Brisbane Broncos 2018 season preview

Very interested to see how Bennett gets the best from Bird. Flanno played him everywhere from fullback to lock forward, I still don’t know what his best position is?

1988

I heard that they offered him what Webke had been paid which was $350k, but he wanted more (don’t know what he asked for, but $400k would not have been unreasonable by any means) given that he had been paid less than Webke while they were both playing. I think Civinoceva was hard done by with the offer he got from the Broncos and that the offer he got from Penrith was an overpayment by the standards of the day. It is one of those situations where there are no hard feelings all round.

iirc it was even less then that, i think petro was asking for like $400k a season

Bennett will never pay top dollar for a frontrower or backrower. Remember that he let Civonceva go rather than match the $600k offered by Penrith (probably the equivalent of $850-950k these days). Bennett won’t spend big money on a player unless they have playmaking talent. While I can see the logic, there aren’t many teams that win a premiership without at least one top shelf prop.

I'll back that up. Moga could find himself in the open often but really butcher the finish. The Broncos ran 2nd to Storm in attack by 36 points, 6 tries over the whole season, it should have been much closer just on Moga alone. Great game against Cronulla was the highest point.

Brisbane have a few good young props comming through, so I can't imagine Bennett going out of his way to keep those two if they were offered more. It seems to be cheaper these days to recruit an average middle aged player from another club than it is to resign an average young player as well, young players seem to generate bidding wars that masively overinflate their value

I imagine he's not the only player that gets a completely different reaction from supporters then from the wider fan base

Fair enough - interesting to hear what supporters think about their own players - I guess you get to see all their matches whereas I might watch half of them.

Blair played a lot better for the Broncos than he did for the Tigers. I agree that the Broncos will miss his aggression and energy. You still have Maguire who I regard as a bit of a grub but he also has plenty of energy and made plenty of metres for the Broncos, Qld and the Kangaroos. I was a bit surprised that Es'esse and Arrow moved to other clubs but maybe they were offered a lot more cash.

He certainly had a great highlights reel by the end of the season, and was getting talked up by a lot of experts. But he had a tendency to take the selffish option, bombed a lot of tries, was a penalty magnet and Oates really suffered outside him (only really getting quality ball from Milf's cutt out passes) which was very frustrating to watch, esecially when he was getting constant praise by commentators

Are you therefore suggesting that Moga is a better player than Bird?

OK - I just thought he was starting to impose himself in the second half of last season. Started to make a few line breaks and try assists. An average of 13 hit ups and 145 running metres per game are pretty fair stats for a centre.

The “loss” of Moga is probably the best contract decision the broncos made for 2018. I am sure he’s the reason I’ll be grey and/or bald 10 years earlier than expected. He should find a shop and start selling some of the best steaks and cutlets in Newcastle, because he was one of the best butchers I’ve seen. He would have a -1 try tally per game he played, at least. If it wasn’t a complete defensive blunder it was butchering a certain try. As much as I didn’t like Blair the grub, our front row stocks look thin and our bench weak (esse esse gone too). Plenty of speed in our back line and this halves combo won 7 in a row last year didn’t they? We will be in the 8, maybe the 4 at a stretch. But unless some young props have a real breakout season it’s hard to see us right at the pointy end in late September.

A lot of Broncos fans aren't complaining that hes signed elsewhere. That being said, I think he'll do the Knights a lot more good then he did the Broncos

It's over two years, so really its probably less risky then a slightly lower long term deal

https://www.foxsports.com.au/nrl/nrl-premiership/stats/players?sortBy=errors Pretty sure the deal was reported to be around $3 mil over four years. The Sharks offer for Holmes was technically an extension and not a new deal, but even if they did count that Holmes's deal was for 2 years while Birds was for 3-4 meaning that the total money offered to him could easily have been more then the offer to Holmes. A lot of technicalities floating around a pretty simple statement can lead to a bit of confusion

Very ineffective player.

You are severely underrating Blair. Blair was never selected as a ball running prop. He was a specialist defender, and probably one of the top 3 in the game. Big bullocking runs might look great on a highlights real, but quick effective and efficient tackles that slow down opposition ball and nullify their playmakers is what wins games. Having said all that, Lodge will make a big difference to the Broncos. They have been missing a powerful ball runner for years, so Lodge will add an extra dimension to their attack. But they will miss Blair.