The General 'Toronto Wolfpack' Discussion Thread

[Oldbear]

6 hours ago, TheLegendOfTexEvans said:

Personally i think the whole thing was spin by Perez he persuaded Argyle it would work it was never going to wash its face.

Bringing in Noble and Vickers pretty much confirmed that theory in my head.

 

 

I will be honest and say the Perez spin thing had never entered my head, but you may be on to something here. I’m not sure who endorsed Vickers (I assume it was Noble) but that was obviously a catastrophic move, Noble I guess was endorsed by either Perez or Nigel Wood, either way Argyle was left with not only a failed concept, but administrators who would guarantee failure and perhaps Covid became the convenient get out.

[Toby Chopra]

5 hours ago, ATLANTISMAN said:

EVERYONE CALM DOWN 

We can have as many different opinions on here as we like however IMHO its all very simple.

* Perez fell in love with RL (Nothing wrong with that I did we all did)

* DA was invited to be an investor and spun whatever 

* DA discovered that all was not a bed of roses

* Perez left (Maybe signed agreement to say nothing)

* DA keeps it going hoping for uplift sponsorship crowds etc 

* Covid 19 kicks in whole thing falls apart 

HAPPENS 

Lets move on

 

P 

Other than adding that DA, for all his many faults, IS a lifelong rugby league fan, this is spot on. 

[CanadianRugger]

2 hours ago, Oldbear said:

I will be honest and say the Perez spin thing had never entered my head, but you may be on to something here. I’m not sure who endorsed Vickers (I assume it was Noble) but that was obviously a catastrophic move, Noble I guess was endorsed by either Perez or Nigel Wood, either way Argyle was left with not only a failed concept, but administrators who would guarantee failure and perhaps Covid became the convenient get out.

Rumour is that Eric Perez and a few others who are minority owners wouldn't sell to the NY group because they wouldn't assume any debt and wanted to keep their share in the club.

NY group said they didn't mind if they kept their share but they would need to assume a proportion of the debt equal to what percentage of control they wanted to maintain.

Perez and co wouldn't accept that so NY pulled the plug.

[Harry Stottle]

12 hours ago, TheReaper said:

That this was you takeaway from what I posted, shows me you're just more interested in taking petty potshots at a sport you don't like, rather than any actual discussion about why a rugby (or any other) team may or may not work in the context of the city of Toronto and playing in international sports leagues. Maybe you can take your clever remarks to the cross code forum, I'm interested in the factors that influence success as a sports business and how the Toronto Wolfpack fit into that overall landscape.

 

Also,

methods of moving the ball - backwards passing, kicks, running

type of contact allowed

offside concepts 

scoring concepts

basic player positions structure  

 

You know.... just most of the core elements of both sports. 

Firstly yes you are very correct I don't like Rugby Union, but your statement of "will a slight change of code matter that much" is very much akin to those who - and there are many of them - do not even realise that League and Union are two different games, Rugby is Rugby to them.

Now all those other similarities you list you are correct all those things cross over, but what is the major difference is how those are construed and applied, for a very simple anology take a novice home cook and give them a set of ingredients and see what they can produce, give those very same ingredients - no deviation and the same cooking utensils - to a 3* Michelin Chef and the end product will be totally different.

You know...... just the core elements utilised by both cooks.

In 'Rugby' terms I have been dining at upper class restaurants all my life, I have tried the other fare but it just doesn't satisfy, if you can't see much difference eating out at the local truck stop then I suggest your taste buds are completely devoid and bland.

 

[The Rocket]

18 hours ago, Harry Stottle said:

Over here and I dare say in Australia but I could be wrong, I think you will find that more people who have grown up with union can make the transition to watching and supporting League, but very few the other way around. 

I can tell you as a fact, I went to university over here and there was a lot of private school snobs, I was friends with some of them, and I can tell you that a lot of them had a favourite League team. Parra was a favourite especially if you wanted to rough it a bit with the working classes. I can`t remember one of my League mates giving a rats ....... about any union team including the wallabies.

