What if America started caring about Rugby?

[BluesAreBest]

Can you just imagine 15 athletic freaks running at you for the entire game?

 

[TNT88]

If they made it their national sport. I'd imagine within 10-15 years they could put together a pretty awesome team. Not some sort of super-human team though. (top 5 maybe)

Quality not Quantity. I could write a whole post on it but I think it is pretty self evident.

If you have a good rugby culture, a good community, decades of tradition, good junior coaching, quality junior comps, good pathways for talented players. You can produce 15 world class players.

You don't need a massive population. Tennis is huge in the USA (relative to most countries) yet a lot of the top 100 players (men and women) are from small eastern European countries. Simply because they have good localized systems there. *this isn't a very good base for any argument, it's all I can think of to express this thought though.*

USA could be awesome at rugby, they have everything in place, but it needs time to evolve. As junior comps get better over time, they will start producing higher quality players. However, it isn't something that could happen overnight if they suddenly decided to "care" about rugby.

A good sign of the uprising of USA will be when they start performing well in the U20 World Cup each year.

 

[profitius]

Its all IFS. They're not super human there. Did you know that the average White man in the USA is about 5'10 and the average Black man is smaller!

Theres loads of physical freaks in every country but it doesn't make them good at rugby. Some are too tall, too heavy etc and every body type has its advantages. The 5'9" French props dominating scrums is an example. You need skill and brains too as well as tactical nous to beat opposition. Not to mention the right mentality. So the USA would need years of playing rugby and producing good players before they'd be in a position to challenge the top teams.

Rugby is about combinations too. Players need time to adjust playing with other players. This is where the USA has a big disadvantage because of the size of the country.

It should be interesting to see how the USA and Canada develop over time. In the USA, American football will start to block rugby if it ever feels a threat, I feel. Its a multi billion dollar business and all big businesses like monopolies.

 

[Shimon]

Would that mean the US would have to narrow it's sports, or is the country big enough to support both rugby and it's other primary sports. It would take ages for Rugby to displace NFL,NBA,NHL and MLB you would think.

I guess the one way to make USA take it seriously would be for Canada to be in the top 5.

 

[calculon]

Would that mean the US would have to narrow it's sports, or is the country big enough to support both rugby and it's other primary sports. It would take ages for Rugby to displace NFL,NBA,NHL and MLB you would think.

I guess the one way to make USA take it seriously would be for Canada to be in the top 5.

They'd be really good technically - just look at NFL - it's ridiculous. There would be no limit to how far they'd take it. It would be "Brad Jones, former UFC fighting champion, and 100m sprinter while he was learning his rugby game" is coming onto the field." But seriously, they're a long ways off in terms of professionalism. Wales for example is very professional considering the amount of players available. The US is amateur. I'll reserve judgment for how far they've come along until we play them.

 

[formerlyfastwing]

you can look at Hockey as an example. 20 years ago the US was an also ran.....they decide to become interested and know they are producing good players and have a strong national team program. The US is Canada's only real competition at the world junior championship. They have turned themselves around in a mear 20 years.

If they decide rugby is their bag then look out.....will they dominate with Universal Soldier type players, no, but they will become very strong.

 

[Aedaphon]

I'd echo some of the previous comments, developing a sport in any country requires localized development before anything else. The problem with rugby in America isn't that there aren't people interested, it's just that they're so scattered throughout the country that there's no real way of forming a strong rugby community.

The North-East is probably the area I would see becoming a rugby centre in America, if that does ever happen. Plenty of college teams, and more importantly a high population density. If you've got an area with 20 schools all within an hour of each other you can actually start to develop local competitions etc. and after that you start to develop club interests.

Still sadly, I don't see this happening for a while. Maybe if the Eagles got through the first round, but that's not too likely.

 

[CDN_Rugby]

The US is Canada's only real competition at the world junior championship.

Tell that to the Russians and Swedes. I'm still having nightmares about last year's finals.

 

[M Two One]

Living in the US, I can tell you that there are more and more people opening up to foreign sports. There are groups of people that sort of thrown the traditional sports to the side in favor of their own big four like rugby union, Aussie rules, cricket, etc.

I personally like some of the national sports, also one sport that is starting to really take off here - association football. The Fox Soccer Channel started about six or seven years ago and originally had limited availability and variety. Today, it has more Premier League matches than any other network here including exclusive licensing for Champions League and Serie A. It also has a second channel for The Football League and some rugby among other things.

With increased interest, the Champions League final has been displayed the past two years on Fox's regular national network. NBC wants to do the same with rugby union by playing a few matches (including the final) from the world cup on their regular national network. While they may not be approaching the cup very well by charging viewers an arm and a leg to watch most of the matches, the fact that the final will be aired on channel 5 is a huge deal.

