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Topic: Hurling on Wall Street
An Fear Rua (Editor)	Posted: 26-Jul-2007 19:28	Quote Edit Delete Report Post Post Reply
An Fear Rua (Editor)	Today's 'Wall Street Journal' Hurling in America Has a Problem -- Too Few Irishmen The Lure of the Old Sod And Immigration Issues Make for a Player Shortage By CONOR DOUGHERTY July 26, 2007; Page A1 For five years straight, the Clan Na nGael sports club in Atlanta sent a team to the North American Hurling Championships. That ended a year ago: Try as it did, Clan Na nGael could muster only 12 players, and it takes at least 13 to make a team. "We didn't play any competitive games last year," says Jim Whooley, vice chairman of Clan Na nGael. "We just played scrimmage games among ourselves, six on six and five on five." Hurling -- a centuries-old sport that has elements of field hockey and lacrosse -- has an immigration problem. With the Irish economy booming and the U.S. tightening borders, Irish expatriates are returning home and fewer newcomers are taking their place. The New York board of the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) has lost four of its eight hurling teams in the past three years. In Boston, the Wexford Hurling Club is worried it will soon lose one of its two teams. And ever since the San Jose, Calif., team folded a few years ago, Northern California's two remaining clubs have played each other, and only each other. They settle the local "championship" with a best-of-five competition. Hurling "is becoming extinct," says Tom Flynn, an Irish immigrant who started with a New Jersey team in 1954 and remains involved with the club's management. To keep going, hurling teams enlist Irish students who come to America for the summer. Hoping to build a new generation of hurlers, they also are setting up youth leagues. And, as part of a recruiting push, they are trying to interest Americans in the sport. "American-born players must become the backbone of our clubs in the long term if the games are to survive out here," says Eamonn Gormley, a San Francisco Web-site developer and GAA member who has been trying to get hurling teams started on college campuses in Northern California. Turning Americans on to hurling will be tough. To many Americans, hurling is just a slang term for vomiting. Once they learn that it's a sport, they often confuse it with curling, the winter Olympic sport played with brooms. Grit and Finesse Perhaps the greatest obstacle is that hurling -- which requires the endurance of soccer, the grit of football and the finesse of hacky sack -- is hard to play. Americans who try the sport quickly find themselves outclassed by Irishmen who have been playing since they were toddlers. GAELIC SPORT A hurling team has 15 players armed with wooden paddles called hurleys. Players tussle with another team over a baseball-size sphere called a siothar. There are goals at either end of the field, and teams score three points each time the siothar (pronounced "slit-ar") makes it in. A siothar that flies through uprights above the goal scores one point. The hardest part of the game is learning to handle the hurley, which is like an extended arm, for the 60 minutes of a match. Hurlers can't throw the siothar, and they can carry it in their hands for only a few steps. So players pass the ball with a combination of open-palm slaps, kicks and -- for extra-long shots -- by tossing the siothar in the air and striking it downfield with the hurley. When the siothar is balanced on top of the hurley, a player can run for as many steps as he likes. But that isn't easy with the opposing team throwing body checks and slashing at the siothar as if they were in a sword fight. Brian Whitlow, an American graduate student in San Francisco, tried out for a hurling team two years ago after seeing the sport on television. It didn't go well: In practices, he rarely got the ball, and when he did he never made it more than a few steps before the ball was knocked away. After playing in one match, he was benched. He quit halfway through the season. Mr. Whitlow now has a new strategy: With help from Mr. Gormley, he has organized a club for American players. "The idea is to get an opportunity to play in a match and kind of learn as we go," he says. Irish games have been played in the U.S. for as long as there have been Irish immigrants. In the summer, Irish expats flock to places like Gaelic Park in New York's Bronx borough, where they cheer from the bleachers and drink beer or Magners cider over ice. The New York board of the Gaelic Athletic Association was formed in 1914, and, by the club's reckoning, it has had a hurling team ever since. For all that time, the size and strength of U.S.-based hurling teams have been tied informally to U.S. immigration policy and the strength of the Irish economy. Until recently, the New York GAA says, its toughest recruiting period was the late 1960s and early '70s. The Immigration Act of 1965 had reduced the flow of Irish immigration. Irish Economy Today, there are two problems: The strong Irish economy is keeping people from emigrating or drawing them back home, while U.S. immigration laws are making life tougher for Irish who are in the U.S. illegally. Ireland's gross domestic product has grown an average of 7.2% annually for the past decade, according to the International Monetary Fund, more than twice the rate of the U.S. There were 128,000 Irish-born residents of the U.S. in 2005, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, down from 156,000 in 2000. In 1980, there had been about 290,000. The decline has accelerated in recent years as post-9/11 immigration reforms -- particularly a New York program to verify Social Security numbers for driver's licenses -- have made it tougher for illegal immigrants to live normal lives. Alan Gleeson, a 28-year-old electrician who hurled in New York until last year, recently returned to County Offaly, in part because his illegal status was making it harder to live in the U.S. "You couldn't get a driver's license, so you were limited to where you could work," he says. At its height in