Mullen on the Juice

[Hello, I'm The Doctor]

There goes another 45k.

"...and take the NRL to the Court of Arbitration for Sport."

And that is probably just BEGINNING the Court of Arbitration for Sport process...

 

[Hardcore_Fan]

At the end of the day, paying mullens salary isn't going to affect our recruitment this season, we are that far under the cap it doesn't matter.

 

[Spot On]

Haven't read up about this so can someone tell me why the Knights are paying anything to Mullen now?

 

[Bring it home Knights]

At the end of the day, paying mullens salary isn't going to affect our recruitment this season, we are that far under the cap it doesn't matter.

But wouldn't it make sense to front end some contracts to pay them less later using Mullen's cash?

 

[Hardcore_Fan]

But wouldn't it make sense to front end some contracts to pay them less later using Mullen's cash?

We are millions under the cap. We can front load heaps of contracts without worrying about Mullen.

 

[Alex28]

We are millions under the cap. We can front load heaps of contracts without worrying about Mullen.

I honestly don't care about being OK even if we are still paying him.

Why are we paying for a drug cheats house?

He let us down. After his career here I can't believe he is doing this to us. If he ever gets life membership I'll quit my membership.

 

[Hello, I'm The Doctor]

We are millions under the cap. We can front load heaps of contracts without worrying about Mullen.

"Who cares, youre only spending $15k a week on nothing"

Never become an accountant...

 

[Hardcore_Fan]

Not the point I was making.

All I am saying is, paying Mullen doesn't affect our cap situation and recruitment. Spin it all you like though

 

[slotmachine]

The doctor's point is that every dollar you pay Mullen is one less you can front load in 2017, therefore one less you can spend in 2018. As we are getting shafted by not having big TPA deals every dollar is important.

 

[Hardcore_Fan]

We have heaps of room, I doubt even without mullens money, we would be using all our cap space to front load contracts. We can front load all our good players and still have money to spare.

Whether or not we pay Mullen or not,
It makes no difference to anything except our bank balance.

 

[perverse]

We have heaps of room, I doubt even without mullens money, we would be using all our cap space to front load contracts. We can front load all our good players and still have money to spare.

Whether or not we pay Mullen or not,
It makes no difference to anything except our bank balance.

Yeah, I agree. I'm pretty sure there's a limit imposed by the NRL these days to the amount you can front-load or back-load a contract. You would need to re-negotiate a new contract with the player to do it, and given that I don't see us "extending" too many of our squad at the moment, particularly ones that are already signed beyond this year, then I can only ascertain that we're either at that limit already or have no interest in doing it.

I feel like front and back loading is something you do when you're trying to open a premiership window, because you always feel pain at the end of that back or front-loaded period, generally either paying a squad more than its worth in the case of backloading, or scrambling to re-sign $12mill of talent with a $9mill cap in the case of front-loading. It makes sense when you're trying to max out a squad for a short period, not when you're building over the long term.

"Rebuilding" from the point of view of a wealthier club - is generally the recovery period after they've maxed out their cap on front/backloading.

For the front-loading argument to make any sense we'd need to be at cap this year with front-loaded contracts. We're not, so it's a non-argument for mine. It's wishful thinking.

 

[slotmachine]

It would be interesting to get the precise rules for how the cap works (along with public player salaries). Makes the discussions much more interesting.

If it were a free-for-all in terms of front loading you could pay gags say $2m this year and nothing in 2018 and 2019. Surely our owners would be OK with signing off on that?

 

[perverse]

It would be interesting to get the precise rules for how the cap works (along with public player salaries). Makes the discussions much more interesting.

If it were a free-for-all in terms of front loading you could pay gags say $2m this year and nothing in 2018 and 2019. Surely our owners would be OK with signing off on that?

What would the point be though? If you fill the rest of the cap for 2018 and 2019, you're up shit creek trying to retain everyone for 2020 onwards. This might work if you take this approach with players that are signing their last big contract. We could take this approach with someone like Graham, but we can't pay him for this year unless he comes this year. Even then, you end up in a position where you lose a valuable player at the end of that contract and have no cap space to spend to replace them without shedding elsewhere.

I'm not really massive on front/back loading unless you've got a clear, achievable target on when you want to compete for a premiership.

 

[slotmachine]

The alternative is just to lose that cap space forever. Surely getting in a hired gun for 2 years is preferable?

 

[perverse]

The alternative is just to lose that cap space forever. Surely getting in a hired gun for 2 years is preferable?

On the surface and in the short term, sure. It would only put us backwards again in a year or 2 if you get anyone of actual worth - because they're going to be occupying a valuable spot in the team for free for a period.

Having said that, our cap is potentially so damn sparse with everything that we've shed that it might take years to fill it, I dunno. I'm philosophically opposed to front/backloading for the most part... I guess I'd have to see the books to know for sure if we could get away with it.

 

[slotmachine]

It would be fascinating to see the cap/salary position for every club.

 

[perverse]

It would be fascinating to see the cap/salary position for every club.

Yes, it would be interesting to spend an evening looking over each clubs books. I think the Broncos official books would be the biggest laugh. Milford on $400k I think? hahahaha.

 

[Knight76]

If we have cap space left over after year end, surely the NRL can deduct it out of the debt we apparently owe them.

 

[macavity]

The alternative is just to lose that cap space forever. Surely getting in a hired gun for 2 years is preferable?

Apparently you can't move money around any more. So it is just lost.

 

[Zoidberg]

I don't understand why Mullen continues to fight it.