Loyalty

[antonius]

There's quite a few posts on here refering to the lack of loyalty to the club being shown by players lately. I think we can blame one bloke for that. One Andrew Johns, who played the club off last year against union, to gain what was for him a very lucrative deal. We have players like Tahu being critised for leaving last year and being called a mercinary. When he signed his first contract with us it was common knowledge that he told the club offer me what you think I'm worth and I'll sign, which he did. He trusted us to do the right thing. When his contract came up he hung around while the Johns fiasco gathered momentum and in the end said stuff ya, and left. Ben Kennedy has stated that part of the reason he left was because of the drawn out negotiations last year, when the club couldn't move until Johns was sewn up. Daniel Abraham knocked back a huge offer from the Warriors at his last contract negotiation purely to stay at the club he took $130,000, when he could of gotten $200,000 plus with the warriors. We have people on here saying he should take a pay cut because he's injury prone!!! he's been taking a pay cut for the life of his current contract. The same people claiming Abes take a cut, haven't said much about the contract Johns is on, lets face it he's (Johns) spent a fair bit of time on the side lines for various reasons. What I'm trying to say is it cuts both ways loyalty, Guys like Abes and Simmo have been loyal, they've played for less than they could get elsewhere, when has Johns done that? the club pandered to him last year and I will bet players like Simmo would have to wonder why they didn't adopt the same attitude as Johns when their contracts were up. We used to have a loyalty thing going here in Newcastle, I'd say the fact that it has gradually dissapeared is down to the farce that was allowed to go on last year.

 

[The Little People]

There's quite a few posts on here refering to the lack of loyalty to the club being shown by players lately. I think we can blame one bloke for that. One Andrew Johns, who played the club off last year against union.

Maybe Joey should say.. I've made my millions out of the Knights over the years and will make millions in endorsements for years to come. So I will sign up on $150,000 for 2006 and give them $350,000 to build a competitive team around me so I dont get frustrated losing 20 out of 24 games in 2006.

Yeah fat chance of that Barge arse

 

[Jobdog]

Tony, u make a few good points, however the fact of the matter is we HAD to re-sign Joey at all costs. Maybe with the benefit of hindsight, management should hav offered him a set amount, and said take it or leave it. Then moved on to retaining guys like Tahu and BK. That way, they would hav maybe kept BK.

But who would hav signed another contract not knowing if they were going to be playing with the worlds best player? The fact of the matter is yes, Joey was perhaps a little greedy and should have thanked the Knights for their LOYALTY to HIM over the past few years with his injuries and how they stuck with him. That should hav involved taking a bit of a PAY-CUT instead of drinking most of the water at the well and leaving a few drops for everyone else.

I think I may hav contradicted myself here, but lets just say I was pointing out positives and negatives :lol:

 

[Baron Vo Mandor]

Mate I would have given anything to keep in this order Kennedy, Ennis, Tahu, Parsons & O'Davis here for another year.

And no Reyno.

We'd be in contention for a top 8th birth and not have the little peacock "Joey" running around, and instead have 5 great first graders in his place.

Picture it.....

1. Robbie O'Davis.
2. Milton Thaiday
3. Matt Gidley.
4. Timana Tahu.
5. Anthony Quinn/Dustin Cooper
6. Jarrod Mullen.
7. Kurt Gidley/Dane Campbell/Steve Witt
8. Matt Parsons.
9. Danny Buderus.
10. Craig Smith.
11. Clint Newton.
12. Steve Simpson.
13. Ben Kennedy.

14. Adam Woolnough.
15. Josh Perry.
16. Michael Ennis.
17. Daniel Abraham.

The halfs yeah are a bit weak admittedly but a monster forward pack, and very, very strong backline.

The worst thing is that we could have had this easily!!!!!

Makes me want to f**ken cry.

 

[Ben]

I doubt the team can win without Johns. All other teams know that without Johns in the Knights, you target the halves and the team is going to cumble to pieces

 

[Jobdog]

Which is why I said that it was imperative that Joey signed, however he should hav made up his mind a lot quicker instead of holding the club to ransom.

 

[antonius]

Tony, u make a few good points, however the fact of the matter is we HAD to re-sign Joey at all costs. Maybe with the benefit of hindsight, management should hav offered him a set amount, and said take it or leave it. Then moved on to retaining guys like Tahu and BK. That way, they would hav maybe kept BK.

But who would hav signed another contract not knowing if they were going to be playing with the worlds best player? The fact of the matter is yes, Joey was perhaps a little greedy and should have thanked the Knights for their LOYALTY to HIM over the past few years with his injuries and how they stuck with him. That should hav involved taking a bit of a PAY-CUT instead of drinking most of the water at the well and leaving a few drops for everyone else.

