Brissy Bulldog
Proud to be a Bulldog
- Joined
- Feb 26, 2004
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We have Newstext here at work. Here is the article:
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We're all human - Willie opens up on eve of Origin - ORIGIN III - THE DECIDER
By MARK ROBINSON
Willie Mason earns over $600,000 a season, but he finds life in the NRL tough. Mason opened up to leading AFL journalist MARK ROBINSON
MR: On the pay scale, are you one of league's highest paid players?
WM: Yeah, I think so.
MR: More than $500,000?
WM: Yeah, about five or six, maybe a little bit more than six.
MR: Are you Mr Nice Guy?
WM: I'm a nice guy. I'm not a p.... and I think everyone's starting to learn that now. There are all those stories now about villain to hero, all this kind of garbage, where they think I've turned a whole U-turn in my life and I haven't. I haven't done anything different, it's just people's perceptions have changed.
MR: You were one of eight kids.
WM: Five sisters and two brothers and I come in third. I just think I have a different view on life, like getting into trouble, being in the papers for stupid things, whether it be drugs, or getting blind or stuff like that. It doesn't worry me. I don't look at it and say, `Oh, my life's over'. Other people say, `Oh no, my career's over', but I don't think that. I watched my old man die when I was 17, so as if being on the front page or some s... is going to faze me.
MR: Do you carry fear into an Origin game?
WM: Yeah, of course. That's what makes you know you're in a game: the fear, the nerves. If you're not feeling that before an Origin game, I don't know where your head is.
MR: When you've got the ball, and you're running, you know they're coming to hit you. What do you feel?
WM: It's an adrenalin rush. It's a bit of fear, bit of nerves, bit of excitment.
MR: Are you the most controversial figure in league, or one of?
WM: I think so.
MR: Enjoy that infamy?
WM: They call you controversial, bad-boy, blah, blah, blah. But the mates who know me, and the boys in the team, they see me as a joker, the bloke who's not that serious. Serious about football, but pretty relaxed.
MR: So where did it all come from?
WM: The media went, in 2004, when a girl ...
MR: You mean Coffs Harbour.
WM: It started from there and it went mental.
MR: So nothing happened?
WM: Not at all. And it's the media who built it up. They were smashing us and smashing us and me being a high-profile Bulldogs player, everyone points the finger at me. Then I got fined $10,000 for wearing shorts and thongs at a police interview. Everybody wore the same things, but I got fined. And then after that there was a drugs scandal. It said on the front page that I had tested positive to cocaine. All of that was in a month and it just went boom.
MR: I read recently that you reckon you're getting targeted for drugs tests.
WM: I get tested all the time. Five times this year. They say it's random, but my name gets picked out with some bloke who doesn't even play first grade.
MR: That's all we hear down here from Sydney: someone's on the drink, someone's bashing someone, someone with drugs.
WM: It's turned into a circus now. Players can't do anything. If players are in a bar and they're pissed, next minute you're in the paper for being intoxicated, or if some bloke calls you a f...... ****** or a ****** or a black c..., all this kind of s..., you're expected to just wear it. We're all human beings.
MR: Are you headed to the NFL?
WM: I don't know. It was a bit of a shock really.
MR: Who approached you?
WM: The New York Giants, I think the New York Jets. It makes you feel like just leaving with all this s... that goes on with league, feel like giving it a crack over there.
MR: There are extremely emotive words linked to you, like drugs, cocaine, brothels, rapes. I don't know if you've denied them all,
but can I ask, are you all clear on all of them?
WM: Yeah.
MR: The others?
WM: Cocaine no. What were the others? Brothel. We were in camp at Origin and we [Mason, Mark Gasnier, Trent Waterhouse, Craig Wing] were looking for a beer in the morning and people saw us. Apparently there was a brothel in the area of the pub. We walked out of the pub and I think we walked past it, so they figured we've gone to a brothel.
---------------------------------------------------------
We're all human - Willie opens up on eve of Origin - ORIGIN III - THE DECIDER
By MARK ROBINSON
Willie Mason earns over $600,000 a season, but he finds life in the NRL tough. Mason opened up to leading AFL journalist MARK ROBINSON
MR: On the pay scale, are you one of league's highest paid players?
WM: Yeah, I think so.
MR: More than $500,000?
WM: Yeah, about five or six, maybe a little bit more than six.
MR: Are you Mr Nice Guy?
WM: I'm a nice guy. I'm not a p.... and I think everyone's starting to learn that now. There are all those stories now about villain to hero, all this kind of garbage, where they think I've turned a whole U-turn in my life and I haven't. I haven't done anything different, it's just people's perceptions have changed.
MR: You were one of eight kids.
WM: Five sisters and two brothers and I come in third. I just think I have a different view on life, like getting into trouble, being in the papers for stupid things, whether it be drugs, or getting blind or stuff like that. It doesn't worry me. I don't look at it and say, `Oh, my life's over'. Other people say, `Oh no, my career's over', but I don't think that. I watched my old man die when I was 17, so as if being on the front page or some s... is going to faze me.
MR: Do you carry fear into an Origin game?
WM: Yeah, of course. That's what makes you know you're in a game: the fear, the nerves. If you're not feeling that before an Origin game, I don't know where your head is.
MR: When you've got the ball, and you're running, you know they're coming to hit you. What do you feel?
WM: It's an adrenalin rush. It's a bit of fear, bit of nerves, bit of excitment.
MR: Are you the most controversial figure in league, or one of?
WM: I think so.
MR: Enjoy that infamy?
WM: They call you controversial, bad-boy, blah, blah, blah. But the mates who know me, and the boys in the team, they see me as a joker, the bloke who's not that serious. Serious about football, but pretty relaxed.
MR: So where did it all come from?
WM: The media went, in 2004, when a girl ...
MR: You mean Coffs Harbour.
WM: It started from there and it went mental.
MR: So nothing happened?
WM: Not at all. And it's the media who built it up. They were smashing us and smashing us and me being a high-profile Bulldogs player, everyone points the finger at me. Then I got fined $10,000 for wearing shorts and thongs at a police interview. Everybody wore the same things, but I got fined. And then after that there was a drugs scandal. It said on the front page that I had tested positive to cocaine. All of that was in a month and it just went boom.
MR: I read recently that you reckon you're getting targeted for drugs tests.
WM: I get tested all the time. Five times this year. They say it's random, but my name gets picked out with some bloke who doesn't even play first grade.
MR: That's all we hear down here from Sydney: someone's on the drink, someone's bashing someone, someone with drugs.
WM: It's turned into a circus now. Players can't do anything. If players are in a bar and they're pissed, next minute you're in the paper for being intoxicated, or if some bloke calls you a f...... ****** or a ****** or a black c..., all this kind of s..., you're expected to just wear it. We're all human beings.
MR: Are you headed to the NFL?
WM: I don't know. It was a bit of a shock really.
MR: Who approached you?
WM: The New York Giants, I think the New York Jets. It makes you feel like just leaving with all this s... that goes on with league, feel like giving it a crack over there.
MR: There are extremely emotive words linked to you, like drugs, cocaine, brothels, rapes. I don't know if you've denied them all,
but can I ask, are you all clear on all of them?
WM: Yeah.
MR: The others?
WM: Cocaine no. What were the others? Brothel. We were in camp at Origin and we [Mason, Mark Gasnier, Trent Waterhouse, Craig Wing] were looking for a beer in the morning and people saw us. Apparently there was a brothel in the area of the pub. We walked out of the pub and I think we walked past it, so they figured we've gone to a brothel.
