Taumalolo was similarly ‘game changing’ and ‘elite’ when the cowboys offered him enormous money and the return on investment there has been poor at best.
No matter how good Haas is, he’s a front rower and anything over $1m/year starts to seriously affect our ability to build a strong, balanced squad.
I think it's the length of that contract that is causing issues.
Payne's manager has indicated that he's not all that happy with his current contract, primarily because it was 6yr and he was young... so he feels he probably got underpaid early on.
If we try to go with a 4-5yr deal again, then he'll probably want a huge contract to compensate or mitigate against the length of the deal... or he'll want player options so he can move or test his value again in the future.
You could almost go with a 3yr $1.2m deal and it may not hurt you too much... that would be a 2yr extension and upgrade on next year, and take him out to end of 2026.
If he lives up to that $1.2m then happy days and you work on the next contract, if he drops a little or other players start to surpass him as the best prop in the game, then you know he's overvalued himself and there's room to move or negotiate at the next contract... Fifita took a pay cut on his $1.2m contract, but still stayed with the tits.
All that depends on where other contracts sit though. If you've got value for money contracts sitting around that need upgrading then a high value contract can impact your ability to retain them... on the other hand Reyno and Capewell are on decent contracts and nearing the end so we know there's money to spend there.
We have high value re-signings in Walsh and Mam, that are possibly just as important or arguably more in the case of Walsh, that we need to ensure can be done.