VOTE What hurt worse; 2015 GF or the spoon?

[Renegade]

The grand final loss for sure. Maybe if that didn't happen this spoon would hurt more but without trying to sound too dramatic that loss and the way we lost it took something from me. I went to a really dark place after that and eventually realised that I cannot let sport affect me that much and cannot be that invested. I am still an avid Broncos supporter which I am sure is obvious but I cannot ever be like that again.

I know what you mean, I didn't perhaps get as down as you did (although I was certainly unhappy and it was a shitty 40min walk back from The Australian in NYC to my hotel), but I think that gf kinda broke that child like tribalism of mine with sport. It sucked, but it was also like, see that wasn't so bad was it? Life goes on and there's more important things in life. To borrow a Darryism, it is just a game to us fans. It doesn't need to be more than that, we all emotionally invest cause we love it, but we can choose how much we do invest and I think this game was the circuit breaker for me. I guess that's why the spoon doesn't bother me so much.

 

[Culhwch]

Hodges retiring a winner would have been huge as well.

Yeah, this for sure. I was absolutely devastated for him, particularly the way it happened. To give it away at the last minute was far worse then if we'd just been flogged outright.

Add that the fact that every time we play the Cowboys they play that same fucking clip and seemingly will until the end of time, that's going to hurt a lot longer than this write-off of a season.

 

[Cult]

The GF loss. The spoon was expected

 

[Jedhead]

The 2015 season we played some great footy and therefore most weekends were enjoyable. The last game, last minute, last pass did spoil it, but I still have the memories of the Broncos playing like the Broncos. The Milf and Hunt show was great to watch, as was our rock solid defence. Some of the tries Oates scored defied science/physics/gravity.

2020 was a slow motion train wreck of a thousand cuts. Players never put in, some plays were dumber than dumb, we lost some potential superstars and got flogged some record scores and broke so many records for playing badly. Nearly every weekend was ruined by watching a weapons grade fraud slowly dismantle the culture of a once great club in his quest for Harvard footy. Highlights were very few and far between and to be the laughing stock of NswRL was a bitter pill to swallow.

The spoon was always threatening from around 10 weeks out, so it was not a great shock when it happened.

I'd much rather we had a 2015 year every year and got pipped at the post then be doomed to watching us play like the 2020 shitshow for the rest of my days. So I'd say the sppon (sic) was worse in terms of the whole season.

 

[Midean]

You guys are mad, getting to a GF is awesome.
Losing it sucked sure, but we were good enough to get there.

This year is easily my worst year watching/following league.
Being as shit as we have been these past 2 seasons is so much worse that losing a GF.
The spoon is a blight on this club, and will go down in history as the worst season on record for the Broncos.

 

[Painin the Haas]

2015 was a perfect year, from jersey designs to excitement of Wayne and Kev returning and the style we played. Our attack was excellent, I can watch those first 3 tries against the Roosters in the final over and over, but we all enjoyed our try line defence (especially in that game against the Storm).

If we had won in 2025 this all would have been different, players like milf probably would have kicked on, Wayne would have sealed a new contract that probably would have taken him to 2020 and we wouldn’t be discussing a spoon

Losing in 2015 still ranks No.1 for me with 2008 coming a very close 2nd.

5 years ago we could say with pride that our club:

• never lost a grand final

• never won a wooden spoon

 

[Rico]

Still haunted by the GF. I too drove down and didn't speak a word to my mate for 11 hours the next day on the trip home.
What I'm more interested in is the reaction to these dogshit events and only time will tell on the spoon. We followed up the GF in 16 with being eliminated by the same mob based on discipline then wacked in 17 in an away from home capitulation to the Storm and have never got on top of these issues.
Even if our discipline, attitude (including defence) really picks up next year and our rubbish home losses to Titans and away losses to clubs like tigers go then its the spoon that hurts much less...lets bloody hope so fellas.

 

[Browny]

This year I can kinda laugh about it, in a morbid way.
I can’t even look at 2015 highlights.

 

[jarro65]

2015 GF loss for sure !!

To have the win in the bag, only to lose it in the last few seconds was absolutely devastating.

As far as the spoon goes, it was hardly a surprise we won that......Ray Charles could see it coming.

 

[theshed]

This year I can kinda laugh about it, in a morbid way.
I can’t even look at 2015 highlights.

By this metric maybe I should change my vote.

 

[Major JW Hochstetter]

Both were downers in different ways, but interestingly I've gotten over both of them surprisingly quickly.

Having the pleasure of watching our boys in the 90's - some of the greatest 17's to ever play the game - play such incredible footy and win all there was to win, I often feared how bad losing a Grand Final or taking out the spoon would be, even though at the time both seemed a hell of long way off.

Turns out, for me anyway, both weren't all THAT bad.

Swings and roundabouts. Highs and lows.

We'll be back at the top again soon enough, enjoying our brand of footy and actually appreciating the journey to get there. In hindsight, some of us who got to experience all the glory of the 90's without any exposure to failure may have taken our success a little bit for granted at the time. And who could blame us, really!

 

[Huge]

I've never seen that GF but was listening on radio on the extreme fringe of reception. I was driving a train and entering the dark zone deep inland in remote WA and I was gutted AND enraged. I was alone, venting my wrath on a steel bulkhead. By comparison the spoon was neither here nor there. Anywhere not finals is the same so, gf for me.

 

[Santa]

The 2015 grand final hands down for me. It was the first nrl grand final I had ever been to as well...

 

[FaceOfMutiny]

GF was worse. The spoon I mind less than year after year making the 8 and then getting demolished in the finals and then everyone patting themselves on the back about how good we are for scraping into the finals.

 

[Dexter]

2015 no doubt.
My first trip to a Broncos GF.
Started out well when I met some fellow BHQers B4l , porthos, and a few others.
Big pete was their somwhere but didnt show.
The game was fantastic but I will never forget the realization that we were trying to defend our lead from so far out.
I turned to my mate and said if we keep doing this we will open ourselves up to some bullshit hail mary lucky play and get rolled.
Nek minute.
It was all in slow mo that last play. Watching Oates hold his ground then coming in when Morgan had 3 defenders on him and nowhere to go, game over if he holds position.
Still not over it.

 

[WASSHHH]

Started out well when I met some fellow BHQers B4l , porthos, and a few others.

That sounds more like a case of your night could only get better.
(one for each of you)

Who am I to talk; those who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.

 

[IceWorks]

The 15 GF was an epic night, I remember watching at the back of a crowd (no social distancing then) of people on someone's huge outside TV projector screen at a campsite we were staying at. Fun game and an exciting finish, ok not to get the biscuits if you are denied by fate and an inspired JT, however this year and the last.. with the boring play and incoherent club coaching and leadership where the team clearly was getting worse has been tough to support.

I genuinely feel like the 2015 team cared about the results and so did I, this year I just don't know how much some of the team cared at all.

 

[Mustafur]

Obviously the grand final loss, this season has been bad but I was well and truly numbed to the crappiness well before we where confirmed to the spoon, the 2015 GF just fills your head with What ifs, it's much worse.