Kalyn Ponga discussion

bremsstrahlung said:
Ponga Pros:
- game changer. He can absolutely turn it on, and be the games best on his day.
- His connections with Brown on and off the field are looking great.
- He’s definitely that luxury X factor type of a player a club needs to win a premiership. He’s more than capable of doing what Walsh did last year, (start the season poorly…) string a bunch of games together where he takes control, takes it personally and carries the team to victory. But the squad we have around him now, means he doesn’t need to do all the heavy lifting.

Kalyn Cons:
- injury. Biggest thing for me. Injuries are part of the game. Unavoidable. But his record isn’t great. Chances are he plays 15 or 20 games a season. Is that the output you expect from 1.5M?
- And price. For the right price, no brainer. But if he’s gonna be commanding a new competition record salary, I’m not sure it’s worth the players we could lose.


Verdict - I’d be happy to re sign him for the right price. I think the club are planning the roster long term, which is nice to see, a potentially putting some emphasis on the bones of the future team - Brown, McEwen, Lucas, Sharpe etc. and seeing if we can facilitate a big money luxury. My hope, and this is potentially unfair to expect from players who have limited time to make their money, is that he would want to repay some of the faith we have shown in him. We have paid him very well. Has he lived up to his side of the contract?
Click to expand...
Exactly right.

And then I'd contrast with Sharpe:

Pros:
- Dynamic ball runner who's also very robust & "physical" - very easy to envision him as a huge work rate fullback along the lines of Tedesco or Edwards, 200+ metres every week, lead the league in tackle busts stuff. This would reduce our reliance on a battering ram winger like Marzhew. Gets tries from outleaping fullbacks and being the first to grubber kicks.
- Superlative support player & instinctive/reactive playmaker who thrives in broken play situations. Insanely "switched on" - that clip of him communicating with Hunt mid-sprint to cover the winger because he knows he can pull down Noah Martin, this is the kind of stuff you dream about a player developing by the time they're 25.
- Very rapidly developing skillset in terms of fully harnessing his reactive playmaking, particularly the developing short kicking game. A good sign in terms of him replacing pretty much all of what Kalyn brings in attack at 1.
- Local junior who has been way more impressive in the NRL than anticipated when he was coming through pathways. This stuff matters for keeping his salary down, part of why someone like Ponga is so expensive is that he was the Chosen One before he even played first grade.

Cons:
- Borderline poor ball player who relies on beating men with his feet before he can create something with his hands. (This matters way less at fullback than any other spine position).
- Not seeing a lot of organisational ability or contribution to building play in structure.


I could be describing James Tedesco here with a lot of this.
 
Last edited:
frankLauda said:
Fletcher is the ace in deck. They will think we have a good side. His money will go to upgrading some players internally and buying what we need.

If KP goes we will have a spine of Brown, Sandon, Fletch and Crossland. 9 we are well placed with what we have.

Someone mentioned we buy and elite half, but I rate Sandon. He’s only young, 50 games in and is showing great signs of a quality half that can create heaps of opportunities.
Click to expand...
Yeah and also... we have an elite half. We're locked into one for a decade. Dylan Brown is like Shaun Johnson if he could tackle. I think it's silly how caught up people got with "if he's a 6, you can't pay him all that money". I think it's just because Cleary and Cronk kept winning the comp so that meant everyone thinks you need the best 7 if you're going to win. But we've just seen a fullback almost single handedly carry a team to a comp while his geriatric #7's both tragically died mid-game. Just because Penrith kept doing it one way, didn't mean that's the only way to do it. No one was saying you can't make a 6 your most expensive spine player when Lockyer, Fittler & Maloney were leading teams to premierships.
 
Last edited:
krustykraz said:
All the talk about Ponga from Brent Reed on NRL360 just sounded like speculation to me.
He said he hasn't spoken to the Ponga camp.
And didn't mention he had spoken to the club.
Just media hype imo.
Click to expand...
Yeah it’s funny how much backpedaling from the media since Chamma’s incorrect report saying he was considering his options and leaving only for it to be 100% false.

The fact that he is allowed to run a football team and still work in the media whilst giving out and encourage degenerate gambling tips on radio (whilst being poor at all three) is baffling
 
krustykraz said:
All the talk about Ponga from Brent Reed on NRL360 just sounded like speculation to me.
He said he hasn't spoken to the Ponga camp.
And didn't mention he had spoken to the club.
Just media hype imo.
Click to expand...
Every year since Ponga signed with the knights he has been linked to multiple other clubs like clockwork. I am interested to see what the club offers and what Ponga asks for. Injury history likely comes into play with the offer.
The club is absolutely flush with talent at the moment and doesn't appear to rely on Ponga as much as they did in the past. Also it looks like Hunt is being groomed as the no 2 fullback and with Sharpe on the roster and Smith performing in the halves it makes me think the club won't be as desperate as they were in the past to offer Ponga ridiculous money. They might be ok with letting him walk.

Obviously I want Ponga to stay but I also don't think he is worth an upgrade on what the club is currently paying him based on his injuries.

It will be interesting to see what happens, especially if Ponga stays fit until November 1st after he returns from injury.
 
