Fan favorites yep, probably your favorites - yep, value for money - nope
Gotta say I agree 'somewhat' with this. Ben Henry's development in particular has made Bakuya's retention somewhat unecessary. I for one thought he (Bakuya) was one of our better forwards against Manly, but only because the rest of the pack bar Matulino under performed so badly.
Rapira in particular receives a huge amount of love on this forum when in fact, if people took off the rose tinted glasses and assessed things realistically, they would see that, yes, he has a big heart, yes, he puts in his all for the club, and yes, when fit, he is reliable, but how often does he actually put in the dominant performances you need from a frontline starting prop.
Here's a quick example. Rapira has received a lot of love as compared to Matagi this year, but a brief look a their respective stats for the year shows that they aren't that far apart in terms of work rate.
Sam Rapira. Played 13 TK 288 ARM 1194 HU 112
Suaia Matagi Played 18 TK 271 ARM 1626 HU 117
Sure Rapira has played five fewer games, and shows a better defensive work rate, but are these stats so far apart as to explain the disappointment that people have with Matagi as opposed to Rapira? I would also suspect that Matagi's actual playing minutes aren't as high as Sams as well. Could be wrong though.
And as for the injury explanation, people obviously didn't notice the heavy strapping that Matagi was carrying on one leg up until about 3 games ago, so both of them have suffered in that respect.
Matagi is obviously not quite the player that he was last year, and there may be reasons for that, but I really don't think that he and Rapira are that far apart in terms of performance. Matagi also has the advantage of bending the line more and causing trouble for opposition defenders. The reality is that Rapira doesn't do that as often. Watch the Brisbane game from about a month ago and you'll see what I mean. Thaiday and co. absolutely monstered Sam at the point of contact and were as a result able to get back into the defensive line quickly because of it.
But Rapira still gets talked up and Matagi doesn't. Why?
I don't necessarily agree with everything Iron Lion is saying, but he does have some valid points.
What concerns me is that people seem to be happy to stick with players simply because they are long serving club men or fan favourites. I'd trade Rapira for Jesse Bromwich or James Graham in a heartbeat given the chance. Because those guys are the sort that put in performances that give you the chance to win premierships.
