I'd say there are 3 main factors that are causing us to play shit.
1. Leadership - we can't have a leadership group, where only Patty and Payne are the consistent players. Staggs, ARey and B Hunt are in the group too, and they have been far from consistent. You can't have hot and cold players leading a team and expecting everyone else to play better.
2. Defensively Minded - We are trying to grind teams down and doing it poorly. From a defense perspective, our forwards and backrow are mainly catch and wrap defenders, which isn't a bad thing for slowing the ruck, but very bad for a hard ball runner that can get their nose through the line, or offload easily. We need to have more impact at the start of the tackle, like faster defensive line pushup, and cutting the legs.
The adaptation of being defensively focused needs to be tweaked to be more than a poor imitation of it. Sure, we sometimes get it right for 10 minutes at a time, but we need to be better if we want to play that style.
3. Team list - I understand why Madge has picked the team he has, they are pretty much the players with the highest tacking efficiency AND most experienced, which is why there have been no mass changes, unless due to injury or the occasional 1-person bench swap that doesn't really achieve that much. I am going to give an example, look at Souths this year, yes, they have had injuries most of the year, but Wayne isn't afraid to shake the tree to get results, and they
Rabbitohs pack around the inconsistent times this year:
8 - Keppie
9 - Mamouzelos (Injured now)
10 - Tatola
11 - Keaon
12 - Duncan
13- Arrow
Rabbitohs pack recently, which I believe are playing more consistently:
8 - Arrow
9 - Havili (Would be Mamouzelos if he wasn't injured)
10 - Keaon
11 - Aitken
12 - Duncan
13- Hubner
Rather than going for the traditional big boys to start, Wayne has gone for a more mobile and hard-hitting and hard-working pack, then following it up with the bigger "catch and wrap" style bench, which will help to control the ruck speed a bit more when the other team starts gaining momentum throughout the game.
Madge needs to shake the tree. Not just in the forward/backrow pack. But our leadership group and expect more from our spine.