Stefano Utoikamanu

[Nutz]

From SMH - 10 August 2024
Tigers powerbrokers have reportedly written to the NRL, seeking clarity regarding the Storm's offer which enticed Stefano Utoikamanu to make the move south to Melbourne. That is according to the SMH, who are reporting the merger club have requested information regarding his new contract, hoping to confirm it's within salary cap guidelines.

The WT are apparently not suggesting that the Storm are cheating or went against the guidelines....so what are they saying?

 

[TheDefinitionOfMadness]

From SMH - 10 August 2024
Tigers powerbrokers have reportedly written to the NRL, seeking clarity regarding the Storm's offer which enticed Stefano Utoikamanu to make the move south to Melbourne. That is according to the SMH, who are reporting the merger club have requested information regarding his new contract, hoping to confirm it's within salary cap guidelines.

The WT are apparently not suggesting that the Storm are cheating or went against the guidelines....so what are they saying?

Yeah I know what you mean. It's clear they're suggesting that Melbourne are cheating the cap, and with bloody good reasons:

1. Unless they dump NAS they have about $5.5 million of their cap tied up in 6 players. How could they possibly be under?
2. It's not like Melbourne don't have form on the board.

If the NRL is serious about making the competition even (which I don't believe they have any interest in at all) then they need to:

1. Enforce all contracts for their full duration, both club and player.
* They won't do this as they consider the constant contract scuttlebutt to be a good form of entertainment.
2. Don't allow players to accept lesser money to play at elite clubs.
3. All TPA's need to be publicly posted, including details of how the chain of events, from inception to signing of the agreement were managed and by who.
*This might create a bit too much work for the salary cap and investigations units. In addition, smart supporters will probably, and quite easily find violations. Can't have that.
4. All player salaries must be publicly posted showing how each team is managing their cap.
* Can't see this ever get taken up due to privacy concerns, even though the muck rakers publish this info quite regularly.
5. The salary cap has a maximum cap, but NO minimum cap.
* The collective bargaining agreement has them over a bit of a barrel here. The NRL need to fight to scrap this next time the agreement comes up.

Unless they do something like this they may as well just do away with the cap altogether. They won't though because teams will start going broke trying to catch up, and this will breach the NRL's agreements with 9 and Fox re # of games per week.

 

[Nutz]

Yeah I know what you mean. It's clear they're suggesting that Melbourne are cheating the cap, and with bloody good reasons:

1. Unless they dump NAS they have about $5.5 million of their cap tied up in 6 players. How could they possibly be under?
2. It's not like Melbourne don't have form on the board.

If the NRL is serious about making the competition even (which I don't believe they have any interest in at all) then they need to:

1. Enforce all contracts for their full duration, both club and player.
* They won't do this as they consider the constant contract scuttlebutt to be a good form of entertainment.
2. Don't allow players to accept lesser money to play at elite clubs.
3. All TPA's need to be publicly posted, including details of how the chain of events, from inception to signing of the agreement.
*This might create a bit too much work for the salary cap and investigations units. In addition, smart supporters will probably, and quite easily find violations. Can't have that.
4. All player salaries must be publicly posted showing how each team is managing their cap.
* Can't see this ever get taken due to privacy concerns, even though the muck rakers publish this info quite regularly.
5. The salary cap has a maximum cap, but minimum cap.
* The collective bargaining agreement has them over a bit of a barrel here. They need to fight to scrap time the agreement comes up.

Unless they do something like this they may as well just do away with the cap altogether. They won't though because will start going broke trying to catch up, and this will breach the NRL's agreements with 9 and Fox.

Good read DOM.
As a joke earlier I wrote...Scrap the Cap... All income be made visible to the public and legalise performance enhancing drugs...as well as other stuff
The irony of it all is, in regards to income, it should come down to this if all the cards were on the table.
There are two things that makes a mockery of it all,
1. The NRL investigates then rattifies all contracts so it's their reputation that should should come under scrutiny and not the rorters and
2. There are gambling agencies involved with the game. It appears that the horse racing industry is more transparent than our game. After each race there's no money paid out until the stewards give the all clear. There is a weight handicap system and the horses, jockey, trainers and all connections are under scrutiny and info is available to the punter in the way of form guides and periodicals. There are also odds to give the punter a fair deal.
The RLPA should get the best deal for these players but in professional sport where the punter and the supporter really have no idea if the horse is riding the jockey or the jockey is riding the horse, it's just not good enough.
How is it a fair race.
Stefano knocking back 150-200k a year makes me wonder if the contract is as they say, correct weight.

