Why are Rugby League players so dumb?

I know it is not right to judge sportsmen by their intellect, or their ability to string a sentence together. You’d never do the reverse to an astrophysicist. You’d never say: Einstein, genius, but awful ball skills. That would be stupid. But with all that said, one would like to hope that our sports heroes at least have some semblance of a brain. It really helps in your everyday life. But with Rugby League that may be one wish too many.

Somehow league manages to attract the thickest of thick to its ranks. Again and again NRL players find themselves yellow-carded in real life for a wide array of the stupidest acts ever. This week a player from Canberra thought it would be a good idea to get some snapshots of him “simulating” oral sex with his dog. I put simulating in speech marks because it looked pretty real. Google image search it. But be warned, it’s graphic.

Beyond the questionable morals of the man, how stupid do you need to be to do this? At what point does it seem like a good idea? Even if you have sucked back a caseload of booze, surely your “career alarm bells” start to ring when your knob is in a dog’s mouth? Surely at some point you must think: Is oral sex from a bull terrier really worth millions in club salaries and sponsorship deals?

Oh well, that’s probably the last we’ll hear of Joel Monaghan. Or maybe he will reinvent himself as a heavyweight boxer like John “Stinkfinger” Hopoate did. Hopoate got the name stinkfinger after he stuck his finger up another player’s ass during a game. Hopoate, in true numpty fashion, didn’t seem to understand what the horde of men on the sideline with the funny little black boxes were doing. Yes, John, they were taking your photo. In the blink of a camera, your career can disappear just like a finger up a man’s a-hole.

League stars have come up short so many times that there is an entire section on Wikipedia called: List of off-field incidents involving rugby league players. If you try avoid the dark stories of gang rape and sexual crimes (NRL players have an evil streak too), you will see some seriously dumb things there. A man who shat in his mate’s shoe. A guy who pissed under the table in a casino. A player who tried to set fire to a kid’s foam costume while the kid was in it. And another who succeeded in setting a friend’s pants on fire. But probably the most telling thing on the list is the warning at the top of the page: This is an incomplete list, which may never be able to satisfy particular standards for completeness. (What I think they are trying to say is: leagies are a bunch of thick bastards and will be keep cocking up until kingdom come).

Rugby league is a hard game and it is guaranteed that you will take a few hard knocks to head. But surely players are not left that retarded that they lose all sense of right and wrong? And if that is the case, maybe we need to consider new living arrangements for them. Cages at the stadiums may not be a bad idea.

PS. I know that every code of sport, every walk of life, has its morons (our old Springbok friend, Joost, springs to mind) but Rugby League defies belief.