On the fair dinkum side of things, if we resign Ponga we may be saying bye to Best to even out the cap for a bit. Best has similar injury issues to KP. Plenty of good juniors coming through in the outside backs including a couple of potential superstars in Seve and Winter. McKewn has been earmarked as the priority upgrade right now. Best may just be a disposable luxury when the time comes.
 
Owey said:
On the fair dinkum side of things, if we resign Ponga we may be saying bye to Best to even out the cap for a bit. Best has similar injury issues to KP. Plenty of good juniors coming through in the outside backs including a couple of potential superstars in Seve and Winter. McKewn has been earmarked as the priority upgrade right now. Best may just be a disposable luxury when the time comes.
Click to expand...
As a fan, losing Best and Gags in conservative years would be very difficult to stomach.
 
How much is Ponga actually worth to us?
If we could get him on the same as Brown without ratchets for 3 more years id be happy.
$1.3-1.4mil.
 
krustykraz said:
As a fan, losing Best and Gags in conservative years would be very difficult to stomach.
Click to expand...
Yeah, and I don't want to lose either Braddy or KP. Might not be possible though, or might cost us a Hopwood who would be harder to replace then a centre. If we are winning, it won't feel so bad.
 
krustykraz said:
How much is Ponga actually worth to us?
If we could get him on the same as Brown without ratchets for 3 more years id be happy.
$1.3-1.4mil.
Click to expand...
I imagine that there are clubs out there like the Dragons that would offer 1.5 mil for Ponga.

I really don't know what the club will offer because there is so much talent coming through the Knights right now. NSW cup team is ontop of the ladder.

The question is how badly do the knights need him right now?
 
CornChippy said:
I imagine that there are clubs out there like the Dragons that would offer 1.5 mil for Ponga.

I really don't know what the club will offer because there is so much talent coming through the Knights right now. NSW cup team is ontop of the ladder.

The question is how badly do the knights need him right now?
Click to expand...
And can you really see KP wanting to go to a lowly club?
 
Beatell said:
And can you really see KP wanting to go to a lowly club?
Click to expand...
We have been one of the lowliest clubs in the last decade.

With the club currently playing so well it may also be reason for him to want to stay but would he take a reduced contract?

Best situation for the club is that Ponga sees us as a team that could win the comp and takes a small cut or the same salary he is currently on to stay.

Its an interesting situation.
 
There isn't a chance he takes a pay cut, I know I wouldn't take a pay cut in my job if I was the best in my role..
He just wont get a big increase on the next contract
 
CornChippy said:
We have been one of the lowliest clubs in the last decade.

With the club currently playing so well it may also be reason for him to want to stay but would he take a reduced contract?

Best situation for the club is that Ponga sees us as a team that could win the comp and takes a small cut or the same salary he is currently on to stay.

Its an interesting situation.
Click to expand...
100% we have and he's stayed as he got paid enough but more importantly i think he loves the club and town. It seems like he know has a team around him that can compete so he would be happy. The only place i think he would go is to a guaranteed or close to comp winning team, and they arent going to pay him well as they wont have salary cap to do so. So i think he stays even if its lightly less money. Going to union is a different matter.
 
HarVeeGee13 said:
Exactly right.

And then I'd contrast with Sharpe:

Pros:
- Dynamic ball runner who's also very robust & "physical" - very easy to envision him as a huge work rate fullback along the lines of Tedesco or Edwards, 200+ metres every week, lead the league in tackle busts stuff. This would reduce our reliance on a battering ram winger like Marzhew. Gets tries from outleaping fullbacks and being the first to grubber kicks.
- Superlative support player & instinctive/reactive playmaker who thrives in broken play situations. Insanely "switched on" - that clip of him communicating with Hunt mid-sprint to cover the winger because he knows he can pull down Noah Martin, this is the kind of stuff you dream about a player developing by the time they're 25.
- Very rapidly developing skillset in terms of fully harnessing his reactive playmaking, particularly the developing short kicking game. A good sign in terms of him replacing pretty much all of what Kalyn brings in attack at 1.
- Local junior who has been way more impressive in the NRL than anticipated when he was coming through pathways. This stuff matters for keeping his salary down, part of why someone like Ponga is so expensive is that he was the Chosen One before he even played first grade.

Cons:
- Borderline poor ball player who relies on beating men with his feet before he can create something with his hands. (This matters way less at fullback than any other spine position).
- Not seeing a lot of organisational ability or contribution to building play in structure.


I could be describing James Tedesco here with a lot of this.
Click to expand...
But Sharpe DOES NOT have a kicking game. I've had to hear it all summer. Except he does. Simple question: is the team functioning well with this guy at 5/8?
 
We're already seeing the effect of having so much tied up in Ponga and Brown. Toohey keeps saying how tight things are. They stayed clear of Barnett despite him wanting to take less to come home. They were already trying to cut Marzhew's contract, and even those talks are on hold while we count pennies further. Lucas and McEwen are going to need upgrades. JSaf and Dom are among the others who'll be free agents in November.

It's unfortunate it's taken this long to put a decent squad around him but Ponga is more of a luxury than a necessity at this stage. We could still have a very good spine without him, and a lot of money to spend elsewhere. Wouldn't get into a bidding war for him.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top