5 things

1. Get well Scott Hill!

2. An article in the Herald Sun today pointed to the Melbourne Victory (baaad name) A-League (good name!) team playing their home games at Olympic Park. This is good news. If the Super 14 thing happens as well, then Bracks and co. will have to do something to either fix up Olympic Park or build something nice and new for us, the wogs and the toffees to play at.

3. The new away jerseys look like t-shirts from the 80s. Very strange. I kind of think they're OK, but the team will look a bit wussy playing in them.

4. FOR A COUPLE OF WEEKS THE MELBOURNE STORM WEBSITE WROTE EVERYTHING IN CAPS. MAYBE THEY THOUGHT BY YELLING EVERYTHING MORE PEOPLE WOULD HEAR THEM. They've stopped that, thankfully... But now seem to break everything...

...up like this. I'm not sure...,

...what's worse.

5. I don't know how sponsorship arangements work with big sporting clubs, but I'm really grateful that we are called 'The Melbourne Storm' and not 'The Adecco Melbourne Storm'. Travelling to Canberra this year and hearing the ground annnouncer go on about the 'Fone Zone Canberra Raiders' made me want to puke. And never get a mobile from Fone Zone.

Bits of bodies that will influence 2005


Featuring...
Brian Waldron's brain and its ability to get us more bums on seats, better facilities and a higher media profile.
Billy Slater's post-op groin giving him his line-breaking ability back.
Matt Geyer's knees holding up under the pressure of another season.
Matt Orford's heart being big enough to keep him in Melbourne.


Nicknames

Having a look through Storm Front (Melbourne Storm's Official Magazine) the other day has prompted me to try and rectify a pretty big deficiency in the team - an abundance of crappy nicknames!

Steven Bell’s nickname is ‘Belly’. Yawn. Alex Chan’s nickname is ‘Chany’. Yawn. Robbie Kearns’ nickname is ‘Kearnsy’. Yawn. Can we see a pattern emerging!? Apart from Sione Finefeuiaki’s (which is the totally awesome ‘C-Dog’), almost everyone has got a moniker that needs changing real soon. A nickname should be a pointer towards the personality of a player, not just an excuse to add an ‘O’ or ‘Y’ to the end of their surname.

Now, the Stomers seem like a pretty bright bunch, so I’ll let them sort out the issue themselves and look forward to reading a whole bunch of new nicknames in the next issue of Storm Front. In the meantime here’s a few suggestions to get the ball rolling…

Matt King’s nickname is of course ‘Kingy’. I think it should be something like ‘Whopper’. To get Whopper I went from ‘King’ to ‘Burger King’ and then their most popular burger popped into my head. Matt’s a big dude and he’s also a pretty humble and straightforward guy, so I think being named after a big, honest hamburger suits him well. Also, yelling out ‘Go Whopppaahhhh!’ is going to be fun.

Ryan Hoffman’s nickname is of course 'Hoffy' (it would’ve been hard choosing between it and ‘Hoffo’!). I’m going to go with ‘Hoof’ for his new one because I like to think of him as a charging bull or galloping horse or some sort of animal with hooves that runs fast. Anyway, hopefully by him becoming 'Hoof' or 'The Hoof Man' even, he'll grow into the role of a big, bad metres-getter.

See? It’s not so hard...

Old School

The whole 'relocation' thing was a pain this year. To counter the doubters I've come up with a cunning plan; let's just pretend that the Storm aren't a new team at all and that we've been around for ages and ages, just like Souths. Then if anyone wants to move the club we can say 'We've been in Melbourne since League was invented. It would be ludicrous to move us! Back off!'

So, yeah, here's a Storm jumper that may have been worn in the 1960s by club legends such as Patrick 'Green-Eye' McGraw or Bradley 'The Professor' Anderson-Smart. That was a great era for the Storm, wasn't it? Brings a tear to my eye just thinking about the good ols days, etc, etc. Wink-wink.

Who Knows.

A pleasing thing happened in season 2004 and it happened in 2003 as well. I hope this is a pattern because we’re losing some quality players this year. I call it the ‘who?’ effect (I call it this because I am very bad with coming up with good names for things). What tends to occur is that we lose a really great player, but they seem to be replaced by someone as equally great. For example, we lose Richard Swain, we get Cameron Smith. We lose Marcus Bai, we get Matty King. We lose Robbie Ross, we get Billy Slater. It’s good isn’t it? The best thing is that the replacements seem to come out of nowhere. I can’t wait to see the new Kearney, Howe, Reynoldson and Williams!

