With baseball’s steroid scandals still occupying the news in America, Australia is also reeling from shameful news about its national pastime as well. Rugby players in the land down under have been behaving in disgraceful fashions, but no team is dealing with more controversy than the Sydney Roosters. One year ago, the Roosters suspended and fined Nate Myles after he pooped on a hotel room floor, and now the team is faced (Ed. – feced?) with scandal… No. 2.

Roosters rookies Sam Brunton and Anthony Gelling have been kicked off the team for taking dumps all over a Holiday Inn in North Queensland. Ironically, South Queensland is known for its love of table-pooping. Needless to say, the hotel’s staff was not too pleased with this behavior, and they want the world to know about this awful stench of injustice. Meanwhile, Najeh Davenport thinks these guys are A-OK.

Aim for my chest, Daily Telegraph:

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You all might know about the New Zealand national rugby team that goes by the ‘All-Blacks’, who are mostly famous because of their famous Haka dance where they all get in position at pre-game and perform a feral version of those dances Danzel Washington made his team do in Remember the Titans that are meant to intimidate opponents and receive lots of hits on the internet. It kind of looks like a combination of a human sacrifice ceremony and a turkey mating dance.

Anyway, a new BBC documentary has discovered the story of All-Black superstar Buck Shelford, whose insatiable zest for winning trumped all, including his own testicular health.

If ever there was one moment when Wayne “Buck” Shelford embedded his name forever into rugby’s rich history, it was during the infamous “Battle of Nantes” in 1986. Playing only his second Test for the All Blacks against a physically intimidating French side, Shelford found himself at the bottom of a rather aggressive ruck on 20 minutes.

An errant Les Bleus stud found its way to his groin, where it somehow managed to tear his scrotum, leaving one testicle hanging out. This alone would leave most men screaming in agony and heading for the nearest hospital. But not Shelford. He calmly instructed the physio to stitch him up.

The French public were gobsmacked as an over-eager pitchside cameraman filmed the stomach-turning surgery, and even more so when Shelford returned to the field and carried on playing.

“I was knocked out cold, lost a few teeth and had a few stitches down below,” recalls the Saracens coach. -BBC

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Why, wot's all this then?

I played football throughout high school, and other than practices in 100 degree heat, questionable coaching, and games in which you lose by six touchdowns, it was a good time. So when I got to college, I tried out rugby, under the assumption that it was a less popular form of football that didn’t require me to be three inches taller, 75 pounds heavier, and get consistently cold clocked by 300 lb men. In that regard, I was right, but after a week or so I finally decided to drop the game. It is violent, which I enjoy, and you can get past hitting without pads soon enough, but it’s just not the same as football. Football is organized, and has a sense of direction. You know what you have to do for the play to be successful, and if everyone does their job, the play will work. Rugby is a clusterf**k. I had no idea what was going on at any time I was on the field, and as such, was almost as useless as Brian Scalabrine.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that I enjoy videos in which people get hurt. There’s one after the jump, and it’s rugby related. I would also like to state, for the fictional record, that I like Australian and New Zeland accents. You mean they have summer in the winter and winter in the summer? That’s craaaaaazy. Read the rest of this entry »

Take this video as a precaution not to stray too close to the next furry convention in your town. These guys can move. Maybe they’re starting to make their costumes with breatheable fabrics along with dickholes, or something. Either that, or this is the most athletic furry fetishist of all time.

The footage comes from last month’s Hong Kong Rugby Sevens. Quite an impressive feat by the guy in the cat costume. His friend just quits right at the outset, but Kitty Cat Man jumped from one goalpost, dashed to the middle of the field, danced around with the ball, then put some impressive jukes on security to make it to the stands on the other end. Also nice was the decision of the officials at the stadium to be playing The Pretenders Proclaimers “I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles)” while the action transpired. With the courage gleaned from his flight from security, no doubt that there is no distance Kitty Cat Man would not cross to be in hirsute arms of his beloved in a centaur costume. I guess maybe that’s hooves then.

The dentally challenged bloke pictured above is Welsh rugby player Gareth Thomas. He has played for the English Welsh national rugby team and currently is a winger for something called the Cardiff Blues. And he’s a gay man. Steeped in gayness. The funny thing is, no one really seems to give a rip, including his teammates.

Thomas came out to his closest friends three years ago, but has realized since then that by remaining in the closet he was doing no favors to himself (he once contemplated suicide), nor was he filling the role as a potential role model for other homosexual athletes.

“I wasn’t sure if I ever wanted to let people know, and, to be honest, I feel anxious about people’s reactions and the effect it might have on my family.

“It’s been really tough for me, hiding who I really am, and I don’t want it to be like that for the next young person who wants to play rugby, or some frightened young kid.

“Sometimes I felt so alone and depressed. I’ve stood on so many cliff edges.” via. via.

Given that an athlete who plays the rough-and-tumble sport of rugby can announce that he is a homosexual and not be greeted by derision and alienation by his teammates certainly begs the question: when will we see someone who plays professional sports in the U.S. make the courageous decision to come out? We cannot stand idly by while those Euros show us how progressive they can be. In a way, it is our era’s Race to the Moon; except in that situation, we were competing against the Russians and were trying to land a spacecraft on the Moon. But I hope you understand where I am going with this because I certainly do not.

The International Olympic Committee voted on Friday to reinstate golf and rugby as Olympic events and the two sports will make their return in the 2016 Olympics in Rio di Janeiro. Golf was approved 63-27 and rugby was voted in 81-8, a reversal of when the IOC voted four years ago to not allow golf and rugby in the 2012 Olympic Games. Suck on that, Chicago!

Several members of the IOC were upset how golf and rugby were essentially rammed down their throats by the executive board, specifically Canadian representative Dick Pound.

The selection process angered some IOC members, who wanted all seven sports put to a vote by the entire assembly. Senior Canadian member Dick Pound complained before the vote that the members were never told why the two sports were selected over the other five.

“It is not fair to the other five sports,” Pound said. “Because you decided the way you did, it is not a transparent process.”

Heh. Dick Pound. I wish that was my name. Do you think he actually is proud of it? Is it possible that he has partnered up with Dick Armey to lead a secret society of Dicks?

Rugby was last included as an Olympic event in 1924 and the last time golf was included in the Olympics was at the 1904 Olympics in St. Louis.

Golf will stage a 72-hole stroke-play tournament for men and women, with 60 players in each field. Rugby will organize a four-day seven-a-side tournament – instead of the more traditional 15-a-side game – for 12 men’s and women’s teams. Golf will stage a 72-hole stroke-play tournament for men and women, with 60 players in each field. via.

That all sounds well and good, but there is only one problem: Rio has only two golf courses, and my guess is they aren’t in the condition that world-class golfers have grown accustomed to. So good luck with all that, Rio. My guess is they have about a good a chance at working out this clusterbang as I do understanding what in the hell is going on in a game of rubgy. Seriously, I’ve tried many times and I’m still lost. Granted, I find the rules of Twister confusing. It doesn’t help that I’m colorblind, but still.