Lockyer v Johns

[Shorty]

Misty you have less creditability than all the Knights supporters in this argument - You refuse to give Lockyer any credit whatsoever and rely on pity jabs like 'Queenslanders' etc.

They're not to be compared and I don't think either of them would like you to.
Both play in totally different positions,Joey would never be a fullback and Lockyer would never be a halfback - So imo the comparisons should stop there.

The thing about Joey is that he stamped himself on the game,he was extremely dominant and the whole of the rugby league world stood up and took notice.
Lockyer has always been an exceptional and classy player,he has always given 110% and absolutely devotes himself to the game.
But he's not in the dominance of Johns because he's a different person and player.
While people sit in awe of the things Joey did,Lockyer quietly went about his business doing his job.

It's only now that everyone really is starting to take notice of what kind of player Darren Lockyer really is.

As for the person that said there will be another 40 players like Lockyer,are you ignorant?
Regardless of where you're from and regardless of who you support,credit where credit is due.
Either of them,I do not think we will see similar for a long time.
Joey had so much talent and was just phenomenal but you will not meet another dedicated and clever footballer than Lockyer.

As for the ecstasy thing,lol,please...
If anything it would have impaired Joey's performance,your reflexes and reactions are much much slower.

 

[Azkatro]

Now now, leave Misty alone.. he will be sleeping in after a busy night of reading Johns' book and whacking off, because that's what he likes to do "as I recall".

 

[Abz]

well well well, the stage is set for Darren Lockyer. Eerily similar to Joey's situation:

*ACL-ed
*Came back next year but missed origin 1, chucked into origin 2 after side got an*lly ravaged by the enemy state
*Now need to grab the series by the gonads: win at home before conquering away

im a knights fan so it wouldn't change my opinion what he does. but can he repeat wat joey did?

btw: can we NOT turn this into Quinnslanders going "YES" while blues fans going "NO"

I don't think he can. NSW lost game 1 05 off a Kimmorley intercept - they should've won that and white-washed the series 3-0 so I doubt Lockyer can do it.

 

[Mr. Fahrenheit]

some of you people don't get my point or just refuse to read it re: ecstacy being performance enhancing, i know its not on face value (trust me i know), but it has an indirect performance enhancing effect as i've outlined previously. Also, as Saab said (and i believe he has so much more of a clue on this than most people), you'd be ridiculous to think someone earning 500-600k stopped at MDMA.

 

[Mr. Fahrenheit]

LOL, you toss off about Lockyer doing something you can't remember???

I'll fill you in. He ran off a sweet Thurson pass that the Queen Mother would have scored off with her walking frame!

BTW, unless you have proof that Joey was high in E DURING a game, and that it was PERFORMANCE ENHANCING, it's not cheating.

And a 'muscle issue' near Heather's knee - :lol::lol: I hear Sam Backo once played a game with a band aid on his toe. Maybe that's hero stuf in Queensland, but winning GF's with a punctured lung is REAL heroism.

who said anything to do with heroism, this is why he's not a goalkicker... yet if needed he still took shots - a testament to his character. Besides youre the only one whacking off over pointscoring/goalkicking stats.

 

[Brookie]

As for the ecstasy thing,lol,please...
If anything it would have impaired Joey's performance,your reflexes and reactions are much much slower.

i've never seen anyone become 'much much slower' when on MDMA......

dude you OBVIOUSLY got ripped off and bought crap pills....:crazy::sarcasm:

 

[Billythekid]

I wish Lockyer had stayed at fullback. I still think he was a much better player there.

 

[Mr. Fahrenheit]

i've never seen anyone become 'much much slower' when on MDMA......

dude you OBVIOUSLY got ripped off and bought crap pills....:crazy::sarcasm:

dw shorty/cowgirl is known to talk out of her arse... she probably put the pills up there; therefore them not working.

 

[perverse]

Mr. F, you're clutching at straws with the argument that taking drugs to deal with life should be considered cheating. whilst yeah, sure, he may have been rubbed out of the game much earlier (or even before he carved his legend in the game). does anyone really want that? i may be overstating his influence on the game - but johns shone in an otherwise very dark time for our game. he was the epitome of all things a footballer could achieve on a football field - and he put hundreds of thousands of bums on seats and likely millions of dollars into the coffers of our game. on top of all that - we all got to witness one of the greatest players of all time ply their craft. in perhaps our darkest year - 1997 - he was the one that created the light at the end of the tunnel in the 97 ARL Grand Final - and lit the imagination of many many Australians by completing the fairytale underdogs story, against manly no less! there were many defining moments in his career such as this. they were the moments the fans connected with - and the moments that made him the biggest name in rugby league.

Lockyer is an amazing footballer, and i've been making a lot of effort to watch him play this year as he couldn't be too far off retirement now. he is one of very few true champions left in our game today. watching him pull a rabbit out of his hat last week was awesome. i hate the broncos, but i was on my feet giving a standing ovation to lockyer last friday night - he's an absolute football genius. make no mistake - he is right up there with johns despite his lack of accolades... but he is not johns' equal. there is no other way to describe it other than johns was always a step ahead - even ahead of lockyer. he had an answer for everything, and he could beat the opposition with any single aspect our game has (or a combination of any) be it his defense.. his passing.. his kicking.. his running.. he could do it all and do it at the right time.

i could blab on forever about johns' virtues on a football field - just as most other knights fans could too - however i know that we wont see another footballer like him in a long time. lockyer is the only one in the game currently that even comes close to ticking all the boxes (and ticking them as well as johns) but he too falls short in certain areas. i make this comment trying as hard as possible to take nothing away from lockyer... as i immensely enjoy watchign the bloke play and would encourage anyone who considers them self a fan of our game to go out of their way to watch him play as much footy as possible this year, because i'm starting to now realise that these champions wont always be around in our game. when lockyer retires we wont have a single player in our competition that is close to the level of the 2 names we are discussing here. not by a long long way.

