Normally, two rounds into a season is not the time to be calling for a coach to be sacked.
Hope still exists, the ability for pre-season rust to be shaken off is there, and just maybe it's a couple of bad performances, rather than the start of a rot that will determine the upcoming campaign.
But for the North Queensland Cowboys and Manly Sea Eagles, 2026 is not a normal year, and it could be club-shaping for the next decade if they pull the trigger early enough.
That's because there is one very, very clear next up NRL coach. His name is Willie Peters.
Under normal circumstances, even that wouldn't become a rush job for teams considering their options, but with the PNG Chiefs set to announce their first coach in the next couple of weeks, and Peters believed to be well in the mix, the time might be just right for either the Cowboys or Sea Eagles to make a play.
Of course, the reality is they could already be talking to Peters, which would likely see him turn down the PNG Chiefs job, but that isn't a guarantee.
What is a guarantee is that if the NRL can get Peters for that role, they will, even up against other suitable candidates like PNG national team coach Jason Demetriou.
Peters has all the runs on the board and is ready for a crack at the NRL; of that there can be no doubt.
After working his way through Australian pathways at the Wests Tigers, he was an assistant coach at Manly, the Rabbitohs (where he learnt from Wayne Bennett) and the Newcastle Knights, before being named the new head coach of Hull KR in 2022.
There, he has turned the club into a juggernaut of English rugby league, with his three-year rebuild winding up in a 2025 double - the Challenge Cup and Super League Crown.
The trophies were Hull KR's first for 40 years, and he is now the back-to-back Super League coach of the year.
In February, he coached the Rovers to their World Club Challenge success over the Brisbane Broncos.
The last man to have a resume like that and return to the NRL? Yeah, Kristian Woolf, who led the Dolphins to becoming the NRL's best attacking side last year.
He hasn't quite got them into the finals yet, but you'd imagine that is well and truly on the radar in 2026.
In short, Peters has done pretty much everything there is to do in the English game and has admitted he will take the right opportunity to have a crack in the NRL at some point.
Whether that's at North Queensland, Manly, or the Chiefs remains to be seen, but there are likely going to be opportunities available, and all of the clubs would be rather crazy not to be talking to a man who has success in England, but also understands the NRL, exactly as Woolf did when he returned.
What else is a guarantee is that the Cowboys and Sea Eagles have both started the season as more of a rabble than a functioning footy team.
Maybe we shouldn't be overly surprised by that, in all honesty.
Both Payten and Seibold came into the new season as the most likely coaches to be let go before the end of the season, and nothing that has been produced over the opening two rounds could be doing a job of changing people's minds.
The Cowboys, who kicked off in Las Vegas with a pretty average effort against the Newcastle Knights, backed that up with an even worse one against the Wests Tigers at Leichhardt.
It was a big afternoon for the Tigers as they racked up 44 points in front of their faithful, making a statement about the sort of team they are expected to be this year.
But for Payten?
The defence, a constant criticism and talking point over the last couple of years, was an absolute mess.
Now, we head into Round 3 with speculation around Scott Drinwater, Jaxon Purdue set to try his hand at another new position after baffingly being moved into the halves last year, displacing Jake Clifford, who had a fine win rate alongside Tom Dearden, and an ageing forward pack who aren't holding their own.
They play the Gold Coast Titans on Sunday evening, and these conversations around Payten's future will hit hyper speed if they can't knock over their Queensland rivals.
Things may not be quite as bad on the Northern Beaches, but Anthony Seibold is under the pump, and rightly so.
Maybe even more rightly so than Payten.
While Payten has been somewhat hamstrung by the big Jason Taumalolo contract that still lingers over the club, Seibold has no such issue.
He has, generally speaking, a younger team, but both on and off the field, eyebrows have been raised recently.
Luke Brooks has returned to his previous struggles, the back five seem out of position more than they are in it, and the forward pack just aren't aiming up.
Like the Cowboys, they lost to the Knights in Round 2, but their scoreline was larger, while their Round 1 loss to Canberra came despite jumping out to a 14-0 lead.
Golden point is a lottery, but the hard truth is that after the start, Manly put together, they should never have got there.
Speaking of the lottery, Seibold's forward pack rotation has been about as accurate as picking the winning numbers, and his seeming refusal to change the team, left over from last year, simply can't continue if Manly wants to get away from the bottom during the season ahead.
The Sea Eagles have the bye this weekend, then face the Roosters in Round 4. That's not an easy clash by any stretch of the imagination, but anything less than a competitive effort, improvement at both ends of the park and maybe even a win will heap the pressure on the misfiring mentor, who struggled in previous roles too.
Manly, like the Cowboys with Payten, have given Seibold their backing, but exactly how long that lasts is anyone's guess.
Maybe more so if the two clubs realise exactly how fast they have to move.
