Does anyone know who's out of contract next year ? A little bird tells me one of our potentially good young forwards who might make his debut this weekend is been courted by Warrington and already has an offer on the table from West TIgers in the NRL.

viewtopic.php?f=17&t=540697&tsmp=1370388445 Have a look on here, am I right to assume you are talking about Jordan Baldwinson?

viewtopic.php?f=17&t=540697&tsmp=1370388445 Have a look on here, am I right to assume you are talking about Jordan Baldwinson?

Is Jordan any relation to Billy Baldwinson, who was a decent forward for Hunslet at the old parkside ground many years ago.

I have no doubt that Vickery will be shown the door, but that Bailey will nab himself a new deal and continue to ride on the coat-tails of his colleagues.

How does he get away with it?

You really should have informed all the previous coaches and current coach along with GH. Just to make them aware. You have a moral obligation.

Andy Gilder seems to know more than the Leeds Rhinos infrastructure.

I wouldn't worry some posters appeared to be impressed by Vickery in pre-season friendlies and probably now think like Gilder that he'll be shown the door so such opinions should probably be taken with a pinch of salt.

Vickery was impressive in the friendlies. Very impressive in the boxing day game.

Very below average since mind.

2 year contract at Auckland warriors for Baldwinson and his mate mason Tonks a little bird tells me !

If we have lost Tonks as well, then the top management at this club need to be asking serious questions. Really poor management.

Hull did the same when they lost Briscoe, and questions really need asking at Leeds.

The question I'm guessing being 6 grand final wins, 7grand finals, 3 Wcc, 4 cc finals, with a team of home grown stars, who have then slowly but surely been replaced, now blooding more top quality youngsters in Sutcliffe, Ward, foster and minns to join The like is Watkins and hardaker McShane and Clarkson, what on earth do we need to do to earn the trust of our fan base so that every time a decent youngster leaves our judgement isn't 'seriously questioned'?

If true it speaks volumes about how poor the Warriors' junior development is, given that they are consistently amongst the best at junior level and essentially have the pick of junior RL in NZ.

It says absolutely nothing about Leeds' retention strategy if an overseas team is willing and able to play untried juniors signigifcantly more than SL rates for teenagers with virtually no experience, especially when other lads have remained - presumably on similar amounts of money to what Leeds have offered them. It would similarly say nothing at all if another SL club was willing to use a significant chunk of cap money to lure them away.

As far as Baldwinson is concerned, it seems a bit 'Luke Burgess' to me - he got a game, was ahead of Foster etc in the pecking order, and all set to be the next forward brought into the first team after Ward. The timing of the Warriors rumours would suggest that he's basically set to go, so Leeds - rightly IMO - aren't going to waste any more first team time on a lad who's not up to SL standard yet and will not be here next season.

Try and seperate the things then you might understand.

Put the trophy success aside, you have to because the academy is future, not 2004,2007,2008,2009, or even 2011 and 2012. The academy is going forward.

Baldwinson is a blow to lose. To add Tonks is massive. They even sent Tonks over to Australia the other year to aid his development, he was that highly thought of. He might well never have made it, but he was part of there strategy.

If you are losing your future identified stars due to not tying them up, then you need to ask serious questions about how these things happen. Hull did the exact thing after losing Briscoe,

It doesn't matter about previous or current success. If you set out a strategy to promote from within and maintain success, if you lose parts of that strategy you hit a problem going forward.

At end of last season, I posted that Baldwinson, Tonks, Foster, and Minchella should be what our future pack is built with, and should be introduced this year and build development. As far as I am aware the club was also looking that way. To lose half of those players now is surely a blow to them. Therefore any self respecting business would ask questions of themselves and put things in place to ensure it doesn't happen again. Remember the academy is a seperate side to the business from the first team. It's job is to provide a pool of players equipped for 1st team, and usually that is built up over a few years.

So? Explain again why Leeds have done the wrong thing by not meeting much higher amounts being offered by the Warriors? Its quite likely if the numbers being bandied around are right (none of us have a clue TBH, but lets pretend its 70k vs 13k that someone suggested) that GH would be breaking the - very successful - club pay structure to meet them.

The way GH works is clear. Kids get a few games, and if the coaches are impressed enough they get offered long-term contracts (like Minns and Sutcliffe and others before them). No doubt these contracts aren't for very large amounts, because Leeds have quite often upgraded contracts for these players if they kick on.

If you add the fact that the probability of all three players you mentioned even being in SL in three years time is average at best, never mind being stars of the game, then I see no reason at all to criticise GH/Leeds on this. I can give you tha names of literally dozens of kids who looked like potential world beaters at 18 (including in the old open-age A team) whose careers ended up down the pan as they never developed.

Unless you had a crystal ball and were able to predict this kind of 'raid' from the NRL for juniors, nobody would have seen this coming. If they had, I've no doubt Leeds would have signed up any and all kids they thought had a good chance of making it on cheap long-term deals a year ago.

If these lads go to NZ and become stars in the NRL without playing for Leeds it would be a shame, but to suggest that we should take part in a money arms race with NRL sides (whose cap is massively higher than in SL) is just plain dumb.

It's that simple is it? it's all down to money?

I don't think it is, but more importantly the point made is that it shouldn't be. If these lads were under contract, and this fantasy situation you talk about of loads of money offered elsewhere, and Leeds agreed to release then fair enough. The issue here is that they are not under contract, and why not is the point. They were identified and developed for future top careers, so how did we find ourselves in a position where they were out of contract and a club playing in a higher level of competition to us, take them?

