If the marker for a quality competition is that its two best teams meet in the final game of the season, then Super Rugby Pacific has seemingly done its job in 2023.
For on Saturday night in Hamilton, the Chiefs, who have lost only once all year, host the Crusaders, who lift trophies like the Reserve Bank does interest rates. It is a finale worthy of a full house at FMG Waikato Stadium, and one choc full of storylines, particularly after the All Blacks squad was named last Sunday.
Whether you agree or disagree with the timing of that announcement -- for comparison, Wallabies coach Eddie Jones won't unveil his group until this Sunday and Australia has no dog in Saturday's fight -- the omission of Chiefs flyer Shaun Stevenson and the inclusion of Crusaders bolter Dallas McLeod has ensured the spotlight will be trained on those two players more closely.
And in Richie Mo'unga and Damian McKenzie, the decider has Super Rugby Pacific's most electrifying attacking players, two men who would sit comfortably among the top 10 for that category right across the world.
So there is a lot to like about this season's finale.
But it is also hard to shift that nagging feeling that Super Rugby Pacific has failed to truly engage the wider rugby public in both Australia and New Zealand, let alone those with perhaps only a passing interest in the game.
And what should be even more alarming for administrators on either side of the Tasman are the growing list of authoritative voices sharing personal anecdotes of their ongoing frustrations with the game - that they are finding themselves reaching for the remote in search of greater entertainment.
If Sky Sport commentator and former All Blacks scrum-half Justin Marshall's comments last month didn't rattle enough cages, then the weight of World Cup-winning coach Sir Steve Hansen handing down his own NRL admission last week must surely generate a response of genuine concern.
"I look at NRL and New South Wales Racing and the guy in charge there, Peter V'landys, who has been really instrumental in making both these sports very popular. And his formula's very simple. It's all about what do the fans want, what do the participants want and give it to them," Hansen told Newstalk ZB.
"Both rugby unions need to sit down and really find out what it is the fans want and how we're going to get them to engage in it and then deliver on that.
"If we're being bone dead honest with ourselves it is at the moment. It [NRL] is a better game to watch on TV than rugby is, because it's not stop-start. They apply a lot of common sense to how they adjudicate things and make sure the game keeps some form of flow to it. Our game over the last five years has got slower and slower and slower. But that's because they've gone out and listened to what the fans want and then applied common sense to it."
Certainly, the noise around the Warriors in New Zealand this year has been hard to ignore. But it's also worth remembering that New Zealand's sole NRL team at long last appears to be tracking towards finals football, a club that up until the middle of last year had also been based in Australia for two seasons because of COVID-19 border restrictions.
And don't get Warriors supporters started on NRL referees, and a conspiracy theory they'll tell you means decisions routinely go against their team.
All of that has had a uniting effect behind the Warriors and sent some NRL commentators into overdrive about the need for a second team across the ditch.
But in contrast to the comments from Hansen and earlier Marshall, New Zealand Rugby on Tuesday released this season's broadcast figures for Super Rugby Pacific, reporting a 9% increase on viewership on pay-TV partner Sky Sport, as well as a 28% increase on the broadcaster's streaming service and free-to-air games on Prime.
So scenes of quarter-full stadiums around the country are perhaps not as glum as many might have you believe, albeit with the acknowledgement that some out-of-the-box thinking might be needed to entice people back pitch-side in what for many is a particularly challenging financial environment.
And, for the record, Saturday's final is indeed a sell-out.
But then there is the fact staring the competition, and specifically Australia, in the face; that again only the Brumbies consistently competed with the Chiefs, Crusaders, Blues and Hurricanes, and that without a team in Saturday's final, the match is understandably a hard sell to fans on the western side of the Tasman.
While passing observers will likely find something else to watch domestically in Australia, the rusted-on rugby fans might have also reached for their Wallabies scarves in preparation for Jones' Rugby Championship squad announcement on Sunday.
It was hardly a shock then to see Rugby Australia chairman Hamish McLennan revive his media push for a Super Rugby draft last week. What has, however, surprised is that the idea is starting to garner support among New Zealand Rugby administrators, having already been given the blessing of New Zealand Players Association boss Rob Nichol.
Again, Hansen's significant backing suggests we may see it come to fruition somewhere down the line.
"I don't know about falling out [of love] with the game but I think they're falling out with a few things that are happening within the game, that's frustrating people. It can be hard to watch at times," Hansen said.
"There's no dispute that Super Rugby has to change. It's pretty predictable and still stuck where it was four or five years ago. You go through the quarterfinals and it wasn't that exciting as you knew who was going to win. Some of the ideas that have been floated by New Zealand Rugby and Australia are quite good ones, so let's hope people are more flexible enough and more open enough to hear those ideas and maybe put them in place."
If the competition is to seriously re-engage the rugby public and grow its reach beyond that, it needs a more competitive Australian cohort; RA is not going to cut teams as NZR would like it to, so other solutions must be canvassed, and the draft may be one near the top of the list.
RA officials also remain hopeful that its "golden decade" of events will see some players return home from overseas.
Moana Pasifika, meanwhile, present another issue, though the expansion franchise's final-round win over the Waratahs and the fact that more than 20 players from this season's squad were named in World Cup training groups with either Samoa or Tonga suggest its not all doom and gloom. Having Pasifika playing more games in Samoa, and hopefully in Tonga at some stage, too, would be positive, but their level of competitiveness must also improve. A near-empty Mt. Smart Stadium was an ugly optic.
Which leaves just Fijian Drua, whose home games this season were undoubtedly Super Rugby Pacific's shining light in 2023. Whether it was in Lautoka or Suva, the noise, colour and sheer excitement that engulfed the Drua's home games was something special, and played a vital role in lifting their team to victories in five of six home fixtures.
So perhaps the problems aren't as stark, the issues so grave, as some might have you believe. The agreed Super Rugby Commission should start to address some of those areas if or when it is established.
And what is abundantly clear is that there is huge scope for improvement, both on and off the field; there are growth opportunities and further expansion possibilities, as was flagged also in the past seven days; and the shared genuine belief that when the games are of the quality of the weekend's Brumbies-Chiefs thriller, the Brumbies-Hurricanes a week prior or a handful of others across the regular season, the contests and entertainment value are as good as, if not better, than what any sport in this part of the world offers.
And that's certainly what Saturday's final is expected to deliver.
The best Super Rugby team in 2023 against the best Super Rugby franchise that ever was; the Chiefs hunting for their first title in 10 years, the Crusaders an astonishing seventh-straight trophy and the perfect farewell present for coach Scott Robertson and All Blacks stars Mo'unga and Sam Whitelock.
The scriptwriters have got the final right, now it's just the Super Rugby Pacific at large that needs a little TLC.