On the rugby fields of Samoa, an island nation in the South Pacific, the pregame is a wondrous ritual called the Haka.
There are no fireworks, no cheerleaders, no rock band and no announcers booming the introductions over loudspeakers the size of a school bus. Not even a Frisbee dog.
There is only the war dance and chant, a ritual that even the national team does for its matches.
There is nothing like it.
“No other pregame hype or talk is better than watching the war dance before the rugby match,” said Baltimore Ravens defensive tackle Joe Salavea, who left Samoa as a teenager to play football in the United States.
Dolphins linebacker Junior Seau, who left Samoa when he was 7, grins when asked about the war dance and chant, smiling the way someone might when recalling the first pro game he attended. Rugby, and its child football, is to Samoans what soccer is to Hispanics.
The Miami Dolphins, who opened training camp Friday, have been joined by a 34-year-old man driven by purpose. A desire fueled by more than fame.
It is about culture.
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“Playing football and rugby is the Samoan sport,” Seau said. “It’s part of the conversation at church. It’s part of the conversation in their barbershops, in the grocery stores. It’s what everyone is aware of and familiar with.
“They take a lot of pride in the beating you can take in the course of that sport … It’s our arena. It’s where we’re able to be gladiators and overcome the pressure, the pain and the obstacles that happen and exist during the game.”
It’s the measure of manhood in Samoan culture.
“If the National Football League could be like that, the games would be even that much greater,” he said, referring to the emotion generated by the war dance. “You just can’t understand the feeling, the intensity. It’s what those people over there are about.”
It’s what Seau is about. He plays football and even talks about it with a passion intertwined with reverence. Several times during off-season drills with the Dolphins, Seau would practice footwork by himself and, in the process, choreograph the steps to his personal war dance.
When he talks about the game, there is a sense of religion in his voice. When he refers to the NFL, he almost always calls it “the National Football League.” It is not some attempt at Cosellian humor. It is homage to a game Seau believes has made him.
Seau’s achievements–such as making the Pro Bowl 12 times in 13 seasons–can be counted, but his love for the game runs deeper.
Seau believes the Dolphins are his last best hope of winning a Super Bowl. He believes they rescued him from the humiliation of being deemed expendable by the Chargers after spending his entire career in San Diego. The Dolphins represent Seau’s football salvation, which for him is something of a holy experience.
Beyond that, Seau likely will be elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame when he is done. This is not a man who wants to honor his island culture by limping to Canton on a creaky reputation.
`Built for collisions’
Jack Bickford, 73, grew up in the tough ethnic neighborhoods of Chicago and spent 20 years in the Marines, serving in Korea and Vietnam. He left active duty after a shower of five grenades impaired his vision so that he couldn’t drive.
He retired to Oceanside, Calif., just north of San Diego, and coached Pop Warner football. He still has the tapes of Seau at 13, and he hopes to one day send them to the Hall of Fame.
He knows well how much the islanders love the game. Aside from Seau and Sal Aunese, who played on the same team with Seau and would later quarterback the University of Colorado, Bickford had another islander he coached over the years whose name alone explains the cultural passion for the game.
Butkus Tusitai.
“The banging, the hitting … they just seemed to excel with the harder the hitting got,” Bickford said with equal parts astonishment and admiration. “They had such players. You couldn’t hurt them. At least they wouldn’t show they were hurt … You couldn’t hurt Junior. He wouldn’t come out.”
It is implicitly understood that islander boys don’t admit to being in pain.
“Oh, no, you don’t show the pain, not till you get home,” said former Patriots fullback Mosi Tatupu, who grew up in Hawaii and is an assistant coach at Boston’s Curry College.
“The stories I’ve heard from back there in Samoa, when they play rugby, that is as rough as it will ever get,” Bickford said.
Such as the first time Salavea tried to play in a rugby match back home. There are no youth leagues or junior levels. When you play, you join the big boys.
“I thought I was ready,” Salavea said. “I took a knee from a 30-year-old to the back of the head. All I remember next was sitting in front of my house with a big headache.”
Salavea was 9.
“You have a crowd around the game, and it’s crazy with them too. There’ll be fights in the crowd,” he said. “There’s no team doctors, no trainers. Guys get hurt and they just keep going. Broken noses, broken fingers and hands. Guys break a leg and they want to limp off. You feel like you’re in medieval times. Guys are just playing on passion.”
Islanders are also seemingly “built for this sport,” Tatupu said.
“We’re built for collisions,” Salavea said. “We’re talking about some big, strong people with raw power and speed. You pray that some of the kids take advantage of it.”
Salavea’s parents sent him to seek a better opportunity, but several more have stayed. Like American football suitors, the famous All-Blacks rugby team from New Zealand has often come recruiting in Samoa, offering good money.
“A lot of guys just don’t want to go, they don’t want to leave home,” Salavea said.
Bond beyond games
In Samoa, teammates’ emotional bonds go far beyond the games.
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Samoa today is little different than what James Michener saw and described more than 50 years ago when he visited the many islands that look like freckles on a globe. A series of islands created by volcanoes, they are lush, with constant temperatures (between 70 and 90 degrees) and constant humidity.
The economic boom that hit Hawaii never hit Samoa and most of its neighboring islands, so the agrarian country is mostly poor. Football has yet to catch on because Samoans often can’t afford the equipment.
So rugby remains the sport of choice, and there is still a tribal sense to it.
Whereas college football in the U.S. is based on recruiting talented players from around the country and hoping they can work together, Samoan rugby is different.
Players grow up together, creating a bond based not just on how they play the game but how they support each other in life. They suffer the same trials and share the same joys.
That emotional bond plays out during games, and it makes the war chant ring with truth, not a staged sense of emotion.
To this day, Salavea closes his eyes before NFL games and imagines himself back in his homeland, getting ready to play on fields bordered by banana trees and sugar cane.
The memory of the ritual is stirring. The players dance and chant in unison, culminating the moment by laying down a ceremonial leaf.
The opposing team picks up the leaf to signify that the punishing, no-pad battle is on. There are no doctors to mend the injured. The players survive on adrenaline and pride.
“I say a prayer and I walk toward the field,” Salavea said of his game-day ritual. “I’m trying to picture the island folk … I picture them watching me and expecting me to give everything I have. I’m representing more than myself and my organization. I’m representing them.”