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I woke up on Sunday morning to discover two things. Firstly, Jarryd Hayne had made the San Francisco 49ers 53-man roster. And secondly, I was being mercilessly hammered on Twitter.
So here it is. The definitive “I was wrong” about Jarryd Hayne piece for all you Hayniacs.
I was wrong.
On October 14 last year, in the wake of Hayne’s shock announcement, I tweeted: “Jarryd Hayne can’t be serious. There is zero chance he is going to be successful in the NFL.”
Dead wrong.
Two days later I wrote a piece for The Roar where I outlined why I thought his dream was doomed to fail.
I pointed out the depth of the NFL talent pool, the difficulty of learning a playbook and the trend that was making specialist kick and punt returners more and more redundant. I touched on Hayne’s age, the youth and athleticism of his competitors.
It turns out I was wrong. I underestimated Hayne and I overstated the ability of those on the fringes of the NFL.
But what I didn’t get wrong was how much hard work it was going to take. I just didn’t realise how badly Hayne wanted it. That was the intangible in all of this.
Hayne’s physical traits and sporting resume were good enough to get a look-in with any NFL team during pre-season. But did he have the work ethic, the drive to make it through months of isolation in a new city learning a completely new sport? Could he overcome any setbacks or lingering self-doubt?
That is what I underestimated.
There had been others, athletes from other sports who boast incredible physical attributes, who had tried to make an NFL roster and failed.
Australian rugby player Hayden Smith is two metres tall and 116 kilograms and after workouts at a number of NFL teams in 2012 he signed with the New York Jets.
The Jets thought he could be a project player and fancied him as a tight-end. A year later when he was waived he gave some insight into what it was like trying to learn the intricacies of the game.
“The first thing you have to understand is the language they use and the little nuances of what is actually happening on the field,” Smith said in 2013.
“Only then can you start working on techniques. It is a long process before you can actually take to the field and contribute.
“It took me months to be able to coherently understand what was going on and that was after putting in 12 or 14-hour long days.
“The playbook would contain hundreds of plays and thousands of varieties. “You only have a couple of seconds to react once we snap the ball.
“You are also dealing with some incredible athletes so it is a pretty tough environment.“
I applied this logic when foolishly dismissing Hayne’s chances last year.
The former Parramatta Eel may be a far superior athlete to Smith, but understanding the game in the moment is something that takes time. And, in a league where there is unmatched pressure to win and win now, it is something that NFL coaches have little patience for.
But Hayne impressed almost immediately. His 53-yard run against the Texans, albeit through a nice sized hole on the left side, showed he had learned a thing or two. I mean former number three overall pick Trent Richardson would have turned that into a four-yard loss, amirite?
Then he showed how good he was in broken play, on kick and punt returners and how he could evade tacklers with ease. This was always going to be his strength, but he exceeded my expectations in this category as well. Hayne was setting up blocks, making the right cuts. By this stage Hayne Mania, in the US and back home in Australia, had started to snowball towards the inevitable.
Hayne was going to make the team. He had been almost flawless in the pre-season and was regarded by many to be the best story to come out of the four-week trial period.
So much so, that when Hayne played sparingly against Denver in week three, Australian fans and media were incensed. “Where is Hayne? Why isn’t 49ers coach Jim Tomsula putting Hayne on?” my Twitter feed barked at me.
The third game of the pre-season, when teams generally play their starters for a half or so, is the best indication of what Jarryd Hayne in the NFL will look like.
Maybe between five and eight touches a game, a few kick or punt returns. Perhaps a run or two out of the backfield. But for now, with backs Carlos Hyde and Reggie Bush ahead of him on the depth chart, that is the best Australian fans can hope for.
But that is nothing to be ashamed of. Getting to where Hayne has is an incredible achievement. His code swap is far more difficult than any rugby league player heading to AFL or union. And I would say even more impressive than Anthony Mundine going from rugby league premiership winner to WBC Silver Super Welterweight champion.
We’ve always used dual-internationals to measure the pinnacle of sporting prowess, athleticism and versatility. But what about going from being one of the best rugby league players in the world to a skill player on an NFL roster?
From the familiar to a sport so foreign to Australians most of us will watch our first game next Tuesday when the 49ers host the Vikings. It’s surely the new benchmark.
Hayne stepped out of his comfort zone like no one else ever has. He backed his ability and he won. He was right and I was wrong.
For almost a year I’ve found myself rooting against Hayne. It was the wrong attitude, but I had backed myself into a corner.
Partly because I had written the piece but mostly because I was constantly being reminded of it by workmates and those on Twitter. I should point out that at the time it was praised for providing a “sober analysis” and a “reality check” for those blindly thinking Hayne would walk onto a roster no trouble.
It was a counter point to all those writing toady ‘Good luck Jarryd’ articles. But I believed it when I wrote it. Just turns out I was wrong. Happens to everyone.
But the Internet never forgets. At last check my “zero chance” tweet has gained an extra 20 retweets this morning. And as I write this my phone lights up. It’s a tweet. “hahahahaha #eatyourwords”, is all it says.
Oh I will. Because I was wrong.
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