I think I may hav contradicted myself here, but lets just say I was pointing out positives and negatives :lol:

You said it yourself in this post He showed NO loyalty, and that's the point I'm making. Others have shown loyalty and are now being ridiculed for not showing it, Johns has never shown any loyalty. By the way I disagree with the HAD to sign him bit There are plenty of players out there that sign contracts knowing they wont be playing with Johns. He screwed us around last year, and in part we are paying the price this year.

 

[Baron Vo Mandor]

Last year we came within a sniff of making the finals and in some games the Kidley/Witt combo was going alright and Steve was stepping up.....

Really actually Ben, WTF? We were twice the team we were last year.

Sorry mate but pretty pissed off with the knights altogether after this simmo thing.

With those players we would have atleast racked up a few wins, if not been in top 8 contention.....

FFS.

 

[Knight]

What did he exactly sign for? I read somewhere $600,000.

 

[Baron Vo Mandor]

Wasnt it like 500k, and then an extra 400k by 3rd party sponsership?

 

[Knight]

TBH, I'd rather the likes of Ennis, Tahu, Kennedy there than Johns. We've only got him until the end of 2006. What then?

 

[Jobdog]

Then there is maybe the "life after Andrew Johns" part of this story.

 

[Johns Magic]

Mate I would have given anything to keep in this order Kennedy, Ennis, Tahu, Parsons & O'Davis here for another year.

And no Reyno.

We'd be in contention for a top 8th birth and not have the little peacock "Joey" running around, and instead have 5 great first graders in his place.

Picture it.....

1. Robbie O'Davis.
2. Milton Thaiday
3. Matt Gidley.
4. Timana Tahu.
5. Anthony Quinn/Dustin Cooper
6. Jarrod Mullen.
7. Kurt Gidley/Dane Campbell/Steve Witt
8. Matt Parsons.
9. Danny Buderus.
10. Craig Smith.
11. Clint Newton.
12. Steve Simpson.
13. Ben Kennedy.

14. Adam Woolnough.
15. Josh Perry.
16. Michael Ennis.
17. Daniel Abraham.

The halfs yeah are a bit weak admittedly but a monster forward pack, and very, very strong backline.

The worst thing is that we could have had this easily!!!!!

Makes me want to f**ken cry.

You are dreaming. Please, I beg you, get over O'Davis and Parsons. They are past it. They were past it last year, let alone this and next year.

That team would struggle without a quality half. Let's face it, Johns is worth more to us than Tahu, Ennis, Parsons and O'Davis combined. A team needs a quality half or two to be competitive.

I would rather have seen Joey's money go to Tahu and Adam Dykes, and keep Kennedy over Reynoldson.

 

[antonius]

I doubt the team can win without Johns. All other teams know that without Johns in the Knights, you target the halves and the team is going to cumble to pieces

We won games last year without him, we've won one with him this year. If it's the case we can't win without him then we better start worrying about 2007, it'll be worse than this year.

 

[Baron Vo Mandor]

Most of the sides named this year have been nothing short of a disgrace, loosing Abes, Simmo, Smith & Lowrie next year, our sides are going to be up there with West off 99.

We ought to all count ourselves damn lucky that we dont have a religation system in the NRL! I wonder how we'd go against the leading premier league sides minus those players.....

 

[Jobdog]

Tony, I don't think it will be the case, because we have some promising juniors coming through, but MANAGEMENT need to keep the best ones. Guys in the halves like ur Scott Dureau's and ur Jarrod Mullen's could quite easily be our five-eight/halfback combination in 2007.

 

[antonius]

Tony, I don't think it will be the case, because we have some promising juniors coming through, but MANAGEMENT need to keep the best ones. Guys in the halves like ur Scott Dureau's and ur Jarrod Mullen's could quite easily be our five-eight/halfback combination in 2007.

See my post in the Crney poll. We already have clubs with MONEY chasing these guys.
All I'm saying in the original post is that the loyalty thing in this club has disintigrated, and a lot of it would be from last years fiasco.

 

[Jobdog]

Well its up to this club to ensure our promising juniors r kept locked up. Mullen is off contract at the end of next season, so IMHO they should b looking towards that the moment they re-sign the players now.

 

[Baron Vo Mandor]

See my post in the Crney poll. We already have clubs with MONEY chasing these guys.
All I'm saying in the original post is that the loyalty thing in this club has disintigrated, and a lot of it would be from last years fiasco.

Exactly good ole joey certainly set the precident thats for sure.....

 

[princessjen]

16. Michael Ennis

Ennis wouldn't have stayed anyway, would he? Didn't he want to have a chance to play hooker?