Between 2007 and 2015, they were backline mainstays for Newcastle, appearing in a combined tally of 340 NRL games and representing NSW in the State of Origin cauldron. Both players were renowned as tough, ultra-professional, popular among their teammates and outstanding role models with squeaky-clean reputations.

Yet by early 2017, both had parted company with the Knights in circumstances that were not only bitter and acrimonious, but downright sad.

When Newcastle kicked off their pre-season training in November, 2016, nobody was under greater scrutiny than Mullen. The 29-year-old was struggling to recover from surgery to reattach his problematic right hamstring to the bone, and when he tweaked it during an innocuous ball-work drill, there was speculation he might be forced to pull the pin. Instead he soldiered on, but after playing only 40 games in the previous three years, Newcastle's highest-paid player was aware of the perception that he was becoming a liability.

People under pressure sometimes make regrettable decisions.

On January 17, the Knights called a press conference to announce that on November 29, Mullen had failed an ASADA drugs test, after a positive swab to a banned steroid, drostanolone. "He's gone outside of the club and taken advice from someone and now he's going to pay the price," Knights chief executive Matt Gidley said. " ... If they go outside of the club and do things that we are not aware of, then there's not much we can do. But they are fully aware of the risks. There's been too many examples in professional sport of what happens when they do go outside of the club and the people they trust and take advice from people that aren't professionals, and they're the consequences."

Gidley added that Mullen, who was immediately stood down by Newcastle, pending his appearance before the NRL drugs tribunal, was "devastated". "It's important we consider Jarrod's well-being through this process," he said. "This is going to be incredibly difficult for him ... while we are extremely disappointed in what's transpired here, we will continue to stand behind him and support him - from a well-being point of view, that is - through this process."

Hoping for leniency, after arguing that he was prescribed the substance by a physiotherapist to treat his chronic hammy and gained no unfair advantage, Mullen instead copped the maximum four-year ban. "I trusted the bloke," a shattered Mullen told Channel Seven, in his only interview. "I've known him for 10 years. He tossed up an amino acid injection to help with the healing ... I could have sat back and collected my money for the next three years, kept tearing my hamstring, and not done anything about it. But I wanted to be out there helping my team."

His gamble cost the 211-game veteran the last two seasons of his contract with Newcastle, reported to be worth at least $1.5 million, and left him with little hope of resuming his career. "It's ruined my life, pretty much," he said. While Mullen declined other interview requests from various media outlets, his mother, Leeann, expressed her disappointment on 1233 ABC Newcastle radio.

"He's certainly been hung out to dry, I believe," she said. "There's a player in deep despair ... four years is, in my view, very, very harsh. There's been a whole range of off-field issues that NRL players have been embroiled in. I believe most of them have got off fairly lightly compared to a four-year ban imposed on Jarrod."

NRL chief executive Todd Greenberg said it was always disappointing when someone "loses a career" but added: "There are always consequences for poor decisions." Greenberg's sentiments were echoed by the anti-doping authorities. ASADA chief executive Ben McDevitt said: "ASADA will continue to work to protect those athletes who make the right decisions when it comes to injury treatment and rehabilitation. Ultimately, Mr Mullen has paid a heavy price for his poor decision making."

Barely a month after the Mullen bombshell detonated, it was revealed in the Sun-Herald that McManus had launched landmark legal action against the Knights, alleging that he suffered career-ending brain trauma and ongoing symptoms after being allowed to repeatedly play while concussed.

In evidence tendered in the Supreme Court, McManus's lawyers said the Knights "knew or ought to have known" that the winger was risking "foreseeable permanent brain damage" by playing and training after suffering severe head knocks. Justice Ian Harrison ruled that McManus was entitled to subpoena medical records of his former teammates, as well as the game-day diaries of coaches Rick Stone and Wayne Bennett, to tender as evidence. McManus's lawyers argued such information was essential "to establish that his position is not unique and that other players have been treated ... in the way that he contends he was treated and which, on his case, amounted to a breach of duty causing damage".

McManus claimed that on as many as 10 occasions, he was encouraged to play on despite being concussed. McManus told the Sydney Morning Herald that "this is not a situation I ever wanted to be in" and he was trying to "ensure no other player, at any other club, on any level of sport, falls through the cracks in the same way again."