the 1980s, the New York board of the GAA had about 10 hurling teams. Today there are just four: Offaly, Galway, Tipperary and New Jersey/Kilkenny. Worries Over Decline The decline worries John Phelan. A retired accountant, he left Ireland 50 years ago and has been playing or watching hurling at Gaelic Park ever since. The league, he says, is as small as it can be: "If it goes below four, we're a dead duck." On a recent afternoon, Mr. Phelan and two Irish friends chatted while watching New Jersey/Kilkenny face off against Galway. Before the game, Galway's manager gave his team a profanity-filled speech in which he encouraged his players to "use the timber." (Translation: Don't be gentle with the hurley.) It would take more than a pep talk. Over the next hour, hurlers from New Jersey/Kilkenny sent shot after shot through the uprights above the goal. Mr. Flynn, the former player who has been involved with the team since the '50s, is confident it will win its third straight championship this year, but he isn't sure how much further the team can go. "The way it's going now," he says, "we will be lucky to get two more years out of hurling in New York." Write to Conor Dougherty
D-Day (1,197 Posts)	Posted: 26-Jul-2007 20:34	Quote Edit Delete Report Post Post Reply
D-Day (1,197 Posts)	Interesting article. I think there are other factors involved, and also other possibilities for the GAA in the United States. Without knowing the sport well, I think many parents would be apprehensive letting their kids play hurling. My parents have a hurley and siothar on display in their house in New Jersey (even though my parents are from non-hurling counties), and most friends view the sport with disbelief. In contrast to that, most friends that have visited here and gone to a hurling match with me, see it more as lacrosse. Without people playing it while they grow up, it's hard to develop a league or get a reliable base for teams to draw on. So, i really fault those that were there in the 80s for not trying to grow it more with non-Irish and with younger players. I could see football taking off more. There are a lot of tensions between fans and players in certain sports in the US, and GAA might be an option that some would go for. However, the other side of that is that many parents want their kids to earn scholarships (and possibly careers) from the sports they play. I think that's more of a trend in the US than here, from my own experience. GAA can't offer that. So, it's a tough one. Many people hate players that make a lot of money, yet want their kids to be those players. GAA should really try to associate themselves with other activities (like summer camps, Irish festivals,st. patrick's day, Irish pubs, etc), and I think it wouldn't be too hard to grow the sport in certain areas.
Melissa (2,276 Posts)	Posted: 26-Jul-2007 20:59	Quote Edit Delete Report Post Post Reply
Melissa (2,276 Posts)	Originally posted by D-Day: Interesting article. GAA should really try to associate themselves with other activities (like summer camps, Irish festivals,st. patrick's day, Irish pubs, etc), and I think it wouldn't be too hard to grow the sport in certain areas. is it your view that the GAA don't associate themselves with all of the above?
D-Day (1,197 Posts)	Posted: 26-Jul-2007 21:21	Quote Edit Delete Report Post Post Reply
D-Day (1,197 Posts)	Originally posted by tipptops: is it your view that the GAA don't associate themselves with all of the above? My first view is that you're an idiot. Aside from that, I have been to all of the above, and I do not think there is enough integretation of Irish sport. I wouldn't put all the blame on the GAA, but I would improve certain practices. In summer camps, I've never heard of anyone playing GAA sports. Many summer camps are looking to play sports that are different, to offer kids something unique. The GAA should not just recruit Irish students to play sports, they should try to get them to work for a week or two at certain camps, and teach the sport to kids. They shouldn't fund this just by themselves, they should associate with the many Irish American organisations in the US. They are mostly older people, but they do have money. I generally avoid Irish festivals. The one I have been to does have one quick game of football played in the morning, but it's a minor part of the festival. They should try to recruit more, and sell more of the equipment/gear used in each sport at the festival. They currently sell "kiss me I'm irish" shirts, and worse. Also, they should play the game in the afternoon, and recruit kids at the festival to play. St. patrick's day usually involves other activities. but, I think this could be an ideal time to recruit college kids to play. teach them the game, and drink with them after. They'd even pay for the keg themselves. As for Irish pubs, I think this is a perfect place to recruit people in their twenties and thirties. Rather than a dart league, organise a small GAA league. Make it informal, include both males and females in the same league, and generally make it a lot like softball leagues.
MagpieTom56 (2,607 Posts)	Posted: 26-Jul-2007 22:14	Quote Edit Delete Report Post Post Reply
MagpieTom56 (2,607 Posts)	Originally posted by An Fear Rua: Hurling on Wall Street Indeed ,was hurling down at an alarming rate today,lost 300+.
Ciaran careys hurling army (1,351 Posts)	Posted: 27-Jul-2007 09:07	Quote Edit Delete Report Post Post Reply
Ciaran careys hurling army (1,351 Posts)	Originally posted by An Fear Rua: Today's 'Wall Street Journal' Hurling in America Has a Problem -- Too Few Irishmen Irish games have been played in the U.S. for as long as there have been Irish immigrants. In the summer, Irish expats flock to places like Gaelic Park in New York's Bronx borough, where they cheer from the bleachers and drink beer or Magners cider over ice. The New York board of the Gaelic Athletic Association was formed in 1914, and, by the club's reckoning, it has had a hurling team ever since. Write to Conor Dougherty Quick, buy C&C. With such product placement you are on a winner.

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