You may have noticed that the MRDA Website hasn’t been updated in quite a while, years even! Our IT team and graphics department have been cooking up a fresh new site full of features our members and the derby community have been asking for.

The new site offers instant score reporting, photographs from our events that feature the incredible photographers the MRDA is proud to work with. The new website has a bunch of new an exciting features including (but not limited to):

Our new site also features a new and improved Officials section with dedicated resources that will be curated and maintained by the MRDA Officiating Committee (as pictured below).

A new and improved events section that will help feature MRDA Post Season events as well as events going on within our leagues.

And finally, a live rankings section that will be updated each quarter.

The creators have been focusing on making the site user friendly, aesthetically appealing as well as providing a central place where the most up to date MRDA news can be found. Another fun feature is that each time you visit some of the selected pages a different photograph/photographer will be featured.

We are really excited about the new site and are already planning to roll out a few new features in the coming months. For questions and comments please reach out to [email protected].

The Men’s Roller Derby Association announces a new member league!

MRDA, the international governing body of men’s roller derby, has added a new league to its ranks.

This new league was accepted by a vote of MRDA’s membership to be added to our growing list of MRDA affiliated leagues.

Pittsburgh Roller Derby
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA
https://www.facebook.com/pittsburghrollerderby

This league worked hard to gain membership into the MRDA and we look forward to their contribution to the men’s roller derby! Good luck and we will see you on the track!

The MRDA Board of Directors wishes the worldwide roller derby community a Happy New Year.

As 2021 begins, we have obviously been monitoring the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Looking at the surge in COVID-19 almost worldwide and the current vaccine rollout schedule, the Board has decided that we will not move forward trying to plan either playoffs or Champs for 2021. We do not see any timeline in which the majority of leagues will be able to get back to practice with sufficient time to work back to full contact and scrimmaging that would allow for any kind of regular season, let alone one that plays into our normal postseason events.

The Board’s ideal timeline for returning to a proper competitive season is leagues having a full 4 months, ideally 6+, of full-contact practice/ability to scrimmage before competitive games. There is no scenario currently that we can see that would allow teams to have that time for practice and still be able to arrange games that can lead into rankings for our regular postseason.

We will be looking into hosting two regional invitationals (one in North America, one in Europe) in December 2021 if pandemic conditions have eased and leagues have been able to prepare. We will begin looking at this plan in earnest in April/May when hopefully we have a clearer idea how 2021 will look worldwide and what might be feasible.

Stay safe friends. Wash your hands, wear a mask, stay home if you’re sick and follow the guidelines provided to you by your local public health authorities.

Another season is over and what a surprising one it has been! The theme of the year has been ‘upsets’, with numerous teams punching well above their weight. In several cases the seeding spots have been turned upside down.  

MRDA European Qualifiers

First off was the MRDA European Qualifiers (MEQ) in August, a five team tournament offering one coveted spot at MRDA Champs. The Kamiquads from France powered through the qualifiers undefeated, and posted 100+ points over all of their opponents, except the Manneken Beasts from Belgium, whom they beat by only 39 points. Both teams had a similar points differentials (Beasts +444 vs Kamiquads +461) however the Kamiquad’s win secured their entry to Champs.

Overall it was a very high scoring tournament, with half of the teams piling on 250+ points per game, a remarkable feat, given the demise of jammer lap points.

North American Qualifiers (NAQ)

There was also the exhilarating North American Qualifiers (NAQ) which saw eight teams compete for two spots at Champs. Both Austin and Denver qualified for Champs after defeating all of their opponents, with Austin winning their head-to-head game against Denver to go into Champs seeded one spot higher.

In a tournament notable for it’s upsets, half of the games resulted in a win to the lower seeded team! Fifth seed Austin Anarchy beat the fourth seed Philadelphia Hooligans (188-98) then went on to upset second seed Mohawk Valley (139-101).  Seventh seed Race City and sixth seed Chicago both defeated third seed team Lane County. Chicago then went on to score a remarkable 109-45 upset win over second seed Mohawk Valley.

MRDA Champs

MRDA Championships has only recently finished and what a great tournament it was! The St Louis Gatekeepers defeated the Magic City Misfits to win their fifth Champs title and solidify their place in history, in a reign at the top, rivalled only by Gotham. Meanwhile the Misfit’s 230-131 win over Vancouver in the Semi Finals showed the difference in class between the top two teams and the rest of the field.

However, as we saw in qualifiers, multiple teams challenged those seeded higher. Texas Outlaws stunned Vancouver to win 192-169 to take the Bronze Medal in the third place game. Initially coming in at sixth seed, they scored a convincing 172-109 win over fourth seed heavyweights Southern Discomfort before posting a respectable 88 points against the  Gatekeepers, while limiting the number one team to just 239 points.

Meanwhile ninth seed Denver also had a superb weekend, winning their rematch against Austin Anarchy (178-142) before defeating fifth seed Manchester in a brilliant 228-179 encounter. They lost a moderately close 46 point game to highly ranked Southern Discomfort (166-120) to finish the tournament in sixth place.

The games have been outstanding right through the whole tournament. Tenth seed Kamiquads scored a thrilling 133-130 upset over ninth seed Austin Anarchy. While the third seed Vancouver held on to win 210-196 thriller after a strong challenge from fifth seed Manchester.

The Future

What a year this has been! Without a doubt, competition has certainly been as fierce as ever. We’ve seen some of the most exciting games on display and look forward to another outstanding year in 2020.