That's a really sad end to Taylor's career.
One of my favourite past times was getting out to Suncorp early and watching the 20s play. It was uncanny watching Taylor play and while he struggled to call for the ball when he did good things would happen. It didn't matter where the Broncos were on the field, they could be stuck in their own half and Taylor would send a bullet out to Pearson to send him away. Or he'd boot a 40/20 down 18-0 after 10 minutes and bring the team to life. The issue was Berrell would just about have to run over and put the ball in his hands for him to get it.
I presume that tentativeness went back to his long history with injuries. I'm not sure about his juniors career, but during his time in the 20s he suffered two serious injuries that saw him spend considerable time on the sidelines. I always felt like those injuries set him back and he really should have been given more time before he was introduced to the meatgrinder of the NRL.
Instead his management put pressure on the Broncos for an early release and instead of dragging things out the Broncos decided to honour it. He ends up at the Gold Coast where the early word was that he'd struggle to make the Round 1 team. However Kane Elgey would suffer a season ending injury in the pre-season which gave Taylor his shot. Watching Taylor was like following a first round pick QB. Everybody was on the same page that he was a rookie and would celebrate his big plays and ignore the mistakes.
Much to everybody's surprise the Gold Coast made the 8 which felt like a minor miracle after what happened in 2015. Taylor certainly played a role in it, but I felt the media lost sight of the role players like MacDonald, Bird, Shillington, Friend, Taia, Paasi, Pulu etc. had in that result. A lot of those players were moving on at the end of the year and the Titans still had to put a team together around Taylor for him to be successful.
It's something they ultimately never achieved. Watching Taylor over the years was just watching somebody fall out of love with the game. He didn't gel with the team, he spent too much time working on his defence than with the ball in hand which would lead to spending more time behind the goal posts. Sure he was cashing in a cool $1,000,000 but that came with other issues that at 22 he wasn't capable of dealing with.
Now it's come to this. Retired at 27, what should have been his peak years because he's been bashed from pillar to post. Yeah the champion players always figure out a way but Taylor is a cautionary tale that's just far too common in sport.
