Reds should stop chasing big-name signings and build the whole squad
Honestly I'd take a 23 grown at Ballymore over another imported "marquee" name who's past it and here for a superannuation top-up. Tate McDermott and Fraser McReight both came through the Queensland club pathway and look how they turned out, imagine a whole match-day side of that, guys who actually bleed for the jumper instead of treating Suncorp like a stopover.
Every big-name signing we chase feels like backing a short-priced favourite that falls over - and I say that as a punter who knows a bad line when he sees one 😂 Someone will pipe up about experience and finals know-how, sure thing mate, but remind me how that record's been travelling lately? Build from club rugby, keep the locals hungry, and let the rest of the comp laugh until they're not 😏
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✓Honestly I'd take a 23 grown at Ballymore over another imported "marquee" name who's past it and here for a superannuation top-up. Tate McDermott and Fraser McReight both came through the Queensland club pathway and look…Two decent Wallabies out of how many hundred club players a decade? That's a hit rate I wouldn't bet the salary cap on. I'll believe it when I see the depth chart.Sample first, conclusions after.
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RobReds mate, that's how every great side started tho 💪 Tate and McReight weren't flukes, the pathway is there. Trust it through thick and thin 🔥 ah well, nowt to do but back 'em 🙌You don't abandon your own.
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RobReds has got a point about sample size, I could be wrong, but the base rate argument cuts both ways. Most imports on a superannuation tour flop too, so the hit rate on that side of the ledger is hardly sparkling. What the pathway gives you is cheap development years, contract loyalty and a squad that stays when the cap squeezes, which is exactly how McDermott and McReight got their head start. I'd back a Ballymore spine over a marquee punt every round of the season. 📊Do the math before you argue.
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Club footy built half the good sides I've watched, lads. Took years though. Patience is a lost art these days 😉 ah well, we'll see.Seen it all, lads.
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FrontRowFan, that's roughly where I land too. I keep a spreadsheet every season of where our minutes actually come from. Which players played Brisbane club rugby before debuting versus who arrived from elsewhere, and the homegrown column has held up better than most would guess, though I could be wrong on some of my tagging. McDermott and McReight are the obvious exhibit A, but there's a nuance: pure Ballymore-only sourcing probably takes a decade and you'll bleed a few gems interstate in the meantime, because someone will offer them more than we can. My caveat, then: build from the club pathway, sure, but keep two or three targeted signings for positions where the local crop genuinely has nobody. My old man used to take me to Prem Grade finals at Ballymore and the crowd there knew every name, that's the culture you can't import. The hit-rate argument cuts both ways, as FrontRowFan says, so back the pipeline and accept it's slow. 📊Do the math before you argue.
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Yeah nah Metric_nerd, patience is all well and good when someone else is wearing the losses 😅 Tate and Frase came through the pathway proper, but a whole 23 straight from club footy? That's dreaming, surely. We'd get smashed in the tight five for three seasons while everyone posts nostalgic photos of Ballymore 🤬 ah well, nowt to doHeart with the team, head on pause.
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TrueBelieverLegend, dreaming? Back in my day we won things with blokes straight off club training runs 😄 give the young ones time and they'll surprise you.Watch as long as I have and you'll get it.
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OldSchoolEst66, "back in my day" is doing a lot of work in that sentence. Nobody's arguing the pathway produces quality, McDermott and McReight prove it does, the question is whether a full 23 of club graduates beats even one or two genuine signings at the weak spots. Source on that winning things bit?
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GloryDays_4Life nails it, pathway first, then plug two or three genuine gaps. Caveat: small sample though, McDermott and McReight are the standouts, not the norm. I track it every round 📊
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FixIsInPTSD tracking it every round and still only finding two standouts tells you everything 😏 those two blokes didn't just fall out of club footy, they got coached up at Ballymore with proper resources. Full 23 from the bushes overnight? Dreaming, sure, but cheap marquee retreads cost you more than a lean year on graduates ever will 🤡Any stat can be bent.
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FixIsInPTSD tracking it every round and still only finding two standouts tells you everything 😏 those two blokes didn't just fall out of club footy, they got coached up at Ballymore with proper resources. Full 23 from th…@BadBeatAndy nah nobody said full 23 overnight mate, it's about patience. McDermott got game time and bloomed. Starve the pathway of chances and you'll get zero standouts, not two 💪One love, one side ❤️
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Andy's got a point tbh. I remember watching McDermott tear around for Uni as a skinny halfback and nobody called him a superstar then 🔥 but two blokes out of how many? Punters who'd put money on a full 23 of club grads are getting long odds, mate. Get the pathway right, sure, but don't toss the chequebook out with it 🤷
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When I mark my students' work I give partial credit for a good process even if the answer's incomplete, and that's roughly where I land here. The pathway clearly works, but two standouts from years of Ballymore graduates is a thin base line, so wholesale squad-building overnight feels like a long punt. My table says build deep through the clubs and sign sparingly at genuine weak spots. Where exactly that balance sits is the bit we haven't settled. 📊Numbers > vibes.
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Seen this argument a few times over the decades and the truth sits somewhere in the middle, eh. Two out of a pile of grads is thin, sure, but McDermott wasn't anyone's superstar either until someone gave him game time and patience. Reds chasing big names has burned them before, so I'd back the pathway, just slower than the dreamers want.Seen it all, lads.
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Seen this argument a few times over the decades and the truth sits somewhere in the middle, eh. Two out of a pile of grads is thin, sure, but McDermott wasn't anyone's superstar either until someone gave him game time an…Agreed about patience, but if the pipeline is only that thin, relying on youth feels like a massive gamble on the market.Up one week, down the next. Classic.