NEWS Walters: the art of the deal

The Broncos are showing faith in Kevvie Walters by allowing him to prematurely renegotiate his September 2020 contract, currently worth around $400K. He will immediately switch to a week to week "standard employment contract" based solely on performance, with handsome incentives for on-field success. He will earn major bonuses if he meets Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), such as making the playoffs. The deal includes the go-ahead to shop for fresh talent in his football department. The terms will include a period of notice, thought to be three months.

This means he can now theoretically be sacked before his previous contract would've expired at the end of the 2022 season. But it also means neither party needs to sweat over whether to renew his contract. It's good to go until it isn't.

Donuts and Ikin are also on standard contracts with no fixed terms, and intend to phase out the expensive player options that crushed the club in previous years.

Kevvie says:


“I’m not expecting any favours from anyone here. I have to perform. Every club has to get results and we’re no different. I’ve said for a while I want to be here long term and I intend to do that. But I’m not a fool either. I’m not kidding myself. It’s about getting results and I need to get results to stay in the role which is pretty clear."

“I want to be here for longer. We’ve had some player movement which hasn’t provided stability and what the Broncos need is stability across the playing group and the coaching staff. I never saw myself as a short-term appointment. I want to be here for a while, but to do that everybody at the Broncos has to perform and I’m no different.”

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A firm grip on the Gold

Walters’ agent Chris Orr:


“The Broncos want Kevvie to be their long-term successful coach. The Broncos are looking to throw all their support around Kevvie by increasing resources, whilst taking away any contractual questions by entering an employment agreement. This means Kevvie will be rewarded on results whilst also increasing stability across the club.”

Donuts:

“We’re in discussions with Kevin, so I’d prefer not to comment for now. Look, Kev’s our coach. He’s our guy and he’s determined to succeed. There’s been quite a bit of change here in recent times, but we feel that with a number of things falling into place, the opportunity exists to build on where we currently are."

“We’ve prioritised investment in our football program and supporting our coach, staff and players. The growth I’ve seen in Kev as a coach and in the program led by Ben Ikin has been tremendous. The pre-season starts Monday and we believe the group led by Kev will continue to grow on the gains we saw at the back end of last season. It’s for them to do, but I’ve got the confidence and belief in them that they will. There’s real value in stability and continuity. I’ve been really impressed with Kevvie in the last three to four months. He’s certainly grown.”

Former future of the Broncos Tommy Dearden:

“I had been at the Broncos since I was 13 years old and I took things from a lot of people that helped me on my journey. Kevvie was pretty strict in the pre-season last year about playmakers playing their own game and being their own player on the field. That’s one thing I learnt from ‘Kevvie’: to be my own player out there."

“Your confidence always takes a knock when you lose so many games in a row. You go out and play to win, but I was struggling to get a win for a very long time. It’s been a tough start to my career, but I took some confidence moving to the Cowboys and getting that win against the Dragons. "

"One thing I have taken from Kevvie is having that belief in my game. He wished me all the best when I left. It’s a part of football sometimes that players move clubs and that happened to me. I learnt a fair bit from Kevvie in the short amount of time I was working with him, so I’m grateful for the time I had with him.”


McHunt
 

Badel I know but not a good look before season starts and lousy trial performance.
 
The "shock" request, is Walters wants a contract until the end of 2023, then he's happy to go on a month to month contract from 2024.

Right now he's on a month to month deal.
 
The "shock" request, is Walters wants a contract until the end of 2023, then he's happy to go on a month to month contract from 2024.

Right now he's on a month to month deal.

He's contracted until the end of this year.

He's asking for a 1 year extension before going on that standard employment contract previously talked about.

The argument they're making is don't judge him on last year's results because of the shit heap he inherited from Seibold.

I certainly don't think he is making unreasonable demands
 

Badel I know but not a good look before season starts and lousy trial performance.


Like the rest of us, he has a right to negotiate his future.
 
He's contracted until the end of this year.

He's asking for a 1 year extension before going on that standard employment contract previously talked about.

The argument they're making is don't judge him on last year's results because of the shit heap he inherited from Seibold.

I certainly don't think he is making unreasonable demands
He should probably show the wares before asking for an upgrade though. 4-6 weeks into season you would think.
 
He's contracted until the end of this year.

He's asking for a 1 year extension before going on that standard employment contract previously talked about.

The argument they're making is don't judge him on last year's results because of the shit heap he inherited from Seibold.

I certainly don't think he is making unreasonable demands
Reasonable demand but what negotiating power does he hold?

No other club will take him, he wouldn’t want to coach anywhere else even if they did, and he has yet to really shown or had the chance to show any real ability.

The club holds all the power and I wouldn’t even consider an upgrade until about round 10.
 
What's the point? Contracts these days aren't worth the paper they're written on anyway.

I guess the only good thing is that if they did decide to sack him, there'd be more of a payout for him.
 
Should we be worried he’s trying to get this done before the team plays a game? Is he worried about how they are going to go?
 
Should we be worried he’s trying to get this done before the team plays a game? Is he worried about how they are going to go?
I'd say he wants some stability for him and the team. it would be stupid to get rid of him into his second season, the talk of picking and sticking needs to almost across the board. unless there is player unrest then Kevvie deserves a couple of seasons , and if he is struggling then bring in better assistants because unless you're getting Bellamy or the like moving from coach to coach is debilitating for the front office.
 
Reasonable demand but what negotiating power does he hold?

No other club will take him, he wouldn’t want to coach anywhere else even if they did, and he has yet to really shown or had the chance to show any real ability.

The club holds all the power and I wouldn’t even consider an upgrade until about round 10.
who would we replace him with ?
 
who would we replace him with ?
He’s probably the best option right now but you’d call his bluff on this one.

