Signings, Suggestions & Rumours Discussion

TigerSkins05 said:
As many of you said .. good player terrible human .. I’m amazed he was ever allowed to play in the NRL .. as a teenage junior footballer playing in the Hunter area (??) .. he was a centre .. not really quick .. not really tall .. he was often left off the team sheet. After a season of injuries he ended up taking illicit performance drugs .. he was caught using the drugs and was then banned from playing league by authorities. His body shape and size changed dramatically. My question is .. does a spotted dog lose its spots .. ??
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I’m from the Hunter Valley and I didn’t even know he was from here. I looked it up and he played for Greta Braxton.
 
gregjm87 said:
He's never been a 'great' finisher. He is pretty good at getting low and keeping his balance to get over the line when given a little bit of space close to the line. But that is his only move. Great finishers have other options eg. Speed to burn someone on the outside, power to run through defenders, a kick target, acrobatics to leap out/over defence but still ground the ball inside the touch line. He's got none of that.
I don't really like assessing players simply on tries scored as it ignores the work done inside them. So I will not bag him for not crossing the line too much this year. But playing centre shouldn't be used as an excuse for not scoring tries. If he had some of those other attributes I'm sure he'd have scored more.
As for great clubman and character. Maybe, hard to assess from the outside. He does seem to be a bit of an energy guy lifting spirits around the locker room. He also seems to lose his cool and want to fight everyone when things aren't going his way.
I definitely stick to the overpaid and overrated opinion but he is also by no means out of place in first grade. Probably on about 100k to much for what he offers but will rarely cost the team a game.
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?? Do you know how hard it is to keep your balance , and poise when the defence is rushing you , often multiple players , skip under the first tackle get your arm free and hold off the second and third . All these tank like wingers like marzhew can’t do it , plenty of slight wingers don’t have the leg strength . To diminish that ability , and the amount of balance and lower leg power , as well as guile and understanding of where your body is …. That’s some armchair bullshit .
If I’m his inside centre or edge backrower , I’ve got every faith in the world he’s finishing 99% of half chances I create .
The off season does my head in . So much dribble .
 
Lestronge said:
?? Do you know how hard it is to keep your balance , and poise when the defence is rushing you , often multiple players , skip under the first tackle get your arm free and hold off the second and third . All these tank like wingers like marzhew can’t do it , plenty of slight wingers don’t have the leg strength . To diminish that ability , and the amount of balance and lower leg power , as well as guile and understanding of where your body is …. That’s some armchair bullshit .
If I’m his inside centre or edge backrower , I’ve got every faith in the world he’s finishing 99% of half chances I create .
The off season does my head in . So much dribble .
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He probably does finish the majority of chances created by his inside men in good ball. No more than most wingers. He pretty much scores the same tries the 'tank' wingers do, (through broken traffic) just with a different path to the tryline.
He however needs more space created for him than the speedy wingers or the DWZ type of acrobats if the opportunity involves beating their opponent on the outside.
More importantly he doesn't create the opportunities through his abilities. He isn't a kick target like many wingers. If he gets on the outside of his man at the 50 he's tackles before the 20. When the speedsters get on the outside at the 50 it's points.
I just don't see what he offers to rate him highly. Not saying he shouldn't be holding his place in the side or that he has nothing. He is obviously first grade quality. But is just an ordinary player, an average winger at best.
 
TigerSkins05 said:
Did Api get a broken jaw after last nights game for Fiji .. ??
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Yeah...f...k
He will likely recover to play in Vegas,but its one more hit to his body he/we didnt need..with no immediate backup other than the 3rd ranked 9 at Raiders
Weve really gotta have a clear exit plan to progressively phase him out,but more importantly a quality replacement identified next year
A bit like our halves mess ,which is even more of a priority
 
NewyTiger said:
I’m from the Hunter Valley and I didn’t even know he was from here. I looked it up and he played for Greta Braxton.
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I’m the same. I even played a number of years ago at Greta and not a mention of his name. Only knew he was from there as one day years later drove past the oval and someone had put up a painted sheet that said Hudson young oval. Think it was the time he first made origin
Maybe it gives credence to my wife when she says I live in my own little world
 
wastedyears said:
The club let the 10yr exit plan go and decided to re-sign the bloke in his mid-30s for two more seasons.

Pathways development is a mess. Recruitment & retention is a mess. It normally takes several seasons to achieve sustainable competitiveness once a sports organisation begins to clean up these two critical areas. Wests Tigers hasn't even started getting it right yet.
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Who TDS? Riding the pine behind Reilly Smith ….. he’s not the answer .
 
wastedyears said:
The club let the 10yr exit plan go and decided to re-sign the bloke in his mid-30s for two more seasons.

Pathways development is a mess. Recruitment & retention is a mess. It normally takes several seasons to achieve sustainable competitiveness once a sports organisation begins to clean up these two critical areas. Wests Tigers hasn't even started getting it right yet.
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The 10 yr plan was deemed only to be another 2 years before Haywood surpassed him, so the club chose 2 years of Api over 2 years of TDS (who got offered silly coin by parra)
 
wastedyears said:
He was their first choice 9, with Smith in reserve grade towards the end of the season. He's also still just 21 years old. So not only is your info wrong, you're willing to write off a kid at an age where most in his position have played very little NRL.
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Yeah I agree, I think TDS is quality and a real lose to the Tigers, he's very highly rated by many and still young. He's quicker then some of our wingers for starters.

Lets hope Haywood can come on like TDS has.
 
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