State of Origin 2025

[Penrose Warrior]

News flash: Billy Slater is a f**kwit. He's been a Grade A one since he came onto the scene.

Absolutely horrific move to invoke the name of Paul Green, and shows that deep down, Billy Slater is about as simple as it gets if he thinks that man took his own life because people may have called him names or made him feel bad. But he already proved that with the Cory Paterson thing. And his rap sheet in his playing days adds weight to that.

 

[Thatwasnthighref]

The hypocrisy becomes more nauseating the more it sinks in.

Bulldog Ritchie tried bringing up the grub headline of Leniu on 360 last night but was shut down by the others because apparently that wasn’t the work of a QLD journo.

But they all missed the point. According to Slater’s self-righteous spiel, all media need to hold themselves to a certain standard, a standard he piously implies he holds himself to. In that case he should’ve piped up soon as that Leniu headline was published.

Instead, he’s picking and choosing when to get on his soapbox and only appears interested when its about him. Pathetic.

Apparently Woods is going to respond sometime this morning on his radio show. I hope he returns serve and rips into him for his hypocritical bullshit and for dragging Green’s name and family into things.

 

[Thatwasnthighref]

Go Woodsy - f**king holier than though Slater - the Green comments was way out of line, notwithstanding the hypocrisy... he seemed to imply that Green couldn't handle losing and the press, so ended his life? I'd expect it's more complex than that

Yea man absolutely. The post-mortem scan on his brain showed he suffered from extreme CTE, so for Slater to draw a line between something as complex as that and public criticism as the cause of his death is incomprehensible.

And the thing is, his comments were very possibly premeditated. The journos on 360 last night talked about how they came several days after Woods’ comments, and how mid-applause, he said he wasn’t finished so could continue.

If true, then he knew he was drawing a long bow. He’s a soulless sack of shit, but he’s not stupid. So he knew, but said it anyway.

 

[Beavers Headgear]

Woods did reply this morning, didn’t go hard, just said Billy went too far bringing Green into it, and his job is give give opinions, good or bad, just like Billy does on Nine. I enjoyed this bit though

 

[BODISGOD]

Slater going for a shoot here isn't good for business.

 

[Beavers Headgear]

News flash: Billy Slater is a f**kwit. He's been a Grade A one since he came onto the scene.

Absolutely horrific move to invoke the name of Paul Green, and shows that deep down, Billy Slater is about as simple as it gets if he thinks that man took his own life because people may have called him names or made him feel bad. But he already proved that with the Cory Paterson thing. And his rap sheet in his playing days adds weight to that.

It’s amazing though how a lot of the comments on this scenario are that Billy is a “gentleman” and “nicest man in the game”

Here is another yarn about Billy. I knew the guy who used to run all the Manly supporter away trips, 2009 he took a group to Melbourne, as they were walking to the ground they spotted Slater walking through the entry gates, a group of 4 young lads aged 8-10 yelled out “hey Billy, 40 nil”. Billy turned around and said “get f**k’d you little (Karmichael Hunts)”. Great bloke

 

[Penrose Warrior]

I listened to the audio this morning, and to be honest it's put me on Billy Slater's side...slightly.

He was clearly trying to make a point about mental health and how the media should be held to account for what they say, and if it becomes personal and hurtful it can have an effect on the person that is well over and above what you'd want or expect for 'hype' or creating a bit of controversy.

OK, you could argue that being called a grub is deserved, and maybe not that hurtful. But Slater clearly went into that press conference with a pre-planned answer, and thought it would come up, and it did. He wanted to make a point that words matter. Either he was affected by it, or he wanted to make something of it to fire up his side.

Yes, he got way too carried away mentioning Paul Green but he was emotional. Did Slater work under Green in QLD camp? I think his emotions ran away from him, trying to point out that things that people in the media say can have a detrimental effect. It's OK to say someone can't pass a ball or tackle, but talking about something personal is over the line - and it is. Being a grub, maybe doesn't meet that criteria, however.

 

[Penrose Warrior]

And the thing is, his comments were very possibly premeditated.

Course they were. Every coach goes into a presser (or they should) knowing what may come up and what they'll say. Especially mid-week, not after a game. AOB made the crucial mistake of not doing that the other week and calling the fans idiots, but you can give him a pass in the fact he's very busy trying to coach a game

 

[Thatwasnthighref]

I listened to the audio this morning, and to be honest it's put me on Billy Slater's side...slightly.

He was clearly trying to make a point about mental health and how the media should be held to account for what they say, and if it becomes personal and hurtful it can have an effect on the person that is well over and above what you'd want or expect for 'hype' or creating a bit of controversy.

OK, you could argue that being called a grub is deserved, and maybe not that hurtful. But Slater clearly went into that press conference with a pre-planned answer, and thought it would come up, and it did. He wanted to make a point that words matter. Either he was affected by it, or he wanted to make something of it to fire up his side.

Yes, he got way too carried away mentioning Paul Green but he was emotional. Did Slater work under Green in QLD camp? I think his emotions ran away from him, trying to point out that things that people in the media say can have a detrimental effect. It's OK to say someone can't pass a ball or tackle, but talking about something personal is over the line - and it is. Being a grub, maybe doesn't meet that criteria, however.

Yep that's fair, I think most people would agree with the sentiment, in isolation.

Where it galls though is a) the wider context, in particular given his past behaviour as both player and coach; and b) the unnecessary, unjustified and callous way he used Green to justify his rant.

