Rugby: any ruckers out there?

[Bronk]

I discovered Rugby in the Marines and rucked for a variety of sides until I was 30. I love the sport and have passed it on to my two sons who are in youth Rugby leagues this summer.

Though a great game with great traditions it is a tough sell until you show kids what it is all about by taking them to a match. This spring, I took about 30 boys to the Univ. of Texas v Rice Rugby match and now have about 20 of them bugging me to teache them to play. One of them will enroll in the U.S. Coast Guard Academy in the fall and he plans on joining the Rugby "team" there.

Any ruckers out there?

 

[Kiwi]

Being a proud New Zealander, I have played rugby since I was 5 years old and I am currently playing for my school's First XV this year. Our team play our first competition match of the season on Saturday so naturally I can't wait for the season to start after being injured all of last year

 

[Bronk]

God how I miss playing Rugby. I finally had to quit because my wife was pregnant and she couldn't stand to have me come home with bloody knees and sore shoulders.

Good luck to you Kiwi. Have a good season.

 

[devans]

My Wife made me stop as well.
Rugby is a great game. The most fun I've had outdoors.
It's like football without all the stoppages and with loads of laterals.

 

[Kiwi]

A thought has just occured to me......

With the amount of white football talent going to waste in America at the moment, why doesn't USA rugby recruit some of these white NFL rejects or college stars like Luke Staley or Brock Forsey?

I'm pretty sure that any rugby club in the world would be happy to have a couple of guys like that on their roster. Not only that, but the USA would soon become one of the top 10 rugby teams in the world in a few years.

Any chance it could happen?

 

[backrow]

yeah i play rugby. played pro for several seasons, now i enjoy semi-pro rugby in sunny Spain. i absolutely love this sport. i play flanker or number 8, sometimes lock but i have played a wing at times as well.

and to reply to kiwi, US Eagles do recruit people that played very high standard of football, like Shaun Paga, who was signed by Vikings several years ago (he played for Cal Berkeley) but he didn't make a cut. also another US great, Dan Lyle tried out for Redskins and Vikes for a while, he played pro rugby in England, now he works as a director of ops for US Rugby.
i played in Aspen with another guy that had an NFL experience, former Chargers' DE Andy Katoa... all of those players excelled in rugby, with their combination of strength, speed and toughness...

 

[devans]

I think Kiwi has a great idea. USA have the potential to really compete with the UK, France, Australia, S Africa and New Zealand. It wont happen overnight - but with the training ground of College football 90% of the skills and attitudes are in place. I think the game would be really popular with U.S. audiences if an open style of running Rugby was encouraged.
Have a look at seven a side Rugby if you ever get the chance, it is great to watch.

 

[KG2422]

Rugby pros get paid in New Zealand. There aren't any professional leagues here unless I've missed something. If there were, that would probably be the incentive needed for players to make the transition from American football to rugby.

 

[backrow]

yeah, Rugby Super League in US is still largely amateur, there are incentives sometimes, they can offer players housing, work etc. but nothing beyond that. If it goes pro, and i think it will as everything is heading that direction we will see a steady influx of ex football players into american rugby.

 

[Bronk]

I know that in the past some U.S. colleges took a chance on some Anzac Ruggers back in the 1980s, but it tended to come to naught.

Some of these guys can really burn. Maybe they should look at South Africa now that it's "okay" to do so.

Took my kids to a sevens tourney in Houston a couple of weeks ago.

 

[backrow]

yeah, sevens are helluva fun and it's a great spectator sport as well, short, fast and intense... i definitely like it, even if this season i only participated in about half of tournaments they have between Spain and Portugal - too damn tired!

 

[Jimmy Chitwood]

Former rugby star describes fighting off 140-pound Rottweiler with bare hands; says that American armored wankballers in same situation would have fallen to the ground and tried to draw a roughing call from refs.

Article

excerpt: "I had to fight the dog and punched it several times in the face to make it let go."

He said the animal, which had moments earlier gone for his Jack Russell, was on a lead but its owner "didn't seem to be doing much".

turn your volume down then follow these links to football hits and rugby hits.

 

[devans]

I was just flicking through some sports TV channels and came across Namibia getting well beaten by Argentina at Rugby. No surprise really as Argentina are ranked 6th in the World, and Namibia is a tiny country in terms of population. The remarkable thing was the Namibian side. There are 15 players in a Rugby team and 14 of the Namibian side were white. I know Rugby is seen as a "White" sport by many Africans, who prefer Soccer, but even so this is quite something for a country with only 90,000 white people, about 5% of the total.
If you want to know more about Namibia by the way try this

[url]http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/economies/Africa/Namibia. html[/url]
or this
[url]http://www.intute.ac.uk/sciences/worldguide/html/967_people. html[/url]
or just Google...Edited by: devans

 

[Kiwi]

Yeah I wouldn't get too excited about the Namibian team personally. Rugby over there is completely amateur and the vast majority of players would be white. According to the IRB website there are only about 10,000 registered players in Namibia.