It’s hard to believe but the spin has started
Roar Rookie By polyglot, 24 Apr 2010 polyglot is a Roar Rookie
- Tagged:
- Brian Waldron, Melbourne Storm, News Ltd, NRL
On the surface, it would seem that the NRL and News Ltd have an uncompromising approach to the Melbourne Storm’s rorting of the system. However, I can’t help feeling we about to be treated to some half-truths in order to serve and protect the “greater good”.
In fact, I think it’s started already.
Those commenting on last night’s footy programs and news interviews would have us believe that the players are completely oblivious to any underhanded dealings.
Brian Waldron and other management, including coaches at the club, certainly had more to gain long-term by leveraging their careers on the back of any ill-gotten success.
That said, are we to believe that all knowledge of supplementary player payments were restricted to senior management and perhaps player managers, and that the players themselves were unwitting beneficiaries?
Are the players mushrooms?
In one breath the self-appointed spin doctors are claiming that there were rumours, gossip and speculation in rugby league circles for years. In the next breath, they would have us believe that the players were not even privy to suspicions.
Now, that is an insult to our intelligence.
At the very least, everybody associated with the Melbourne Storm, including the players, must have had the same doubts as the rest of us, and this alone makes them culpable.
Legitimate payments must have been disclosed within the players’ formal contracts and known to all. Therefore, a player knows what to expect in his pay packet.
News Ltd and the NRL had no choice but to put on a ruthless public demonstration. But behind closed doors, you can bet it’s now about damage control and protecting the “investment” by protecting us from the truth.
It’s the nature of the beast.
Recommend this story.
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The Crowd Says (12) | Page 1 of Comments
Have Your Say
- Explore:
- Brian Waldron, Melbourne Storm, News Ltd, NRL
April 24th 2010 @ 5:58am
Kurt said | April 24th 2010 @ 5:58am | Report comment
And what exactly is the ‘truth’ polygot?
April 24th 2010 @ 6:51am
Rabbitz said | April 24th 2010 @ 6:51am | Report comment
The spin started during the press conference when Gallop kept praising the Storm for “coming forward”.
April 24th 2010 @ 7:22am
MyGeneration said | April 24th 2010 @ 7:22am | Report comment
Do you think this is spin? From http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/league-news/geyer-insists-storm-stars-were-in-the-dark-over-illegal-payments-20100423-tj5i.html
“MELBOURNE Storm foundation player Matt Geyer yesterday insisted that the players who took the club to two premierships from four consecutive grand finals and who have now been implicated in the biggest scandal to hit rugby league in Australia did not know what was going on…
Geyer, who became a fan favourite as he took advantage of a career second chance in Melbourne to win premierships in 1999 and 2007, strongly refuted the question being asked of his former teammates: how did they not know what was going on?
”The simple answer to that is, how much do you know about the people in your office getting paid?” said Geyer, who retired after the Storm were beaten by Manly in the 2008 grand final.
”Cameron [Smith] is one of my best mates at the club. I wouldn’t have a clue what he’s getting paid, so I’m not going to know what the other blokes are getting paid, and I’m not going to sit down and do the maths. It’s unfathomable to even worry about it, you sign your contract and your money is in the bank.
”As far as looking around and seeing all that talent and thinking, ‘Hang on, something might be wrong here’, I know that I stayed for less [than I could have been paid at another club].
”I know other players who stayed for less, and that’s what we thought as a playing group: that we’ve got a good talent base here but we’re all loyal and we all want to stay and each year we looked at the players that were leaving. You could build an NRL team that could be quite competitive out of the players who left over the last three or four years … we were looking at all these players and thinking, that’s how we could fit the superstars in.”
Geyer also said he was angered by suggestions that the illegal dealings were the only reason behind the Storm’s remarkable success.
”It’s a load of s— because you ask any of those players who have gone to other clubs and they’ll tell you the preseason and the work rate and the work ethic at the Melbourne Storm is probably second to none at the NRL. To try and be dismissive and say they only won it now because of all that money is just bulls—,” Geyer said.
”I understand … you have to accept that the club cheated to get those players there but once those players were there they had a choice to make whether they become part of the system and whether they are going to make those sacrifices. We made those choices not as a group of players who knew they were over the salary cap, we made them as a group of players who were a tight unit who wanted to win.””