As you say, slips like that sometimes happen under emotion but as we've also both pointed out, his comments were premeditated. He's been silent for a week and used that time to carefully consider and plan his response. Yet he still brought up Green. The delivery may have been emotional, but the words were deliberately crafted. And he was also conspicuously silent 3 weeks ago when Spencer copped the same insult.

His sentiment was was spot on; the media get waaay too carried away in their incessant pursuit of clicks and ratings. That's why I didn't try to excuse Woods' comments as being meant in jest or whatever. How comments are intended matter less than how they're received.

But Billy Slater preaching that message is like Dave Warner lecturing everyone on fair play.

 

[Thatwasnthighref]

‘I feel terrible’: Billy ‘deeply sorry’ for making link to former coach’s death in emotional presser

‘Not accurate or appropriate’: Billy ‘deeply sorry’ for making link to ex-coach’s death

www.foxsports.com.au

Mea culpa moment for Slater.

Pleased for the family mostly, they obviously never asked or deserved to be pulled into the muck. But hopefully that draws a line under the whole ugly episode.

Kick off can’t come soon enough… rightly or wrongly, you’d think the QLD boys will rally around their coach after a bruising 24hrs. First few minutes could be maaaasive.

 

[Beavers Headgear]

So he sat on a pre meditated response for a week, and the day after dropping it apologises to the family. Wow

 

[Thatwasnthighref]

So he sat on a pre meditated response for a week, and the day after dropping it apologises to the family. Wow

Yep. And we dont know if that was really him waking up to himself, or someone like Ikin kicking him in the ass.

Thats what I meant by rightly or wrongly... without knowing the detail who knows if this really exonerates Slater, but I'm over the tool.

Thank fk kick off is only a few hrs away. Just hope NSW put a number on them.

 

[Beavers Headgear]

I hope it’s a flogging because I’m long odds to stay awake until full time

 

[JJ]

Never occured to Slater that if he wanted to bring Green into it he might check with the Green family - what an arsehole - I can accept that maybe he's moved on from the arsehole he clearly was on field (he wasn't alone, but imagine Mark Geyer etc behaving like he did... but using a family tragedy to score points... wow

 

[Manu Vatuvei]

Bit of a sidenote but I'm pretty uncomfortable with how Leniu has somehow ended up on the side of the "good guys".

Leniu's own journey has basically been lunatic ----> racist ------> bloke who abuses people for calling him out on being racist ----------> back to being the same old lunatic. Somehow, through one of the weirdest applications of rugby league fan logic of all time, Ezra Mam crashing his car turned the world upside down and Leniu became the hero.

 

[Beavers Headgear]

Bit of a sidenote but I'm pretty uncomfortable with how Leniu has somehow ended up on the side of the "good guys".

Leniu's own journey has basically been lunatic ----> racist ------> bloke who abuses people for calling him out on being racist ----------> back to being the same old lunatic. Somehow, through one of the weirdest applications of rugby league fan logic of all time, Ezra Mam crashing his car turned the world upside down and Leniu became the hero.

I wouldn’t say he is in the hero or good guy categories at all, I’d say most people would be ambivalent towards him tbh, but people are entertained by the hard running that isn’t seen as much these days, Nathan Brown is now a crowd hero for being smoked every time he returns the ball. The remark to Mam was poor, but outside of that he’s only ever really been a lunatic on the field with hard running and getting into JWH etc. Wasn’t anything out of line in his discussions with Thurston

 

[Blair]

Kick to Spencer! This should be the Qld attitude tonight. I hope it is and it needs to go down as a bit of a rallying cry for the future, like Billy Moore's Queenslander!

Incidentally, on that score, I always colour it up somewhat, telling people who might not know, that NSW said they were going to bash the first Cane toad who said it. The Maroons heard of this plan, so the captain came down the tunnel shouting it. I love that but it's not true.

 

[Manu Vatuvei]

Wasn’t anything out of line in his discussions with Thurston

Well this is sort of the issue. The "discussion" with Thurston was aggressively ripping into Thurston because Thurston had criticised him for racial abuse. So like I said, racial abuse, then doubling down on it by responding aggressively (I think that's putting it pretty mildly) to being criticised for racial abuse. I can't see how that's anything other than self-evidently pretty disgraceful.

The (completely unrelated) Mam stuff really just opened the floodgates for a pretty large number of people who didn't care about the racism in the first place and jumped at the chance to make Leniu the good guy in a roundabout way. I 100% believe there's a big cohort of people who always saw Mam as the villain (for complaining) and Leniu as the victim (because what he did shouldn't matter), because they were all over socials and Mam's stuff has brought them out of the woodwork.

 

[Thatwasnthighref]

Well this is sort of the issue. The "discussion" with Thurston was aggressively ripping into Thurston because Thurston had criticised him for racial abuse. So like I said, racial abuse, then doubling down on it by responding aggressively (I think that's putting it pretty mildly) to being criticised for racial abuse. I can't see how that's anything other than self-evidently pretty disgraceful.

He said it was because Thurston pretended everything was sweet and kept approaching him for interviews, not because of Thurston's views on what he said to Mam. I havent seen anything else to doubt that story (yet).

 

[Manu Vatuvei]

He said it was because Thurston pretended everything was sweet and kept approaching him for interviews, not because of Thurston's views on what he said to Mam. I havent seen anything else to doubt that story (yet).

How was everything not sweet though? Is there another issue I’m unaware of outside of Leniu being racist and Thurston saying racism is bad? Are we saying that Leniu’s problem was that Thurston continued to do his job in the normal manner?