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Gone fishin'

Sometimes, when I gotta work, Gainline.us goes quiet. For the next two weeks or so, there won't be much posting because I'll be on vacation.

Virginia club in NZ fundraiser

A Virginia club is planning a fundraiser to benefit Christchurch, the New Zealand city recently leveled by earthquake.

Alexandria, which has been raising money for after-school and summer youth programs during screenings of Six Nations matches, is converting its March 12 event to contributions for a relief fund, the club said in a press release. The day's slate includes France-Italy and Ireland-Wales.

Though difficult to measure in terms of gross domestic product, rugby is perhaps the Pacific island nation's leading export. If you've played senior rugby in America, you've almost certainly played with Kiwis. Last week's disaster is therefore rippling throughout the US, among active players and old teammates, even though mainstream media has all but ignored the tragic event.

Yet American clubs are chronically cash poor, and in the midst of economic doldrums. So rallying on behalf of Christchurch is not only public spirited in the game's best tradition, but also a hopeful sign that the donors think they will be able raise additional sums in the future.

With a strong concentration of diplomats and sundry expats, the Washington DC area has traditionally staged an Ambassador's Shield contest, pitting Kiwis against the local opposition.

Separately, USARFU rebranded the College Premier League as the College Premier Division. 'Each of the teams are still classified as division 1 and therefore teams are not technically a league, but rather an elite division,' the union said in a press release. Coming just days before the fledgling league's kickoff, the move suggests commercial development has been tepid.

Friday's post, 'Colleges divided in four regions', incorrectly stated the cutoff for non-CPD division 1 teams to affiliate with conferences, should they wish to participate in USARFU's 2012 playoffs. It is June 1.

US ref guidelines feature the tackle

Managing the tackle features in USARFU's latest Game Management Guidelines, an illustrated supplement to the lawbook now circulating among the country's referees.

Though few in number compared with football or baseball, applying rugby's rules can be bafflingly complex. The more so because elite players, coaches, and referees around the world are perpetually shaping and reshaping conceptual views. 

Few topics are more contentious than the contest for possession of the ball and the offensive team's ability to move it quickly away from the tackle area. Thus the guidelines effectively function to focus of contemporary expectations.

In addition to clarifying the latest thinking, the GMG continue in American officialdom's tradition of innovation. In one notable example, US refs were among the first to collect the laws into a small, annotated handbook with helpful accessories. Subsequently, the IRB superseded the effort (with the unfortunate side effect of preempting a meaningful referee society  revenue stream).

The guidelines debuted prior to the 2008 season, the product of referees working with Super League coaches. Favorably received, they were updated prior to 2009 so as be applicable to all levels of US rugby.

Last year, the IRB issued several directives that were sometimes called 'new laws'. 'They were not new laws, just re-emphasizes, which were already addressed in our GMGs. For example, the requirement of a distinct, four-count engagement sequence,' USARFU referee development director Ed Todd said in an email.

Discussion of the tackle has indeed been au courant among referee fora. Many are already looking for one of three indications that the player isn't holding on and doesn't have any weight on his arms: spreading the arms apart, showing both palms face up, or clapping one's hands together. Provided the player has gotten both feet on 'his' side of the tackled player before touching the ball again, any of these can be deemed evidence that the player may afterward legally go for the ball.

Also in 2011, the GMG section on assistant referees (i.e., touch judges) has been removed and will be reissued as a separate document.

Related stories:
     In praise of American referees
     Tackling in the spotlight for 2006

USRFF makes play for corporate dollars

A leading rugby nonprofit is looking to win corporate funding for its ambition of giving a ball to every registered teenage player.

Next week, the US Rugby Football Foundation intends to submit a proposal to the Pepsi Refresh Project in hopes of a $250,000 grant. The merits will be judged largely on whether the pitch is one of the top two vote getters in Pepsi's online pool, which will launch on August 1.

Present and past US coaches Eddie O'Sullivan, Tom Billups, and Jack Clark as well as at least nine Eagle captains have lined up in support of the 'Ball 4 All' idea.

The campaign underlines the nonprofit sector's role in American rugby. More than is commonly understood, the game relies on a variety organizations to resources and development opportunities. 

Such institutions range from USRFF to public and private schools sponsoring teams as well as rugby summer camps, from for-profit entities such as the USA 7s to the US Olympic Committee, now taking a more active role with the inclusion of 7s in the summer games. 

USRFF's goal is reminiscent of USARFU's recent program to provide jerseys for college teams. Boulder's initiative, disbanded after two seasons, was tied to the union's imperative to project a sponsor's message into the university environment while diverting some of the proceeds elsewhere.

