It's a big year ahead in football. Having already done All Stars and with the pre-season underway, the rumblings are there for what's to come.
Here's my predictions for this year.
The NRL's winners and losers
When you look at the top teams, I don't think there'll be many surprises this year.
Roosters are the favourites. The Panthers, Sharks, Cowboys, Storm, the Eels and Souths are all going to be up there.
The surprise ticket might be the Raiders. They're a team that, if they hit it right, they could end up right up there.
Newcastle is in for the wooden spoon. Sorry Knights fans.
Dally M medal
Cody Walker for me will be the best Blackfulla player of the year.
I've seen enough signs in him in the pre-season to tell me he's determined to go one further. The way he approached his diet, his training, his professionalism at All Stars tells me that he's he's really hungry for this.
Jada Taylor will be an up-and-coming one to watch in the women's comp.
She was the youngest player at the All Stars, and her likely team, the Roosters, will be early favourites.
Koori Knockout
The Knockout is heading up to Tuggerah this year.
I reckon La Perouse are the favourites to beat. They're winning everything else at the moment. With all the South Coast boys playing with them again, they're at their strongest.
The same goes for the women's team! The women's La Pa is a young, strong team, so I think they'll take out the top spot too.
Hopefully we get to see a bit more of this!
Indigenous coaches
Blackfullas often need support moving through a system that wasn't built for us.
It's true in many workplaces, and it's true in football too.
That's where my focus is right now, and phase one is coaching. We're going to get some proper coach mentoring for our Indigenous coaches.
This season we're going to have six of the 10 coaches in the NRLW are going to be Indigenous, but we're still non-existent in that male space [of the NRL]. So we need to start to look at getting our coaches that are coming through mentoring and setting up a programme that helps them take the next steps in their careers.
It really elevated our players and gave them the strength and courage to go and learn more culturally and to take those steps as cultural leaders. But that's only one week of the year, and we need to extend on that.
Proper care for our players is such an extensive thing: it can't be left to a couple of staff members at intermittent times in the year. It needs to be holistic, and all year round.
The recent All Stars week was a fantastic example of bringing together sport and culture, for the enrichment of both.
Support for retired players
That brings me to a really serious issue within our game, and that's what happens with our retired players.
We've got so many players that are at risk, that have gotten out of jail, that are drug dependent, gambling addicts, still unemployed etc.
We really need to focus on those players wanting to transition that are already retired so that we can put some support in there and help them to take steps forward.
Two high profile cases of known mental health struggles are Greg Inglis and Preston Campbell. These are two strong, powerful men; if they're struggling, imagine how many others are out there.
We must get more support around these fullas.
Sonny Bill Williams.
The new and improved Dot
We are back on Tuesday night for another season of Over The Black Dot.
It's going to have a different feel this year. Timana Tahu, Bo De La Cruz and I will be talking more about the issues around the game as opposed to the actual games.
We want to tell the stories of our players and communities, which are powerful.
Make sure you tune in we are on at 8.30pm.
