You're trying to present Politis as a guy who pretends he's the fairy godmother.
Objective #1 is to win premierships. He's obviously ruthless with moving players on who aren't good value to that objective but players who work hard, who don't play up (or never learn from mistakes) and help the team win are given every opportunity to succeed in life outside of football.
My understanding of Smith's comments on the subject sounds like Melbourne excel in making you footballers, the Roosters sold a picture on letting Smith excel in other parts of his life as well.
No, Fam. I'm not trying to paint that picture. That is the picture Smith seemed to be painting with his comments about Uncle Nick calling players on a golf course (when a player they really wanted to sign just happened to be there) to show he cares.
You asked what was naïve about what Smith said. I was just responding to your question.
I'm not saying Politis doesn't care about his players....but I'm sure there are people at every club who care about their players. People in footy build relationships and come to care for one another. That's certainly not unique to the roosters.
The only advantage Politis has over other administrators is the fact he is a very successful businessman and has great connections to the business world. Which poses serious questions about whether he should be allowed to use those connections to lure players to his club for significantly less than market value. From memory, the NRL once had a strict rule prohibiting clubs from signing players for unders. I have no issue at all with any club wanting to help players prepare for life after footy, but if the NRL seriously wants an even competition, allowing certain powerbrokers to use their connections as a bargaining chip to sign players for well under what other clubs would have to pay them is somewhat of an impediment to that goal. Let's not romanticise things. The Roosters have pulling power because they have a very powerful owner who has figured out a loophole which allows him to get more value out of the cap than other, less financially robust clubs are able to extract. Good business? Sure. But spare me the "he cares, he really cares" crap. Namaste