John Rizzo Re-Signed for 2025

By Alistair Kirsch-Poole
Dec 13, 2024 - 3:30pm

Old Glory has announced that winger John Rizzo has been re-signed for the 2025 season. The 26-year-old Midwesterner began playing rugby while attending Indiana University–Purdue University Indianapolis, then moved to DC after college and started playing for Washington Irish and the Capital Selects. Shortly after, he was picked up by Old Glory DC.

Since he was first signed ahead of the 2022 season, his path has been a linear one. He played in 5 matches with 1 start for 152 minutes in 2022, then expanded to 8 matches with 3 starts for 334 minutes in 2023, and expanded again to 11 matches with 10 starts for 842 minutes in 2024.

This increased presence on the pitch has been for good reason, too. With 430 meters gained on 47 carries last season, he was gaining over 9 meters per carry, one of the highest in that stat on the team. He was also a stalwart defensively, with just 7 missed tackles out of 60 attempted for a 88% success rate that is very respectable for a back three player. In fact, he had as many dominant tackles as he had missed ones giving him a dominant tackle rate of 13.2%, which is easily the highest on the team. In fact, for players with over 12 tackles, Rizzo has the second highest dominant tackle rate, just 0.3% behind league leader Wian Conradie's 13.5%.

Of course, his game isn't perfect. He's built a solid base of performance, nailing the fundamentals that make him a reliable option on the wing. However, he doesn't have the ability to make tacklers miss that Axel Muller and Damien Hoyland do, nor does he have any sort of kicking game, which is becoming more an more important for wings these days. If he wants to make it to the next level, and potential Eagles consideration, he'll have to develop these tertiary skills that would take him from a solid wing to a superlative one.

Normally, I would talk through where he'll fit on next season's roster, but no other wings have been announced yet. Axel Muller is almost certain to return and will be all but guaranteed a starting spot when he does so. However, the other wings from last year have not even been rumored one way or the other, much less confirmed. The best I can say is that, as a domestic option who is both fairly young and a strong performer, we should see a good amount of Rizzo in 2025.


Follow along with all of the signing news on our 2025 Player Tracker