We’re about six weeks away from the beginning of the Major League Rugby season, and the second season for a new experiment.
Anthem Rugby Carolina is the USA Rugby-supported team that was added on late notice last year to ensure a good, even number of teams. With funding from USA Rugby, World Rugby, and MLR, the team was created to provide a USA-heavy playing environment within the league. It’s no secret that this is a foreigner-heavy league—Major League Rugby has a very high maximum of non-North American players allowed on a team, and teams can actually trade foreigner spots. As a result, as pointed out here, it’s very tough even for highly-drafted domestic players to get minutes, and at certainly positions it becomes near impossible.
That’s where Anthem came in. And while they had to use some overseas players for a little veteran continuity, the goal has definitely been to make this an all-USA-eligible side.
The first season wasn’t so easy, as Anthem went 0-16. But given the fact that the squad was put together really late, it’s not a terrible thing. They gave up a lot of points—200 more than the next highest number—but they also scored points, averaging about three tries a game.
But they had no shortage of players wanting to play for this team. Why? Minutes. As Anthem Head Coach Alama Ieremia said in his interview with GRR, “meaningful minutes.” Anthem had a commodity they didn’t need—foreigner spots—and a commodity US-eligible players wanted more than extra money (such as it is in the MLR)—game time.
So Anthem traded up for draft options, taking the #1 pick in all three rounds (which they had already) and trading for the #2 overall, the #5 overall, and the #24 overall. The result was a six-player haul: Saint Mary’s center/fullback Erich Storti, Queen’s University Ontario hooker Neil Trainor, Life University fullback/flyhalf Jeron Pantor, Arizona center EJ Freeman, Lindenwood lock LeDonn Mathis, and Notre Dame College wing Ashawnty Staples.
That’s six new players. No other team drafted more than four.
And getting American players time on the field is a major part of the Anthem’s mission; a major part, but not the entire part.
“There is a big development component to our campaign,” Ieremia told GRR. “But make no mistake, I’m actually coaching to make sure we actually get some wins. I I believe we can do both, and I believe in some cases that actually winning is a good tool for development. Certainly I’m going to bring that into our campaign and we’ve actually started that way. I think we’ll still we’ll still have a big development focus to the, but then I certainly think we’ll aim to try and win games as well.”
Anthem is in preseason training and, for sure, they have some work to do to establish the right combinations and who plays where. Most of the players who were not USA eligible who were on Anthem last year have moved on. A couple have stayed as sort of player-mentors. The team also makes dispensations for players who will be USA eligible via residency soon.
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