My uneducated take to me Metcalf is a natural ball runner, up until they put the 7 jersey on him his first instinct was to run......now its looking to set up play outside him. Once he learns to balance that out and realizes one of the best ways he can open up space for his outsides is to run, the attack might flow smoother and open up more oppertunities.
Also he's yet to gain understanding of tempo. Changing tempo can open up defences a lot more than just going full pedal to the floor everytime. TMM plays with great tempo going from fast to slow or slow to fast hence why he puts runners into space often. This however only comes with experience and can take a long time to realize......look how long it took SJ to get it.
Webby and the club are all in on Metcalf so even if the results dont necessarily go our way their going to give him all the time he needs, so injury apart i think he's got the 7 jumper all season.
You know nothing John Snow (see bolded part of your post).
You see this tempo switch across the NRL itself.
There is this paradoxical thing where the game has been artificially sped up, but as halfbacks age and slow down, they become even more impactful in games. A half backs prime in the current game seems to include a late bloom period after their running legs are gone.
In oldschool thinking, experts would talk about how the great ones looked like they had more time and space than the rest of the competition. Your tempo switching discussion helps explain this phenomena/ your comments should unwrap the mystery for people - perhaps they should be forwarded to the 'experts' on the telly at SKY (only partly tongue in cheek, you learn more here in posts than years of SKY game analysis)
To add to what you have said,
Metcalf you can see, is also concentrating on his new defensive demands, you would have to give him a tick there, he has been solid - which is a big step up from where his rep was as a running six.
We also have to bare in mind that he has a new long kicking game, and we need to appreciate that it doesn't come about readily nor easily, what we are seeing is months of practice and taking that from beta testing to the real thing without the confidence of hours on the odometer. He is also goal kicking.
So yeah, no shit we are all in on
Metcalf and the coaches think he is our long term halfback.