Everyone knows the Johnathan Thurston premiership ring story.
Well, they should.
In what has now gone down in NRL legend, then-Bulldogs bench player Thurston handed his 2004 grand final trinket to injured captain Steve Price.
Thurston admitted “it didn’t feel right” accepting it on the winner’s podium.
Adding to the tug-at-the-heartstrings factor, hardened Bulldogs coach Steve Folkes offered his ring to Thurston in the dressing room upon hearing of his young playmaker’s noble gesture.
Ten years later Thurston, 31, hopes to again enter sporting folklore.
He is primed to lead the North Queensland Cowboys to their first premiership.
And it seems, seal his Immortal status.
Yet not so long ago Thurston almost became a cautionary tale.
The notion of Thurston leading a title-winning North Queensland side was almost as amusing as the dreadlocks the fresh-faced playmaker sported when he first moved to Townsville in 2005.
Former whipping boys the Cowboys had only made the finals once in 2004 – nine long years after their inception.
And while Thurston took confident strides on the field, relishing a guaranteed starting berth at North Queensland, off the field there were some stumbles.
In 2008, he was charged with public drunkenness after being arrested outside his Townsville apartment semi-naked.
Two years later the Cowboys issued a club apology after their captain was arrested on a public nuisance charge in Brisbane.
It wasn’t a good look – and Thurston knew it.
A quick glance around Townsville these days shows just how far Thurston has come since.
He is on billboards.
He is stopped on the street by strangers.
And that’s just in the pre-season.
Ahead of North Queensland’s NRL semi-final with Sydney Roosters on Friday night, all eyes are again on Thurston.
Quite simply, he is their hero.
Retired Test winger Brent Tate – who arrived at the Cowboys in 2011 – summed it up best.
“He is their hope up there,” he said.
“Everywhere he goes he brings joy to people.
“He is respected and he respects the community.
“I think he has really learned that over the last few years and grown into a real mature leader.
“He’s a wonderful man and he means a lot to the people up there and I know they mean a lot to him.”
It already has the makings of a feel good story but Thurston will be looking to add another chapter with a long-awaited premiership ring.
Yet ex-Test international Matt Johns believes Thurston will achieve so much more if North Queensland triumph on grand final day.
“If he can guide this Cowboys team to the title, he will be assured of Immortal status,” he wrote in his News Corp column.
Tate disagreed.
“In my eyes he doesn’t need any more accolades to become an Immortal – he is already one in waiting,” he said.
Queensland coach Mal Meninga backed Tate’s call.
“I don’t think it (him winning another title) should be part of the criteria at all … when it comes to how good a player he is,” he said.
“One of the (Immortal) criteria is longevity and he has been at the pinnacle of the game for such a long period of time and he’s still the best player in the competition.”
There was a time when veteran Cowboys team manager Peter Parr might have been tempted to throttle Thurston.
Especially when TV cameras beamed the infamous 2010 images of Thurston walking out of the Brisbane watchhouse.
These days, Parr sounds like he just wants to give him a hug after witnessing Thurston’s remarkable transformation first hand.
“My view on JT is that I would love him to win one (title) because he deserves one, because of what he has done for the club,” Parr said.
“It will be for others to judge but I don’t think he needs to win a grand final to become an Immortal.”
Immortal honours may or may not be bestowed on Thurston.
One thing is for sure, Thurston will earn everything he achieves.
Especially a premiership ring.