"You don't want to be in the position where you are the first to do something, but I think things have to change in the game, there's no doubt about that ... I guess it's protecting my future and the future of my family," he said. "It's had a significant impact on my life and that's why I've gone down the path I've gone." The case was expected to last years, rather than months, and McManus, who had been employed by the Knights in a corporate-liaison role since his forced retirement, soon resigned after securing another job.

There were further setbacks during an eventful pre-season. Before he had even played a game for Newcastle, new signing Rory Kostjasyn - a former Melbourne and North Queensland hooker who helped the Cowboys win the 2015 grand final - suffered a career-ending throat injury during a training session. Prop Korbin Sims requested and was granted an immediate release to join Brisbane, while unwanted winger Akuila Uate received a reported $200,000 payout from the Knights to resurrect his career at Manly. Then big Pauli Pauli, who played in 15 games in his first season with the Knights, suffered a dislocated hip in a multi-car pile-up on the M1 motorway between Sydney and Newcastle.

Despite the various misfortunes, the Knights started the season in encouraging fashion with a 26-22 loss in Auckland, fighting back from a 12-point half-time deficit. In round two, Newcastle mercifully ended their 19-game losing streak with a 34-26 win at home against the Gold Coast, their first victory in 335 days.

A week later, the issue of concussion was back in screaming headlines when the Knights were fined $50,000 - with a further $50,000 suspended - for failing to take fullback Brendan Elliot from the field for a head-injury assessment after a brutal high shot against South Sydney.

After their breakthrough win against the Titans, Newcastle's only success in the next 16 weeks was a 34-20 victory against struggling Canberra. Among the losses was an 18-14 defeat at Brookvale when Uate scored two tries, one after a blatant knock-on, against his former club. He would finish the season with 14 tries, four more than the Knights' leading scorer, Nathan Ross.

By this stage, Brown's record at Newcastle - three wins from 42 games - was becoming a talking point, especially after a 33-12 loss at home to Wests Tigers that chairman McGuigan described as a "catastrophe" and "completely unacceptable".

Asked about Brown's long-term job security, McGuigan said that if results did not improve, he would be the "man who has to carry the can". McGuigan's comments annoyed Brown and were widely criticised in the media. But perhaps they provided motivation for Newcastle's players, who responded with a courageous and desperately unlucky 20-18 loss to Canterbury at Belmore, then competitive showings against the finals-bound Broncos and Roosters.

Just when it seemed the Knights, after eight successive defeats, had a mortgage on the wooden spoon, they rallied to string together three wins on the spin - against the Dragons (21-14), Warriors (26-10) and Parramatta (29-10) - the latter their first away success in almost two years. Unfortunately, the Tigers kept winning too, to maintain a buffer between themselves and last-placed Newcastle.

Heading into the final round, the Knights needed an unlikely trifecta to have any chance of climbing out of the cellar: beat Cronulla at home, hope the Warriors upset the Tigers at Leichhardt, and bank on a 42-point turnaround in their differentials.

They would tackle the unlikely challenge minus co-captain Sione Mata'utia, who was ordered to stand down from the final two games - and also representing Samoa at the World Cup - after a series of worrying concussions. By now, Knights officials and coaching staff were sick of hearing that C-word.

There would be no last-round miracle. Newcastle competed with the defending champions before succumbing 26-18, while the Tigers downed the Warriors 28-16 to climb to 14th, above the Gold Coast Titans. Once again, the Knights finished last, becoming only the fifth club - and the first since the now-defunct Gold Coast Seagulls (1991- 93) - to collect three consecutive wooden spoons. Their five wins and 275-point improvement in for-and-against statistics were evidence of progress since the end of their humiliating 2016 campaign.

Nonetheless, no team in rugby league's salary-cap era, designed to ensure all clubs are competing on a level playing field, had reached such a low ebb. Fans of most clubs, whatever the code, would be hanging their heads in shame. Yet as the crowd of 20,535 filed out of McDonald Jones Stadium after the last game in Newcastle's 2017 season, the mood was overwhelmingly optimistic.

Hard Yards: The Story of the Newcastle Knights. Available to purchase from theherald.mybigcommerce.com/books/ $19.95