Some colleges are really getting into rugby and most people here that have never watched the sport have shown some interest in it. The problem before was that there was no where to watch the game without paying a price! ESPN now has weekly Top 14 matches available for free online and announced this summer that if interest increases again this season that they may push the number of matches per week online to three with one of the matches aired live on ESPN2.

There are already a lot of clubs in cities like Chicago and New York, where both cities have their own governing bodies within USA Rugby. I'd love to see the sport take off following the world cup. If more people cared about rugby, I think we could be a top five nation within 20 years.

​

 

[Thingimubob]

Would need to have a very good grassroots rugby system before they can really and truly challenge any of the bigger nations.
Just look at New Zealand, population of 4 Million (a fraction of the US population) but they just have a conveyor belt of talented rugby players! They have very good club system, very good school and age grade system and they have a good sized step up to things like the ITM and then Super Rugby. The US would have to go some way to doing the same if they want to be good, then again they could just implement rugby into the college system that they already have, seems to work for most American sports!

 

[big ginger 8]

7's is better suited and it's what they're more likely to concentrate on ecspecially since it's in the olympics.

 

[Larksea]

I can see the US becoming much more interested in Rugby and Football in particular. Obviously football is on the rise in the US and becoming a much more popular sport and I think the IRB 7's and the rugby world cup has increased US interest in Rugby as well.

it's all relative though, yes rugby is big in NZ but it's not the only sport we play is it. NZ are obviously the current league world camps and in all honesty I can think of a few guys in the kiwi's league team that would walk into the all blacks if they were union players. Kevin Locke in particular, that kid is a freak. NZ are also one of the strongest Rowing nations in the world and punch well above their weight in many sports.

 

[calculon]

I can see the US becoming much more interested in Rugby and Football in particular. Obviously football is on the rise in the US and becoming a much more popular sport and I think the IRB 7's and the rugby world cup has increased US interest in Rugby as well.

it's all relative though, yes rugby is big in NZ but it's not the only sport we play is it. NZ are obviously the current league world camps and in all honesty I can think of a few guys in the kiwi's league team that would walk into the all blacks if they were union players. Kevin Locke in particular, that kid is a freak. NZ are also one of the strongest Rowing nations in the world and punch well above their weight in many sports.

Yeah, u deffinitely do. As does Norway.

 

[calculon]

..will they dominate with Universal Soldier type players..

maybe.

 

[james5000]

A country as large and rich as the US could definitely have the potential to develop in to a top tier rugby nation.

I very much doubt they could break top 5 in twenty or less years though. That's not realistic at all. They would have to improve from grass roots level up at a tremendous rate. They would have to compete in either 6 nations or what is soon to be Quad Nations, to have any chance of getting to top 5 level in less then 20 years.

 

[calculon]

A country as large and rich as the US could definitely have the potential to develop in to a top tier rugby nation.

I very much doubt they could break top 5 in twenty or less years though. That's not realistic at all. They would have to improve from grass roots level up at a tremendous rate. They would have to compete in either 6 nations or what is soon to be Quad Nations, to have any chance of getting to top 5 level in less then 20 years.

Or maybe some contact version of ultimate frisbie will become incredibly popular and spawn pro leagues - nobody knows the future.

 

[M Two One]

They would have to compete in either 6 nations or what is soon to be Quad Nations, to have any chance of getting to top 5 level in less then 20 years.

That's true.

You have to get your ass handed to you if you want to get better.

 

[calculon]

That's true.

You have to get your ass handed to you if you want to get better.

But everyone would hate you if you were really good, because most Americans wouldn't care. It would be: "The Cowboys were beaten by the Jets. In other news America won some world cup in some game called rugby that nobody's every heard of."

 

[duncanb]

Would have to be developed bottom up without knowing about USA I think schools/colleges have a vested interest in producing players for Universities as the feeders NFL NBA etc what could Rugby USA offer as a $$ incentive to produce players then where is the pro club base to then feed into. Would be a very long road to develop and can't see it being top down as any players who are good enough head abroad and as other posts USA limited coverage of rugby.

Duncanb

 

[UilamOsa]

If they really got involved, Money/Sponsors/Colleges - it would take them less than 2 generations to be a Top 10 team.

If they were to consider it, I think they would recruit current pros from around the world, develop a 'Super' comp to maintain interest. Develop their juniors then clubs and then everything else would follow.

It's a country where professional sports has been done for years. It wouldn't be easy, but they would be a Top 5 team with US born players within 3 generations.

Just the money alone they could throw at the talent floating around both playing and coaching would match both hemispheres combined.

But that's if...