Quote getdownmonkeyman="getdownmonkeyman"Yep. Did you run out of space or deliberately miss out 'disruptive'?'"
Mundine wasn't disruptive to a team. He never got into trouble off the field and his teammates loved him, so did David Waite who was his coach at the Dragons. The reason Mundine got a reputation as a controversial character was because he was outspoken to the media on a lot of issues:
- where most players leave contract negotiations to their agents, Mundine came up front to the media during the Super League war when he was asked about his future and said he was going where he got the best offer. Having said this, when the British media hinted English clubs were interested in him, he didn't try to use that to bid him up, he said Australia was the land of his people and nobody would drive him out of it
- he was super self confident in his own ability and when he didn't make the Aussie squad he told the media he was better than Daley/Fittler and insinuated racism. This did not endear him to the ARL or a lot of Aussie fans.
- when September 11 happened (he had already left league by this point) he made some comments about US bringing enemies on themselves through their foreign policy.
- he annoys a lot of Aussies today by saying he's Australias greatest ever athlete, ahead of Rod Laver and Don Bradman
Mundine got a lot of peoples backs up but it was people in the media and fans of opposing teams, the Dragons fans still hero worship him. Saying he was disruptive is like saying Roy Keane was disruptive at United.
And in fairness to Mundine, when he was playing RL he could back up his mouth. He put a lot of pressure on himself by saying he was better than Daley and Fittler but it wasn't a ludicrous claim.