 

[Tigerm]

I am a firm believer that the salary cap should be scrapped as well.
It's far too easy to rort the system.
I think player ratings are the best and most transparent system, where you only have an allocated total to fill your squad. It would make it impossible to rort and stack a team with elite players.

 

[Nutz]

I am a firm believer that the salary cap should be scrapped as well.
It's far too easy to rort the system.
I think player ratings are the best and most transparent system, where you only have an allocated total to fill your squad. It would make it impossible to rort and stack a team with elite players.

How does the rating system work Tm.
Are other codes using it or similar?
What about a draft? It seems to work in arial ping pong.

 

[Tigerm]

How does the rating system work Tm.
Are other codes using it or similar?
What about a draft? It seems to work in arial ping pong.

I don't think anyone uses this type of thing.
I think a draft would be great, but the trouble is, when the measurement is a salary cap, it can be cheated.

My example for this would be:
Players are rated 1-5 by the NRL. At the beginning of a season.
1 being a rookie
2 never played NRL
3 played NRL less than 50 games
4 played NRL more than 50 games
5 Played current (last few years) SOO or International (some international teams would be exempt, as they don't play at elite levels)

The squad of 30 would have to have a total of (Say) 90 rating points.

So that could look something like:
3 X 5 (rated players) =15
8 X 4 = 32
8 X 3 = 24
8 X 2 = 16
3 X 1 = 3
Total = 90

So, if you stacked the team with (5) players, you wouldn't get a squad to stack up.

 

[glockers]

I see you don't understand sarcasm.

 

[glockers]

Pulling out the big guns to prove him right. Well done.

I see you don't understand sarcasm.

 

[Nutz]

I don't think anyone uses this type of thing.
I think a draft would be great, but the trouble is, when the measurement is a salary cap, it can be cheated.

My example for this would be:
Players are rated 1-5 by the NRL. At the beginning of a season.
1 being a rookie
2 never played NRL
3 played NRL less than 50 games
4 played NRL more than 50 games
5 Played current (last few years) SOO or International (some international teams would be exempt, as they don't play at elite levels)

The squad of 30 would have to have a total of (Say) 90 rating points.

So that could look something like:
3 X 5 (rated players) =15
8 X 4 = 32
8 X 3 = 24
8 X 2 = 16
3 X 1 = 3
Total = 90

So, if you stacked the team with (5) players, you wouldn't get a squad to stack up.

That seems interesting but it would still come down to money and TPA. The rich clubs who can offer big incentives during and after footy would be stacking their roster with the young guns like LachlanGalvin, Blaize Talagi, Ethan Strange, Kaeo Weekes, K. Kini etc etc.
Also it might make it easier to get players like Stef because he's not on big points

 

[Nutz]

It's dodge. The only way we can compete is letting guys like Stefano go. Surely they are paying him 800k plus which to me is ridiculous.

Absolutely and we offered him 900k didn't we... ridiculous.

 

[Tigerm]

That seems interesting but it would still come down to money and TPA. The rich clubs who can offer big incentives during and after footy would be stacking their roster with the young guns like LachlanGalvin, Blaize Talagi, Ethan Strange, Kaeo Weekes, K. Kini etc etc.
Also it might make it easier to get players like Stef because he's not on big points

Money would not be a consideration,but the clubs could spend them selves broke.
That’s up to them, to manage their finances.

 

[Nutz]

I just think the NRL needs to bite the bullet and make all players NRL related income transparent.
It's a unique type of income. The managers don't want to disclose it because they use this as power.
If the RLPA gets the players to boycott so be it. Eventually players will be running out of money and will go back to work. It's the same reason that unions don't have as much power as they did years ago.
The major drawback would be a backlash from sponsors and television rights, 9, foxtel.
Even if we had to sit out a whole season to get transparency so be it, at least WT would be safe from the spoon.

 

[Nutz]

Money would not be a consideration,but the clubs could spend them selves broke.
That’s up to them, to manage their finances.

