Don’t sue the Raiders for being sacked, Curtis Scott, thank them for the opportunity
"We all sit down to a banquet of consequences", is a favourite quote of Wayne Bennett's. It's something 23-year-old Curtis Scott could reflect upon following his sacking by Canberra Raiders
Once upon a time, Curtis Scott, two men made the same choice.
While enjoying a night out that was still going at breakfast time the next day, Josh Dugan and Blake Ferguson climbed onto a roof in Belconnen and took a photo of themselves making obscene finger gestures and drinking pineapple-infused vodka Cruisers.
Then, full of piss and the vinegary, mad fun of it, they posted the photo on social media, laid back and cackled at their reckless enterprise, effectively saying publicly to their employers – the brothers David and Don Furner, respectively coach and chief executive of Canberra Raiders, men who held the not unreasonable expectation that well-paid professionals would nurse injuries otherwise - Screw you Hans Brix!
The next day Canberra Raiders Football Manager John Bonasera knocked on Dugan’s door and delivered a letter. The fullback was to front the Canberra Raiders board and show cause why he should not be sacked from his job at Canberra Raiders.
Dugan, who had form, as they say, in other areas of public notoriety that didn’t reflect well upon the Raiders’ “brand”, could not show sufficient cause. And like Todd Carney before him, out the mother-hubbin door he went. Fergie followed not long thereafter.
By round 23, the season shot, David Furner was punted himself (though not before signing Jordan Rapana) an ouster which heralded the return of Ricky Stuart from Parramatta.
And the lesson for you, one of them anyway, is this: choices begat swings and roundabouts.
That poor one by Fergie and Duges meant they lost dream jobs with Canberra Raiders and entered a netherworld of notoriety, the now-iconic Instagram image of drunken devilment being viewed, by conservative estimate, 462 million times.
Of course, in the way of gilded youth such as yourself, kissed on the cock by athletic prowess, the pair was able to find employment pretty much straight away. Ferguson at the Roosters while Dugan tootled off to St George Illawarra Dragons, the club that continues to break new ground for tin ears by trying to sign Israel Folau, considering Jack de Belin captaincy material short weeks after the Covid-defying Barbecue at Vaughny’s Place (and all the rest), and employing Shane Flanagan who coached the Sharks during a club-wide blood doping operation, didn’t abide by the rules of his suspension, and is now appearing as a talking head on a media he once despised in a recruitment video for himself.
It’s a rich tapestry, Curtis Scott, full of swings and roundabouts. And choices.
One man watching on was then-Raiders centre-come-back-rower Joel Thompson. Just two years older than both members of Durgason, Thompson had known his own issues with the drink in his early adulthood. Yet by the age of 25 had begun to make better choices.
He’d been picked for the Indigenous All Stars (whom he later captained), found a good and supportive woman, and looked himself in the mirror. He got help. And he vowed to be a better man – for his kids, his wife, his people, himself.
Today Thompson owns a Ken Stephen Medal for advocacy work, is considered a go-to man and elder among rugby league players, particularly Indigenous ones, and only just finished playing footy at the age of 33.
Ten years older than you now, Curtis Scott.
Meanwhile Dugan, 31, is getting lifted in Lithgow for breaking Covid rules and endangering the entire National Rugby League. I don’t know if there is a gene for doing stupid shit (though I hope so then I can blame something). But if there is, our Duges’s DNA is verily infested with it.
Anyway. Point remains, Curtis Scott: everybody makes choices. And when you’re yet to reach the age of 28, say, or whatever number society actually confers full-blown adulthood upon a man, you’re apt to make poor ones.
And Curtis Scott? My man - you’ve made some duds.
Yet there is hope. Great lumps of it. For you remind me, in a way, of Thompson. And I’d advise you to reach out to him with words to the effect of: Joel Thompson?You were a young, drunken fool once. What would your advice be for a 23-year-old you and by extension me?
And Thompson might suggest: Mate just get off the piss for the footy season and go easy on it during the off-season. And think about people other than yourself in a holistic, charitable sort of way. Reach out, baby. Be the best you that you can be. And don’t sue the Raiders for punting your arse, see it as opportunity.
I don’t know if he’d say any of those things. But someone would. And there is an entire organised union of someones called the RLPA whose raison-d'etre (Google it, better yourself) is to help their people. And you, Curtis Scott, are their people.
And so are the Canberra Raiders, much as it, right now, may be hard to believe. And I’m tipping they’ll do everything in their power to facilitate any goal you so desire.
You’ll just be doing it at another club. Because it hasn’t worked at this one.
Now, Curtis Scott? Don’t beat yourself up. People are punted all the time. Doesn’t mean you can’t do better somewhere else. And in you, Curtis Scott, people believe.
Craig Bellamy believed. He brought you into the Melbourne Man Factory. And I will bet you all your dollars to a steaming packet of cinnamon donuts that he and Ricky Stuart, old mates, spoke about you, Curtis Scott, before Stuart brought you to Canberra.
Your man Josh Hodgson, good fellah, senior man, an elder, says you’re a “good kid” who’s made poor choices.
“He’s a young man. I think sometimes we can forget he’s made some mistakes in his life as we all have but I’m the type of bloke that doesn’t spend so much time on people who don’t deserve it,” Hodgson said.
“I’m not going to put a lot of time and effort into someone if they’re not a good person and he’s certainly a really good person.”
So there you go, Curtis Scott. If Hodgo believes then we believe.
Up to you now to believe it, too. And live it.
Go well. Good luck.
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