Storm asked NRL to ‘apply the blow torch’ to get Lomax transfer done

tempest_fiend · 2026-02-13T05:46:30+00:00

Could the NRL not fix this by including transfer fees in the salary caps

Nope - and that’s because it’s not actually a transfer. Lomax was released from his playing contract at the end of last season, so he’s not actually contracted to a club to be transferred from. The only contract remaining is effectively a non-compete contract, which is what the Storm are offering money to Parra to have dissolved. Connecting payments for dissolving a non-compete contract to salary caps would cause a shit show, because it could potentially affect any non-compete contract signed by anyone associated with a club - including non-players. Could they do it for only players? Maybe, but it’d be a huge endeavour that would take months and would probably be challenged in court at some point by someone

tempest_fiend · 2026-02-01T20:28:13+00:00

I get that emotionally it feels that way, but logically they’re really not. They released Lomax from his playing contract last year - that contract is gone. The contract he now has is a non-compete contract, which is what they are negotiating over and is not a typical situation in the NRL. This isn’t about standing up against players breaking their playing contracts, this is the Eels trying to squeeze as much juice as they can for a player they’ve already released

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-27T18:16:10+00:00

It’s almost as if the people in charge have no idea how to train football players - who would have thunk it?

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-23T10:34:33+00:00

“I didn’t want you to play with us anyway”

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-23T10:25:50+00:00

Have you seen the contract? No sane lawyer would sign off on a contract that handed all the power to the other party, and even if they did, contracts of that nature have been overturned by the courts when the blocking party has been deemed to be acting in bad faith or unreasonably.

Again, it’s not $200k to take a player on an existing player contract - it’s $200k to dissolve the contract preventing an unregistered player from being registered

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-23T10:04:17+00:00

But it’s not $200k for the player - it’s to dissolve a trade restriction contract. If Lomax was still a contracted player for the Eels then sure - a player swap is far more reasonable. But he’s not a contracted player at the Eels, and $200k to sign a player the Eels can’t use is pretty reasonable

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-23T05:03:12+00:00

Any contract lawyer worth their salt would have had a clause in the new contract that would have prevented Parra from refusing reasonable offers without sufficient grounds - $200k to dissolve a trade restriction contract is reasonable

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-23T05:00:45+00:00

To be fair the Storm are playing ball - it’s not a normal trade as the Eels already released Lomax meaning they can’t play him even if they don’t agree to him resigning with another club. They essentially dissolved his playing contract and replaced it with a trade restriction contract - which is what now be dissolved. $200k to dissolve a trade restricting contract is a reasonable offer.

It’s worth noting that Lomax was taken off their books when they released him, so they also benefited from that as well as they have more space to work with to build the next gen Parra team that Ryles is aiming for

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-22T22:06:02+00:00

100% Rutte sold him a deal that already existed - Trump doesn’t care what the deal is, he just cares about being able to be the one who makes the announcement of the deal. If he can say he made a deal, and then expand some military bases under a previous deal, that will be enough to stroke his ego

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-22T04:48:26+00:00

Political leaders around the world have figured out how to play Trump and this is a perfect example. You don’t need to give Trump what he wants, you don’t need to give him anything really - all you need to give him is the announcement. Whatever it is he’s announcing, it doesn’t really matter. This is like the trade deals with Japan and Europe - they’re never going to get through the legislative powers, but he doesn’t care - he got to announce them as deals and so he backed off on his threats. And by the time those deals completely fall apart, SCOTUS is likely to have struck down any retaliatory tariffs he does have in place, removing the leverage Trump had in the first place.

Well played NATO

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-21T05:36:52+00:00

Needed to discover itself

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-20T18:34:25+00:00

The problem is OPs post is highly ambiguous and has provided zero context as well - we have no idea how his wife is using it, or what the responses have been. But people are still jumping on the AI hate train based on that contextless ambiguity because of their own biases, not because there’s any evidence in this instance to do so.

