I can understand why they didn’t. I was torn at the time out of pure spite given how it all played out. I thought the Hawks offer was barely equitable and given they were trying to poach a club captain and best player then barely equitable wasn’t going to cut it from the clubs point of view (and mine).
I didn’t at the time (and still don’t now) buy into all the bullshit that holding him to his contract would/ did destabilise the club.
The rot runs much deeper than that and I’ve called out the leadership group (McGrath, Redman, Ridley, Parish, Langford etc) for years for being weak when it comes to driving standards while still fulfilling their potential as players.
That is just as much on the club as it is on the players themselves but the Merret non-trade is the symptom not the cause.
Beyond Scott’s non-existent game plan I had hoped he would at least rid the club of the pretenders among our list but unfortunately he did the exact opposite and appeared from the outside to encourage it.
Becoming pretty clear that we should payout and delist most of our key defenders, and just bring in the best state league key defenders and give them a go instead… because at least they will value the opportunity.
Reid has a role but clearly not as the no.1 defender.
Today exposed if it wasn’t clear enough already why we invested so heavily in McKay. Yes he is a bust but that doesn’t mean it was the wrong strategy… just the wrong player.
Unfortunately there’s plenty of clubs trying to get gun key defenders. Our problem is we tried to buy the only one available for free (rather than trade for a good one).
Exactly. We’re not doing this to get Doedee. We’re doing it (at the cost of a list spot & salary cap) to save them his salary so they can fit in Bailey. We would only doing it if they were rewarding us for doing so at the trade table (and we’d need to convince Doedee to come as well, not necessarily easy).
As has been explained to you before, it isn’t about Doedee being good for us, but that losing him is good for Brisbane and that they would reward us at the trade table. Or we don’t do it, as it costs us a list spot and salary cap.
And I’m not sure if there would be anyone else with his kind of contract at Brisbane who they would want off their list.
I mean that we’ve front loaded the contracts so that the remaining contracts are (say) $400k p.a. I’m also assuming we’re currently running below the 95% threshold for the cap and have “banked” two years of 5%. So, if in 2027 we went to 110% that would be at least $2.7m. At $500k p.a. left on the front-loaded contracts, we could offload 5-6 years of “additional” contract years beyond 2027 next year. Which would let us to say several or all of Parish, McKay, Langford.
I think its rubbish that the long contracts are a major weight around our neck, or that they were given out because we really really rated the players. I think the long-term contracts were given out so we could offer the players $600-$800k p.a., but pay an extra $500k-$1m across the early years so that we were hitting the 95% of cap we needed to hit (and 110% once every 3 years). And that because we were doing that, it wouldn’t be that hard to cut them.
If we want to cut Jones this year, I’m very confident the cap can fit it in. And I would do so.
I’m not convinced we need HVH as much as we need Teixeira or Butler.
We are seriously deficient in both areas and I’d like to hear from some of our underage watchers on their thoughts, as to which would be the best fit for us.
We need every type of player, hence why we are last.
I still think that the senior guys we have, are capable of playing way better than they currently are. The whole group is down on confidence.
McKay is not the player we are seeing today. Look at his brother, he looked cooked only 2 months ago, now with a new coach and belief, he is playing excellent footy again.
I think we could definitely look at what we did similarly with Goldy, and look at someone like Witts or Reilly O’Brien for a season or two while our rucks develop. Not ideal moving forward but helps our ruck stocks.
I also think that clubs will try to pry Bryan next season when he is out of contract. Bryan isn’t anything to write home about, but for Tassie or any club needing a ruck that isn’t bottom of the ladder, he would be a target.
You could be right; but, now is when we have needed them the most and they’ve let us down.
We have needed them to stand up and be the players they have been well rewarded to be, and they haven’t.
I’d happily trade them all and bring in a handful of real leaders, with experience & clear communication skills that will give the kids direction on the field and off.
Is there not a fine involved for being below the 95% figure for more than two years? And this is part of the logic for front loading the contracts?
I guess what I’m getting at is, what happens if we didn’t give these players long, front loaded contracts and instead just paid them closer to what they’re worth (accepting that they may have left) over a shorter term, even if that meant not hitting the minimum spend on the cap and therefore being fined?
Yeah, I’m not suggesting keeping them. I am suggesting they are all capable of playing at a higher standard. The issue is they are all minions. They need a master to lead them.
Just had a quick look at what a breach of the cap floor would cost and it’s interesting to note that according to Wikipedia no club has ever been penalised for breaching the floor. From Wikipedia “As of 2025, no club has been penalised for breaches of the salary floor regulations, and no punishment has included the deduction of premiership points”.
I don’t believe in drafting for fit with a top 5 pick. I’m hoping, and kind of expecting, that one of the four potential options will have a huge finals series and separate themselves from the rest.
Generally, unless you nab a top five pick in a trade, you’re going to have no lack of areas which could use with some upgrades. So best available makes a lot of sense.