[gingerjon]

9 hours ago, ATLANTISMAN said:

EVERYONE CALM DOWN 

We can have as many different opinions on here as we like however IMHO its all very simple.

* Perez fell in love with RL (Nothing wrong with that I did we all did)

* DA was invited to be an investor and spun whatever 

* DA discovered that all was not a bed of roses

* Perez left (Maybe signed agreement to say nothing)

* DA keeps it going hoping for uplift sponsorship crowds etc 

* Covid 19 kicks in whole thing falls apart 

HAPPENS 

Lets move on

 

P 

Where in that process (either before DA arrives or after) are the multiple times they failed to pay people?

I don't really care about the rest now. We have professional rugby players not being paid what they are owed whilst bootlickers peddle sob stories about billionaires not having easy access to the (to them) button money required to make that right.

[Les Tonks Sidestep]

53 minutes ago, gingerjon said:

Where in that process (either before DA arrives or after) are the multiple times they failed to pay people?

I don't really care about the rest now. We have professional rugby players not being paid what they are owed whilst bootlickers peddle sob stories about billionaires not having easy access to the (to them) button money required to make that right.

Strange that he can't access 'cash' isn't it? As with another supposed saviour of the UK game, it's also odd that despite his alleged wealth he doesn't appear in any (Canadian or Australian) rich list and the adjective 'billionaire' only seems to get applied after he becomes involved with a RL club? There's little bio information out there but he seems to have managed (not owned) a few large mining operarions and been a hedge fund advisor during the course of his career.

[TheLegendOfTexEvans]

7 hours ago, Oldbear said:

I will be honest and say the Perez spin thing had never entered my head, but you may be on to something here. I’m not sure who endorsed Vickers (I assume it was Noble) but that was obviously a catastrophic move, Noble I guess was endorsed by either Perez or Nigel Wood, either way Argyle was left with not only a failed concept, but administrators who would guarantee failure and perhaps Covid became the convenient get out.

Perez is a PR guy is doing what he does.  The trick is to understand the difference between PR and reality.

 

[Robin Evans]

1 hour ago, Les Tonks Sidestep said:

Strange that he can't access 'cash' isn't it? As with another supposed saviour of the UK game, it's also odd that despite his alleged wealth he doesn't appear in any (Canadian or Australian) rich list and the adjective 'billionaire' only seems to get applied after he becomes involved with a RL club? There's little bio information out there but he seems to have managed (not owned) a few large mining operarions and been a hedge fund advisor during the course of his career.

Nahabooesk

[The Rocket]

It is a bit of a tradition of Australian ` billionaires ` who don`t pay their creditors: Nathan Tinkler- mining; Clive Palmer-mining; Alan Bond, Christopher Skase, et.al.

As someone said to me once, "we would all be rich if we didn`t pay our bills or our any tax."

[TheReaper]

3 hours ago, Harry Stottle said:

Firstly yes you are very correct I don't like Rugby Union, but your statement of "will a slight change of code matter that much" is very much akin to those who - and there are many of them - do not even realise that League and Union are two different games, Rugby is Rugby to them.

Now all those other similarities you list you are correct all those things cross over, but what is the major difference is how those are construed and applied, for a very simple anology take a novice home cook and give them a set of ingredients and see what they can produce, give those very same ingredients - no deviation and the same cooking utensils - to a 3* Michelin Chef and the end product will be totally different.

You know...... just the core elements utilised by both cooks.

In 'Rugby' terms I have been dining at upper class restaurants all my life, I have tried the other fare but it just doesn't satisfy, if you can't see much difference eating out at the local truck stop then I suggest your taste buds are completely devoid and bland.

 

 

We could argue "degree of separation" on a non-existent scale from  medieval mob football to NFL-played-by-robots-in-space all day.

 

None of that matters to the success or failure of a sports team in Toronto, for reasons I thoroughly explained.