If you scrap the cap of course it's going to come down to money. The rich will offer more and more money to the lower tier players, paying more for talent and potential.
If you scrap the cap who pays for the contracts, the NRL won't.

 

[Tigerm]

If you scrap the cap of course it's going to come down to money. The rich will offer more and more money to the lower tier players, paying more for talent and potential.
If you scrap the cap who pays for the contracts, the NRL won't.

Correct, the rich will offer more, but they can only have a certain amount of rated players.
And of course if the player doesn’t perform (like our losers) then the club has lost value for money.
The clubs are a business and should be treated as such.
As I said, if they spend their inheritance then it’s on the club.

We all suspect that many clubs are paying under the carpet payments already.

 

[Nutz]

Correct, the rich will offer more, but they can only have a certain amount of rated players.
And of course if the player doesn’t perform (like our losers) then the club has lost value for money.
The clubs are a business and should be treated as such.
As I said, if they spend their inheritance then it’s on the club.

We all suspect that many clubs are paying under the carpet payments already.

Ok. Clubs will fold trying to pay for players if nrl doesn't. WT are struggling to cope without 1mil sponsor let alone pay 12mil+.
If the cap is scrapped or are you saying keep the cap but distribute it evenly with a point system.. that's where nutz is getting confused.

 

[Pezz70]

Third party agreements should be limited, to a car or university or education, limited to $20k a year while studying. Anything else illegal if you get caught banned for life, players and their managers

 

[Tiger05]

Absolutely and we offered him 900k didn't we... ridiculous.

If this is true there are at least two massive issues:

1. The recruitment and retention committee including Richo are completely incompetent.
2. There is clearly some form of rorting going on in Melbourne.

There is another potential issue as well.
3. A young player like Stef doesn't have any confidence in Benji.

 

[Nutz]

If this is true there are at least two massive issues:

1. The recruitment and retention committee including Richo are completely incompetent.
2. There is clearly some form of rorting going on in Melbourne.

There is another potential issue as well.
3. A young player like Stef doesn't have any confidence in Benji.

Yes it's a concern alright. Richo said in his BTR interview that he was not happy with Stefs offer. However Stef has family in Sydney and for him to go when we have a rebuild in progress does say little about his confidence in the WT system... can't argue with that I guess.
I'm confused about Richo's statement that we save money on Bateman's 2024 contract. He insists he will be coming back so how does that work?
I know we can carry over a certain amount of cap till next year so maybe that's what he's talking about.

 

[Tiger05]

Yes it's a concern alright. Richo said in his BTR interview that he was not happy with Stefs offer. However Stef has family in Sydney and for him to go when we have a rebuild in progress does say little about his confidence in the WT system... can't argue with that I guess.
I'm confused about Richo's statement that we save money on Bateman's 2024 contract. He insists he will be coming back so how does that work?
I know we can carry over a certain amount of cap till next year so maybe that's what he's talking about.

Honestly he sounds completely and utterly incompetent. He flies to England to off load players and gets rid of Bateman for 8 weeks at best. We lose Stef who to be fair is overpaid and delivering sweet f**k all but he is in our starting team and he does have the ability to dent the line. We also let Papalli go who we probably should have kept and who wouldn't cost us as much as Stefano.

We've come dead last again as well.

In all seriousness I can see us turning it around next season but we need to buy some forwards desperately and I can't see us getting any established players. We are going to have to sign guys not playing first grade and hope they come good. We have also taken this path in the past I think correctly but it goes pear shaped. We bought in Stef and Blore who were two top tier juniors. They are both going to be in Melbourne next year. We need to get them and then pay them a fair wage and retain them but our history in this regard is terrible.

 

[Tigerm]

Ok. Clubs will fold trying to pay for players if nrl doesn't. WT are struggling to cope without 1mil sponsor let alone pay 12mil+.
If the cap is scrapped or are you saying keep the cap but distribute it evenly with a point system.. that's where nutz is getting confused.

I’m saying scrap the cap. It’s not able to be monitored.
I don’t see clubs folding, the worst case scenario may be they have to sell the club, I’m sure there would be plenty of buyers, this is how a lot of systems in other sports work now.
If a club pays $m’s for a player, they can, but they still need to be inside the rating system.
I would think that clubs are already doing this, outside of the salary cap anyway.