Keebra Park and Tweed Seagulls product JJ Collins links up with first Dolphins NRL squad

For the past two years, this Tweed enforcer believed his time in the NRL was over Now he will go down in history.

For the past two years, JJ Collins believed his time in the NRL was over, ending on his terms when he left the Canberra Raiders at the height of the pandemic.

But the Tweed Seagulls enforcer has been given a second chance at the top, establishing himself in history after inking a deal with the Dolphins in 2023.

Collins will join the NRL newest outfit for its inaugural season, the signing of his contract coming just two weeks after the birth of his second son.

The 26-year-old has not been sighted in first-grade since 2019, after the Covid-19 chaos led to players taking a 50 per cent pay cut when the competition went into lockdown with the rest of the world.

JJ Collins runs the ball for Tweed Seagulls. Picture: Dylan Parker

Collins said as tough a decision as it was to leave his two-year contract in the nation’s capital, with a wife about to have his first child he needed to be around family and enter a more traditional workforce to support her.

Now that his sacrifice has come full circle, a return he never saw coming, the Keebra Park product was primed to make his comeback one for the long haul.

“To tell you the truth I didn’t even think I was going to get back into the NRL. I thought me leaving Canberra was just ending on my terms and I had to move on with life,” Collins said.

“At the end of the day it wasn’t about myself anymore it was about my family. That’s something I always take into consideration, the decisions I make are all based on my two children and wife.

“At one point in time footy was everything for me, it was the top of my list. Whenever I was going home I was on my phone with footy posts, when I was going to training or to sleep it was all footy.

“I thought I’d get out to the real world and experience it for a bit. It made me appreciate the time I did have in the NRL, and I told myself if I got back I wouldn’t let that opportunity slip.

“Just to have my two sons and wife there by my side signing the papers meant a lot to me. It was pretty surreal, I couldn’t really come to terms with it until it was all on paper.”

Tweed Heads Seagulls player JJ Collins (right) is all smiles after beating Redcliffe. Photo: Supplied.

Collins credits the life balance he has established for his rugby league renaissance, having become a focal point of the Seagulls Queensland Cup side.

The club’s leading prop has run for more than 100m in each game of 2022, while his defence has been near perfect with just three missed tackles for the year.

However it was not just his form that thrust Collins into master coach Wayne Bennett’s first Redcliffe squad. Rather it was his history in the game that gave him this chance.

“One of the boys at Tweed hit me up on Instagram for my number and said ‘some guy from Redcliffe is trying to get a hold of you’,” Collins said.

“It was Kieran Ashby, his son Delayne was a gun junior coming through and I versed him in the representative sides and every now and then for clubs. I talked to the guy and he said ‘I’ve been watching you play footy since I was young’.

“It was strange to me, I never got a call like that or anyone saying that sort of thing to me.”

Collins will now have to cast aside his excitement in a bid to ensure he is at his best for Tweeds pursuit of the QCup title, beginning with this Saturday’s home clash with the Northern Pride.

However when he does at last arrive at Redcliffe, the teammates he lines up alongside will mark a full circle in his career.

JJ Collins pictured during his Wests Tigers days, picture Craig Greenhill

When Collins was 19 he debuted for Wests Tigers against a powerhouse Melbourne Storm unit, one which featured fellow soon-to-be Dolphins Felise Kaufusi and Bromwich brothers Jesse and Kenny.

Now approaching what is typically the golden age for NRL middle men, Collins said when the time came his past rivals would quickly become his greatest mentors.

“The way they carry themselves hasn’t changed. They’re real professionals in the way they operate, and I think that will be good for myself and the younger boys coming through the Dolphins,” he said.

“If we can be sponges around those veterans who have done it all we’ll all be better for it.

“I don’t find it hard to focus on it (the next game for Tweed), just because with that balance of footy and outside of footy I feel like I’ve got that right.

“Everything I’ve learnt on the way in footy and life has helped me improve as a player, and that’s what I hope to take to Dolphins.”