It's been quite a while since I've seen a rugby match in person, but I've always admired the players. Because I thought they were nuts. Nuts can be characters. In my dodge, characters are coveted. Love rugby.
Think about something close to tackle football without pads and helmets – you know, like we used to play in parks as kids when we didn't know any better. That's rugby. But this great international sport, like most games outside of Monopoly and Scrabble, has changed.
There are great athletes – many of them making a lot of money – playing rugby. And dozens of them will be on display today and tomorrow at Petco Park when 16 international teams literally collide in the USA Sevens tournament.
JIM BAIRD / Union-Tribune
The USA Sevens rugby tournament will be a Petco Park fixture for at least the next three years, well beyond that if the vision of tournament organizers is realized.
It's an event – here at least three more years – that has a great chance to become a San Diego staple and bring millions into the local economy. But, imagine my dismay. I'm hearing rugby players, really, no longer are nuts.
“Not now,” says Ray Peterson, the managing director of the event. “Back when I played, yeah, proportionately, we were a little bit nuts. But we have good coaches now, teaching respect. We are not soccer. There's a rugby explosion.”
Says J.D. Dahlen, famed local restaurateur and longtime rugby backer and player and one of OMBAC's founders: “It's changed. There's nothing but speed. These are well-conditioned athletes, some training twice a day on their own.”
Sigh. Another myth destroyed.
I'm talking to American Dan Lyle, tournament director (who lives and works here), and he's one of the legendary ruggers. He played in England, where he is beloved. But, while we're in conversation, I discover he isn't at all nuts. Unlike me, he still totes the majority of his faculties.
“That's our misconception about rugby in America – mud, blood and beers,” he says, “that it's less rivalry and more revelry. But, as a Division I athlete, I never had that bumper sticker on my car.
“There's a great respect level now. The game's gone pro and added some world-class athletes.”
Lyle once was offered a $78,000-a-year contract with the NFL's Vikings to play tight end. He decided on rugby in England, where he doubled that salary.
“Once you go abroad,” he says, “you see that rugby is the world's great contact sport. It unleashes all the athleticism. It's something Americans can pick up on very easily. Give rugby a try. Kids love it, because everybody who plays gets to touch it.”
Of course Americans can, and are, picking up on the game. We love our contact sports here. Football. Hollywood marriages. Rugby fits in nicely, and it's growing. All you need is one of those crazy balls and a pair of shoes, although I don't know if you'd want to play naked.
So, why rugby?
“Why not?” says Bob Watkins, local businessman and rugby freak, who is running for the soon-to-be-vacant seat in the 52nd Congressional District. “It's an obsession, a game I could play all my life. We started playing at San Diego State in the early 1960s, when there wasn't much competition. It's continued to grow.
“It's such a great sport. You can go smack somebody and you don't have to wear pads – except, because there is no blocking, there are far fewer injuries than football.”
Rugby rises. This Sevens thing is a bastardized form of the sport – using seven players instead of the usual 15 in two seven-minute halves – but, if you attend, you'll get the picture. This is fast, and those putting it on think it will remain a San Diego event.
“The IRB (International Rugby Board) gives this tournament out in five-year increments,” Peterson says. “I moved it here from Home Depot (Center, in Carson) and it's our intent to stay. We'd like to be in San Diego forever. It was a success last year, when we got it off the ground. Now it's a matter of growing it and getting sponsors.
“There's a significant economic impact here. We've got San Diego State's MBA people working with us, conducting surveys, getting responses from restaurants, hotels and car rental places. We'll eventually go back to the city and tell them this is a $50 million event.
“There will be close to a sold-out stadium by 2010, and 20,000 of those people will be from out of town. This is something San Diego will want to identify with.”
The thing about this event, with the United States (ranked 12th among the 16) not being among the favorites, is that there really will be a few choices in the crowd. The fans root for everyone. Because the games are so short, play just goes on. The matches start at 10 this morning and will continue until 7 p.m.
Says Peterson: “The uninitiated can sit up in the stands and, within two games, have a pretty good idea what's going on. You can watch baseball for a month and not have a clue. You can watch football forever and not have a clue.
“This is a game of incredible respect. When it's over, you walk off the field, shake hands, have a drink and move on.”
My kind of game. But some of these guys must be nuts, no?
