Putting The NRL Judiciary System On Report For Being A Grade 5 Shambles

In the last few weeks a number of high-profile rulings have shown the NRL’s judiciary system to be a vipers nest of confusing and bad laws. Footy fan Jarret Filmer has gone half-mad trying to figure it all out.

League is a simple game with simple charms: big blokes smash into bigger blokes while small blokes try to run around them.

While league’s well-to-do cousin rugby union has thrived for decades on a set of nigh-on-incomprehensible rules, the appeal of rugby league has always rested largely in its gladiatorial simplicity.

Unfortunately, as rugby league grows into a more corporate beast the sport has been tidying up its rougher edges, and codifying things that had previous been left to personal interpretation. The current state of the judiciary is a prime example of where this meddling has got the NRL.

The judiciary is the kind of disciplinary system that was conceived in a focus group and approved after a Powerpoint presentation over a long lunch of kale crisps and kombucha tea. The primary feature of the judiciary is an arcane grading system laden with a variety of quasi-legalistic terms that describes 17 different offenses with five possible grades each, making for a total of 85 different offenses a player might be charged with. Even Greg Bird has only been charged with 32.

Then there are three different types of high tackle – intentional, reckless and careless – each with five different grades for a total of 15 unique high tackles. Even the most ardent proponent of a swinging arm to the noggin will be hard up explaining the subtle variation of such a gamut of high shots.

The blatant absurdity of the judiciary has been on full display during recent rounds.  The Dragons’ Tyson Frizell was suspended for a game for placing a hand on a referee to avoid bumping into him. In the same game the Bulldogs’ Josh Reynolds attempted to trip St George’s Joel Thompson – an offense for which he has been previously suspended twice – only to escape without suspension because of an early guilty plea.  This is the league equivalent of giving a litterer three months in jail while letting a serial fraudster walk with a warning.

Then there is the case of Gold Coast’s Ryan James, who didn’t receive even a solitary week on the sideline after breaking the jaw of Tigers star James Tedesco with a swinging arm in a ‘careless’ tackle that was only careless in the same way that the Titanic hitting the iceberg could be considered careless. James escaped suspension because the judiciary determined that his tackle lacked intent and Tedesco had slipped into the tackle which resulted in injury. A more cynical person might suggest that James avoided a suspension because the NRL was loathe to shear Gold Coast of a crucial cog in the run up to the finals given their desperation to ensure the Jarryd Hayne-fuelled Titans are a success.

Oddly the judiciary took into account James’ intention but refused to acknowledge the severity of the injuries inflicted on Tedesco when dishing out the penalty. Surely if a system is designed to assess the intention of the tackler then they should also factor in any injury caused to the tackled player. In essence the judiciary decided that Tedesco was more to blame for his injury than James because he allowed his jaw to come into contact with a swinging arm.

Compare this with the punishment handed out to Frizzell and it is impossible to come to any other conclusion that the judiciary system is hopelessly broken. A serial offender (and the most penalised player in the NRL) ends a star player’s season and likely takes his team’s finals hopes with it, but he receives no suspension while another player attempting to politely prevent a collision with a referee is sat out for a week.

If the judiciary system is designed to mete out justice in a fair and equitable manner, then it’s an utter failure. The only way the NRL could make the judiciary system more unjust is to have it run by the Manitowoc County Sheriff’s department. While Brendan Dassey definitely possesses mental faculties on par with the average front rower and wouldn’t look out of place in a Cronulla jersey the NRL could do without the sort of rank corruption that results in a Netflix documentary series.

All of this would be little more than a source of absurd fun and fodder for apoplectic talkback rants if it wasn’t for the potentially dire consequences of such a Mickey Mouse system. While the NFL and other collision sports are grappling with the long term effects of repeated concussions the NRL has much more dramatic example of what happens when foul play goes wrong. After the illegal tackle that saw Newcastle Knight Alex McKinnon left quadriplegic the NRL can’t be seen to shirk its duty of care for its players.

Players need to be held responsible for their actions, but they also need clear parameters around what constitutes illegal play. Players should be certain what constitutes foul play and what they need to do to stay within the bounds of the rules. Allowing players like James and Reynolds to skate on technicalities and use vague explanations to mitigate their actions will muddy the waters and result in more catastrophic injuries.

League is an inherently violent game but it doesn’t have to be inherently dangerous. The primary purpose of the judiciary should be to ensure the safety of players and level punishments designed to reinforce the boundaries of fair play. The complexity and incomprehensibility of the judiciary system seems to exist solely to allow the NRL to put their finger on the scales. A better system would see experienced league people using common sense and precedent to arrive at a fair outcome.

Players will always push the boundaries. If dirty play can be excused with clever legal maneuvering it will let grubby players act with impunity.  League is a simple game, but it also needs to be safe. At the moment the judiciary is doing its best to ensure that it remains neither.

Here is a PDF of the NRL’s 128-page ‘Code of Procedure’