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Schade playing pro rugby
The Canfield High School grad plays for Columbus
By BRIAN DZENIS
Chris Schade could be living the easy life as an investment banker in Columbus, but rugby players usually aren’t apt to do anything the easy way.
The Canfield native gave up a “real job” for his real passion. He’s joined PRO Rugby Ohio, a team part of the first USA Rugby-sanctioned professional rugby 15s league.
“I love this sport, even when I wasn’t making any money and I had a real job,” Schade said. “I still played rugby as much as I can.
“I think it’s a part of the sport’s culture in this country,” the 2008 Canfield graduate said. “There’s never been a professional league here before so you really have to love the sport and love traveling and playing in order to do it. Otherwise it won’t be enjoyable to do it.”
PRO Rugby Ohio is part of PRO Rugby, a five-team league in its first season. The team is based out of Columbus and is the only team east of the Mississippi River. The other four teams are based in San Francisco, San Diego, Sacramento and Denver.
Schade, who plays at the “hooker” position, signed a contract with the league, but had no choice of where he played. The league chose where each player went.
“There wasn’t a draft,” Schade said. “Say there’s 30 players per team and there’s five teams, so that’s 150 players.
“I think they just had a pool of players that they wanted to go after to try to get contracts to players,” Schade said. “They took anyone who took the contracts and just assigned them to the teams.
“I’m sure it had something to do with where they lived, but they wanted to see who could mesh together as well.”
Schade’s professional connection was Paul Holmes, the team’s backs coach. Holmes knew of Schade through his time playing for Columbus RFC and Tiger Rugby. Salaries range from $25,000 to $40,000 depending on the player’s experience. Schade supplements his income by bartending in Columbus.
He played football and ice hockey for Canfield and was introduced to rugby in gym class.
Steel Valley Rugby, Youngstown’s rugby club, was on hiatus when Schade lived in the Mahoning Valley, so his first organized rugby experience came in college at Ohio University.
“I didn’t go to a very prominent rugby school,” Schade said. “Ohio University has a good program but we didn’t get any looks for All-American or the collegiate national team.”
Despite Ohio’s lack of a collegiate rugby pedigree, Schade did earn the chance to train at the Olympic Development Academy in Columbus after graduating.
For the first time since 1924, rugby sevens will be an Olympic sport. Although Schade considers himself a 15s player more than a sevens player, he is shooting for a spot with the national team. Being apart of the nation’s first professional rugby league can only boost his profile.
“This is a good opportunity for me,” Schade said. “I’m 25, a few years out of school and I haven’t had a lot of looks with a national program, but this can raise my stock being available to play professionally full-time.”