THE Big Three for the smallest of rugby league bickies.

Mark Murray’s greatest gift has kept on giving for Melbourne over 17 seasons now, with Craig Bellamy’s predecessor signing a teenage trio of Cameron Smith, Billy Slater and Cooper Cronk for a bargain basement $5,000 each.

Ironically Murray and then-assistant Anthony Griffin only lasted 18 months in the southern capital before back-to-back finals misses in 2001-02 saw Bellamy ushered in.

Need more of a quick & clever rundown of key NRL talking points? Click here to sign up to nutshell!

Round 20

But the pair’s previous role as coach and scout for feeder side Norths Devils left Melbourne with the three greatest to ever pull on the purple.

From 2000 they arrived one after the other at the proud Queensland club.

Billy Slater and Cooper Cronk chair Cam Smith off after his record breaking 356th NRL game. Source: AAP

Smith first, followed by Cronk via Brisbane’s schoolboy rugby scene, and then Slater in the clapped out Mitsubishi Magna he and his cousin fanged for 18 hours from Innisfail.

Murray and Griffin, who was then the Storm’s new head of recruitment north of the border, ensured they were all Melbourne-bound.

“They were all on the same Storm deals that we used back then, two years at $5000,” Murray told foxsports.com.au.

“They all came to us differently and in round about ways. And straight away they gelled and got along famously.

“Even their parents got along really well, that was one thing I remember noticing when they came through.

“It really doesn’t feel all that long ago that they were starting out ... those three they were just foolproof.

“The easiest thing with recruitment is spotting the football talent. People in the stands can see that.

“The hard part is working out what you can do with that talent, whether you can make a first grade player out of them.

“Those three blokes, you can build a club around for a decade. They were faultless kids around the club at Norths, and it’s been exactly the same ever since.”

Ben Ikin, Nathan Ryan and Ben Glover are joined by Storm football manager Frank Ponissi to talk all things grand final and the possibility of a Storm future without Craig Bellamy.

You can also subscribe via iTunes or for Android users, listen on the iPP Podcast Player app.

Bellamy has taken the champion building blocks first delivered by Murray, and with a sterling and ever-evolving support cast, created an empire.

Three premierships (two later stripped for salary cap cheating). Seven grand finals. 108 Tests. 101 Origins. 977 NRL games between the Big Three alone.

And with Cronk Sydney-bound in 2018, 80 minutes is all that remains together as they return once more to the biggest stage of all.

Their salaries are no longer in the same stratosphere as those fateful first contracts, with all three now pocketing over a $1 million a year.

They’re also light years from that maiden meeting in the 2001 Norths pre-season, when all three took to the field for the first time.

Slater still recalls the “fancy Fila boots” of Cronk and Smith in that Devils training session at Nudgee College.

Cooper Cronk in 2004 after re-signing with Melbourne. Source: News Limited

For Murray he was the most obscure of the three, told if he could get to Brisbane from his home town of Innisfail in Queensland’s far north, within 48 hours, the coach would give him a run.

“He played OK, not outstanding or anything,” Murray says.

“I said to him afterwards he could stick around, work his way into the team but we couldn’t put him up or find him work.

“We had no resources for accommodation back then, and Billy would’ve been playing for match payments. $50 for a win or something as you do in Colts.

“Next thing Billy’s with us at training and that’s what struck me about him, his resourcefulness as an 18-year-old kid at the time.

Billy Slater in action for Norths in 2002. Source: News Limited

“When most kids come in from the bush and need everything done for them and a bit of mothering, Billy just goes ‘I’ll be right. I’ll see you at training’. And he was.”

Griffin famously spotted Smith when selectors didn’t at a juniors carnival, with the future Australian skipper left out of a Queensland under-17s side.

Murray and Griffin muscling in on the Broncos breeding ground got up a few noses at Red Hill, and soon enough Brisbane came knocking.

Slater found himself in a face-to-face meeting with Wayne Bennett, surprising plenty when he rebuffed the game’s most successful coach.

And when the rest of the NRL cottoned onto Smith’s talent a few years on, they chased him too.

With interest from the Broncos, Canberra and Canterbury, Smith’s re-signing forced popular clubman and incumbent Kiwi international Richard Swain out.

Murray still describes it as one of the toughest calls he’s ever had to make on a player. Bennett ended up getting Swain, but the Storm got the goods.

Cameron Smith during his debut with Melbourne in 2002. Source: News Limited

“We signed them in the first round without too much trouble,” Murray says.

“Cam, Cooper and Billy they were all just great kids who were enjoying their time together in our system and we were able to re-sign them in the face of the Broncos when they came calling later on.

“Because we were moving into the Broncos territory we tried to do something a bit different.

“They were signing plenty of kids to scholarships, they’d have 30 a year that they’d bring in for specialised training or run clinics for.

“We were only signing 6-10 players, the Broncs had Queensland to themselves for so long so our focus was pretty narrow up there, and our strike rate ended up being pretty good as a result.”