American 'football' vs Rugby

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These two sports seem pretty similar, big people smashing into one and other while carrying funny shaped balls but we British don't bother with the body armour. In fact, we look at American 'football' as a pretty poor game played by people to soft to go it without the rest breaks and padding.

So, which is better and why?

 

Rugby. No pads, no helmets, men of equal or greater stature smashing into each other as in American football, and rucks, mauls, lineouts...the list goes on. Rugby is and always will be more of a mans game than American football. If they lost the pads and helmets then I would consider it a game worthy of being manly. Until then its just a bunch of girlyboys who dont like getting hurt. And Silvery, our team is better than your team. All Blacks FTW!

 

The All Blacks prod buttock honey. They are REAL men, even the British rugby players would have to admit to that!

 

We are all real men down here.

 

Shame I'm getting married, sounds like a fun trip!

 

Never has and never will stop me . Just adds to the fun and challenge of it all

 

Good Grief!

Well, between the two of us it looks like we've got this sorted, rugby rocks

 

Did you just turn 25?

 

Nope, I'm 25 tommorrow

 

Meh, well...I suppose its to be expected when Im on the otherside of the world and its already 'tomorrow'.

 

Looks like you 2 hijacked your own thread!

I'm not a fan of either sport, and it constantly amazes me how people can get so worked up about a game. But to each his own, I suppose.

American style football is a lot slower than rugby as near as I can tell and the padding is a good idea from a medical standpoint but obviously it's not 100% necessary because rugby leagues seem to get by fine without the stuff.

 

Does rugby have any strategy? It seems to just be a bunch of people playing in the mud. Football is probably the closest a sport can get to chess. Strategy and gamemanship play a huge role in football.

 

Rugby has a lot of strategy, but the game play dynamics are fluid. There is a kind of rugby that is like American Football with the stopping, starting and has more 'tactics' like you said. Its called Rugby League. In League you have to get the ball over the try line at the end to score, like in rugby, but your team can only be tackled 5 times before you have to swap the ball over. Also after the tackle the opposing team has to move back a certain distance and the person who has the ball passes it back to someone who then passes it back to someone else and everything starts up again. On the 4th tackle and before the 5th it is pretty much the rule of thumb to kick the ball, usually high up so that you have the chance of re-catching it, and it leads to quite a spectacular scramble for possession. This contrasts Rugby Union (ie Rugby) in that there are unlimited tackles, none of the stop start stuff going on, there are lineouts, rucks, mauls and other things. The strategy in Rugby is to keep the ball moving constantly. It used to be a boring game of kicking the ball down field, only to have it being kicked back down field by the other team. But those days are gone, mostly.

 

Someone pointed out in another thread... rugby is a contact sport, football is a collision sport... in rugby you are going to do as much damage to your own body as to someone else's by tackling them, so you lessen the blow. In football they don't give a **** and will hit you as hard as they can.

And the pads don't do much, they are quite thin.

 

Haha, rugby is most definitely a collision sport, not merely a contact sport, as anyone who actually watches it can attest to. The men are huge, they wear no pads. There are defined rules on how to tackle though, to reduce injuries (ha, unlikely). The reason why they wear no pads is because they are real men. But both rugby kinds and American football are nothing compared to Aussie Rules football. No pads, no helmets, full collisions. American football players wear pads because they are weak like American beer.

 

Aussie Rules football is just barbaric. it's not a sport, it's just an excuse for young lads to smash the crap out of each other.

Anyway, rugby is better than gridiron every day of the week. But neither are football.

 

Real men? What kind of concept is that? Are you insisting because I don't like to run full speed into some one across a field I'm a fake man? Or that anyone who is short is also a fake man? The whole idea seems astounding, I'd hate to see how you view yourself if you judge the quality of a person on such superficial barbaric qualities. How much skill does it take to stand on a field and be tackled? Or run full force into some one? Almost none, apart from tackling "correctly." I don't see the point of saying moving the ball down the field in rugby implies there is skill involved, that doesn't seem to matter to you - you're only using it as an excuse to say there is skill involved - otherwise you wouldn't care whether or not the people are wearing pads. Unless your only qualm with football is the stop/start, which doesn't seem to be the case.

Either way, I'd rather be a weak, fake man than have bones jutting out of my leg/other severe injuries for the sake of so called "sport" and some money. Which one is better? Neither as there is no point comparing apples to oranges. Why try and compare tennis to basketball; baseball to golf? Different rules, different basic idea, etc.

 

I have not seen many men in the Australian Football League or Rugby even come close to the size of NFL players. The average front line player (defensive and offensive) weighs over 300 pounds. Even the "small" guys (receivers and cornerbacks) are over 225 pounds -- there are a few who are near and even below 200 pounds, but not many.

The hits in the video posted by Nataraja are very tame compared to hits in the NFL. I don't care how much padding you have; when a 275 pound linebacker like Brian Urlacker hits someone at top speed, full in the numbers -- that's vicious ... and it happens many times, every game.

The Aussies and Rugby guys wouldn't last against NFL players -- with or without pads.

 

Although I don't want to get pulled into a 'who is harder' debate, as I don't think that's a measure of a sport, I think it's worth noting that in Rugby Union it's not so much about weight, but power. One of England's main forwards can bench over 500lb's and squat over 600lb's. This is extremely important in things such as mauls, rucks and scrums, where you're not hitting and throwing your own weight, but pulling, pushing and throwing others. Despite that, he weighs little over 250lb's. This is not 'extreme' for Union forwards. The backs, however, typically have little upper body strength in comparison and are quite small, but have extremely powerful legs, and nearly every one can run at incredible speed. South Africa have a chap who can run 100metes in 10 seconds, and out-race cheetahs.

I've no idea how this compares to gridiron players, doubtless they have players in their ranks who can beat that kind of thing, but I'd like to think a sport is more about talent than force. Football is a much better sport than either, IMO.

 

Just to throw out a comparison off the top of my head that I read a long while back...

Donovan McNabb plays quarterback for the Philadelphia Eagles, this is one of the positions that requires the least strength and he can even bench 450 pounds. Of course this is probably an outlier of sorts, but only for his position.

As for skills-wise I'd say American Football requires a little more, but Barmy's football requires the most...

I still like basketball for a skill game the most, I can't stand having nothing to do with my arms while playing 'footie'