 

[Shorty]

i've never seen anyone become 'much much slower' when on MDMA......

dude you OBVIOUSLY got ripped off and bought crap pills....:crazy::sarcasm:

Read reflexes and reactions,not movements.

 

[perverse]

oh and also - if someone were to take the footy field on pingers i would suspect they would either have a heart attack - or would have very serious hydration issues. it would be more likely to kill you than enhance your performance.

 

[gottabegood]

I've already explained how it was cheating, once again for the crackheads of the world... Pro athletes face pressures, some fold under these despite being fantastic talents, others choose to take drugs to escape the expectations/pressures. Joey took drugs to deal with that aspect so he could perform better on the field, whislt not technically performance enhancing... you'd have to be deadset worse than Truth to not see the connection.

That's nuts.

So beer, talking to your wife, playing with your kids, or playing golf are performance enhancing according to you.

mein got....

 

[Mr. Fahrenheit]

difference being that their not illegal, Craig Field wouldnt have been rubbed out of the game for talking to his wife.

and perverse, whilst i believe that is one of the more... fair posts in this thread, my point still remains (as you acknowledged) he woudl have been rubbed out of the game alot earlier. I'm not saying its a desirable result, but surely it loses some integrity and would definately count heavily against him in any best and fairest discussion.

 

[Mr. Fahrenheit]

oh and also - if someone were to take the footy field on pingers i would suspect they would either have a heart attack - or would have very serious hydration issues. it would be more likely to kill you than enhance your performance.

you'd assume they'd be chewing gum... or their mouth guard, fail that their own teeth.

 

[Mr. Fahrenheit]

oh and also - if someone were to take the footy field on pingers i would suspect they would either have a heart attack - or would have very serious hydration issues. it would be more likely to kill you than enhance your performance.

just reiterating my point, i never suggested taking the field whilst peaking was performance enhancing - merely it was a way for him to cope with off field issues. Issues which if he didn't deal with, he wouldn't have performed onfield. The way in which johns dealt with them was illegal, and tbh its FINE with me if others like Sailor, Field didn't get rubbed out OR Tim Smith even - prosecuted in the media for drinking. Joey was the golden child of the media and he exploited it, thats what irks me. Again, IMO Joey = Lockyer - overall.

 

[gottabegood]

difference being that their not illegal, Craig Field wouldnt have been rubbed out of the game for talking to his wife.

and perverse, whilst i believe that is one of the more... fair posts in this thread, my point still remains (as you acknowledged) he woudl have been rubbed out of the game alot earlier. I'm not saying its a desirable result, but surely it loses some integrity and would definately count heavily against him in any best and fairest discussion.

Weather they are illegal or not is not the point.

Performance enhancing is the question, and taking E's certainly is not for a game so physically demanding. Absolute crapola.

Silly Ben Johnson missed out on shaving an extra second off his time if he just took an E.

 

[Mr. Fahrenheit]

Weather they are illegal or not is not the point.

Performance enhancing is the question, and taking E's certainly is not for a game so physically demanding. Absolute crapola.

Silly Ben Johnson missed out on shaving an extra second off his time if he just took an E.

with the mental component being so crucial for playing rugby league, a player's head needs to be switched on. If other off field issues are troubling a player, it affects him on field... look at tim smith this year. Johns took an illegal substance (and against ASDA codes) to cope with his off field issues so his mental state could be more stable. The mental state that helped him perform well on field... it can't get anymore black/white than that.

 

[Mr. Fahrenheit]

Weather they are illegal or not is not the point.

Performance enhancing is the question, and taking E's certainly is not for a game so physically demanding. Absolute crapola.

Silly Ben Johnson missed out on shaving an extra second off his time if he just took an E.

Again, your view of this situation is so narrow minded that you can't possibly fathom this, or you won't let yourself because youre another joey fanboy.

 

[perverse]

The way in which johns dealt with them was illegal, and tbh its FINE with me if others like Sailor, Field didn't get rubbed out OR Tim Smith even - prosecuted in the media for drinking. Joey was the golden child of the media and he exploited it, thats what irks me. Again, IMO Joey = Lockyer - overall.

fair enough - and i wont argue with your opinion on joey = lockyer. let's just say i don't agree with it... and i strongly doubt that's how history will remember it, and leave it at that.

yes - what joey did in dealing with his demons was illegal. no disputing that. it was wrong, and stupid.

the most surprising part about the whole saga was the lack of blame, guilt or criticism that was levelled at the many personalities in the media and other sectors in league that kept their mouth shut on the issue for so long. half of the league world was in seemingly total denial about it for most of joeys career, and nothing official was ever done about it. i very strongly suspect that the right people in the right places were aware of joeys little habits. i can guarantee you that most people that enjoyed a night out in newcastle were well aware of it. you can blame joey for taking illegal substances, but i don't think the blame falls squarely on him for not accepting the consequences earlier. he was very well sheltered - by the knights and i personally suspect by the NRL themselves too (take that as opinion only - i certainly have no concrete basis for my suspicions) . i was very surprised that many more heads didn't roll when it all came out. it was a genuine cover up.

 

[The Engineers Room]

Lockyer is and always has been a better player than Johns. But then again so is Lewis and Sterling.