#RUGBY | #SPORTS | #SEATTLE
Rory Best Accepts a Coaching Role With the Seattle Seawolves
It’s a big shakeup for the team.
A famous hooker from Ireland has accepted a coaching role with the Seattle Seawolves. His main role is to help build elite player skills and capabilities.
Rory Best brings his technical and high-performance skills coaching to the Seawolves and will be with the team through the rest of their 2021 season. He will work with the coaching team in the current year and work toward laying the groundwork for future club development.
A professional rugby union team founded in 2017, the Seattle Seawolves are based in Tukwila, WA. They compete in Major League Rugby, which is top-level for the United States.
What’s a hooker?
It’s one of the front row positions in a rugby team. The name hooker comes from the way they hook or rake the ball back with their foot. Sometimes a hooker is called a rake.
A hooker is one of the team’s forwards and has a lot of responsibility. They’re the ‘acting halfback and are the ones who pick up the ball when the play begins again after a tackle. Their decision about where to put the ball is key to the game. They can pass it, run with it, or kick it.
The hooker is a specialized position, one of the more important ones on the team.
Rory Best (OBE) is a former Ulster and Ireland captain.
- (OBE stands for Order of the British Empire, an honor awarded for a major role in his capacity, making a distinguished contribution of ‘service to rugby’.)
He made his debut in Ulster in 2004 and became their captain at the young age of twenty-five. Then he led them to the Heineken Cup finals in 2012.
When he was captain of Ireland, he earned 124 caps and played in four world cups.
What’s a cap?
- Anytime a rugby player plays in a match they are awarded a cap. It’s an honorific, not an actual award. The term is used to count the number of official games a player has appeared for their national team against another national team.
- Best has earned the most caps of any rugby player all time.
He is the only Irish captain to have a win over Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. That’s an achievement that only a few captains have achieved.
Best retired from rugby, playing his last game in October 2019 after the world cup.
He’s been spending his time working on the family farm near Poyntzpass. He’s also taking time to be with his family.
He returned to the family farm to help his father, John, and his brother, Simon with the operations. They currently run a farm with a pedigree Aberdeen Angus herd.
- They’ve modernized, and are using the Herdwatch app to track and monitor stock. It’s been an invaluable tool to add to the farm, allowing anyone with a phone to take notes and update important information.
Born and raised on the family farm in County Armagh, Best is married with three children, two sons, and a daughter.
The transition from being a senior rugby player into farming after 15 years was a shift, but he enjoyed getting back to his roots.
Farming during the lockdown was a beneficial distraction.
Now that he’s moving into a coaching role, he’s looking forward to the change. He’s also evaluating his long-term career options, to see if coaching is a possibility for him.
“This will give me an idea. Even getting out there to do a bit of stuff with them when the time is right, that’ll give me a feel for how involved in rugby I want to be. I’m really grateful to Seattle for giving me this opportunity.” Rory Best
Sources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rugby_union_positions#Hooker
*also published in Newsbreak, by author.