'If we are fortunate to be one of the two organizations to receive the top award of $250,000, we will use every cent of that money to purchase balls so that every youth and high school player registered with US Rugby will receive their own ball,' USRFF executive director and past US captain Brian Vizard wrote in one letter rounding up support.

'Receiving the first ball I ever owned elevated my play as that ball rarely left my side for the next 10 years. I took that ball to school, to the store, in the car, on dates. I even slept with it. But the constant handling and kicking improved my overall game and helped me get to the top of US rugby,' the standout eightman said.

The Pepsi Refresh Project provides 32 organizations with cash awards each month. USRFF feels August is the optimum month to compete for top prize.

Tuesday's post incorrectly described the commercial basis of the Collegiate Championship Invitational: USA 7s paid for the tournament and NBC paid for television production and air time, and the two bodies collaborated on ad sales, which were used to cover costs. USA 7s broken even on the debut event, according to people familiar with the matter.

Also, I made a hash of the distinction between players registered in the 'competitive season' (i.e., September to August) and the calendar year. To date, the number of players registered in the soon-to-end competitive season is near to 93,000, and will top the 2008-09 cycle by approximately 11 percent, according to national office staff.

Paul Ganey (d. 2010)

Paul Ganey, one of the more practical, persistent men in the long history of Southern California rugby, expired this past weekend.

Ganey helped found Loyola Marymount University's team in 1958 and went on to play for Los Angeles, a leading senior side in one of the country's stronger regions. But his lasting mark was made through many years of diligent regional administration.

He took up as president of Southern California just as American rugby began an era of off-field innovation that confused players and complicated volunteer work. Starting with the 1992 launch of USARFU's dues program, the next dozen or so years taxed the energy and common sense of local officials who often had to implement new initiatives without meaningful direction from the national body.

In addition to the Club and Individual Participation Program's initial lack of a central compliance mechanism, there was the dues-fueled growth but uncertain trajectory a national office headed by a succession of undistinguished executives, and the board of directors-led collapse of the senior Inter-Territorial Tournament, then the main conduit to the national team. All but lost in such turmoil was the territories' priority to manage everyday and championship competition, an imperative sometimes expressed by the saying that the game is for the players.

Ganey not only saw to it that games were played and champions crowned, but also faithfully carried the perspective to USARFU's board, where his views were authentically local without being narrowly provincial. Such voices have largely been muffled by the union's 2006 reorganization because the directors have evinced little organic understanding of America's domestic game, although Ganey and a few kindred spirits perserved in the congress.

Of course, Ganey himself played a pivotal role in another rivening moment, the fracturing of the old four-territory structure, as Southern California's 1995 split from the Pacific Coast preceded the more rambuctious dissolution of the Eastern territory into three. Why did the erstwhile local union do it? Particularly given the growing demands of CIPP, Ganey and his colleagues thought they could do a better job managing league competition and of course that perennial American bogey, player eligibility, than could a body responsible for a region from Seattle to Salt Lake to San Francisco to San Diego.

A contractor by profession, Ganey continued in Southern California's administration to the end and had been working on a history of American rugby.

Cheerful but not quite optimistic, skeptical but not really cynical, Ganey tried to see things for what they were and to make the best of them. It would hard to fete a figure whose career was occupied by bureaucratic currents. But for more than 50 years, Paul Ganey's intent was to clear the decks for players and teams to compete, and so it is fitting that Southern California's senior championship, the Ganey Cup, is named in his honor.

Maturation evident in charity event

Pink Jersey, Pink Tie organizers are hoping next weekend's Olympic Club-San Francisco Golden Gate charity match and auction will generate the equivalent of a full season's expenditure for many American teams.

'In 2009, the first year this event took place, we were able to raise over $16,000 for the KAM [Kathleen Ann McClenahan] Foundation. This year we ... hope to raise over $20,000,' executive director Nick Polsky said in a prepared statement. KAM provides services for breast cancer patients and their families.

The benefit can be seen as evidence that maturing rugby teams are taking on civic roles common among America's mainstream sports. In addition to raising a sum that would be the envy of many hand-to-mouth clubs -- particularly amid economic doldrums that have traditionally hit the sport hard -- the initiative shows San Francisco's elite at work on behalf of a so-called women's issue.

SFGG, which is hosting the March 6 game at its estimable Treasure Island facility, also stages a Thanksgiving fixture to help prevent teenage suicide, inspired by the loss of a high school player. Across country, the New York Athletic Club holds an annual game to honor players, many of them in public services, victimized by the September 11 terrorist attack.

For more and more teams, as philanthropy becomes part of their repetoire, so their overall organizational capacity increases.