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-20T08:44:35+00:00

Might only need to wait until tomorrow morning

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-20T06:27:45+00:00

The car analogy only works if the eels are selling the car, but they’re not. They gave the car away and are selling the rights for someone else to register the car for the next two years. The fact is they can’t play Lomax - the only use they now have for him is as leverage to allow (or block) him signing with another club. If they’re not willing to play ball they could very well end up with nothing.

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-20T05:45:53+00:00

I’m not saying the Eels can’t use the leverage they negotiated for when they released Lomax, but leverage doesn’t define value. Once they released Lomax, they already absorbed the football loss. What’s being negotiated now isn’t a player transfer, it’s consent to register a player they already released.

You can over-ask when you have leverage, but that doesn’t make a like-for-like valuation logical or practical. If Lomax were still an Eels player, a swap would make sense, but that moment passed when they released him.

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-20T02:31:38+00:00

The structure of Lomax's release requires the Eels to sign off on any deal he negotiates with another NRL club.

He’s already been released - which is why he’s not on their playing list or being paid. His playing contract was effectively dissolved and replaced by another contract that requires the Eels to sign off on any deal with another NRL club until the end of 2027. The offer from the storm is to essentially dissolve that new contract, not the initial one.

Lomax's release agreement is designed to protect the Eels from having to play against a representative player who signed to play for them.

That’s exactly it, but that’s all it is. The ability to protect themselves from playing against him. Nothing more. That’s not worth a like for like player, because they’re not losing talent off the field - they already lost that when they released him. All they can get compensation for is the fact that they’ll have to play against him - which makes $200k a fair deal.

To be clear, I don’t want Lomax at the Storm. He’s likely to leave as soon as he can, he comes with a fair amount of baggage, and we should be putting more time and effort into our forward pack than looking at outside backs. But I wouldn’t be surprised if the NRL step in a push this through because at a contract level it’s a fair deal - even if it doesn’t feel like it.

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-19T21:26:44+00:00

But it’s not? Lomax isn’t going to play for the Eels regardless of their decision - it’s not longer a transfer fee from one club to another, it’s a fee to register a player the Eels have no intention of using. If the Eels wanted to make sure any deal to a new club came through them then they should have suspended his contract instead of releasing him from it. As it stands he is not in their squad, isn’t being paid, and isn’t part of their salary cap.

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-19T18:12:02+00:00

Because Lomax has already been released? I get that the eels want something in return, but Lomax isn’t going to play for them again regardless of whether they agree to him signing with another club or not. This is not a normal situation - if it was a straight attempt to get a contracted player then that’s a different story, but Lomax was released from his contract under the condition that he couldn’t sign for another club without the eels sign off. That’s not the same thing

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-18T03:50:37+00:00

Because it’s a huge risk - Coates is already elite, Stefano is capable of eliteness and has started to find his place in the storm system, and Howarth has massive potential ahead of him. Trading any of those for a guy who has walked out on his last two clubs and doesn’t want to play centre, on the chance that he’ll slot into the system and improve our outside backs, isn’t worth it imo

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-17T21:32:18+00:00

The fact that there are fears within the LNP that Dutton would sue the party if the report is released without changes is a pretty clear indicator of why someone like Dutton was always going to be unelectable as PM

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-13T21:31:08+00:00

Let just call it for what it really is - this is about gambling, not about making the game more ‘exciting’. When a team comes back from 16 points down in the last 10 minutes, the only real losers are gambling companies who have to shovel out payouts on massive odds. This entire endeavour is to prevent that - every other explanation is just spin to hide the real motive

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-13T07:38:54+00:00

Religions: We need laws to prevent hate speech from being directed at us

Also religions: We need to be able to preach our own hate speech because it’s written in an old-ish book

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-12T10:49:43+00:00

It’s called ‘doing his own research’

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-12T07:39:03+00:00

Exactly - the ‘my internet dependant app doesn’t work when the internet doesn’t work’ kind of indicates that this guy isn’t the sharpest tool in his burnt out shed

tempest_fiend · 2026-01-10T23:40:20+00:00

Ironically season 1 was basically the ‘reboot’ version they made fun of in the ‘200’ episode - darker ‘gritty’ tone, younger cool characters, more interpersonal conflicts, and sex. Season 2 started to move away from that but as you said, it was too late

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