Melbourne Storm chief executive Brian Waldron has promised the club will decide on Tuesday whether to apologise to the NRL judiciary and appeal a $50,000 fine for questioning its integrity.

Waldron and coach Craig Bellamy have been threatened with legal action for defamation for comments made about skipper Cameron Smith's suspension for a grapple tackle two weeks ago.

The club was also fined $50,000 by the NRL for the comments.

The wide-ranging attack on the judiciary sparked a furore which dominated the lead-up to the grand final, made the Storm public enemy No.1 in Sydney, and may have negatively contributed to the Storm's heavy 40-0 thumping.

Waldron denied the club had been avoiding the issue, saying the appropriate time to discuss the matter was always after the season had finished.

"We'll just have a chat about it some time tomorrow and see where we go from here," Waldron said.

"We're treating the issue very seriously.

"We always said we'd discuss it in due course and we felt it wasn't appropriate to discuss it in the lead-up to the grand final.

"Let them get through today. It's a tough 24 hours when you lose grand finals, and it's also about saying goodbye to the blokes who are leaving.

"We'll sit down and discuss it tomorrow."

Tomorrow is the deadline for appealing the NRL fine, but it remains unclear whether a Storm apology would appease judiciary members Darrell Williams, Royce Ayliffe and Darren Britt enough to stop the legal proceedings the trio have flagged.

Brought to you by AAP © 2024 AAP