So much for serious league analysis. What really stood out from the historical quiz is that for the pinnacle (pronounced 'pinnikw') of the game, State of Origin has rarely been about the best playing the best. There's a lot of angst recently about how the standard of players in this year's Origin has fallen out of the showcase. The Queensland has-beens against the out-of-form New South Wales leftovers will only highlight the absence of Shaun Johnson, Kieran Foran, Issac Luke, Jason Taumalolo, Roger Tuivasa-Sheck and friends, the ineligibility of George Burgess, James Graham and Gareth Widdop, not to mention the likely non-selection of the new breed who aren't considered 'Origin-ready' yet.

To that I have a simple answer: Danny Moore. Greg Oliphant. Brad Tessmann. Adrian Brunker. Gavin Allen. Adrian Vowles.

What Queensland has always understood better than New South Wales is that Origin is not about having the best footballers. The Maroons have had the best for the past few years, but that's an aberration that has promoted false expectations. You're a fool if you think Queensland's Origin record rests on superior talent and foolproof game plans. Queensland understand that Origin is not about football, it's about hatred. It's about killing Cockroaches, throwing cans at the blue bus from the Caxton Hotel, and 'up and under and an all-in'.

Queensland understand that Origin is about John Buttigeig, Bruce Astill and Russell Bawden.

Every year, Queensland laugh themselves crimson over south-of-the-border pre-Origin discussions of 'form'. Queensland picked Arthur Beetson from reserve grade. Rod Morris would be hauled in from a building site to demolish NSW packs. And Bob Lindner? Can anybody at any of Lindner's four NRL clubs remember anything he ever did? On form, he was a questionable pick for first grade, yet for Queensland, Lindner was the most destructive running second-rower of his generation, a true great of the game.

It's an illusion created by Queensland's recent past that Origin has anything at all to do with brilliant rugby league individuals. Their however-many-years-in-a-row of wins (don't put that in a quiz because we can't remember) were built on a crop of incredible players who may win another for the road this year. But it's puzzling, the hand-wringing about that generation's fall from the pinnikw, as seen at Lang Park last Sunday, the concern that their decline is going to affect the prestige of Origin.

True, they are not Grant Rix. Or Terry Cook. Or Adam Mogg. And none of them will ever score a try as great as the one scored by that would-be NRMA director and insurance manager Mark Coyne.

So it might be true that Cameron Smith has been eclipsed as the game's most dynamic hooker by Luke, or James Segeyaro, or Apisai Koroisau, or Jake Friend or Jake Granville. But when has that ever mattered?

When did it matter to Danny Nutley? Neil Tierney?

To NSW, picking the best players has mattered with sometimes comical intensity. So, having finally found a pair of halves who have proved the mental capacity to cope with Origin, in Trent Hodkinson and Josh Reynolds, predictably the first thing the Blues do is look to replace them. Apparently they don't produce much brilliance week-to-week for their clubs. When has that ever mattered in Queensland?

Mark Hohn. Darren Fritz. Jamie Goddard.

Notoriously, NSW selectors have the concentration span and loyalty of a beagle. If they see something new, they take off after it. They might have won Origin last year with Mitchell Pearce and James Maloney, but they didn't. They would surely have won with the Souths scrumbase trio of John Sutton, Adam Reynolds and Luke Keary at full force, but they didn't. They won with Hodkinson and Josh Reynolds, who weren't playing especially well for their club at this time a year ago either. Something happened to Hodkinson and Reynolds when they wore blue. What Queensland have proved, year after year, is that at a fundamental level it doesn't really matter who you put on the field, it's what happens to them when they put on their jersey.

Terry Butler. Greg Holben. Ross Henrick.

So there's no need for the rugby league community to fret about future Origin fields populated by journeymen. That's how it always was, and how it's destined to be again. Origin is a tribal pow-wow that is not really contested on the football field but out in the homes and pubs and clubs of maroon and blue Australia. Even if the football is utter rubbish that will never match the skill and fluency of half-a-dozen NRL games each weekend, even if there are 30 better players who aren't eligible, Origin is still Origin, still the pinnikw.