Former NRL player Willie Mason has opened up about the benefits of ‘magic mushrooms’, ingesting too much cannabis and why he was desperate to knock out Englishman Stuart Fielden in a vicious on-field attack.
The straight-talking former Kangaroos and NSW Blues forward recently appeared on James Graham’s The Bye Round podcast where he spoke about his life since retiring from the game. One of the biggest personalities in rugby league, Mason, 42, didn’t take long to reveal the medicinal benefits he gets nowadays from the use of psilocybin mushrooms.
‘With psilocybin and stuff like that, I just find… your brain is on and conversations are deep. Like obviously we think with one side of our brain – your brain on mushrooms, both sides are on.’ Graham, who played over 187 NRL games, talked about the benefits of using medical cannabis – and Mason revealed one of his worst experiences with the drug. ‘I got the medicated THC as well. I took too much one time and it f****d me.
‘I’ll dabble in stuff like that [mushrooms] once a month,’ he said. ‘I’m not sitting there and taking mushrooms and going out and partying. I’ll sit at home. I’m very honest about it. ‘And a lot of close mates – I’m not naming them – and we’ll sit there and we’ll have in-depth conversations. We’re not drinking or doing anything else. We’re just sitting there and it’s the best thing in the world.
‘I had a very important meeting in the city. I had like two drops. I felt great, I felt fine, nothing, and then when I was in the meeting I couldn’t even move. ‘They were asking me really important questions and I was like yep… I couldn’t move. I couldn’t move my arms.
‘I was always hunting for him and he was always running at Danny Buderus and all those kinds of guys, and he was playing 80 minutes and I was just hammering about getting on the gear [steroids] and stuff like that. ‘I hated it, I was just like “you juice-head” and I was always into him and he goes, ‘Oh shut up, you f***ing convict”, and I was just calling him a cheat.
‘The meeting went for two hours.’Towards the end of the podcast, Graham asked Mason about his infamous brawl in Great Britain’s last win over Australia in 2006. Mason took a swing at Stuart Fielden – who he explained he had been ‘hunting’ for years – before English skipper Jamie Peacock returned fire.
‘He was playing 80 minutes in the middle and we’re all pretty fit but we couldn’t get 80 but he was and taking like 26 hit-ups, 40 tackles and absolutely being a beast. So I was like, “F*** this dude, I’m going to punch his head off if I get the chance”.
‘It was just a matter of time for both of us. We’re two young bulls, alpha males so before the game talking first hit I said, ‘I’m gonna punch the f*** out of him, it’s gonna be on and I don’t give a s***. Just someone have my back.’ ‘What I love about Peacock is that after the game we shook hands and had a beer but Fielden didn’t, he took it real personal and wouldn’t talk to me at all.’
‘That was 2002, 2003, 2004 tour same again, so I was still hunting for 2005, same again and then 2006 I finally got him.’ Mason then went into detail about how the brawl unfolded.
‘So yeah bang I hit him and he’s talking and as soon as we go we’re banging and it happened real quick, then Peacock comes in. Then Sean Long comes in and I didn’t know what to do with Longy because do I punch him in the head or just push him, so I went ‘f*** off Longy’ and Peacock comes in.
