: Wed Jun 17, 2009 7:40 pm  

Terry Monster wrote:

Wing is twice the stand off Jeffries is. Newton is twice the hooker Jeffries is. Newton's nationality is also in his favour. We can either let a genuinley class hooker go and have a long hard look for a replacement that we might not find, or we can pursue this Wing as a straight swap for a stand off that he is clearly twice as good as.

Seems a very easy choice to me. If Deacs was out of contract then it would be him out of the door for me, but he isn't and we are highley unlikley to cut him.

simple - keep him as backup ala robbie paul after we signed harris. We shouldnt be guaranteeing a players starting spot just because he's in contract. Form determines who gets the starting spot. Jeffries is a much better halfback than he is a standoff so play him at halfback where he did well earlier in season against leeds and saints.
or to put it another way platts under contract for next two years, halley is OOC so by your logic thats halley on his way.

: Wed Jun 17, 2009 8:32 pm  

mat wrote:

simple - keep him as backup ala robbie paul after we signed harris. We shouldnt be guaranteeing a players starting spot just because he's in contract. Form determines who gets the starting spot. Jeffries is a much better halfback than he is a standoff so play him at halfback where he did well earlier in season against leeds and saints.
or to put it another way platts under contract for next two years, halley is OOC so by your logic thats halley on his way.

I don't understand what you are saying.

: Wed Jun 17, 2009 8:33 pm  

Terry Monster wrote:

Wing is twice the stand off Jeffries is. Newton is twice the hooker Jeffries is. Newton's nationality is also in his favour. We can either let a genuinley class hooker go and have a long hard look for a replacement that we might not find, or we can pursue this Wing as a straight swap for a stand off that he is clearly twice as good as.

Seems a very easy choice to me. If Deacs was out of contract then it would be him out of the door for me, but he isn't and we are highley unlikley to cut him.

Is Newton really that classy nowadays? I rate him as a good hooker but I don't think we've consistently seen Terry at his best in a Bulls shirt unfortunately. For me, it would very much depend on the sort of money he was looking for as to whether we retained him or not. I certainly wouldn't want us to get into a bidding war to keep him.

I doubt Jeffries would be asking for huge pots of gold to keep him at the Bulls and his form this year has been on the whole very good. If we bring Wing in but left Jeffries go, we're still in the same situation as this season. We need options that allow us to have something other than Deacon cemented into the no.7 jersey. We should be retaining Jeffries and looking to bring someone else in. If we're to keep Rinaldi then I'd rather it was for a hooking role than back up scrum half.

: Wed Jun 17, 2009 8:47 pm  

Bully_Boxer wrote:

Is Newton really that classy nowadays? I rate him as a good hooker but I don't think we've consistently seen Terry at his best in a Bulls shirt unfortunately. For me, it would very much depend on the sort of money he was looking for as to whether we retained him or not. I certainly wouldn't want us to get into a bidding war to keep him.

I doubt Jeffries would be asking for huge pots of gold to keep him at the Bulls and his form this year has been on the whole very good. If we bring Wing in but left Jeffries go, we're still in the same situation as this season. We need options that allow us to have something other than Deacon cemented into the no.7 jersey. We should be retaining Jeffries and looking to bring someone else in. If we're to keep Rinaldi then I'd rather it was for a hooking role than back up scrum half.

I think Terry is classy, he's one of the best in Super League and he would be a real struggle to replace. Godwin or Rinaldi as our first choise hooker? Seriously?

I reckon Ben is probably a relativley high paid player at Bulls, I cant see him being cheap at all, and this time around he will want more. Plus he is not that good, he's been better this year, but he's not all that is he, he doesn't have that class we have been missing, where as Wing does.

If we got Wing, I don't think we could keep BJ as cover, he'd cost way to much for a cover player I reckon, which is where Rinaldi comes in in my books, as he would be a cheaper option and he can cover more positions than BJ.

: Wed Jun 17, 2009 8:50 pm  

Terry Monster wrote:

I don't understand what you are saying.

you said if he was ooc you'd prefer deacon to go but as he's in contract jeffries must go and deacon retains starting spot. i.e. a player whose out of form retains starting spot purely because he's already under contract for next year. the comparison I made was platt who's not playing well but in contract for next year against halley who's playing well but ooc of contract. following your logic we'd retain platt because he's under contract and allow halley to leave.

