It was a decent amount better than last year, and until Manly's eleventh hour offer he was more than happy with it...I personally believe Manly have paid overs for a guy who, while a good player and a top bloke, is in the twilight of his career.
Agreed they paid overs..but good on him for taking it.
Realistically he wouldn't be more than a bench player next year at Parra with Shackles and Poore coming in...so take the paycheque while he can.
With incentives this year...he'll still earn less than 6 figures and the offer from my understanding was going to be similar to this years...with the potential value to be just barely six figures if he played a certain amount of games.
Whereas Manly's offer provided a lot more stability and guaranteed income. Similar to Penrith's negotiations with Rodney last year...We paid Rodney BIG money after 2003 on a 4 year deal...but he barely played 20 games in 4 season's.
Our offer was based around incentives for # of games played, with Base minimum salary as the ...well..minimum. Manly came in with a stable offer of guarantee'd income and further opportunity and he took it. I was disappointed, sure...but we know the club's stance and agreed with it and Rodney is a top bloke and we didn't begrudge him leaving because he probably needed a new destination to re-invent himself which he has done beautifully at Manly.
Just saying ... similar situations - $$$$ + Opportunity usually means players will leave a club..