Geyer is just one player. Maybe others were more curious about how they were paid. I’m still suspicious of Bellamy’s role, however. But you haven’t added much to our knowledge today, polyglot.
April 24th 2010 @ 9:59pm
steveDarke said | April 24th 2010 @ 9:59pm | Report comment
Nice straw man thrown up there by Geyer.
It’s not about knowing what every other player is being paid and then adding it up to see if the salary cap has been exceeded.
It’s about signing a contract for $200,000 per year and then noticing that in fact you are being paid an extra $50 grand on top of your salary. Money which doesn’t come into your account as ‘wages’ and neither does it come with a payslip.
Only a complete moron would believe that the players knew nothing (but then again, at least half of us are morons, so it’s not a bad strategy).
April 25th 2010 @ 8:46am
Andyroo said | April 25th 2010 @ 8:46am | Report comment
The extra money was via “third party deals*”. The SMH has copies of them and says those deals are written in such a way to look legit.
* the violation is that the Storm aren’t supposed to negotiate third party deals on behlaf of players (it’s up to them to source those themeselves) and that these deals were false and the money was actually coming from the Storm doing some dodgy accounting rather than a company actually willing to pay the players.
I find it funny that you would call people morons for not being sure if the players knew when a) you ave ignored what the newspapers who have seen copies of the paperwork have said and b) if the players did know it would have come out about 4 years earlier.
April 24th 2010 @ 7:42am
Rabbitz said | April 24th 2010 @ 7:42am | Report comment
MG, while I don’t doubt that some of the players may not have known, but those getting brown paper bags must have. Regardless of the players knowledge the leadership group (as they like to call them these days) we well aware and led the team down this path. The leadership group are in the end responsible for all happenings at the club.
The players can can whinge and bitch all they like, but they should take a second and ask why they still have a job, i.e. why hasn’t the NRL pulled the franchise licence. I think they should thankful they are still getting (over) paid.
April 24th 2010 @ 8:11am
Andyroo said | April 24th 2010 @ 8:11am | Report comment
All those people saying it was obvious….masters in hindsight.
Who did they add in the last few years mid season discarded Finch (now described as SOO Finch) and mid season discarded Newton.
Of the top of my head they lost Dallas Johnson and Israel Folau. So it’s not like these rorts have made them immune from the cap.
April 24th 2010 @ 9:58am
Shane said | April 24th 2010 @ 9:58am | Report comment
Ok, so why has the NRL gone so hard at the Storm. Everyone knows that the Eels and Roosters are currently over the cap and that the Broncos have been for most of their existence. Don’t talk about proof. Don’t talk about evidence. It is common knowledge that they are over and if the NRL wanted to prove it they could investigate until they found evidence. But no, they don’t.
April 24th 2010 @ 10:03am
M1tch said | April 24th 2010 @ 10:03am | Report comment
They won premierships, they dominated the game for 4 years through cheating the cap
April 24th 2010 @ 1:11pm
BennO said | April 24th 2010 @ 1:11pm | Report comment
“Don’t talk about proof. Don’t talk about evidence. It is common knowledge that they are over…”
Say what? I would have thought you’d need those two things to do anything.
April 25th 2010 @ 10:09am
Billo Boy said | April 25th 2010 @ 10:09am | Report comment
Why would the NRL and News publicise the cap breach and then inflict a monumental punishsment, and then try to spin its way around it all? They could easily have “spun” the whole issue before it had begun to got to the public if that was their motive.
polyglot what your perceive as spin is people offering up opinions and observations in the public domain, while mindful that there are defamation laws in this country.
April 26th 2010 @ 11:24am
Mike said | April 26th 2010 @ 11:24am | Report comment
Can clubs offer players, say, a $250K salary per year and at the end of their career, then offer them a job that’s ridiculously overpaid? Almost like a suspended Superannuation but immediately payable after retiring for taking on a low-key position with the club.
If I was a club and wanted to 1 – rort the system, and 2 – keep players at the club, I would be looking to do something like that.
I’m sure the auditors would catch wind of it at some stage, but much harder to track