that 17 jersey... without having our full squad in front of me I'd say he's above a lot of the other depth forwards we have and a good chance of passing Gos if he nails his preseason.
