Why people are jumping to say the bloke with the proven track record must be the problem of why we can’t recruit, rather than the club that’s been a basket case for 2 decades is beyond me. I’m sorry but I find that truely mind blowing.
I'm not saying he's a part of the problem (yet), I'm giving him a D- for his first year of recruitment and expressing worry about the next 2-3 years of watching this team. It's looking shit and I don't believe it had to be the case. I'm evaluating his performance on what he's done for the team I'm going to be watching next year, not on our state when he took over.
Aren't you at all curious, looking at next years top 30 list, where the 11.5m+ of the salary cap is going? I sure as hell am... but then I realise Taj Annan is in the top 30 on good coin and I sigh. Oh that's right, we're just wasting it on different players next year.
On your question about his work with the junior sides, Ive been reading the MS forums a bit and a few people that seem to like they’re very knowledgable about the juniors posted that POS is bringing new kids into our junior squads “every week”. My dad’s also heavily involved in the Newcastle comp and said the exact same thing and that POS has been a lot more visible than previous guys have been. Not being in Newy myself I can’t comment if any of them will be good, but at least he’s prioritising those squads. He’s also prioritised re-signing and upgrading talent like Hopwood and Chase Butler who would both likely be gone under previous regimes.
It's all anecdotal, but I guess I have to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume it's all true (although again, this is stuff I've heard more times than I can count for over 2 decades now). It's not hard to be more visible than blokes that weren't even in the city doing the job, which has been the case in the past too. None of this is talking about what I am though. It's great that he's doing amazing things with the juniors, love it. What I'm refuting is that the top 30 roster had to be burned down without any ready replacements. I don't see how it has benefited us and I'm unsatisfied with the conclusions of others in that department. Saving money? No. Front-loading? Maybe, but I think that will bite us in the ass in time if we're doing it to any significant degree too. It was possible to be more incremental with the change. Ultimately the simplest answer (to me, this is my opinion) seems to be that the hubris of POS and the club was such that they believed they could just clear the decks and fill the roster with ease - and they fell on their ass with their recruitment drive. That's very much how it looks.
Yeah I completely disagree that players don’t improve when they come here. Leo went from a reserve grade player at the Raiders to the most in demand prop in the game here in 18 months, Lucas was a nobody in the Dragons system and now rep quality, we turned Dom young into a star, he went to the Roosters and turn to shit and is now looking like a star again. There are plenty more.
I want AOB gone too but it’s definitely not accurate to say players haven’t improved here. There’s literally no reason we cant develop some of the fringe guys into better players like we have in the past. I actually have zero issues with AOB’s player development at all. Tactics in attack are the reason he needs to leave.
I think his record is mixed (and I'm being generous). Doesn't seem to be able to make first graders out of many guys that don't already have a lot of talent. There's a much longer list of blokes we haven't been able to get the most out of than super talented blokes that he's managed to do so with tbh. See article:
https://archive.is/SsL9U . I honestly think Crokes and maybe even Jones would go much better in another system too. Crokes in particular looks like a guy who is in his comfort zone to me and has more to give talent wise.