 

Being convinced that the code of play on the field matters this much is all too common and holds rugby league back.

[fighting irish]

What I want to know is, where the fo ok is Parksider? and Scotchy? When all this is going on? 

[TIWIT]

Just wait till Kayakman finally leaves the bush.

[TIWIT]

So Bodene Thompson's signed with Leeds. Nary a mention of any problems with TWP. In fact he thanked Brian McD for helping set the deal up.

[Robin Evans]

2 minutes ago, TIWIT said:

So Bodene Thompson's signed with Leeds. Nary a mention of any problems with TWP. In fact he thanked Brian McD for helping set the deal up.

Well thats ok then. 

Its a bit like me not getting a payrise and saying "everyone went out to clap for you Robin.... stop whinging"!

[Les Tonks Sidestep]

12 minutes ago, TIWIT said:

So Bodene Thompson's signed with Leeds. Nary a mention of any problems with TWP. In fact he thanked Brian McD for helping set the deal up.

McD is probably in exactly the same (unpaid) boat as the players so why wouldn't he thank him? And if the employees are going through legal means of trying to recover the money owed it's not really that surprising that he didn't say anything against the club. 

[Oxford]

21 hours ago, Harry Stottle said:

Each to there own Oxy.

Each to their own indeed HS!

[TIWIT]

Whatever. I would have thought the media would be all over this, looking for some juicy quotes.

But so far, nothing. Maybe Thompson is taking the high road and saying nothing.

Or maybe there's nothing there.

It is interesting he has no visa problems. Got them all sorted out, apparently. Just too late to do TWP any good.

[Big Picture]

 

4 hours ago, TheReaper said:

We could argue "degree of separation" on a non-existent scale from  medieval mob football to NFL-played-by-robots-in-space all day.

None of that matters to the success or failure of a sports team in Toronto, for reasons I thoroughly explained.

Being convinced that the code of play on the field matters this much is all too common and holds rugby league back.

In addition to the differences which you explained so thoroughly the sport's English fans seem not to understand that the class divisions which prevail in the UK and apparently exist in Australia too are absent over here.

[Tommygilf]

2 minutes ago, Big Picture said:

 

In addition to the differences which you explained so thoroughly the sport's English fans seem not to understand that the class divisions which prevail in the UK and apparently exist in Australia too are absent over here.

Whoah hang on, class is very much a thing in NA. Yes you guys don't have an aristocracy, but you definitely have a form of class. Its less clear than in the UK, indeed there's a good thread on that on the AOB/Politics forum. The big blob of "middle" class that constitutes the population in North America has huge variations within it

[Big Picture]

2 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

Whoah hang on, class is very much a thing in NA. Yes you guys don't have an aristocracy, but you definitely have a form of class. Its less clear than in the UK, indeed there's a good thread on that on the AOB/Politics forum. The big blob of "middle" class that constitutes the population in North America has huge variations within it

Those variations don't matter here though, that's the point.  We virtually never think about class here.

[Dave T]

37 minutes ago, TIWIT said:

Whatever. I would have thought the media would be all over this, looking for some juicy quotes.

But so far, nothing. Maybe Thompson is taking the high road and saying nothing.

Or maybe there's nothing there.

It is interesting he has no visa problems. Got them all sorted out, apparently. Just too late to do TWP any good.

Bob Hunter confirmed that the RFL sorted the visa issues out. 

Are you suggesting that players are not having issues with wages? Despite Hunter saying that he doesn't know where the money will come from to pay players and the many tweets from players saying they have gone three months without wages?

Absolutely delusional. 

[Lowdesert]

3 hours ago, fighting irish said:

What I want to know is, where the fo ok is Parksider? and Scotchy? When all this is going on? 

They are here.

[fighting irish]

Just now, Lowdesert said:

They are here.

where?

 

[TheLegendOfTexEvans]

I wonder if this guy is still available for hire?