PREVIEW: 2025
The Todd Payten Referendum
Welcome to Bovine Bulletin, a monthly newsletter about the North Queensland Cowboys.
Programming notes
This is the first official edition of the Bovine Bulletin, a newsletter dedicated to the North Queensland Cowboys. This section will function in much the same way as the Pony Picayune does and will run approximately in the middle of the month. I think fanbases are underserved for decent text-based content that doesn’t treat them like morons1 and so I have decided to do something about that.
Those of you who have followed my writing over the years will know I am not from North Queensland (the south-east, actually) and I am not a Cowboys fan (yes, Broncos). I have been to most of the major hubs in North Queensland, can point to Cairns on a map and I don’t think Bob Katter is the messiah of the north2. I believe this puts me ahead of 90% of people writing about rugby league in either of the major newspaper sets, most of whom haven’t ventured further north than Port Macquarie and don’t know their Atherton Roosters from their Sarina Crocodiles3.
This doesn’t mean that the Cowboys will never be criticised. They will get the same treatment as everyone else and I am (usually) fair. If you want uncut praise, then you’re in the wrong place and may prefer to return to the moron-centred coverage, although they are also unlikely to give you what you want because they don’t care.
Also, when the Cowboys win the Big Game, you get a taste of my immiseration and that seems popular too. Either way, enjoy.
Let’s go over how every Cowboys season review has been written since COVID:
The 2021 season, and pretty much everything since that grand final run in 2017, did not go well. The Cowboys are underperforming their roster and are bad. Plus they just signed Chad Townsend for 2022. Christ.
2022 was the biggest single turnaround in Cowboys history. Just as everyone, including me, gave up on them, the Cowboys are back, baby. Chad Townsend is the greatest player in history.
2023 didn't go well. 2022 was an aberration. The Cowboys are bad. Chad should go back to Sydney.
2024 went pretty good. 2023 was an aberration and the Cowboys are, indeed, back, baby. Chad should still go back to Sydney.
Guys, just pick a lane. Be good or bad but just pick one. The pattern of it is meaningless. The only consistency is the inconsistency.
The Cowboys’ recent seasons could serve as an allegory for how tightly packed the midfield of the NRL has been in Vlandoball era. With the number of premiership contenders ranging from two to six, it doesn't take much to get from just above the Tigers’ cellar to just outside the Panthers’ porch. If Scott Drinkwater does not drop the ball five times in a game and Jeremiah Nanai actually tries and gets aerial and maybe there's a touch of good fortune through the soggy Origin period, then that might be enough to move from say 15th to 3rd or 12th to 5th.
It can also tell a story about Todd Payten. He has been at the helm for those seasons and delivered two shockers and two very good efforts. We can excuse the first shocker as year zero but the lack of consistency speaks to the quality of the process. The process is what you pay the coach for.
What weighting you want to apply to the Cowboys-specific outcomes relative to the broader context, I will leave to you, but I think this season serves as a referendum on Payten’s leadership. This is his team and if it goes poorly, either through a lack of tactical brilliance or the locker room giving up or whatever misfortune, then that will tell it's own story. If it goes well, then we officially consecrate 2023 as The Aberration, perhaps because of that midfield congestion, and move on, firmer in the knowledge that he's the man to lead this franchise for the foreseeable.
2025 presents its challenges. How will Dearden and Clifford go? Heilum Luki did his ACL, so are the Cowboys really forced to rely on John Bateman, a man who's already walked out on two clubs and hasn’t looked up to playing in first grade for a while? Every roster has its holes but seriously, how are they going to buttress that left edge?
Maybe the answers to those prove to be “well enough that they become the halves for Queensland”, “yes and he's up to it, contrary to all prior evidence” (or perhaps “it didn't matter after Marly Bitungane4 started stomping the shit out of everyone in Cup”) and “we just need Robert Derby to take the opportunity this presents and make the jersey his.” If Payten can engineer those favourable outcomes, that will go a long way to securing a favourable response at the ballot box.
On the other hand, if the league figures out they can go right and find plenty of joy, and this configuration represents Plans A through Z and there are no cavalry over the hill in reserve, then it doesn't take a lot of imagination to work out the consequences.
Attention: Cowboys fans
If you are planning on coming back for any future editions of the Bovine Bulletin and are not a paid subscriber, this is exactly where the paywall would be and you wouldn’t get all of the cool stuff that follows. I am showing you this one time so you can see what a paid subscription would get you.
The price of the brick goes up with kickoff in Vegas so sign-up for this introductory offer now.
If this is your first time here, it might feel like a bit much for me to ask you for money. Instead, you can give me your email address.
Or if you don’t like Substack or recurring subscriptions or both, but still want to support this endeavour, give us a tip on Ko-fi.