Speaking of Marcus Bai, it’s good to see he’s continued his success in England. The post-match celebration after his last home game for Melbourne was great, wasn’t it?

Oh Captain, My Captain...

Today begins a series of posts about what happened in 2004 and what might happen next season. First up, who’s going to be arguing with the Ref in round one?

We’ve gone from having lots of able candidates to no real standout. Howe and Kearney have gone and Kearns seems to go better without it. Also, you’d think he’d be retiring at the end of next season anyway, so let’s just forget about him and hope that he grows his beard and long hair back and keeps on charging forward. Booyar. That leaves us with these guys as possibles; Smith, Kidwell, Hill, Orford, Geyer, Bell. None of them really stand out though, do they?

Not that it matters, but vote goes to Cameron Smith. He plays real good every week and has been described as ‘an old head on young shoulders’ by Robbie K. He can also talk without mumbling and would be a good ambassador for the club - if only he was a bit older than 21! That didn’t stop Steve Kearney from captaining New Zealand, but the regular NRL season is, well, regular, so it’s a lot more work and it’s hard to tell what effect that will have. Hopefully, it would make him play better! I hope so, because I think he might get it. If Bellamy does pick him and it works then we can look forward to having the same captain for ten years, which would be great for the Storm from an on- and off-field perspective.

Oh... I listed Bell above because his Dad is in local Government (or a similar occupation) and maybe some of his leadership skills have rubbed off on Steve and he doesn't know it yet. You know, osmosis and all that. I think I'm on to something...

The Un-Prestigious Forecast Awards

In the spirit of last night’s Presentation Ball I’ve decided to compile my own honours list;

Player of the Year: Matt Orford
His role on the field carries a higher level of difficulty than anybody else’s and he touches the ball more so he always gets chances to showcase his ability. With that said, the bottom line is that he wins games for us and that's what counts. There's nothing more exciting than seeing the big-little guy slicing through some lazy defence and setting up an outside back for a try. His reluctance to sign a long-term deal with the club was disappointing, but hopefully this year he'll fall in love with a Melbourne girl, get more settled and be compelled to stay. Rock on, Matt!
2005 prediction: Billy Slater

Most Improved Player: Dallas Johnson
Since signing a contract extension late in the year, Dallas became a tackling machine and I'm glad that he’ll be a storm dude for a while longer. Throughout 2004 his effort was tireless and his application, for the most part, flawless. After falling in to first-grade last season thanks largely to our big injury list, he's definitely done enough to be running on in 2005 at the start of each game.
2005 prediction: Ryan Hoffman

Import of the Year: Alex Chan
You gotta like a guy with one of his front teeth missing. Chan came in with a few question marks over injury and ability, but rarely let us down and provided some great moments when he broke the line and ran free. On the downside, the high tackle thing that kept him out of more than a few games sucked, but he looks as though he's fixed that up now. As an aside, it’s sad to see our other import Ben Mac leave us so soon. His match-winning try against the Raiders at Olympic Park was a personal highlight and we’ll miss his head-down, ‘just try and stop me’ running.
2005 prediction: Dennis Scott

Rookie of the Year: Cooper Cronk
Matt King played a bit last year, so he doesn’t count and Copper Cronk’s name is Copper Cronk, so he beats out Steve Turner. Also, when he takes the field you always get the feeling that the impossible can happen. Case in point, he had a lot to do with our three-minute, two-try miracle that sunk Canberra in round 11. Cameron Smith’s injury in the opening stages of the Broncos final gave CC the opportunity to show everyone that he has the ability and composure to cut and eat the mustard in big-time football.
2005 prediction: Greg Inglis (but hopefully it will be one of our new forwards as right now we need more power up front than we do ability down back)

Bro of the Year: Matt King
Good hair. Refreshing attitude. Scores the odd try. Rides an electric scooter. Enough said.
2005 prediction: Robbie Kearns (would have won it now if he kept the beard and long hair 'renegade' look from earlier in the year)

Dud of the Year: Justin Madden
Throw us a fricken’ bone!

Well, that was fun. Sorry if the categories were a bit boring, I'll come up with something better next year!

We've only just begun.

Er...so today I made it look a bit different and added some crap to the sidebar. Wow. I will continue to do this until it's done and then I'll start writing more. Meanwhile, it's around 150 days until the 2005 season starts. Bogus.

The Forecast

Welcome to what might one day become a Melbourne Storm blog. Rock and Roll.