{"id":960863,"date":"2026-11-11T18:24:18","date_gmt":"2026-11-11T18:24:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/960863\/"},"modified":"2026-11-11T18:24:18","modified_gmt":"2026-11-11T18:24:18","slug":"nrl-2026-storm-sign-cooper-bai-on-three-year-deal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/960863\/","title":{"rendered":"NRL 2026: Storm sign Cooper Bai on three-year deal"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Cooper Bai will follow in his famous father\u2019s footsteps and will wear the Storm jersey in 2028 after agreeing to a three-year deal to make the move south.<\/p>\n<p>His father, Marcus Bai, was a foundation player at the Storm and won a premiership with the club in 1999.<\/p>\n<p>Now Cooper will continue the family legacy in Melbourne after originally signing with them earlier in the year, only to backflip during the 10-day cooling-off period to remain with the Titans.<\/p>\n<p>The 20-year-old forward made his debut in 2025 and played 23 games for the Titans last season.<\/p>\n<p>Bai was heavily linked with a move to the Chiefs for their inaugural season in 2028, but the PNG international has committed to the Storm who have been on the hunt for middle forwards.<\/p>\n<p>There had been suggestions he could be involved in a player swap to fast-track the move for 2027, but that hasn\u2019t been sorted out yet. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cCooper is an exciting young forward and a quality young man,\u201d Storm director of football Frank Ponissi said. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe\u2019s made an impressive start to his career with the Gold Coast, and we\u2019re looking forward to supporting his continued development here in Melbourne.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cCooper has great potential and we look forward to watching his continued development over the next 12 months before he joins us in 2028, which marks the 30th anniversary of our club\u2019s inaugural season in 1998 featuring Cooper\u2019s father Marcus \u2013 making it even more significant.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Originally published as <a class=\"body-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.news.com.au\/sport\/nrl\/bai-bai-titans-cooper-bai-signs-threeyear-melbourne-storm-deal-to-follow-in-fathers-footsteps\/news-story\/112f4aa5e4259f9705bc42dbf73d6296\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Bai Bai Titans: Cooper Bai signs three-year Melbourne Storm deal to follow in father\u2019s footsteps<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cooper Bai will follow in his famous father\u2019s footsteps and will wear the Storm jersey in 2028 after&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":960864,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[384722,528689,391741,167626,528696,4891,89838,32601,528700,474723,528686,378662,528688,404899,528693,528698,380521,528694,488380,528697,64,63,528699,13149,46866,77964,32893,415459,392549,379545,528690,390377,448170,376861,380886,528702,126993,647,528695,761,762,158,411625,395167,28362,85,17711,423212,354064,528691,444597,99646,382205,528692,46675,188308,377421,426761,528701,378787,528684,39937,528687,378969,406869,528685,22958],"class_list":["post-960863","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-s-inaugural-season","tag-s-father-marcus","tag-s-footsteps","tag-167626","tag-1999-now","tag-4891","tag-89838","tag-32601","tag-23-games","tag-a-big-call","tag-a-foundation-player","tag-a-move","tag-a-player-swap","tag-a-premiership","tag-a-quality-young-man","tag-a-rising-titans-star-and-son","tag-a-three-year-deal","tag-an-exciting-young","tag-an-impressive-start","tag-an-nrl-premiership-winner","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-bai-bai-titans","tag-contracts","tag-cooper","tag-cooper-bai","tag-father","tag-football-frank-ponissi","tag-great-potential","tag-his-career","tag-his-continued-development","tag-his-debut","tag-his-famous-father","tag-his-father","tag-his-future","tag-last-season-bai","tag-marcus-bai","tag-melbourne","tag-middle-forwards-there","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-nrl-future","tag-our-club","tag-rising-star","tag-sports","tag-storm","tag-storm-director","tag-suggestions","tag-the-10-day-cooling-off-period","tag-the-30th-anniversary","tag-the-chiefs","tag-the-club","tag-the-family-legacy","tag-the-gold-coast","tag-the-hunt","tag-the-move","tag-the-next-12-months","tag-the-png-international","tag-the-storm","tag-the-storm-jersey","tag-the-titans","tag-the-titans-the-20-year-old","tag-the-year","tag-their-inaugural-season","tag-three-year-melbourne-storm-deal","tag-titans"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/960863","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=960863"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/960863\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/960864"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=960863"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=960863"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=960863"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}