I don't see the problem with retaining jeffries, whose the form half this year and signing wing keeping deacon to cover any injuries. we cant go into a seasn with just two halves, especially an injury prone one like deacs is now.

which of newton/rinaldi to re-sign is a difficult one. theres arguments for and against each although overseas spots could end up determining it. I'd edge towards newton as he's a good leader on the field. My ideal would be to retain newton and godwin and let wagga go but that would only be a short tem fix as tez and rinaldi are both at back ends of their careers.

: Wed Jun 17, 2009 9:12 pm  

mat wrote:

only reason for retaining deacon is as cheap cover for halves. If he didnt already have a contract for next year he wouldnt get one on this years form. we cant afford a half who misses 1/4 of season with recurring injuries which deacon has this year and last. As 50k of his wage doesnt count towards cap then hes good value as a cover player but to improve we need a better starting halves option. Jeffries has looked more effective at halfback whenever he's played there imo. if we can pair him with a class standoff like Wing then we'll improve massively.

The 50k applies to one player with 10 years service for the same club IIRC. Surely Langley would qualify if Deacon was cut.

: Wed Jun 17, 2009 9:13 pm  

mat wrote:

you said if he was ooc you'd prefer deacon to go but as he's in contract jeffries must go and deacon retains starting spot. i.e. a player whose out of form retains starting spot purely because he's already under contract for next year. the comparison I made was platt who's not playing well but in contract for next year against halley who's playing well but ooc of contract. following your logic we'd retain platt because he's under contract and allow halley to leave.

I don't see the problem with retaining jeffries, whose the form half this year and signing wing keeping deacon to cover any injuries. we cant go into a seasn with just two halves, especially an injury prone one like deacs is now.

which of newton/rinaldi to re-sign is a difficult one. theres arguments for and against each although overseas spots could end up determining it. I'd edge towards newton as he's a good leader on the field. My ideal would be to retain newton and godwin and let wagga go but that would only be a short tem fix as tez and rinaldi are both at back ends of their careers.

I think you misunderstood what I was saying, I was saying I would prefer it if Deacon was to go, but because he isn't out of contract, he wont be going anywhere, simply because Steve rates him and it would cost us to pay him off. I don't rate Deacs at all very much now. I think you've got it mixed up somewhere along the line.

They only problem I see with keeping Jeffries is I think he will be fairly highley paid, along with Deacs, and if we were to sign Wing, then that would leave us with 3 relatively high paid half backs, cover men shouldn't be highley paid, that's why I think we should cut BJ, because if we signed Wing then BJ would indeed be cover, given that Macca is highley unlikley to drop Deacs to cover. If Jeff and Deacs were both out of contract right now, it would be Jeffries who I would retain, simple as.

Newton/Rinaldi isn't a difficult one at all. Newton is in a league of his own compared with any other hooker we currently have in the squad. I'd keep Rinadli, but as that cheap cover I mentioned earlier, as he'll be a damn site cheaper than Jeffries.

: Wed Jun 17, 2009 9:18 pm  

The problem I have with Wing is that some of the best coaches in Australia have never been able to decide where he's best at. He seems to be a jack of all trades a master of none.

: Wed Jun 17, 2009 9:22 pm  

redeverready wrote:

The problem I have with Wing is that some of the best coaches in Australia have never been able to decide where he's best at. He seems to be a jack of all trades a master of none.

He's still a top class playmaker and makes the plays wherever on the field he his. It's probably his versatility that makes it hard for coaches to give him one specific position to play, but if he were to say 'right Craig' youre playing stand off for Bulls' I'm sure he would play it and play it very well.

: Wed Jun 17, 2009 10:57 pm  

Terry Monster wrote:

I think Terry is classy, he's one of the best in Super League and he would be a real struggle to replace. Godwin or Rinaldi as our first choise hooker? Seriously?

I'm not so sure he is one of the best nowadays to be honest. But I would retain him if the money was right, but I'm not sure him leaving would be catastrophic for us. I'm interested to see how Rinaldi goes now he has found his feet a little.

Terry Monster wrote:

I reckon Ben is probably a relativley high paid player at Bulls, I cant see him being cheap at all, and this time around he will want more. Plus he is not that good, he's been better this year, but he's not all that is he, he doesn't have that class we have been missing, where as Wing does.

If we got Wing, I don't think we could keep BJ as cover, he'd cost way to much for a cover player I reckon, which is where Rinaldi comes in in my books, as he would be a cheaper option and he can cover more positions than BJ.

I don't reckon BJ is anywhere near one of the highest paid. People such as Deacon, Lynch, Burgess, Newton, Menzies, Morrison, Solomona etc will be on much more. I'd say BJ would be among the average pay category and we should be able to retain him and still bring somebody in. We had enough to have Deacon, BJ and Bird.