Thought hed been sacked with miller for fighting, another load of b..locks, hopefully he can show this year the talent he shows now and again,

I've always thought that claims like this are a bit of an exaggeration. Yes, at times his defence can be sloppy (or even look lazy), but overall he's not really that different to the rest of our pack. Compare last year's tackle completion rates and there's less than 1½% between all of Pitts, Bowden, Watts, Whiting, Ellis, Galea and Westerman. With Westerman being involved in over 30 tackles a game, that's about a difference of 1 tackle every 2 games, and there are a couple of players I would personally consider really strong defenders in that bunch, so hardly poor in comparison IMO. He also tended to play more minutes in a game than at least all but 1 of those, and I think that it's possible that fatigue from this can sometimes be a factor.

In fact, if you narrowed it down to the 4 backrowers of Ellis, Galea, Westerman and Whiting, there's less than 1% in it, which makes it 1 tackle every 3 games. Tickle lags behind all 4.

A lot of things about Joe are over exaggerated. He was for me, our most consistent forward last year. Plays long minutes and does a lot of graft.
He's finally being given the role we all thought he'd be playing for us, he needs to grab it with both hands. There's no reason why he can't be as important to us as SO'L is to the Wigan side.

“I’ve had a good off season"

Jeez i hope hes talking about in training and not the trial games.

He's had 2 years. Done nothing of note and certainly nothing to pay back his massive transfer fee.

Sorry, he should have gone this year.

To be that important to us he needs to cut out the sloppiness, though. Whilst I agree he was one of best forwards last year, he still lets himself down with basic errors he simply should not do at times. As much as I rate him and think that the level of criticism singled out for him can be unfair, hand on heart he's still not one of the players I could say we can rely upon to get a play right when it comes to the crunch.

What I disagree with is the way I think many hold him up to different standards to those around him, picking him out for criticism when most of the time he is no worse (and maybe no better) than his teammates. I know why he's the one picked out, I just don't understand/agree with it. It's a bit like that old line about attitudes towards women in the workplace; he has to perform twice as well to be considered half as good.

There it is.

This coupled with Joe's own implicit assessment of his performance since arriving (as per the article) would be my view. Let's hope he can take the opportunity he seems to have craved. I hope the arrival of Chris Tuson will shake all of the back rowers up at the club as I thought we were relatively weak across the board last year. From the small glimpses seen of Ellis pre-season it looks like he may have stepped up so all to play for in that area.

Fully agree, here's hoping. He's clearly talented, if he can consistently deliver to level of which he is capable everyone wins.

To be fair to Westy he does say that he's been coached more like a 2nd rower. He seems excited to be given the 13 roll with more a ball playing roll.
What's baffling to me is why non of the coaches before have utilised his skills

They did at Cas.

Like he says - no excuses from now on. I don't think he's been value for money on his displays so far for the club, so he really has to earn his corn this year or I suspect he may be shown the door.

Wasn't he being compared to a young Paul Sculthorpe when we signed him?

Not seen evidence of that in his time at Hull but still hoping.

Anywhere near his standards would do for me.

To be fair to Westerman (and accurate) that fee went to Cas, not to him.

I hate when people mention his transfer fee! It's not his fault we paid that much for him.