Firstly, the below article refers to a 2024 amendment to rules that previous decisions or tribunal hearings have no bearing on new cases.
Effectively it is a whole new process (around head knocks) in 2024 is my reading of this and given court cases and the dramatic effects of CTE I think the plan is to come down hard on head knocks with lengthy suspensions.
https://www.sen.com.au/news/2024/02/26/ ... er-powell/
Secondly, Powell-Pepper got 4 and his incident was not nearly as severe as JW's in my opinion.
IMO PP didn't specifically line the player up, leave the ground to hit him or brace to bump in the fashion Jimmy did.
Jimmy is a brave, tough but fair player who obviously had a brain fade in this situation.
I doubt he set out to injure Simpkin or breach current rules as he did, but it happened so now he has to wear the penalty.
I initially thought 6 weeks fair, with 4 a good outcome.
Given the media profile I now think 6 would be a good outcome with 8 more likely as media beat up will add fuel to the fire.
I hope Jimmy comes back and regains his place, it would be disappointing if he is remembered by this isolated incident instead of a body of work where he committed his body unwaveringly to the contest in a fair manner throughout his whole career.