Like I said, Hull were caught out the same way, and ensured they asked serious questions of themselves going forward as to how it happened and make sure it didn't again. Considering Leeds were the club that took advantage of that situation, you would have expected that they themselves would not be caught out in a similar way, wouldn't you?

You actually answer this all in one of the paragraphs I didn't quote. But what I am saying is effectively what you say the only way around it is.

Like I said earlier, these players take a number of years to develop, not just the one, and a lot of effort has been put into these two particularly. Losing one is hard, losing two is bad.

BR-The players mentioned were "flagged up as future stars" long before the Warriors or anyone else for that matter took any interest so why not offer a deal then that improves with appearances etc etc as they have done in the past with juniors??
Whatever some may think on here EVERY Coach at the Acadamy have been shouting about these lads for ages and even Brian Mc himself has attended the u19 games and said he was very impressed with them etc as has GH.
the pioint about how much $$$/£££ they are offered becomes irrellevant if we'd have signed them up earlier rather than waiting before it's too late and before they had other offers.
These kind of deals make the Kirke retention etc even more shocking and i'd go as far as saying Kylie getting another 1yr deal shouldn't have happened either if it transpires that we have lost both of these lads.

Just to add the fact that our pack is as old as it is makes this even more of a bad call/mistake imo.

It is, and what posters like Smokey and others like him do not seem to grasp, is that the team that has won these trophies has changed a number of times over that period, but it has a core of players that have been vital over that period. By the start of 2016, just over two seasons, those players won't be here, or shouldn't probably anyway.

If you look at your squad as it stands now you will be taking out of it, Sinfield, Burrow, McGuire, Peacock, Kylie, JJB, Kirke, Moore, Bailey. And as the game is currently moving, we may probably lose a couple of others to the NRL.

By losing two of your most highly regarded juniors, you are are limiting what else you have to step up, and may have to wait longer for the next lot. What that means is you are looking at probably recruiting externally for at least two or three players over the next couple of years, which to get the right standard could be very expensive.

Has Baldwinson actually signed for the Warriors?

We don't know, it's top secret.

But of course just to cover, the word "if" has been used many times above.

It's not often but sometimes, only sometimes mind you, I agree with you.

Leeds have seen a lot of potential in these two kids and have had them on a SL career track for some time. The club have invested more money and time than they normally would have an a lot of rumblings have been made regarding Baldwinson and Tonks. These two were being groomed, not as potential SL players but as nailed-on success stories, much like they have done with Ward.

I've heard from two different people at the club how exited they were about Baldwinson and Tonks in the same way they were when McGuire and Sinfield were breaking through.

It doesn't usually bother me if a couple of the academy lads get picked off by other SL clubs, but with these two it's different. Leeds don't want them to go anywhere but put yourself in their shoes, they're both young, no commitments, chance live in NZ, potential to play in the best league in the world and earn a heap more cash. The question should be "why wouldn't they want to go?" and TBH there's not much, realistically, that the club can do to stop it. Wigan did their hardest not to lose Tomkins but look how that's worked out?

Shame if it happens.

FB-If it was that straight forward mate i'd agree 100% but the fact remains the Club had a chance to sign these lads up before anyone came calling and for some reason stalled either because they thought it was gonna be easy to retain them or completely took their eye off the ball and dropped it!

Why would we put the trophy success to one-side? What do you think, besides winning trophies, we are to achieve? We can only ever judge the success of the academy in retrospect, judging it on things that havent happened yet seems mental.

Neither may make it. Their loss may be no loss at all, they may well be highly thought of but the amateur and lower league game is littered with highly thought of youngsters who were never good enough to make it


If not on current or past success what on earth can we possibly judge our success by? Guessing?

To bring through 4 players good enough for Leeds, good enough to carry on the success we are seeing now, in the pack, in one cohort, would be an unbelievable achievement. It would have been brilliant, to over the course of 2 cohorts have brought through 6 players with Ward and Singleton and possibly 7 with Sutcliffe, playing in a pack together, and winning trophies as we are now would be evidence not of a succeeding academy/youth development system, but of one redefining excellence. If in two or three years time we are seeing Ward, Singleton, Foster, Minchella and Sutcliffe all fulfilling their potential in the first team we are succeeding, we don’t need to be asking serious questions at all. Our success in blooding youth players isn’t defined by two players who have done nothing in the game so far, and may not do anything in the future.

Smokey, read what has been said and inparticular the single point by rhinoms at top of this page.

That is the what is been discussed here, and why "if" what has been said has happened, serious questions need to be asked by top level at the club.

Previous trophy success is irrrelevant as previous is not the future we are talking about and how to maintain it.

Did Hull really lose out so badly? I know they thought so at the time but it's less clear-cut now. Would they have been better served by contracting Briscoe? And if they had, say, another half dozen youngsters showing similar promise should they have contracted them all too? With finances the way they are there has to be a cut-off at some point.

Again, that is not the issue. Hindsight is a wonderfull thing. Hull had developed the lad, they put a lot into him, and identified him as a future star. In losing him the way they did, they asked questions of themselves, did a full inquiry, and guaranteed it would not happen again. He may well be a star now had he stayed at Hull, then again he might just be reserve like now. But Hull still lost a player they did not expect due to their own controls.

It may well be that both Baldwinson and Tonks also don't make it, and wouldn't do at Leeds. But the fact is that they have had a lot of time and effort put into them, the club have worked with them thinking highly of them and pushing them, and had planned for them to be the future. With all that, "if" they have now lost them, serious questions need to be asked about the controls in place at Leeds, just like Hull did. That is the point raised, not about previous success, not about guaranteed stars, not about what previous promotions from the academy did.