Deep Dive
The traditional Deep Dive into the 202X NRL season has been split up a little this year. Each of the Q4 will get theirs embedded in the longer season preview and then I’ll cover the rest of the league in a Stats Drop.
Explainers for metrics:
More about sims/PRVRS here.
The executive summary for the Cowboys:
North Queensland had a hot offence in 2024, reflected in their third best points per game, third best offensive efficiency and third best platoons for both 1-5 and 6+7+9 by WARG.
Defensively, the Cowboys were significantly weaker, conceding an eighth best points per game, ninth best defensive efficiency and, very concerningly, second worst conversion rate in the NRLM. In other words, for the breaks and metres made by the opposition, the opposition were able to convert that into real points with relative ease against the Cowboys.
The pack remains weak - the starters only good enough for 7th best in the league and the bench 12th - and that’s been a problem for some time. Taumalolo really covered a lot of blemishes for a long time and once he declined, the Cowboys haven’t found a long term solution.
Jeremiah Nanai had a good season by the Zs, but still not as impressive as the average David Fifita season. Still, I can’t stress how much the season will hinge on the Dearden/Clifford combo. I’d like it to work but I’ll need some evidence before I’d stake anything meaningful.
According to the PRVRS ratings and the draw, the Cowboys have a 63% chance of making the finals.
Reminder that Datawrapper embeds look and work best on desktop, next best if you tap through on mobile and least best in email.
Thank you for reading the Bovine Bulletin
Sharing or forwarding the Bovine Bulletin will help new readers find this newsletter and new subscribers is what keeps The Maroon Observer operation running.
Or you can follow TMO on Bluesky, the posting retirement home, where I guarantee any posts will be of lower quality than the content in the newsletter but you can… “re-skeet”… is that what they’re calling it? jfc… links.
Rewind
A mean spirited affair brimming with penalties, frustration and scuffles, North Queensland travel to New Zealand in round 3 of the 2005 season. The Cowboys front-run early but fail to convert an excess of possession in the first half to an unassailable lead. The Warriors hit back, frequently on the counterattack and capitalising on Cowboys’ errors. As possession evens out, the Warriors edge in front with a quarter to go. Through most of the game Thurston is not yet Thurston but in the last ten minutes, we see what’s to come.
As a bonus, there’s a shithot back three of Ty Williams, Matt Bowen and Matt Sing, Carl Webb with the haircut that launched a thousand razors and multiple visits to the blood bin, Adelaide’s Rod Jensen and Redcliffe’s slow giant, Shane Tronc.
Some other observations:
In 2005, five seconds was enough time to assess whether a player was OK with a head injury.
The attitude of the commentators to high shots has a lot more in common with those of 20 years prior than those of 20 years later.
A brief appearance at half time from a young(er) Ivan Cleary.
Notes
Signatures: Jaxson Paulo for 2, John Bateman for 2 (yuck), Rob Derby for 3
The Cowboys face the Sea Eagles, Sharks, Broncos, Raiders and Panthers in the first five rounds, including a Friday 5pm game (?) against the defending premiers. That is a tough start to the season and normally, I’d say that would give you a pretty good idea of how the season is going to go but the Cowboys could start 0-5 and then run the table home, or start 5-0 and then win three more games.
Reece Robson to depart Cowboys at end of 2025 for the Roosters. This is why you can’t rely on New South Welshmen. If Drinkwater was any higher up the Blues depth chart, the Cows would be in real trouble.
Injuries: Chester out for the year, Luki out for the year
In the Dub: Harden, Weale, Goldthorp, two Raftstrand-Smiths, Banu and Malupo all sign on, joined by Roache, George, Dick, Kelly and Ormond-Maunsell. That’s the core of a solid team, albeit with a strange level of Kiwi talent. Who are the Warriors going to sign? Meanwhile, Ben Jeffries has lost Tamika Upton and Hannah Southwell from the Knights. With the uptick last year, that is starting to feel a lot like a bullet dodged. All the way with Ricky Henry… Ricky H… R Henry… We have time to work on that.
This is also true of the Dolphins and Titans but there aren’t as many of them, I only have so much time at my disposal and the Titans are simply too depressing to really contemplate.
Here’s a fun Bob Katter quote that I’ve been sitting on for no particular reason: “Condoms are despicable things that won’t prevent the spread of AIDS but will encourage the community to have sex with gay abandon”. He was Community Services minister at the time and banned condoms from sale in Indigenous community stores in the late 1980s. He was apparently concerned about a “racist genocide”. This stance was seen as too conservative by the National Party of Queensland in 1989, who ordered him to reverse the decision. What a larrikin!
I understand this may be a contentious inclusion but I believe in broad churches.
He's listed as a second rower on the QRL website, kinda looks like one but seems to be playing middle and started at lock in the weekend’s trial so I dunno. Maybe in this fanfic Luki just comes back early and can play better without an ACL???