They can take people on unders, because they actually have had a functional system with a functional coach for a long time, that players want to go to... And they are given leeway in third party agreements outside of the cap to keep Melbourne competitive. Fairly sure you've bumped up both NAS and Utoikamanu's salary there too, I believe he went there on much less than he was on at the Tigers.
You will see with the people outside of the top roster positions, they are on considerably less than they would be earning at other clubs, because they are making a choice to be paid less, to develop under Bellamy, and within the Storm "system". Do you expect us to just get a Bellamy? That's a ridiculous expectation.
We have just started rebuilding the club in the past few years into more of a "system". Prior to then, the entire club was built around a Des. A single operator with his hands on everything... It quickly became outdated throughout the mid-late 2010's, and Barrett in particular couldn't even begin to handle it. Instead of building a system... We just brought Des back. That set us back by years.
Des had his hands on literally every facet of the operation, for better, or for worse. It's why Des's men in Bonasera, Hales, etc have been maintained. Without Des's men there would be no club left.
Unfortunately, Des was no Bellamy. His moneyball alternatives for the Horwarths and the Andersons that the Storm have, were Parker and Harper. He couldn't turn them into world beaters. Only proven systems can do so, and that is a club-wide effort.
I don't think we would immediately be world beaters if we didn't have the big three, but we would be better placed to look for value in other options to build a "system" around. It may not reduce the salary of our fullback, but if we can make every outside back first grade standard, that's a starting point to build from. We have seen that improve in recent years. Now it's onto the forwards.