The Pink Jersey, Pink Tie game derives revenue from match attendance, expected to rival or exceed Super League games because the game is a cross-town rivalry, as well as a postmatch reception and auction at one of the city's better hotels. Reception tickets are available at www.pinkjerseypinktie.org.

Refs mentor Porter stepping down

Bryan Porter, whose sharp eye helped mold many of America's international referees, is stepping down from active duty with USARFU and the IRB.

Having emigrated from New Zealand some five decades ago, Porter played in San Francisco before taking up the whistle. He would have been a candidate for national honors at the time of the union's founding, but instead agreed to chair a new committee charged to standardize and improve the America's officiating.

Porter has held the role of national evaluator ever since. Most of the country's best and brightest, ranging from Dennis Shanagher, Ian Nixon, and Don Morrison to Don Reordan, Al Klemp, and latterly Dana Teagarden, would have worked extensively with the former insurance executive.

Like players, referees are promoted on the basis of consistently good performance, and an official's showing in high-stakes contests is thought to reflect on his referee society, if not the entire union. Even within rugby's closely knit fraternity, the matter of identifying and evaluating elite referees is an enigmatic calling, requiring judgment of technical skill and also temperament.

More a jocular fellow than eminence grise, Porter was often be found on the sidelines or under the referees' tent, intent on the craft. He is expected to continue working in the Northern California area, which boasts one of the country's larger and more active referee societies.

Porter is to be honored at dinners on both coasts in the springtime.

Related: Ref rankings revamped

Ref rankings revamped

Referee classifications are to be consolidated, in an effort to make more challenging games available to promising officials.

The rankings B3 to B1, indicative of a referee worthy of higher-level matches in any given territory, will be grouped in a single T rating beginning January 1. The purpose is to streamline opportunities for evaluation and promotion.

'The requirements for getting promoted through the B grades were essentially impossible to fulfill at the local and territorial level: the requisite-level games were all national appointments. You almost had to somehow earn national panel status in order to be assigned the games necessary to earn national panel status,' referee and laws committee chair Bruce Carter said in an email.

The national panel, the highest level, comprises roughly two dozen or so officials who referee Super League, national playoff matches, and the like. Some are further singled out as capable of handling international games.

America's referees are typically characterized as technically behind, and a draft of USARFU's high performance plan offers few specifics for improvement. The group's administrative practices are more nimble, however, particularly when compared with, for example, the eligibility committee.

The revised ranking approach could help younger officials advance more quickly, something the IRB has sought to encourage. Like soccer, rugby's governing body believes that men in their 50s are not fit to officiate international athletes predominantly in their 20s.

Locally ranked officials also will be reclassified, with L4 as the beginner's designation and L1 as the notch below the T level. As part of the change, criteria for advancement to the L1 and T levels has been stiffened slightly, Carter said.

Gone fishin'

Normally when Gainline.us goes quiet, it signals business has overtaken. For the next two weeks, however, I'm on vacation. See you soon.

On comparing professionalism and 7s

The official delirium that greeted 7-a-side's admission to the Olympics matches the hysteria accompanying rugby's transition to professionalism. Why?

In the nearly 15 years since union shed its antiquated precept barring compensation, tens of thousands of players and coaches have newly made a decent living while virtually every major competition has grown. Not least to gain has been the World Cup, which has bankrolled the International Rugby Board's vaunted development grant program as well as the decade-long 7s lobbying blitz.

Yet professionalism -- more properly, market dynamics operating transparently -- remains the game's bogey. In America, for example, it is said to preclude our elites from catching up to developed nations. That is a tired thesis: Since 1995, amateurs from Argentina, Canada, and the Polynesian islands have routinely proven good enough to compete in European pro leagues, and despite the Argentine union's notorious penury, the Spanish-speaking Pumas have become a world power.

Meanwhile, IRB grants and direct sponsorship have made it possible for USARFU to hire more staff, at higher salaries, than would have been possible in the days when dues alone fueled the organization. To wit, Boulder's 2007 payroll expenses equated to 73% of that year's CIPP dues. (2008 tax filings are not yet available.)

Conversely, Olympic 7s has been lauded for promising to bring the game to many new countries. But in fact only a dozen of the usual suspects will reach Rio de Janeiro in 2016. It remains unclear whether the also-ran unions will obtain significant funding and management assistance from their respective Olympic committees, which are notoriously byzantine (if not plain corrupt).

The expectation of quasi-government funding is familiar to Commonwealth countries, with their history of formally constituted sports departments (ministries), and stands in contrast to the really new source of money that will come into the game. More than 60 percent of International Olympic Committee revenue comes from US sources; more than 60 national Olympic committees have revenue-sharing agreements with the IOC; therefore world rugby has for the first time achieved its cherished goal of tapping the American commercial market. Which is of course what USARFU's board has been charged to do.