You’d be keeping a close eye on guys like Cam Ciraldo, Kristian Woolf, Billy Slater, JD, Matt Ballin.

The list gets a bit rough midway through but I don’t think Kev has shown enough to be a big loss if he walks away because we don’t extend him.
 
He’s probably the best option right now but you’d call his bluff on this one.

You’d be keeping a close eye on guys like Cam Ciraldo, Kristian Woolf, Billy Slater, JD, Matt Ballin.

The list gets a bit rough midway through but I don’t think Kev has shown enough to be a big loss if he walks away because we don’t extend him.

I think this is the reality unfortunately. And this isn’t saying Kevvie won’t deserve an extension, just right now his results don’t demand one.

He has done a great job of uniting the group and cleaning out the dead wood and this is nothing minor.

He also had the side pointing in the right direction in the back end of last season so that’s promising. 6-10 rounds is enough to know whether that good work has continued or not and if the side is sitting even at say 3-3 after 6 rounds, then it is certainly worth revisiting.
 
He’s probably the best option right now but you’d call his bluff on this one.

You’d be keeping a close eye on guys like Cam Ciraldo, Kristian Woolf, Billy Slater, JD, Matt Ballin.

The list gets a bit rough midway through but I don’t think Kev has shown enough to be a big loss if he walks away because we don’t extend him.
I think this is the reality unfortunately. And this isn’t saying Kevvie won’t deserve an extension, just right now his results don’t demand one.

He has done a great job of uniting the group and cleaning out the dead wood and this is nothing minor.

He also had the side pointing in the right direction in the back end of last season so that’s promising. 6-10 rounds is enough to know whether that good work has continued or not and if the side is sitting even at say 3-3 after 6 rounds, then it is certainly worth revisiting.
Unfortunately, the stakes are higher than just Kevvie, the coach. Kevvie, along with his trusty ward Alan Langer, are the embodiment of the the Golden Age of Brisbane. Take that away, or worse prove it a failure, and you're bursting a much bigger bubble.

We need Kevvie to succeed, at least at some level. Right now, we're getting the impression the club is a happier place and the players like each other. That's a pretty good start. But we still need them to win.

I would be giving Kevvie at least another year, with the excuse the club has been hamstrung by subsidizing players at other clubs. And if the feeling is he's not up to head coach standard, there better be a top notch assistant coach doing the actual coaching. There isn't one right now.

Jordan Riki is saying the right things, following his stink with Flegler:

“What happened was one of those things. I was incredibly embarrassed by my actions and I know Tom was, too, but we have to move on and keep working hard together at the club. Me and Tommy ... we are very close mates. He was one of the first people I met when I moved over here from New Zealand at a young age."​
“It was very kind of him to take me into his house and we formed that brotherly bond. He is a year or two older than me, so I’m like his younger brother and sometimes I can do things that get on his toes and he will do some things that get on mine.”​
“At the end of the day, we are like brothers and we are good teammates,” Riki said. “I’m sure people out there have brothers or sisters and you can get frustrated with each other sometimes. It’s like that here, we are with each other almost 24-7 and at times people get on each other’s nerves. But the next day, you can have a laugh and a joke about it. That’s all it was with me and Tom. We are a tight-knit family here.”​
“We all want to rip in and make the finals this year. We need to be brutally honest with each other to play finals. There were moments where a few people were afraid to speak up last year, but now we have the right players here, like Adam Reynolds and Kurt Capewell, to do that. We need to hold ourselves accountable personally."​
“The last couple of years here have been pretty sour for us, but if we can nail our defence, I can’t see why we can’t make the top eight this year.”​
 
He’s probably the best option right now but you’d call his bluff on this one.

You’d be keeping a close eye on guys like Cam Ciraldo, Kristian Woolf, Billy Slater, JD, Matt Ballin.

The list gets a bit rough midway through but I don’t think Kev has shown enough to be a big loss if he walks away because we don’t extend him.
i think if the players are happy with him we keep as the mal type figure head and put quality assistants around him , then if you get quality coach from your assistants you can move them in.
chopping and changing head coaches dosen't work you need security in the direction you want to achieve, ballin we have but woolf isn't a bad option. but every option you listed hasn't been an NRL head coach, 2 haven't even coached so why would we completely reinvent the wheel.
 
He's contracted until the end of this year.

He's asking for a 1 year extension before going on that standard employment contract previously talked about.

The argument they're making is don't judge him on last year's results because of the shit heap he inherited from Seibold.

I certainly don't think he is making unreasonable demands
I feel it is unreasonable at this point in time. Put simply, he needs to prove that his nrl coaching ability demands a better deal.

Clearly he has been put on an incentivised contract because there are some doubts he has that ability. I would think he would have to meet certain kpi,s that he agreed to at the time it was offered.

Gives me no confidence it appears he now wants to opt out before a ball is kicked in anger. 2022 is the last chance saloon for Kevin the way it stands unless he can extract another year.

I honestly hope he’s the coach for us - but sorry I have my doubts.
 
i think if the players are happy with him we keep as the mal type figure head and put quality assistants around him , then if you get quality coach from your assistants you can move them in.
chopping and changing head coaches dosen't work you need security in the direction you want to achieve, ballin we have but woolf isn't a bad option. but every option you listed hasn't been an NRL head coach, 2 haven't even coached so why would we completely reinvent the wheel.
Yeah ideally you sack Matterson or Cartwright and pay Ciraldo as much as a head coach to be an “assistant” coach while paying Kev minimum wage to continue to be the guy who yells about pride in the club at half time.

Ciraldo has shown to be a top shelf defensive coach and players respect him so much that he is an actual draw card.
 

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