When Alex Fraser, a champion high school swimmer at Blue Valley, became paralyzed following an accident in March 2014, he was unsure if he would ever compete again. Thanks to a few new friends, he is — through ‘murderball.’
"It's definitely a stress reliever to go and just push into people in a chair when you sometimes feel very fragile,” said Fraser.
‘Murderball’ is also known as wheelchair rugby. It’s gained in popularity on the west coast in recent years, and that’s where KC native Tony Durham picked it up.
“It's chess and bumper cars mixed together,” said Durham.
Durham began using a wheelchair following a car accident outside of Kansas City in 2008. As a former competitive athlete himself, he felt it was his mission to bring the sport of murderball to other wheelchair athletes in Kansas City.
"Moved to California, found a team out there," he said. "Picked up a couple practices and fell in love with it. So I knew when I came back here, I knew if they didn't have a program yet that was something I wanted to build."
Now, after one year of play, there are two local teams. One player who took advantage of the opportunity to play right away was Fraser.
Fraser became paralyzed from the chest down following a diving incident while on spring break two years ago. Just a couple weeks previous, he broke his high school record in the breast stroke at State.
"It means a lot. It gives me something to look forward to for sure and keep me motivated and keep getting stronger,” said Fraser.
Interested in learning more?
The KC Revolution Facebook page is here.
You can also reach out to Midwest Adaptive Sports and the Rehab Institute of Kansas City, both of which played large parts in forming the current Kansas City league.
Durham hopes the sport’s popularity continues to grow in order to not only give wheelchair athletes a chance to compete, but also reverse stereotypes.
"I think there's always a stereotype that since you've been injured that you're made of glass. And we're trying to break that stereotype. We can take hits and we can get back up just like anybody else,” he said.
The first rule of murderball, a.k.a wheelchair rugby, is that you must have at least three limb impairments to play.
According to Fraser, there are roughly 50 teams in the country. However, the local Kansas City teams hope to compete in some tournaments next season.
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Josh Helmuth can be reached at josh.helmuth@kshb.com.
