Tapine Gone

[Elephant Hunter]

Source

Joseph Tapine heads to Canberra as monster offer knocks Newcastle out of race



CANBERRA has signed boom Newcastle backrower Joseph Tapine for the next three seasons on a deal worth close to $1.5 million.
Tapine informed his Knights teammates of his impending move at training on Thursday morning with the club unable to get near Canberra’s monster offer for the 21 year old.
It is understood the Knights’ offer was closer to $1 million.
“We are obviously extremely disappointed because while he is not a local junior, we brought him here and helped develop him,” Knights CEO Matt Gidley said.
“But it’s hard to get your head around the Canberra offer and all I said to Joe was to wish him all the best. It’s difficult to blame him for accepting that sort of an offer.”
Asked if the Knights would consider releasing Tapine to the Raiders immediately, Gidley said it hasn’t been spoken about.

“But we will look at our options. Nothing is off the table.”
Gidley quashed speculation linking the club to Bulldogs backrower Tony Williams.
“First I’ve heard of it. No, we won’t be going down that path,” he said

 

[Swarzey]

Well, I knew it was coming but It still hurts.

 

[slotmachine]

Can't blame him really, $500k a year is just ridiculous.

Looks like the Raiders have worked out the TPA thing, they've been recruiting like crazy. Leilia, Sezer, Junior Paulo, Tapine, Austin, Sisa Waqa, FPN, Hodgson.

May as well release him early now, if Canberra are up for it.

 

[Burns]

Surely we have to release him? What would be the point of him playing entire year in NSW Cup when someone could use the experience.

$500K a year is an absurd amount of money to pay a player with so little NRL Games, which is why it would have been a no brainer for Tapine to agree to Canberra's offer.

 

[perverse]

Absurd money, we don't even know if he'll be worth that at his peak. See ya later, Joe. Good luck cracking a starting spot down there.

 

[Bring it home Knights]

10 years ago we had the best player inandrew johns on 500k per year. Now we have an inexperienced second rower on the same money. Times have definitely changed.

 

[Spot On]

You know, once upon a time it would have been Newcastle paying 500K for Tapine.

So glad (fingers crossed) that shit is over at Newcastle.

He surely walks straight into the starting side at Canberra being on $$$ like that.

Good to see a player hitting the jackpot like he has. Best of luck to him.

 

[Still Nutty]

Firstly good luck to him, that sort of money is excessively absurd and I even think our figure of $1 million would want to have been significantly back ended and had some performance based triggers in there...but if the Raiders are throwing that sort of money at him, you can't blame him for snapping up the offer

The discussions about this year are going to be interesting because from what I've seen on this forum I understand Brown made it clear he will be in NSW cup for the year if he signed elsewhere...would be interesting to see what a release this year would save us on him but I'd expect not a huge amount. For that we might be better off using him as a journeyman back rower in the NSW cup and freeing up the options of blooding some of the up and comers into first grade?

And thank you Gidley for killing the T Rex rumour

 

[Alex28]

Good on him.

So now the Raiders can pay $500K a year for a player who has rotted away on the bench for NSW Cup for the year. Screw him and the Raiders.

 

[Burwood]

I'm not sure the right option is to put him down in NSW Cup for the year. If he ditched us for an extra $20,000/yr I could understand, but it would be beyond stupid for him to turn down an extra half a million over three years. It is hard to begrudge the guy for taking the money.

Even offloading him now to Canberra is a waste- Tapine would be a lot more beneficial playing in our side compared to the minimum amount of money we'd have to spend in the salary cap if he were to go.

 

[harrywilliams]

He'll be released as soon as it's confirmed by the Raiders in 10 days

 

[perverse]

I'm not sure the right option is to put him down in NSW Cup for the year. If he ditched us for an extra $20,000/yr I could understand, but it would be beyond stupid for him to turn down an extra half a million over three years. It is hard to begrudge the guy for taking the money.

Even offloading him now to Canberra is a waste- Tapine would be a lot more beneficial playing in our side compared to the minimum amount of money we'd have to spend in the salary cap if he were to go.

I'd generally agree with you... but I think we're in such a shabby state at the moment that a few other circumstances need to be considered:

1. Playing for the Knights is a f**king privilege. Not a right, not a given and not cheap. I'm sick of how cheap our jersey has become. Bennett tried to fix this and make juniors earn their shot... but all it did was make those at the top super comfortable.
2. The future. We just can't afford to waste any time on Tapine. He's gone now, so we just have to get on with it and move on accordingly.
3. I don't see the point in increasing the value of the Raiders latest acquisition. It only serves the Raiders at the end of the day.

I would drop him straight to NSW Cup and pretty much ignore him if I were Brown. Not for personal, being upset about it reasons... but for professional, f**k off I'm busy building THIS club reasons. If we can find a better way to spend whatever we were going to pay him for the rest of this season, then we should definitely explore that, too. Let Canberra spend their resources on him now.

 

[Zoidberg]

Can't blame him for taking that kind of pay increase.

What would be our benefit of letting him go to Canberra early?

 

[Whats Doing]

Yep put him reserve grade and let the raiders develop him in 12 months time. Tapine can waste 12 months of development for all I care

 

[Allstar Knights]

A player swap with Canberra this season would be ideal.

 

[Jono078]

If Canberra want him this year we would have to do some sort of player swap to benefit both teams.

Cant blame him for leaving for that money, but as Perverse said, we need to focus on who's going to be here in 2-3 years and get them the experience and taste of first grade over Tapine.

 

[The Showstopper]

I have no issue at all with him going cos he is the type of player we do not need. Brown has made it clear that you either want to wear the jumper or you will go elsewhere. He is making a cultural statement here for the club and I like it a lot. We are not going to be anyone's bitches at the negotiating table any more.

Much rather us give a kid who wants a shot their go instead of paying some arrogant entitled brat with a short memory like Tapine. There is not one backrower at Canberra outside of Papalli I would want.

 

[Noname36]

I'd generally agree with you... but I think we're in such a shabby state at the moment that a few other circumstances need to be considered:

1. Playing for the Knights is a f**king privilege. Not a right, not a given and not cheap. I'm sick of how cheap our jersey has become. Bennett tried to fix this and make juniors earn their shot... but all it did was make those at the top super comfortable.
2. The future. We just can't afford to waste any time on Tapine. He's gone now, so we just have to get on with it and move on accordingly.
3. I don't see the point in increasing the value of the Raiders latest acquisition. It only serves the Raiders at the end of the day.

I would drop him straight to NSW Cup and pretty much ignore him if I were Brown. Not for personal, being upset about it reasons... but for professional, f**k off I'm busy building THIS club reasons. If we can find a better way to spend whatever we were going to pay him for the rest of this season, then we should definitely explore that, too. Let Canberra spend their resources on him now.

I agree we shouldn't waste any time on players that don't realise they're lucky to play for the club, but in all fairness the Tinkler/Bennett era was when this crap started. The ridiculous contracts to the likes of Roberts and Aku, Bennett's overhyping of Sione and his brothers pushing their value right up, etc. The side has had a bad entitlement problem and I'm happy to see Brown putting his foot down to try and fix it which Stone was too weak to.

 

[Allstar Knights]

Our second row stocks in the lower grades are pretty average imo.
Jacob Safiti can do ok there but I think his future lies in the front row. Not particularly dangerous on an edge.
Fitzibbon is meh.

Luke Yates is a good prospect but he's more of a middle forward.

 

[Burwood]

A player swap with Canberra this season would be ideal.

That would be the only way I'd look at offloading him this season. I wonder if they have a strike centre who we could exchange him for? :lol::lol: