Jahream Bula #269

I think Bula is severely hampered by the handbrake that is AD and at times by Luai when he switches direction of the play. In one case he is set on the left and the ball goes right and in the other AD steps back inside and kills the play too often. Bula and KPP could be a real weapon - if they could get the ball more often.
 
Jolls said:
I think Bula is severely hampered by the handbrake that is AD and at times by Luai when he switches direction of the play. In one case he is set on the left and the ball goes right and in the other AD steps back inside and kills the play too often. Bula and KPP could be a real weapon - if they could get the ball more often.
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Too many excuses and not enough solutions.
 
Telltails said:
I thought Bula had a good game without being outstanding. Watched it again and really don't know what some are looking for. This is a team sport he did his job yesterday.
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I think they get sensitive about how much he will be paid like it’s coming out of their own pocket. You gotta spend the salary cap somewhere and we have value for money in other areas of our roster
 
Telltails said:
I thought Bula had a good game without being outstanding. Watched it again and really don't know what some are looking for. This is a team sport he did his job yesterday.
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We are looking for a game that equates to 900k in value and when was the last time we saw that ?
I’m not sure why it is so hard for some people to comprehend, but getting value for money, particularly highly paid players is extremely important to a teams success.
 
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Vicious said:
We are looking for a game that equates to 900k in value and when was the last time we saw that ?
I’m not sure why it is so hard for some people to comprehend, but getting value for money, particularly highly paid players is extremely important to a teams success.
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Its not hard to comprehend - you don't rate him.
If you don't keep him you have to replace him and who that's better that doesn't cost and hasn't already reached their ceiling? Otherwise your banking on potential again.
Very few players earn their contracts every game if you measure them on their salary and if you want to retain spine players that have options you have to pay them or someone else will.
 
old_man_tiger said:
Would like to see him in the frame when opposition score, unfortunately with camera angles bring what they are it can be hard to tell why he is often not visible and easy to assume the worst.
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Look at him on the first try just jogging. Even if jock made a tackle to slow him down he has no support. Baffled as to why he wasn’t sprinting to save the try once Luke’s jam failed
 
Telltails said:
Its not hard to comprehend - you don't rate him.
If you don't keep him you have to replace him and who that's better that doesn't cost and hasn't already reached their ceiling? Otherwise your banking on potential again.
Very few players earn their contracts every game if you measure them on their salary and if you want to retain spine players that have options you have to pay them or someone else will.
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We also need to take into account what he does off the ball and how our defence is structured. Bula is critical to our defence and gives early and clear direction from the back. We have also made the defensive decision to make our middle the rock that water has to flow around. Like it or not this means Bula is anchored around the A defender until the threat has passed. He can't be doing that in defence and being there to make the tackle on the wing.

This defensive pattern forces teams to try and go around us and, with inexperience on the left edge and new combinations with Jock and AD we have been found wanting on a couple fo occasions. Once we get our starting 13 back on the park this current weakness will be shored up.

Could Bula do more in attack? Possibly, if the ball was promoted to him. The key weapon for his utilisation at the moment is KPP and unfortunatley that edge is being stifled by our "playmaker" at times.
 
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Jolls said:
I think Bula is severely hampered by the handbrake that is AD and at times by Luai when he switches direction of the play. In one case he is set on the left and the ball goes right and in the other AD steps back inside and kills the play too often. Bula and KPP could be a real weapon - if they could get the ball more often.
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This really is all sounding like the 300 reasons why other players were stopping Brooks from being any good. Remember when the popular theory was that it was Robbie's fault? That was laughable too.

Bottom line is that any other quality fullback playing with our pack and our halves at the moment would be having a stellar season.

Teddy doesn't make excuses, he's just good every week.
 
Telltails said:
Its not hard to comprehend - you don't rate him.
If you don't keep him you have to replace him and who that's better that doesn't cost and hasn't already reached their ceiling? Otherwise your banking on potential again.
Very few players earn their contracts every game if you measure them on their salary and if you want to retain spine players that have options you have to pay them or someone else will.
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Supposedly the Dragons are looking at Bula. William Kennedy at the sharks has been mentioned as being paid $350000 and not resigned yet. Should Bula go, I would be more than happy to offer Kennedy $450000.
 
Vicious said:
He is not re-signing with Wests Tigers for anything less than 900k
Is he worth that money ?
Wests Tigers are now at the stage where we have a dominant forward pack, some good quality options in the halves, but lack class within our 1-5.
We are currently in a good forward trajectory, but cannot take the next step and be a genuine premiership threat without an elite fullback who is capable of dominating games and taking advantage when our opponents are tired, battered and bruised.
The more I watch him play the more I’m convinced Bula simply does not have the game to take him to the next level, he will always be a good fast, tall, athletic and safe fullback who backs up well, but does not have the class and x-factor like all the elite fullbacks do.
If we had a dynamic 2-5 with two or three of them that are explosive match winners, we could get away with a more simplistic fullback, but we don’t have that luxury.
It’s no secret that the Cowboys will highly likely need to lose either Purdue or Drinkwater, we should be targeting either one of them if we are serious about going to the next level.
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Drinkwarer is likely heading to St George for next year that is why trai fuller to dragons if it happens is only for 1 year 2026.
cowboys will keep purdue
 
Oscar Martinez said:
This really is all sounding like the 300 reasons why other players were stopping Brooks from being any good. Remember when the popular theory was that it was Robbie's fault? That was laughable too.

Bottom line is that any other quality fullback playing with our pack and our halves at the moment would be having a stellar season.

Teddy doesn't make excuses, he's just good every week.
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OK, I'm not making excuses for him - he is in the right place most of the time but isn't getting the ball and plenty on here are saying that he is missing in defence on the edge. Well if he is set on Luai's edge and he changes the point of attack - as he does regularly - he can't then pop up on the right. If he is set to run a line off KPP and AD steps back in - as he does regularly - he can't physically get the ball. When he does get the ball he normally does pretty well. Should he have been hanging around the ruck more yesterday? In my opinion that could have been a game changer - but we didn't play off the back of creating chaos in the middle - our playmakers (wearing 6 and 7) didn't shift he play that way - so Bula needed to keep on the edges. He just can't be in two places at once.

In defence we can't have a system where he is anchored to the A defender and also making cover tackles on the wing - our defensive plan - shown very clearly yesterday is for the inside pressure to take care of that. Note my point re Jock Madden missing his assignment there by tackling too high - he was there but didn't execute at the standard we need (harsh but fair criticism).

It is early in the season and we are still working out our play. You could plug Tedesco into our system and the points about Luai and AD above mean he aint getting the pill either.

I'm not saying Bula is playing brilliantly - but he isn't the dog shit that some are painting him as.

I have said on here plenty of times that we have offered him what we think he is worth - if he wants more happy to let him walk - but let's understand what we're being critical of!
 
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Tito Santana said:
I think it’s the price point mate.
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This is my issue with it all though.

We generally have to pay above market for external players. We all know that.

So say we deem Bula at 600k and we pay 800k or whatever, would it be any different if we went elsewhere. Say we targeted a 600k fullback from another club, we would probably have to pay them 800k - 1 mill for them to consider switching to us. So I guess the question is, who could we actually get that is better than Bula?

What I do know, its hard to compete if your fullback does not have blistering speed (hence why the Cowboys are so keen to get Purdue back there). Teams like the Dogs and Dragons are trying to move their 'slower' fullbacks on for that reason.
 
Oscar Martinez said:
This really is all sounding like the 300 reasons why other players were stopping Brooks from being any good. Remember when the popular theory was that it was Robbie's fault? That was laughable too.

Bottom line is that any other quality fullback playing with our pack and our halves at the moment would be having a stellar season.

Teddy doesn't make excuses, he's just good every week.
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Is Bula not having a really good season?

We are 2nd for Christ's sake.

He gets half the amount of ball than the likes of walsh and Edwards.

This has more to do with our structure than a problem with bula.
 
Jedi_Tiger said:
Drinkwarer is likely heading to St George for next year that is why trai fuller to dragons if it happens is only for 1 year 2026.
cowboys will keep purdue
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Drinkwater would make us a much better attacking team and help our clunky attack with running game, ball playing ability and kicking game.
 
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